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LaRue Baptist Church Annual Bible Conference 2024 Lost and Found (Luke 15) You're That Guy (Luke 15.11-19) Peter LaRuffa
Not there. I mean, inheritances were in different sizes and contained different items and landmasses and actual money. They would vary from person to person, but the one thing that they all had in common was that they are dispersed when the person is dead.
Only after the father's death could the beneficiary, the son, do whatever he wished with his inheritance. That was a given. That was assumed. Inheritances might vary from person to person, but the one thing they all have in common is you get it when the person dies.
And so not only did Jesus' audience never, ever, hear of such a thing, this would have been tantamount to the son saying to the father, I wish you were dead. I mean, can we make like you're dead so I can get what I have coming to me?
In essence, you, your presence in my life, your love, your leadership, your provision, your authority, your care, all of that, I have no use for. I have no value for it. You might as well be dead. In fact, it would be a little better if you were dead because then I could get mine.
Can we just make like you're dead so I can get what I have coming to me? So this was not just a son saying, hey, can I just get that a little early? Hey, could you help me out with a little bit of cash?
Hey, here's what I'd like to do. I'd like to go out on my own and I was wondering if you're gonna give me this later, could you give it to me now? This was highly insulting. This was highly disrespectful.
And the people hearing this would have understood not only was this disrespectful, but this was the son essentially riding himself out of the life of his family. You are worth more to me dead than you are alive.
And so I'm not gonna kill you. That would be, that would take, that's a whole thing. So can you just give me the money as if you were dead? And so the father would have felt way more than just, wow, the boy's moving on sooner than I thought.
Wow, he's, time flies. I wish he'd stay around a little more. This makes me a little sad. The father would have felt two things. Again, one, I'm as good as dead to my son. In fact, I'm better dead to my son than I'm alive.
And the second thing that we would have thought was, and I'm never gonna see him again. I'm never gonna see my son again. The son wants what is his and wants to leave and intended to see his dad with about the same frequency as he would if his dad were dead.
And so right there from verse 11, right there in just verses 11 and 12, emotions are already conjured up within the people who are reading this. This isn't like, okay, so then what happened? Right there, there's people who are perplexed.
There's people who are shocked. There's people who don't know where, they already don't know where this story is going because it's, it started out in a way that you never would have imagined possible.
Verse 12, at the end of verse 12, it says, and he divided his property between them, which he couldn't really do, right? He couldn't really divide up his property between them because he's still using his property.
But he he did his best. And verse 13, so he's probably, you know, like, sure. Okay, wasn't ready for this. I guess you would get a little bit of this. I guess you would get this. The money, I could, I guess you would get this.
What's the value of the land that I would have given you? I don't know how I can give you that. So this is like a hurried thing, right? This is not, this is not how it was supposed to be. This is not what his father pictured doing as he was like, I'm gonna leave an inheritance to my kids.
He did not intend to do it this quickly, but he divided up what he could, gave him what he could, and verse 13 says, not many days later, the younger son gathered all he had and took a journey into a far country.
You see that? A journey into a far country in verse 13. That country is also mentioned in verse 14. That country is also mentioned in verse 15. And that he squandered his property in reckless living. Not only did he take from his father, he didn't have it long.
He would have had to have sold whatever he had at, like, garage sale prices on the futures market in order to get the cash he needed to live reckless living. Reckless living. It means a lot of things, but I think it at least means one thing that we can get from the text.
Unfettered, unrestricted sexual sin. Unfettered, unrestricted sexual sin. If you skip down to verse 30, which we'll look at more tomorrow, Lord willing, but verse 30, one of the things that the older son said was, when this son of yours came who has devoured your property with prostitutes.
So that's one of the things that he knew that he did. Like, he just basically just squandered all the things that you gave him, and he did it for sex. They did it for sexual sin with prostitutes in this far country.
Unfettered, unrestricted sexual sin. And so here he is in this far country, far away from everything that he knew, far away from everything that he loved, living completely like the devil, completely differently than he was raised to live.
And then, wouldn't you know, look at verse 14. Verse 14 says, and when he had spent everything, a severe famine arose in that country, and he began to be in need. Let's talk about famines for a minute.
