Finding Out Who We Are
Luke 15:11-20 , 21, 22-24
September 26, 2002
I. I want to talk about something this week that applies to everybody, and I know that’s hard to do but this is a sure fire thing.
A. I heard someone else talking about something similar last week and I stole some of the things that they said.
B. There was a movie not too long ago called "Bourne Identity." I didn’t see the movie and I am not saying that seeing it will improve your spiritual life in any way.
C. But the movie was about a man that didn’t know who he was and the whole movie was about him trying to find his true identity. He wanted to know who he really was.
D. And the character in that movie is in a way everyone of us sitting here today. Everyone of us in some way, are trying to discover who we really are.
E. Who we really are is who God created us to be. And a couple of weeks ago when I made the statement in my sermon about Jesus seeing the woman who was caught in the act of adultery, for who he created her to be and not for what she had become, there were a lot of people who commented about that statement later.
F. Well, I think that is because every one of us knows that there is really a better version of us than what we are living.
G. Every one of us knows that there is a better us in there somewhere, than what we are letting out.
II. There are a lot of people in this world who will say to you, "that the bible is a book full of Self-righteous people, whose lives are in no way relevant to the way that we live our lives today."
A. And I can tell you for sure that if someone tells you that, you can be certain of one thing, and that one thing is, those people have never read the bible.
B. They may have read some of the bible, and they may have heard someone quote some of the passages in the Bible, but if they can make a statement that false they have never really read the bible.
C. In the book of Genesis alone you can prove that statement to be wrong because there are some very real people in that book that have some VERY real problems.
D. As a matter of act there are some really messed up people in the bible.
E. Don’t believe me? Well lets look at just a few.
1. Cain is jealous of his brother Abel and kills him.
2. Lamech introduces polygamy to the world.
3. Noah who is called the most righteous man of his time gets drunk and curses his grandson.
4. Lot when he is faced with a whole city of men who want to have sex with the males visitors in his home, decides that the thing to do is send his daughters out to them to have sex with, and then his daughters later get him drunk and get pregnant by him. And then we are told that he is the most righteous man in all of Sodom!
5. Abraham plays favorites between his sons Isaac and Ishmael and their descendants are still killing each other because of it in the Middle east today.
6. Isaac plays favorites between his sons, they hate each other for twenty years and their descendants still fight each other to this day.
7. Jacob plays favorites between his eleven sons and Joseph and his brothers want to kill him, and end up selling him into slavery in a foreign country.
F. And if you think there were no marital issues in those times:
1. Abraham has sex with his wife’s servant and sends her and her son by him off into the wilderness, both at his wife’s request.
2. Isaac and his wife get into a contest about which son is going to get the father’s blessing, and she plots with the son to deceive the father.
3. Jacob ends up with two wives and they get into a contest to see who can have the most babies, and he ends up sleeping with both of their servants at their request!
4. Jacob’s first born son sleeps with is concubine and his other son Judah has sex with his own daughter-in-law, and she dresses up like a prostitute and he hires her out, and she did that because Judah had went back on his promises to her, because his first two sons were so wicked that God killed them both.
G. Now, folks you will not find these people on Andy Griffith, They are a psychiatrist’s nightmare, and James Dobson and Dr.. Phil together would not stand a chance in a room with this bunch.
1. These are some really messed up people!
2. Jerry Springer can’t even dig up people as messed up as these people were?
3. And Soap Opera writers can’t even compete with what was happening in the real lives of these real people!
H. Lets look at this! A part of the Christian belief is that we are here to help people learn that living the way God wants us to is the best way.
I. And if the goal is to help people understand that the living the life style that Jesus taught about is the best and most joyful way then why would God want to include so many messed up people in the stories?
J. Wouldn’t it seem like a better promotion plan to find some really together people and write about them, because those stories are just out of the first book of the bible. It doesn’t end there!
K. There are sixty-five more books and there are messed up people in them too!
L. And through out the bible there is story after story about people who are trying to figure out how to deal with their messed up lives, and make some sense out of the situations that they have gotten themselves in to!
