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We're going to get into our memory verse here in a second. Ephesians, chapter two. But I just decided I wanted to share something with you. I started sharing this with my elders a couple of years ago. The story, I think it was a year and a half ago at an elder retreat because I was over in the Philippines and we have a Bible college and everything over there and, and they're graduating and I had, I think there's 35 people graduating there in Manila. And I'm talking to all of the graduates and being able to challenge and to charge them. Now you saw in the pictures from our friend Ken, graduations are a big deal there and I have to wear all kinds of crazy stuff. It's nuts. And you know, I'm wearing long sleeve everything and it's hot and literally it's 143 degrees outside is what it feels like. I mean, this is. And I'm just dripping and God just hit me with something. I'm going to hit you real quick before I even dive into our message tonight. Anybody remember Jason in the Bible? I don't hear, I don't see a lot of heads shaking. Yes, Jason, you don't count. You are named after him. It's called cheating acts 16, 17, right? Am I right? I'm like, this is just like in me, I'm sitting over here going, ah, here's what I love about it is you got these guys and people are all upset with Paul and everybody else and they're trying to find him and they're looking for him and they're going, where are all these guys? And Jason and a bunch of other guys are there and they're sharing about Jesus and they're representing Jesus Christ. And here's the response of the people looking for him. Where are those guys turning the world upside down? Do you remember this at all? Where are those guys who are turning the world upside down? We need more of those guys. We're not talking about anybody in scripture tonight. Who we go, man, they just played it safe. We're not talking about anyone in scripture tonight. In the word of God. They go, man, you know, they were so calculated and they did everything the way the world told them to do it. We're talking about people who turned the world upside down. Not by running from it, by jumping into it. I say, man, we need more people adopting a mentality of turning the world upside down. Amen. And it might be you, it just might be you. So be careful. Anybody remember the old song I Surrender All? Anybody? How's that chorus Go. Go ahead. Anybody. Surrender all. There you go. No, no. That's good. That's good. I love you. You're not that good. No, I'm just. This is going to keep going. Hey, it was good to be with you guys tonight. If only we meant. Just might turn the world upside down. Something to think about. Ephesians, chapter two. We get to dive into that 8 through 10. We already know it, so we got it up there. Yes. You ready? I feel like we should stand for it. Let's stand for it. All right. Everybody ready? With all the motions that we don't have. We're so lesser than our children. It's okay. Here we go. For by grace, you have been saved through faith, and this is not your own doing. It is the gift of God, not a result of grace. Amen. You may be seated. And by the way, which God prepared in advance for you is the right translation, because that's the way I memorized it. 1903 is what it feels like. So let me tell you what's going on tonight and tomorrow morning and tomorrow night. Ready? Luke chapter 15. One parable. It's when you're all going to go, man, I already know that one. But I hope, I pray you'll have some new insights. Luke chapter 15 is the parable of. Of the lost. There's three parables all about lost things. So Luke 15 is an incredibly important text when you start looking at it. So if you would try to go ahead and turn there now, Luke chapter 15. And then you can just camp out there for the next day. As we were able to look at three lost things, really focusing, really just. We're going to look at the prodigal son. Part of the reason I think it's so important is you got to look at the contextualization, of course, of everything. You're going to hear some of that tonight. But In Luke chapter 14, you had the cost of discipleship. Like, it's literally. And by the way, if you ever want to read a beautiful, beautiful book, go read the Cost of Discipleship by Dietrich Bonhoeffer. Absolutely awesome. It's not quite. Hey, I need to read it kind of like mere Christianity four or five times to kind of understand it. At least that was me. Not real bright, maybe, but I would tell you it's a two reader. It's a two reader. Calls of Discipleship by Dietrich Bonhoeffer. If you don't know his story, you need to know his story. And it's through the midst of World War II and everything else. But in Luke 14, it's talking about the cost of discipleship and what that really means, the significance of it. And really, I think he's telling these parables to help them to understand what it is to be a disciple. So Jesus, how