We don't know much about that, but famines were unbelievably scary. Unbelievably scary. Jesus said in verse 14 that this wasn't just a famine, but what, a severe famine. There's a qualifier there that Jesus describes it as a famine, but this one was like above average.
This was severe. Things changed rather quickly. People hoarded their stuff. They rationed it for themselves. They couldn't give it away. They wouldn't give any away at all, ever. It's the worst time in the world to be in need.
And so this is, quite frankly, the worst thing that could happen to the younger brother at this juncture in his earthly life. I mean, surely the famine wasn't the younger brother's fault, right? But given the way the story is being told, and given the way that we know the Pharisees think, when they, like, they think good things happen to good people and bad things happen to bad people, like when they ask, you know, who sinned, this boy or his parents, that he would be born with a disability, they automatically assume, yeah, but good things happen to good people and bad things happen to bad people.
And so they would have understood this to be, this is the judgment of God. This is the judgment of God coming down on this land, likely for the people's sins, but surely for this guy's sin. Surely for this guy's sin.
This was the judgment of God for this seemingly irredeemable, unrescuable, irreverent, irresponsible young man. Verse 15 says, so he went and hired himself out to one of the citizens of that country, who sent him into his fields to feed pigs.
Many, if not most of you, are employed, but I'm guessing that little to none of you hired yourself. I mean, you might be self-employed, you might have your own business, but if you're working for somebody else, you typically don't hire yourself.
You're typically hired by somebody, you don't do that, that's like their job, right? They hire you, you don't hire yourself. It's a weird phrasing, but it conveys the idea that the relationship between the younger brother and whoever owned the pig farm was a one-way relationship that the citizen did not initiate himself, that he didn't have a help-wanted sign hanging and he thought, oh, yay, I can do that, I can feed these pigs, but that the, especially during a time of famine, right?
Because they're gonna cut overhead and they're not gonna want to hire somebody else, and so when it says hired himself in the Greek, the phrase literally means he joined himself. He joined himself. It actually means he united himself with the guy.
It's an awkward phrasing. The word can also be understood as he glued himself to this guy. It would convey the idea of as if he was hanging on him, like I'll feed the pigs, what do you need me to do? I can feed the pigs.
See how the pigs are eating on their own? How about I feed them? I got it, you gotta help me, you gotta hire me, I can do that thing with their, please let me do this, let me just, let me just do this.
Hanging on him, begging him for food, being willing to do anything for food because he's starving. Verse 16 says no one gave him anything, so this wasn't a real job. This wasn't a real job because he did this, but he still wasn't given payment, and so it's likely that this guy's had, like, hey, hi, I need a, I was wondering if I could work on your, I was wondering if I could work on your farm, maybe you could hire me, and maybe if I keep nodding, you'll nod with me, and maybe I can, I can feed the pigs and just do the thing that you don't really need me to do, but maybe you can pay me to do, and the guy's like, yeah, yeah, that would be brilliant, just like, yeah, you should do that thing, primarily because it's, it would mean you're not hanging on me, so if you could just go, that would be, yeah, oh yeah, that would be great, go, yeah, go feed the pigs, just to get him off of him, just to get him to get away from him, just to get him to stop begging, but then verse 16 tells us clearly he wasn't ever given anything.
Also in verse 16, it says he was longing to be fed with the pods that the pigs ate. This would have meant that he was likely losing his mind, because things that were completely unappetizing to him were now appetizing to him.
Hmm, I should eat that. Hmm, I bet that would be good. He was likely losing his mind. The effect that severe, unbelievable hunger has on the brain is severe. It will, it will mess with you. If you're ever in a, in a city, particularly, or you're ever around a homeless population, there's a wide variety of reasons why homeless people can sometimes act the way that they do, no question, but hunger is usually one of them.
Lack of sleep and hunger is usually key driving forces as to the impact that it had on somebody's mind, and how they talk, and how they relate. It will impact your mind. I was talking to a brother yesterday who has a pig farm, so I'm a little intimidated to talk about this, because I'm rarely talking to people who are like, I know pigs better than you did, but here's what I, here's what I think I know.