M. Now, I want to ask you a question. Why would the writers of the Bible put stories about these kinds of people in the bible?
N. I am not going to answer that question right now, but I am going to come back and answer it a little later so hold on to that one for a minute.
III. There is a story in the bible about a boy that really messed up his life. Most people call it the story of the Prodigal Son, but I like to think of it as the story of the loving father, and it is in Luke Chapter 15.
(Luke 15:11-20 NIV) Jesus continued: "There was a man who had two sons. The younger one said to his father, ’Father, give me my share of the estate.’ So he divided his property between them. "Not long after that, the younger son got together all he had, set off for a distant country and there squandered his wealth in wild living. After he had spent everything, there was a severe famine in that whole country, and he began to be in need. So he went and hired himself out to a citizen of that country, who sent him to his fields to feed pigs. He longed to fill his stomach with the pods that the pigs were eating, but no one gave him anything. "When he came to his senses, he said, ’How many of my father’s hired men have food to spare, and here I am starving to death! I will set out and go back to my father and say to him: Father, I have sinned against heaven and against you. I am no longer worthy to be called your son; make me like one of your hired men.’ So he got up and went to his father. "But while he was still a long way off, his father saw him and was filled with compassion for him; he ran to his son, threw his arms around him and kissed him.
A. I’m not sure that the kissing thing was necessary, I coach football, and I feel like a high five would have been sufficient, but this is still a cool story.
B. But there are a few things about this story that don’t jump out at us right at the beginning.
C. One of them is that there is a section of the story that we’re not told about.
D. Notice that it says that the boy went off to a distant country. He was not close to home. He had traveled a long way and it was going to be a long trip home.
E. Then it says, So he got up and went to his father. "But while he was still a long way off...
F. There is a large span of time in this story that is unaccounted for, and I believe that probably the most important thing that happened in this story happened during that time.
IV. Lets take a look at what was going on here.
A. A man has two sons and the younger one said give me my part of the family inheritance now. At this time for a son to say give me my part of the family inheritance now, was the same thing as saying from this point on you are dead to me.
B. So this boy has not done anything for family relations, and he goes out and becomes a party animal and really messes up his life.
C. He blew his part of the family fortune as the bible says on Wild Living, and then he found himself in a bind, because there was a famine in the land, and the bible says that he began to be in need.
D. That is an understatement! He was starving, the only job he could find was one feeding hogs which for a Jewish boy was about the biggest slap in the face that there was.
E. And on top of that he was not making out too good, because it says that he was still so hungry that he would have eaten the slop that he was feeding the Hogs. But they wouldn’t give him any!
F. Things were not going exactly the way he had them planned out when he left home, and then it dawned on him that his father’s hired hands did a whole lot better than what he did, and he thought "Hey, I can do better working for my father than I can here, and he came up with a good speech, and he started out toward home.
G. At this point in the story I don’t think the boy had really learned anything except that his daddy treated his employees better than the guys in the country that he was living in treated him.
H. But remember that this boy was in a DISTANT country. There was a long trip home and on that trip he was going to be going through the same towns that he had gone through when he had left.
I. And I think that the most important part of this story happened on that trip from the distant country to home.
J. Some where on that trip this boy found out who he really was. Somewhere on that long hungry walk, which was probably more like weeks than hours this boy realized that he had really been missing the boat.
K. Some where between some things dawned on him, it says So he got up and went to his father. And "But while he was still a long way off, there is a time gap there where some major realizations happened in this boys life, and he changed his attitude.
L. I believe that on the journey that he was on, he found out who he really was, and there are two reason that I believe that.
V. The first reason is found in the story in the difference in what the boy said he was going to say when he left the distant country, and what he actually said when he got home.
A. When it dawned on him that his father paid better than this bum he was working for he said.
I will set out and go back to my father and say to him: Father, I have sinned against heaven and against you. I am no longer worthy to be called your son; make me like one of your hired men.’
B. But when he got home it says, (Luke 15:21 NIV) "The son said to him, ’Father, I have sinned against heaven and against you. I am no longer worthy to be called your son.’