long was his Messianic ministry? Remember, it started with his baptism, and it took off with the summer on the Mount. Right. I talked about some of this. Day one, Matthew three, baptism, tempting of Satan, the temptation there in Matthew four, and then Matthew five, six and seven. You know, you have the Sermon on the Mount, and he just jumps in really fast. Right? That's the beginning of his Messianic ministry. How long was his Messianic ministry? It's three years. I won't ever ask you a trick question. That would just be embarrassing. That's not good for anybody. So, yeah, it's just three years. And what an impact he made in three years. And now he's walking, literally. He is making now his journey. He's beginning in this moment, his journey toward Jerusalem for the very last time. He knows that the end is coming. And so now he's going to be speaking about, yes, Luke 14, the calls of discipleship. But now he's going to be telling some parables in Luke chapter 15 that really help us to understand what it is to be a disciple. He's on the road to Jerusalem. It's the last months of his life. He's been ministering for three years. And now he is going to step in and he's gonna recognize. He's gonna recognize he's developed a lot of enemies. Process that for a moment. Primarily the Pharisees, the scribes, others, these are people who really had control over the majority of things. But they don't like Jesus very much. They're legalistic. I would say that they were also inwardly corrupt in many regards. There's a hostility that's been building up toward Jesus over these three years, primarily because Jesus, man, he confronted their hypocrisy. That's the primary reason why I recently, I'm preaching, I think I said, through the armor of God right now, where I'm able to minister every week. And one of the things that I've recognized is conviction. Friends, let me tell you now, conviction is a blessing. Adopt it. Put it above your door frame. Conviction is a blessing. Why conviction? Who is it from? Who's it from? Holy Spirit. What's he doing? He's saying, hey, you're not going down a path that you should be going. He brings conviction of the heart that's an indwelling of the Holy Spirit, right? Jesus said, I'm going to leave a gift with you. Now, the Holy Spirit's always been just as Jesus has always been. It's the Trinity, right? But we know that at Pentecost he gave it to the believers of the New Testament Church. And here comes the wave. And it's just amazing to think about. But the Holy Spirit convicts to align your priorities. He's going, hey, you're getting it wrong. People with pride and arrogance reject that. They justify it, right? Does this remind you of anybody with wise and foolish builders who tried to justify who they were? Put put their shoulders back and look at me. I'm awesome. I lift heavy stuff or whatever it is. So we start processing that and we go. We are reminded that conviction is a blessing because conviction comes from the Holy Spirit. Condemnation comes from Satan. There's a difference. We confuse condemnation, being condemned and conviction. One is a gift because it's aligning your heart with Christ. One suppresses you and pushes you down and tells you that you have no value. Those are two different things. Jesus was doing that to the people that he encountered. And so as a result of that, they didn't like him. It created a lot of hostility. We already know that. He looked at the Pharisees and he even labeled them as self righteous. He said, man, you don't really get and understand Scripture and it's not what they wanted to hear. And so then you jump Into Luke chapter 15 and this is what we find right away. And again, there's three parables. We're not gonna hit them all. You have lost sheep, lost coin, lost son. That's your order. Lost sheep, lost son or lost sheep, lost coin, lost son, which begins in verse 12. So you have the parable of the lost. That's the entire chapter. And he's going to be helping us. Everybody do me a favor. Everybody take your left hand. I'm seeing if everybody's actually using their left hand. Okay, Just because I was gonna make fun of somebody, put it right here in front of your face. That's a mirror. I love this parable because everybody will be forced to look in the mirror and go, where do you resonate? You will find yourself in this parable. You will. I promise you, you are going to find yourself somewhere in the working in the midst of this parable that we're gon looking at tonight with the parable of the lost son. So you've got here again, lost sheep, lost coin, and then the lost son. Look at Very quickly, though, verse one. I know it begins in verse 12. Later on with what we're going to be diving into, but we're going to look at the law. We're going to look at the very first verse. It says, now the task collectors and the sinners were all drawing near to hear him. Why? Tax collectors in the sinners are all drawing near. They're