Pigs eat slop. Just slop. Leftover food that would have been literally, like, the most unattractive, you would never be attracted to what a pig would have eaten. They'd be fed rinds, and eggshells, and husks, and corn cobs, and corn by itself, I would argue, is hardly digestible.
Evidenced by the fact that when you eat corn, right? Okay? You're like, did I even chew it? Like, it's, it's, it's, corn by itself is even hardly digestible, let alone the corn cobs. I think I just added one moment to your life where you will think about Jesus, that you typically don't think about Jesus.
You're welcome. Desperation and hunger is having an impact on his mind, if you're considering eating something that you would have never considered eating in your right mind. In the Greek, there's a word there for pods.
That word is a Greek word which would have referred to what's called carob pods. Carob pods were long, string bean-shaped seed pods with, like, hard beans inside this tough, leathery shell. You can grind it into a powder and use it as a substitute for chocolate.
It's not unusable. You can extract kind of a kind of molasses from it, but that, that's about it. By itself, it's inedible. By itself, it's indigestible for humans. You can fill yourself with them, and you can feel full, but you would have gained nothing from them, and so while you might feel full, you're still starving.
This young man was going to die. Do you understand that? He was on death's door. There was nothing that he could have done to save himself. This was the end of the road for him. It's not just like he was living with the pigs, and the pigs were stinky.
Aren't pigs stinky? Everybody say, ew. Imagine that. Wow, he really needs to go home so he can take a bath. That's not what's happening here. He was on death's door. Anybody hearing this, I'm convinced anybody hearing Jesus talk about this would understand just how far off this young man had gotten, that he was about to die.
This was the end. The Pharisees would have, would have known that, and as they heard Jesus tell the story, they probably would have been like, good riddance. Good riddance. After all he did, after all the shame he brought his father, and the shamefully reckless way he spent the inheritance on his own hormones, and the famine that was likely brought on by his own sinful ways, get him out of here.
This checks out and makes sense, and so he's gonna die, right? Now, there are tons of application points to be drawn from Luke 15. Tons of application points to be drawn from this particular portion of Scripture.
We need to love like Jesus loved, no question. We need to love who Jesus loves, no question. When things are lost, but then are found, it's worth celebrating. That's what God does when somebody comes to him.
That's what we should do, and now we're in a parable that talks not about things, but about people. We're not talking about lost sheep. We're not talking about lost coins. We're talking about a human being made in the image of God.
When people are lost, but then found, we should celebrate as they do in heaven, no question, but listen to me. You can look at the prodigal son and say, because you know how the story ends, and say, man, I've got to be more like that dad.
I've got to be more like the father. How forgiving, how kind, and we'll talk about that as well. That is true. We could all stand to be like the father, but here's my point. You'll never be more like the father if you don't first see yourself as the younger son.
The title of the message is you're that guy. You will never be like the father unless you see yourself as the prodigal himself, being symbolic of you, and so point number one is you're missing the point if you don't see the prodigal son as symbolic of you.
You will miss the greatest point of this parable if you don't see the younger son as representative of or emblematic of or symbolic of you. Now we started out in verse 12 and it says the youngest of them said to his father, father give me the share of property that is coming to me.
Now when you read this parable, and you think of that prodigal son or daughter who is out there living like the devil, or you think of a friend who if they were any further from God they'd be the devil, or you think of a coworker or a group of people or a neighbor or whatever, and you think this is a great reminder that God can even save them.
That is true. That is true, but you're missing the point if you don't see the prodigal son as symbolic of you, and understand that this is a phenomenal opportunity from God's Word to be reminded of how far off I was and would have been had Jesus not rescued me.
You're that guy. I'm that guy. The prodigal is symbolic of every sinner who has ever lived past, present, and future. You say, I don't know pastor, like I don't think I've literally, I've literally never done anything remotely close to what this guy has done.
How would this represent me? Well, consider the fact that God doesn't distinguish sins, distinguish between sins like we do. Consider the fact that God, that all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God.
Consider what your Bible says, and it's in your outline. 1st John 5 and verse 17, all wrongdoing is sin. 1st John 3 and verse 4 says, everyone who makes a practice of sinning also practices lawlessness.
