HOME SWEET HOME
LUKE 15:11 24
There is an old song that is still popular that says, "There's no place like home for the holidays..." With Thanksgiving and Christmas just around the corner our thoughts often turn toward home.
For me, there are so many great memories of the times my family had during the holidays as I was growing up. We were not very well off, but there was so much love and togetherness...and excitement...
And food...my mom was is a great cook, and baker...and there was always enough there to feed an army...and it seemed like there was always an army of people around. We had a big family...and we were very close.
After I left home, there was such a void when I was kept away during this time of year. I remember one year I spent the holidays in Spain, on a ship...and even though I was in my early 20's, and had been on my own for several years...I WAS HOMESICK.
I missed my family...and the smell of pie and cookies...and the dull roar of all the family that always seemed to gather at our house as we watched the parades, and the football games, and laughed as we told the same old stories about the funny things that happened over the years.
I can't imagine anything that would ever be able to dim the joy of those memories...but times do change...and people change...and for some, similar sentiments that once were strong...have faded into a fog. And home is just a distant, by gone memory.
This morning I want to look at the story of a young man who discovered the truth of the familiar quote, "There's no place like home." It's the familiar story of the prodigal son...but maybe from a different angle than you've heard it before.
READ 15:11 24
I think that for the most part, the young man in this story received a bum rap. He's pictured as a bold, insulting, depraved, heartbreaking rebel. I guess, from popular conception, that he rode a motorcycle, a black leather jacket, wore shades (inside and out), was fed up with the wimpy life of a farmer, and wanted to go "do his thing"
But the Bible doesn't say that. The Bible doesn't give a hint that he was a worry to his father, or that he gave his mother all her gray hair and wrinkles. In fact, if the guy had been as bad as all that and his dad gave him half of the family fortune...then dad was more of a fool that the son!
From the story, it appears that Dad had a great deal of confidence in his younger son. If you read on you'll remember that this boy wasn't the oldest...which means that he wasn't the heir...the inheritance would legally go to the oldest.
But immediately upon request, Dad divided up his property and gave the younger brother half. Now Dad must have felt that his son had some talent and at least a desire to make good. Up until that moment it appears that the guy was trustworthy, industrious, and at least worthy of the benefit of any doubt.
He was probably curious about the outside world...and there's nothing wrong with that. And I'll tell you something else. I don't think the guy ever lost his love or respect for his father at any time. That was always there...through loneliness, famine, husks, and all the disillusionment.
I think it's wrong to jump all over this young man and tear him apart. He made mistakes...ones that cost him dearly...mistakes that were almost fatal. He lost his way. But so have multitudes of smart people.
And it happens so easily. I know so many, and so do you, who were not bad people...but they wanted to be on their own...do their own thing, be their own boss.
Instead of taking with them all the moral truths and standards they were taught they somehow became convinced that they were the exception to the rules...they could do it and it wouldn't affect them...they could handle it.
"I just want to see what it's like...I know how far I can go...I can give it up any time I want...I won't get pregnant...I won't become addicted...Hey, it's not illegal
The boy left the safety of home and found vultures, and they can pick an innocent person clean. The world is exciting, but it is a wicked place that can quickly devour "portion of goods" that you bring from a good home.
He was a young man who got trapped...who thought the very people who were using him were saints...and the further he plunged the greater he thought he was. He probably echoed the lying words of the commercial that says, "It doesn't get any better than this."
He was a person who had never experienced deficiency at home. He never had to go without the basic necessities of life. He thought that his inheritance would last him forever.
It's amazing how much we take for granted...especially when someone else is there to take care of things for us. But we also take many other things for granted...like the fellowship of fellow Christians... ones who are there just when we need them most...
There to give an encouraging word, or to talk with...or even when they don't actually do anything per se, but we just know they're there and that they care.
The church was meant to be just that...a family...friends...help when we need it most. People who care. But we take it all for granted and we head out for greener pastures. That's what the young man did.
It was a new experience for him...a devastating experience. It cost him everything...self respect...peace of mind...faith in people...his entire fortune...everything but his life.
And it's a story that repeats itself...day after day, in every city, every nation in the world. That's why it's in the Bible. The young are always confident that they can play the game smarter than the previous generation. Others may have tried and failed...but not me!
I now know 90% less than I did 25 years ago. When I was still in my teens, I knew all the answers...even before I heard the questions. I wanted to get away from "home", get out into the world, and change it with the same plea this young man made, "Give !me„Ç a chance" But the world changed me just about as quickly.
It doesn't take long to spend...One drink calls for another...one sexual encounter calls for another...one sin leads to another, and another, and soon it is out of control.