wanting to do what? Well, they're wanting to see what he's going to say. It says, and then the Pharisees and the scribes grumbled, saying, this man receives sinners and eats with them. The sinners and the tax collectors are going, man, this guy's got something. He's saying, I want to hear it. The Pharisees and the religious leaders are going, who is this guy? He's screwing everything up. And they want to trap him, right? There you go. And that kind of lays some additional groundwork for lost sheep, lost coin, lost son. They're going to come. Partly because he had said previously, end of chapter 14, he had once, once again said, he who has ears to hear, let him hear. And the sinners and the tax collectors were willing to hear, to listen. And so now we're going to be able to dive into this. As we dive into it, I'm going to go verse 7, verse 10. And then down to the story. Here's why. Here's verse seven. If you look at it, this is lost. We're going to be looking at lost sheep. And he says, just so I tell you, there will be more joy in heaven over one center who repents than over 99 righteous people with no repentance. What's the key word there? Repentance. You want a theme? Look at this. Now jump down to verse 12. And this is remarkable. I mean, it truly shows you what God is trying to do. Verse 7. And then I said, 12, verse 10. Just so I tell you, there is joy before the angels of God over one sinner who repents. So lost sheep about repentance. Lost coin is about repentance and the importance of it. I think the next parable is going to really define repentance, what it means to repent. We talk about it all the time. I grew up learning the ABCs. Except, do you know the ABC of salvation? Believe. Let's see. Confess. Similar to repent. I was kind of modeled that. The prodigal son models repentance in so many ways. It's beautiful to think about. So here we are. We're going to end up being introduced to two different sons and Then there's the elderly father as well. We're going to hit tonight. We're going to break it down. We're going to really get specific and personal about some things in the next three messages. Tonight, we're going to be talking about the younger son. That's the guy who took his inheritance, ran away. We're also going to be speaking about the father tomorrow morning. Tomorrow night we're talking about the older son, which the bulk of us actually probably should be relating to more than anyone. All right, Luke chapter 15. Let me begin with verse 12. And he said there was a man who had two sons. And the younger of them said to his father, father, give me the share of property that is coming to me. And he divided his property between them. Not many days later, the younger son gathered all he had and took a journey into a far country. And there he squandered his property in reckless living. And when he had spent everything, a severe famine arose in that country, and he began to be in need. And so he went and hired himself out to one of the citizens of that country, who sent him into the fields to feed pigs. And he was longing to be fed with the pods that the pigs ate, and no one gave him anything. But when he came to himself, 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 I will go to my father, and I will say to him, father, I have sinned against heaven and before you I am no longer worthy to be called your son. Treat me as one of your hired servants. And he arose and came to his father. And that's where I'm going to stop. So let's dive into this together again. Luke 15:11 and 12 it starts right away. There's a man, two sons. The younger one said to his father, father, give me a share of my estate. So he divided his property between them. Let's talk about disrespect. Let's talk about a shameless request. It showed incredible disrespect toward the father. There was no gratitude in his heart for the legacy of the generations of work that his family had provided for him, or anything else in that culture. For especially it wasn't even the older son. The younger son really had no voice at all. And so for the younger son of all of them to come, it is so disrespectful to come to the father and say, give me my share of the inheritance. But he did it anyway. I mean, it is incredibly disrespectful it's the same thing as saying culturally, contextually speaking, father, I wish you were no longer living. I want absolutely nothing to do with you. So as a father or a mother, I want you to process that from a child. That is what he's saying, right? I'm always gonna pick on my kids. If any of my kids came to me. Right? I mean, it's similar. These two guys, knuckleheads, got married two weeks ago, right? Please pray for them. And imagine they get married, I get to officiate the wedding. It was the best one ever because they were in it. But imagine it's like, you know what? We've got our own life now. We want nothing to do with you. We're out. Do you think I would be in a good