Sin is lawlessness. Romans 3, Paul tells us in verse 22, for there is no distinction. For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. James 2 and verse 10 says, for whoever keeps the whole law but fails in one point has become guilty of all of it.
And so your outward history, your life story may not look like this guy's. I would venture to say likely didn't look like this guy's. It's a very, very different context. It's a very odd situation. He's doing things that were not, you can't say like, yeah, I've done that too.
I've done exactly what he did. But what I'm trying to tell you is it doesn't matter because you're just like him. I'm just like him. And God doesn't distinguish between sins like we do. And the bottom line is that before you were saved, whether you were walking or running, you were headed to a far country.
Do you know that? Before God came into your life, before his sovereign grace impacted you and arrested your heart, you were in your own way, on your own, headed to a far country. And that's what we read in Luke 15 and verse 13, that not many days later the Son gathered all that he had and took a journey into a far country.
But in Isaiah 53 and verse 6, we read that all we like sheep have what? Gone astray. We have turned everyone to his own way. First Peter 2 and verse 25 says, for you were straying like sheep. You see, friends, regardless of the circumstances in your life when you were saved, if you don't see yourself as having been a long way off, friends, here's what's going to happen.
You're going to lack the humble gratitude for having been saved because you'll tell yourself that you kind of had it coming. I mean, you kind of had it coming. Or you think it actually would have been stranger to not be a Christian than to be one given your fill-in-the-blank, your heritage, your morality, your upbringing, your good name, your politics, your phenomenal grades, your hair, your looks, your accomplishments, whatever.
But if you don't have the humble gratitude to realize, wow, when God saved me, his son died just as much for me as it did for this prodigal, regardless of whether I ever actually physically, literally did the things that he did.
I think this particularly for my own kids. One of the things that I just can't stand hearing, I get it, but I'd have to like kind of calm myself, I have to dial it back before I respond, is when somebody says, yeah, my testimony, I don't really have an exciting testimony.
That's usually coming from somebody who was raised in a Christian home. Usually they're saying like, yeah, this was kind of like on-brand because I'm a pastor, I'm a gruffa, I'm a whatever, because my family is Christian or my family's full of Christians, so I don't really have an exciting testimony.
I'm like, you don't have it, really? You don't have an exciting testimony? You weren't literally hellbound and hell-deserving but for the grace of God. I would argue that because my son, for example, came to faith in Christ, it might even be a greater example of the song of grace of God at work in his life.
Because when you find somebody who has a tremendously dramatic testimony, who is driving a big rig down the highway at 80 miles an hour while he was drunk and high and all of a sudden he miraculously spared his life until he got down right there in the middle of the interstate and cried out, God have mercy on me, a sinner.
That's a phenomenal story. That's a phenomenal story. But he has a lot in his life that is showing him he's jacked up. Does that make sense? It's a phenomenal story and we're really glad that God saved him, but for God to come into the life of somebody who's like, I'm a pretty good kid, right?
I'm a pretty moral young lady. I have all these things I've known since my youth, right? I've never not really known a day without the Word of God. For God to impact that individual, for that individual to say, I need Jesus.
Not like, I'm kind of okay, I've got tympasma as a dad. I've got, I'm a baby. I'm a LaRuffa. I'm okay. For that person to be like, whoa, I need to be saved. That is miraculous. That would never happen apart from the sovereign grace and mercy of God.
Every one of us have gone astray to our own way and for every one of us who would believe the Lord laid upon Christ our iniquity and we headed to a far country and God brought us home. You're that guy and you'll miss the greatest point of the greatest parable, the greatest story ever told if you don't see the prodigal son as symbolic of you.
What about you? How do you feel about the fact that God doesn't distinguish between sins like we tend to do? How does that cause you to think about your own life story, your own before and after testimony of how the Lord worked in your life?
Or if you're here and you're not a believer, what about you? To hear that all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God, that the ground is very level at the foot of the cross, that breaking one sin makes us as guilty as, or the committing one sin or breaking one point of the law makes us as guilty as if we've broken all of it.
Friends, you're missing the point if you don't see the prodigal son as symbolic of you, as symbolic of me. Closely related to that, point number two, you're missing the point if you don't know that you were headed for certain inescapable death apart from Christ.