C. Put them both side by side and tell me what is different.
D. What’s different? He didn’t ask for a job in what he actually said when he got home, and I think that there are two reasons for that.
E. First during that trip home He realized that he had been looking at everything wrong and the focus was on him and not on his Father, and the second thing was the he found out who he was.....He found his born identity.
F. He realized for the first time what he had done to his father. Which basically was that he had hurt him, because he was looking only at how things affected him.
G. The focus of his life was him and how things related to him, and he had not once stopped to think about how all this had hurt his father. He had looked at his relationship with his father strictly from how it affected him.
H. Secondly on the trip home he realized who he was.
I. And his born identity was that he was a child of his father. Some where on that trip he realized something. He had gone away to "FIND HIMSELF" and he realized that he was his father’s child.
J. He realized for the first time that was loved way beyond what he deserved, and that his actions had hurt the one who loved him most very badly!
VI. Now let me ask you something? Who are you?
A. Have you realized yet that you are a child of God?
B. Have you realized yet that you were born as a child of the King of Heaven, and creator of the universe?
C. Have you realized that your actions, your rebellion against the things that God says are right have hurt God more than anything could have ever hurt him.
D. Have you realized that you have been looking at things in life only from the stand point of how they affect you and not in the way they affect the one person in this world that loves you more than anybody, which is God?
E. Have you realized yet that what Jesus was saying is that every one of us is the boy in this story?
F. We have all looked at life most of the time only in the way it affects us and not from the stand point of how much a lot of actions have hurt the god who loved us enough to die for us?
VII. Well lets look at one more thing that the boy is this story found out.
A. (Luke 15:22 - 24 NIV) "But the father said to his servants, ’Quick! Bring the best robe and put it on him. Put a ring on his finger and sandals on his feet. Bring the fattened calf and kill it. Let’s have a feast and celebrate. For this son of mine was dead and is alive again; he was lost and is found.’ So they began to celebrate.
B. The boy who had done so much to hurt his father, who had looked at his life only from the perspective of how it affected him and had never acknowledged how much what he did affected his Father also got to find out, that His father’s love went way beyond what he had done.
C. It didn’t matter what the boy had done, he was still his Father’s child. His Identity had not changed, and all that he had to do was admit that he had done wrong and the love of his father was there waiting to make it all right and Celebrate that his son who was dead to him was now alive and where he belonged.
D. Now I am sure that this boy didn’t live the rest of his life without making another mistake, and I am sure that he did things to hurt his father again, but he had found out who he was and he had accepted his father’s love and the relationship was healed and for as long as the they lived he knew where he stood.
E. Do you realize that God feels the same way about us. You are his child, and there is no doubt that all of us have done things that have hurt him, but his love for us goes way beyond our actions and he has done all that has to be done to mend that relationship between us on a Cross, and all he wants us to do is realize who we are.
F. We are his child, and he wants us to admit that we were wrong and come home to him.
G. He wants us to admit to ourselves that we have really made a mess of it, and be willing to admit that, and say I want to be your child again, and I know you are the only one who has the power to make that happen. and accept what he has provided for us which in eternal life.
VIII. Now I told you that I was coming back to answer the question that I asked early. Why does God let there be so many stories about messed up people in the bible?
A. Because were messed up, and he wants us to know that no matter how messed up we are, no matter what we have done, no matter how many things we have done against his will, No matter how much we have hurt him. HE LOVES US!
B. And he wants us to come back to him.
C. Everybody here has an identity. That is the way that people look at us and who they see us to be, but we also have a born identity and that is what God created us to be.
D. And our life is the process where we are to realize what our born identity is, and that is a child of God!
E. And also what we can be with God in our life.
F. And I hope that you have the courage to admit to yourself who you were meant to be and step out and come down here this morning and admit that you have done things that were wrong, and hurt God.
G. And that you would admit to God that you can’t fix that yourself, and you would ask God to fix it for you, and forgive you, so that you can by the grace of God claim your true identity!