position right now? No. And so here comes this younger son and he says, dad, I don't want to have anything to do with you anymore. I wish you weren't living. That's what he's saying. Just give me what I want and I'm out of here. And I'm going to leave you. Never. In that culture, also another thing to go with it, you never got your inheritance. Now we do things differently because we live in a different world. You're going to have a trust, maybe, or whatever it is, and they're going to get it at certain times, and we're going to allocate it for these ages and all these different things. I get it. But in that culture, you never got your inheritance until your father passed away. And to ask it for him while he's alive, what, in fact, the family would consider the son to be dead. Typically, the response would be this, get out. You're no longer our child. These should be the cultural responses. That's why it says in verse 24, when the Son came back to him, and I know we didn't get there, we will later. But when, when the son comes back, he literally says, the son of mine was dead. That's why he says it, because culturally speaking, he was. He was no longer he no longer ever. He never expected to see him again or anything else. He's going to say it again in verse 32, when he's talking to the older brother, he says, hey, don't you guys get it? Hey, don't you understand? This brother of yours was dead. That's how deep it was ingrained into the culture. They would even hold a ceremony at times in order to resolve this. Here comes the son. Father, give me my share of the estate and he uses the word estate in Greek. That meaning is give me all of the property, Give me everything, all of the property. Give me all the goods that I am owed. Which means this, this was not fast. Now it's a parable. But this would not have been a fast endeavor. That's why the listeners of this tax collectors, sinners, Pharisees, religious leaders, they're all going, what? Because it means he's now selling off property, selling off goods in order to give him his share of the estate. So now it just got even more far fetched. Are you following me A little bit. You look a little groggy. We can do burpees, whatever you want to do. Don't challenge me on it. Right? All right. So is it far fetched enough? Now they're going to come to me after getting married. They're going to say, hey, listen, we want nothing to do with you, but we want our portion of the estate. We need you to sell half of your property, half of your goods, or whatever it is it's going to be and give us all those resources. Your whole life is going to be turned upside down. But I want my portion and I'm leaving. I'm out. I don't even wish you were living. That's this parable. And so I'm going to throw one more wrench in it. When somebody then would receive an inheritance, and this is the way I think it should be today, this is what it normally would mean culturally, when you would receive an inheritance, you were receiving a responsibility to manage whatever that involved that entailed. I don't think we can get into a whole process on this. I've walked this journey for the last several years big time on how, what and how and where and when you should give to children. Let's have that conversation. That'd be fun. I don't think you should give them anything without responsibility. There's a responsibility that comes with saying that you are a follower of Jesus christ. Read Luke 14. It's called the call of discipleship. So don't say that you're a follower of Jesus Christ if you're not going to fulfill the responsibility. It's the same thing here. Don't ask for an inheritance if you're not going to fulfill the responsibility of those who are giving you the inheritance. Again, I felt like that deserved an amen. Let's all do 20 push ups. Just gotta wake you up a little bit. Hey guys, did you know that this is the living word of God? It is alive and well. It is not dead. You can deny it all you want, but it is the sword of the spirit, the word of God. So we start using should jack you up, right? So here all of a sudden we're going, wait a second. What this should be is, hey, I want the inheritance or I've been rewarded the inheritance. And that's going to bring a responsibility to manage the estate on behalf of my family. In order to do what? To add to it. The responsibility was to manage what the wealth came from and then to add to it, not just take out your withdrawals. That's what was expected. But he didn't want any of that. He just wanted the stuff. He didn't want the leadership or the accountability or the responsibility that came with what he desired. That might be some of you. You want to live the good life, right? But you don't want to do all the work or have the responsibility that it comes with. Luke 15:12 holds a surprise for us because it says, and very quickly. And he divided his wealth between them. Rather than do what the culture would