Certain inescapable death apart from Christ. Not only were each and every one of us a long way off in our own version of a far country, but we were headed for certain death without Christ. If we don't know that or we deny that, we're deluded.
Verse 16 says he was longing to be fed with the pods that the pigs ate and no one gave him anything, just as the younger brother was when he was sitting in a pig pen thinking, I could eat that and feel better, when it would have only made matters worse.
I'm good, I could eat that and feel better. I'm really hungry, I'm really starving, but I bet that which is absolute slop would be better and I'd be better off with that inside of me than I am without it.
Friends, that's why I'm convinced one of the saddest things in the world is a happy non-christian, a happy, contented, satisfied, unbeliever, just enjoying life, fruitful in what she or he does, maybe even moral and upright, fun to be around, generous and kind, doing their best.
They even look like they're doing their best, but they don't have Christ. And so while they look full and they're not emaciated, they're eating pig slop and carob pods and corn husks and all the things that won't leave you hungry, but will leave you dead.
Why? Because at the end of the day, Romans 6 23 remains to be true, that the wages of sin is death. And the truth of the matter is that we owe God death and God will collect. No one will escape the collection call of God.
And so the wages of sin is death and every single person on the planet who has ever lived or ever will live will pay. They'll pay in one of two ways. They'll pay with their own eternal death in hell, or they'll pay because Jesus paid for their death on the cross.
And contrary to the hymn, nothing do they owe because Jesus paid it all. Sorry if I just ruined the hymn. We kind of don't. Nothing do. Sin had left a crimson stain, for the wages of sin is death. God will collect.
James 1 and verses 14 and following says, but each person is tempted when he is lured and enticed by his own desire. Then desire, when it is conceived, gives birth to sin. And sin, when it is fully grown, what brings forth?
Death. Paul in Ephesians chapter 2 says, and you were dead in the trespasses and sins in which you once walked. Not you were sick, not you were kind of in a bad way. D-E-A-D. Dead. And that's the each and every one of us who was ever alive.
We were dead in our trespasses and sins in which we once walked following the course of this world, following the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience.
Verse 3, among whom we all once lived. Not like among whom we once lived, especially the following people. I'm going to point. No, among whom we all once lived in the passions of our flesh, carrying out the desires of the body and the mind, and were by nature children of wrath like the rest of mankind.
You're missing the point if you don't know that you were headed for certain inescapable death apart from Jesus Christ. And closely related to that, point number three, you're missing the point if you don't know it was solely by God's grace that you came to Christ.
You are that guy. I am that guy. Every single one of us is like the younger son somewhere along his journey. And so if you're not a believer, you are like the younger son in that you are in a far-off country.
Even if you're living a very moral and upright life, spiritually speaking, you are spiritually dead. You're not spiritually sick. You're certainly not spiritually well. Nobody really tells you. You're spiritually unheard.
Most people, like, they're common sense. They're like, no, I'm not that. But I'm okay. I'm sick. But I can make it better. The Bible says apart from Christ, you're spiritually D-E-A-D dead. And so each and every one of you, if you're not a Christian, you are like the prodigal, that you're in that far-off country.
You are far away. You are living for yourself. You are pursuing the things of your flesh. You are not living cognizant of the fact that there is a heaven to gain and a hell to shun, and that God saves sinners through his son Jesus Christ.
You're missing the point if you don't know that you're that God. You are missing the point if you don't know that you were and are headed for certain death apart from Christ. And you're missing the point that if you are a believer, it was solely by God's grace that you came.
And verse 17 says, he said, how many of my father's hired servants have more than enough bread, but I perish here with hunger. I will arise and go to my... Ephesians 2, in your outline, beginning in verse 4, says, but God, being rich in mercy because of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ.
By grace, you have been saved. Titus 3 verses 5 and following says, he saved us not because of works done by us in righteousness, but according to his own mercy, by the washing of regeneration and renewal of the Holy Spirit, whom he poured out on us richly through Jesus Christ, our Savior.
The Gospel of John chapter 1 said, but to all who did receive him who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God, who were born not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God.