I've looked into the eyes of many a person who told me stories of moral, mental, and physical bankruptcy...who knew after the first time it was wrong...but lies pound into the brain, and the person drifts until they are nearly "starved to death" spiritually and maybe even physically...and the homesickness becomes unbearable.
You remember the times when the family was close...you remember Sunday school, or church...singing songs that touch the heart...that sense of peace and well being..the company of brothers and sisters in the Lord.
But there's that tantalizing bait that says, "Just a little further along and it will be better...one more night...one more drink...one more encounter...and you get in deeper and deeper. You wish you were back, but you are too ashamed to turn around.
You are out to prove something...and you will. You'll prove that the "far country" isn't what it's cracked up to be. The booze ads don't advertise the sickening hangovers, or the mangled wreckage that it often causes...
The dealers won't tell you about the side effects and bad trips that can come from using drugs...and who will be there to cheer you on when you've contracted a deadly venereal disease...or face an unwanted pregnancy.
It's hard to take advice. That comes later in life. Everyone is set on finding the shortcuts...but the path is a rut, and it leads right past your supposed "promise land" and goes directly to the pigpen.
It happened to Lot. He came back with just the clothes on his back. It happened to Samson. He made it home...blind and the object of a house full of catcalls.
And there are more "famines" than those we see in this young man's experience. There's a famine of feeling. Where you get so numb emotionally that you are like the living dead. It comes from the repeated abuse of these things you desire so much.
You enjoy the freedom, and the thrill of doing those things that you know deep down are wrong. You convince yourself that you can handle it, but soon you realize that you've become a slave to your passions a slave to a lifestyle that is slowly destroying you.
But before most of you get too comfortable...there's a famine that is just as real, and just as deadly, and can just as rightly qualify you as a prodigal...and that is a famine of spirit.
You see, a prodigal isn't necessarily one who actually leaves home and goes about carousing and openly partying with no holds barred. It's someone who takes his inheritance and squanders it wastefully, without regard for the desires of the Father, or the guidelines of his upbringing.
The preacher Eli knew what it was. He told a twelve year old boy, "God used to speak to me. He doesn't any longer." You starve spiritually, and that's the worst kind of slow death.
You are responsible for that "portion of goods" that has been turned over to you. Many of you have had the prayers of a godly parent... you've had the Bible teaching you were given...and the examples of godly people in your life.
And that is what makes your problem such a tragedy...that you've taken so much and accomplished so little. But I believe there are some who have come to the place where you are able to recognize it.
There is that moment when you realize you don't really have a thing left. You haven't got one real friend...you can barely draw a sober breath...you can't think a single clean thought...you'll never have another peaceful nights sleep.
You no longer feel brave...you don't feel very intelligent...and you have to face the fact head on I've squandered everything.
I'll always believe that the lowest moment in the prodigal's life came when he was sent to feed the pigs. It wasn't just that it was a nasty job. He was an Israeli...and being there with the pigs was to blaspheme his God.
It's bad enough for hell to ruin you, but then it will sit back and laugh...and watch as you join yourself to things that you know are wrong. You'll sell your soul for a bite to eat. (v. 16)
You'll make deals with the very people you despise. Sin will develop in you an appetite that grows bigger than your sense of decency. It made a cheap informer out of Judas, and a couple of despicable liars out of Ananias and Sapphira...and it can do as bad or worse to you if you allow it.
They were prodigals who never physically left the church...who still played the game and made their appearances...but inside they were off in a distant land, squandering everything God had given.
The prodigal thought it was bad at home...but now look at what he's become. Not a shred of dignity left...a Jew slopping the pigs.
So many times we have to reach that point.
But the guy never forgot his father and his home. Not the famine, or the hogs, or all the disgrace could erase them from his mind. And always there was this homesickness...and thoughts of a better life.
Thank God for the wonderful moment when you get your eyes opened... when you realize how false your whole journey has been. Hell doesn't like it...but hell can't stop the message, "In my fathers house there is bread enough to spare"
In v. 17 he says he was nearly starving to death. This "good life" was no longer a temptation. It was nothing but misery and heartache. And he said, "I'll go back to my father."
All the distance between him and his father...all the differences, everything that caused him to leave just melted away. It was time to go back home. It's only a step from where you are to the grace of the Father.
Your homesickness is your passport. It gives you the right to turn around. And it doesn't take long to settle accounts. You can get right with God in just a few minutes.
Look at v. 18...He said, "I will say...Father, I have sinned." And that's what it takes. You can't make yourself fit...but He can. He furnishes it all...the robe...the ring...the shoes...the supper.
Some of you may be homesick...and why not? Nothing makes a person more homesick than to realize that morally spiritually, you're a ruined, dissipated, broke disaster.
But before you give up...give in.