say, strike him on the face, be done with him, the father grants him what he wants. Why? Because he's willing to endure the agony of rejected love. The greater the love, the greater the pain when that love is rejected. Yeah. Anybody been there? This is God. This is God giving the sinner his freedom. And so the younger son cashes out. That's what he does. I'm going to throw the text up here for you in verse 13 to 16. Not long after that, the youngest son, he got together all that he had. He set off for a distant country and there squandered his wealth and wild living. So far he's done the exact opposite of everything that should be expected, right? Wants no responsibility. I remember one of my buddies when I went to college, just. It didn't cost so much, right? I think I was able to graduate debt free. My parents helped me a little bit. I worked all the way through college on a regular basis. Literally. I would get out for winter break, which would be three weeks, and I would work 70 hours a week during those three weeks in order to make sure I could pay for everything. On Saturdays, I'd be cutting firewood if I wasn't working to pay it. That's what you did back in the day. Can we go back to that? It was so good. And I remember it was just a lot cheaper. And today it was so expensive. And one of my buddies though, he just started taking out all this debt and I was like, what are you doing? And he bought a new car already. Some of you, I just saw your faces go. He was not the sharpest tool in the shed or the brightest light in the room, whatever it may be. And he had all this debt. He ended up spending about. I think it was 22,000 for college education, but he racked up $80,000 in debt because he just did whatever he wanted. And then he goes, man, I found out. Did you know you pay a. I remember him going, did you know they charge you a percentage on top of that? I said, yeah, don't ever tell anybody where you went to college, because it makes me look bad. He wanted no responsibility for what was being given to him. He just wanted to do whatever he wanted to do. That's this guy. He cashes out and he walks away. Just wants to do anything he wants to do. And he didn't waste any time. I just go, wait, what's happening here? He squandered all of it, which means just that. He scattered it, he threw it away. He wasted it with reckless living. We Learned in verse 30, the older brother says that he squandered it away with prostitutes. And so this guy is running as far as he could from responsibility, and as a result, he absolutely trashes his life. Is there a responsibility that you're running away from? You know who this reminds me of? A little bit. If you want to go Old Testament, here's a guy who wants to take what he has and just run away from any responsibility. Does this not remind you a little bit of Jonah? Right. Hey, I want you to go to. Where? Where's he supposed to go? Nineveh. And he's like, no, I ain't going to Nineveh. I ain't doing it. No. So what's he do? Gets on a boat, takes off. God says, ha. Basically, you're in the water. Now we know what happened. Hey. He tells the guy, throw me overboard. He gets swallowed by a giant fish. And then all of a sudden, that throws him out. And then finally he wises up and he goes, fine, I'll go to. Well, then he goes to. This is a fun game. And God tells him, I want you to preach to the people of. His sermon in the original language is literally five words. And they all turn from their evil ways and repent and go to God. And Jonah's ticked. I love that because it's a reminder that God is calling you. He wants to use you, but he's not going to use you because you're the effective tool. He wants to use your Obedience and your faith, that's all you have to be. Isn't that Jonah? He didn't even want to do it. He went and sat down under a tree afterwards that wilted. He needs your faithfulness. He doesn't need you to be the best at anything. He's the best at everything. You've already lost that competition, by the way. He needs you to be faithful. He needs you to obey. And Jonah is the perfect example in the Old Testament of somebody who just took off. I don't want to have anything to do with it. Well, he's going to wise up. And guess what? This guy is going to wise up. So similar in terms of the story and what God is teaching. And so here's this younger son who represents the immoral. He's going to represent the sinner and the broken. And he's going to use him to teach us powerful, powerful lessons. It says in verse 14, when he had spent everything. That kind of introduces that when he showed up in town, he was the guy with a bankroll and could do what he wanted. And probably seen that way. I mean, think about that. You get an inheritance from this guy and you're just like, I'm rolling, right? Comes into town, has a good time, probably had some people who wanted to take advantage of him and his generosity. He surrounds himself with the wrong