Friends, if you are a believer, please understand that you were dead and now you've been made alive. Made alive. You did not raise yourself from the grave. You were spiritually dead and now God has made you spiritually alive.
Wow! And once you come to the realization that it took just as much of Jesus' blood to save you and to save me as it did everyone else, and that you were just as headed for death and destruction as everyone else, and you were just as lost as anyone else, once you see yourself on level ground with every other sinner, because God doesn't distinguish between sins, you can't help but wonder, God, why me?
Why choose me? Why save me? Why are my eyes open? Why give me the gift of faith? Why love me? Why save me? Why have my eyes been open when so many others remain shut? But why has my heart been given life when so many others perish in their sin?
That's where I'm hoping this portion of our time together will leave us today. That every single person in this room should be shocked to be here. You should be shocked that you're here. You should be shocked that God and his providence cause you to live where you live and worship where you worship.
You should say, even if you can explain it, like, well, I've always lived here. I've always come here. I grew up here. Friends, you should be shocked that you're here, and you should be grateful to be alive, and grateful to have been the recipients, not just of happenstance that, well, I happen to live in this part of Ohio, and I happen to go to this church, or I happen to be in this family, or I just happen to be grown up in a home that was filled with Jesus-loving, Bible-believing Christians.
You should, every single one of us, if we really knew our hearts, we'd be shocked. Shocked that we've received such goodness, and grace, and mercy from God. But we'll only ever be shocked if we can appreciate the distance from which we have come, because every single one of us is that guy.
Father in heaven, as we reflect upon the truth of your word, as we consider the state of our own souls apart from your sovereign grace at work within us, as we look to this parable, which is familiar, so familiar to many of us, if not most of us, Lord, would you convict us?
Would you change our hearts and our minds for the amounts of times that we read this parable, and even rightly think of someone else, rightly think of, wow, God can even save them. And that is true. We ought to be as shocked and amazed by grace at work in other people's lives.
But Lord, would you forgive us if we are not shocked at that grace at work in our own lives? Lord, would you cause us to see ourselves as the ones who are far off, ourselves as the ones who are destined for destruction, ourselves who would be the ones eating things and living in ways that would only lead to our certain death and destruction and eternity in hell.
But that you have saved us, that you have brought us home, that you have brought us out of a far country into the family of God. Lord, grant to us for your glory, a grateful awe. Lord, would each and every one of us just be a little shocked to be here, to be under the preaching of your word and to realize we did not have this coming to us, but you, oh God, have granted it to us by your grace and for your glory and for our good.
Thank you. We love you. In Jesus name we pray. Amen.
All God's people said, amen. That was great. Thank you, brother. That was wonderful. We're going to spend a few minutes on a break, sufficient amount of time. I think 10 minutes, 15 maybe. I'm not sure, but we'll figure it out.
If everyone wants to stand up, we'll pray. And then you're welcome to get refreshments in the back and make your way back up front in a few minutes. Oh God in heaven, truly each one of us at one point, at one time, we were dead in our sins.
And like this man we just read about, we were thinking that the pods the pigs would eat off of would suffice. But we know, Lord, that that was just our passions. That was our wayward desires, thinking that fulfillment is found in them.
God in heaven, what God you must be to have such grace in our lives, to cause us to awaken to our terrible condition and to know that there is a father that we can return to through the Lord and find grace and mercy.
God in heaven, what grace this is. And as was just spoken, let us be shocked that we would have affections and desires in our hearts, no longer for the pods, but rather for the mercies and richness of Jesus Christ, our risen Lord, that we can hear and receive and grab hold of through your word proclaimed.
We thank you for our brother Peter and the way he has delivered it to us, Lord, so we can behold your glory in it. Lord in heaven, I pray for those who have not realized this mercy and beauty in Christ in a while.
I pray that you would even change their heart now to cause them to go from complaining and murmuring to worship. Even my own heart, Lord, I pray that you would awaken up my soul even more to the glory's richness that's found in Jesus, our great Lord.
So I pray that you'd bless his word to us, bless his rest of the day to us, Lord. And again, I pray that our eyes would be more fixated on Jesus through these words being proclaimed in Jesus' name, amen.