people. If you have really young children, can I encourage you with something? One of the greatest prayers I've ever had when my children were young is that they would hang out with the right people who would point them to Jesus. I probably prayed for that more than I prayed for them, right or wrong. Young, young parents, please pray for that. That they have spiritual voices that aren't named mom and Dad. This guy is surrounding himself with scum. But then we find out that a severe famine occurred in the country. Now, it's not his fault, but that's how life is. Some things aren't your fault, some things are. But a famine comes and they strikes. He has no family. He's in a foreign land. He has nowhere to turn. All of his resources are now gone. He is destitute, but he's still not ready to go home. I want you to think about this. There's a famine. He has nothing to eat. He's destitute. His resources are gone and he still won't go home. It is a new level of pride and arrogance, right? Have you ever met that guy who will never ask for help? Don't raise your women. Do not raise your hand. We don't need counseling all night. It's especially abundant with men, though. Like, I don't need your help, Really. Yeah, you do. God made us. So I'm one body, many parts, right? He made us to need help so that we wouldn't be prideful and arrogant. One of the things I hope I've modeled to my children is that I'll ask for help. Hey, I need your help. I need you to cut the grass, paint the house, and change the roof. It's fine. But it's a beautiful model. And this guy wouldn't accept help no matter what. Even when he's destitute, even when he's running out of money, even when he has nothing to eat at all. But then he finally hit bottom. End of verse 14, he says he began to be in need. How far do you have to go down the barrel before you actually accept help, Before you ask for help? He began to be in need. For the first time, he can't supply what he really needs. He comes up with a plan to figure it out on his own. It's typical for a sinner. Well, I'll figure out another way to do it. In fact, it tells us that he goes to one of the citizens of the country. Now, when it says citizen, if you look in Greek, the word citizen literally means he went to a privileged person. So he goes to somebody who's privileged, who has wealth, who has money, and he's like, hey, I need some help. So he's going to be able to go and do this. And finally, it says in verse 15 that he sent them into his field to feed the pigs. He's feeding the pigs. Turns out it doesn't even pay anything. It doesn't seem. But then all of a sudden, he is desiring to eat the food that the pigs are eating. Friends, you have a Jewish boy feeding pigs in a gentile land. Process this. You know where I'm going on this, right? You have a Jewish boy feeding pigs. Did Jewish people eat pig? No. That's why I love Paul so much. Paul just turned every cart upside down. He's like, eat red meat. He came up with that slogan, eat meat, right? But we know there's a Jewish boy, and he's going, man, wait, I'm feeding pigs, which I'm not even supposed to be touching. And now I'm eating their food. It is the definition of despair. Anybody been there before? I've been there before. For me, it's because I was serving a church. The church was going in a direction I didn't necessarily Agree with. I wasn't the lead pastor, so I stepped away and I was like, you know what I'm going to do? Forget it. I have a business background. I'm just going to go in. I've got some friends who want to hire me, and they're telling me to do this and doing this. I'm just going to do my own thing. I'm going to do business. I'm going to make a lot more money that way. I don't have to worry about all this church stuff, because people. The church is amazing, but the people of the church, which at the time, I was just stupid, they're a pain in the rear. People are a pain. Amen. Especially in the church. And so I'm like, I'm just not going to do it. So I just did my own thing and I started making money. I flipped a house in like three weeks, made 15K. I was like, this is awesome. I'm the stud. Flipped another house and I made like $400 in two months. And it wasn't good. And all of a sudden, I started recognizing I had a gift, but I was living according to what I thought I was gifted at. I wasn't living according to what my calling was. That'll preach. And so I started doing fine with it, and I was doing okay, but I was miserable. I cried every day. I started writing out the entire Bible, word for word, starting in Genesis 1:1 in the begin. I was desperate. It was my wilderness. Anybody ever had a wilderness experience? This would have been this guy's wilderness experience. A Jewish boy wanting to eat food with pigs in a gentile land. Of course, as soon as I quit my job and I started, I'm just going to do everything on my own. As soon as that happened, my wife came to me and she goes, honey, I'm pregnant with that knucklehead. I was like, honey, I don't know. You're just kidding with me because I just left a job. I don't have insurance. And then that knucklehead decided. He's like, he's just hanging out in the NICU for a week or so. And in the same month, the house, my roof of the house blew off my house from a tornado coming through Louisville, Kentucky. And then literally the next day, I go out to get in my car to drive away. Somebody had stolen my car out of the driveway. Oh, I could go farther within 30 days. Stories I actually can't tell you because of attorneys and everything else. And I'm just going, and I'm Just breaking down. Has anybody else been there before? Wilderness experience. Yes. And I'm calling out to God and that's when he taught me. He goes, he's like, joel, you may have a gift, but I gave you a calling. Why did you walk away from me? The next day, this is what happens. I get a phone call from a church search team. They said, hey, listen, I told somebody this story today. They said, hey, listen, we heard you preach once and we thought you were okay. This is starting great. And we heard you know what a hedge fund is. Before I know it, I'm moving to Greenwich, Connecticut, the land of hedge funds. And I'm ministering to a bunch of people who I have no clue who Jesus is. I was broker than broke, but I was living large because I was being obedient to the call. Are you being obedient to the call? Are you being obedient to the call? God has called you. This guy was not being obedient to the call. He's now in the wilderness. And when the Pharisees, the scribes, the tax collectors, all of them, the Pharisees and the scribes, religious leaders, when they're hearing this, their radar is just bouncing. All of these things are just horrendous for them to process. That would never happen. And who are you to think about like this? And I mean, this is just making it horrendous for Jesus. Because the lesson is about the rebellion of sin and what it does in us, friends, every one of us, somehow we have rebelled in sin toward go. Why? Because we've all sinned and fallen short of the glory of God, every one of us. No, not right. You heard it two days ago. No, not one is good. Not even one is good. Why do you say that? You're good. Not one is good. These are words of Jesus, by the way. And so this is happening, and this is lesson that in rebellion and sin against God the Father and this sin that is shunning the relationship that God desires to have with you. And you've shunned the responsibility, you've shun, shunned the accountability. You've shunned everything that God is really wanting for you. And as a result, you've denied God. And here's the thing. Sometimes you can love God in some parts of your life through habits and tradition, but you can shun him in your heart with your behavior and your beliefs and your thoughts. If you don't believe me, I'm not going to go into this. Don't worry. Go to Mark, chapter seven and read about what Jesus says on traditions, right? And so all of a sudden, this guy finally recognizes that he truly is in need. And he goes, you know what? Even the servants, the slaves of my father have more than I have. I need to go home. And some of you are going, can I just go home? Can I get back to a healthy relationship with God? Some of you may be rebelling in some way against God right now in your own life. You just want to turn away from what he's called you to. Like, I knew I had a calling. I had rejected my calling forever. That's why I have a business degree, which actually God has used. God's in the business of redeeming all things. I'm so glad that I can. His business card says redeemer of all things. That's what he does. But I didn't want to go into ministry no matter what. I ended up going into ministry. And then I walked away from ministry for a year because I got so fed up with the church. And now the church is the most beautiful thing I've ever seen. The church is what the bride of. Side note, if he's the groom and the church is the bride, be careful if you're throwing mud on the wedding dress. So I get. I only get angry two times is what I say. When you mess with my wife or you mess with the church, his bride mess with my bride or his bride. That's the only time I really get bothered. Because here's the thing. If you talk bad about my bride, I'm coming at you. You might be bigger than me, but I am a Southern redneck. I do not fight clean at all. I will take you. I may die in the moment, but Jesus will bring me back, right? Right? Drew, I already love you, dude. We've been messing with each other the whole time because I keep asking him. I'm like, dude, I need son. Can you get out of the way? So, I'm sorry. How is. I'm proof God can use anybody. Amen. Don't say amen right then. But it's funny, because I think the way, like, you speak negative of my wife. And I'm gonna come. I really am coming at you. Somehow not. But hey, whoa, whoa. Right? I'm gonna do the same thing when you talk bad of the church. It is full of broken people, but it is the bride of Christ. Stop throwing mud on the wedding dress. I'm a little sensitive with that. Probably because we come from a larger church, which means we can't have solid teaching. We have to be shallow to grow. We must be seeker friendly. No, no, no. Maybe people want truth, but with grace because we're all broken. Yeah. If you have spoken negative of the bride of Christ, you need to repent of it because you speak negative of my girl. I'm coming. I will cheat, but I'm coming. That's the bride of Christ. And some of you are rebelling in the way that you treat the bride of Christ. Some of you are rebelling in what you won't surrender to him. Some of you are rebelling against God in some part of your life. You're like, no, no, no, Pastor, you don't understand. I'm at family camp for Christians. When I was growing up, I didn't know there was such a thing. But you're like, man, take all this, but just, you're not going to mess with me. I've got my toys. You're not going to mess with my hobbies. I know that we're trying to save and we can't save and we're trying to give back to the King, but we can't give back to the King because I got to have my boat. I'm not going to tithe because I got to have my toys. I got to have another compound bow. Deer season's coming. I mean, I've heard all of it. Friends, you have no more preferences. You surrendered them when you said yes to Jesus, being your Lord and your Savior. I tell people that all the time. I'd have no more preferences. At least I have no more rights because I surrendered those rights to the King of Kings and the Lord of Lords. No more rebellion, no more resisting what God is doing in your life. And some of you need to sit there and go, wait, maybe it's not with squandering an inheritance, but I'm still rebelling. And I've stepped away from the heavenly Father and I need to go back home. Something for us to process. And so what I like to do, I want to pray. I just want to sit with you for a moment. Again, I literally wanted. Tonight, I stepped in and I started rearranging. I appreciate the guys letting me rearrange how we did the beginning as I was like, man, what are the bookends? I often think, what's the bookend of a sermon? To me, I thought prayer. So I wanted to start with it. I want to close with it. I just want. I'm going to sit here with you and I want to pray the goodness and the greatness of Jesus Christ over your life. So let's pray together. God, I love you. I praise you. I declare that you are my master. I am the Doulos, I am the slave. I am your servant. And I'm thrilled to be one. God. There are. I know from conversations already there are godly people in this room who love you dearly. Thank you for their witness, the testimony that they are living. I also know, God, that we're all broken and fallen and that we all have blind spots. And so if there is an area in which any of these brothers or sisters are rebelling against you, I am praying, God, that they would have the humility to repent and to come back home. I'm praying that they would have a godly wisdom. We know that wisdom primarily comes from the reading of the word of God and through asking you and for your strength to come into our life. I'm praying, though, that you would give them powerful, powerful wisdom and strength as they lead families, as they teach and as they guide others to understand who you are and your greatness. I pray that they would search for spiritual discernment and wisdom. Well, Proverbs 2 says to search for it as we would gold or silver. So may they, if they need to get bloody hands, may they get bloody hands searching for your wisdom from searching for your discernment as they make decisions for their families to be beautiful witnesses of the grace and the mercy of God Almighty. Because we're not bringing our children to a Christian family camp to raise good people kids. We're doing it to raise godly kids. May we know the difference. And encourage them, Lord. Encourage them with your truth and with your power and with your strength. We've all walked through the wilderness. At some point, we need to. It's part of the refining process. It doesn't mean that you're not present. It means that you're a good God because you let us grow and be sharpened and mature. And the fire is a beautiful place to do it. But we have a responsibility to take the knowledge that we have of you and to display that, to put it on display for the world, to see people who are gracious and merciful and forgiving and to look at people who don't know you with compassion, just as you look at the people with compassion. So give us an evening of celebrating the fact that we know we can come home to you, That we have a father who is so kind, so generous, offering repentance and forgiveness for us. Thank you, Lord. Bless these friends in Christ's name. Amen.