Let’s go ahead and begin to worship Him, let’s go ahead and begin to magnify His holy name; Father we worship You this morning, Father we magnify Your holy name, Father we give You glory, we give You honor, we give You adoration; You are worthy to be worshiped, You are worthy to be magnified, You are worthy to be exalted, You are worthy to be lifted up, Father we worship You, You are a holy God, merciful Father, merciful God, merciful Daddy, we worship You, we bless Your name.
Thank You for who You are, thank You for what You do, thank You for Your mercy, thank You for Your goodness, thank You for Your benevolence, thank You for watching out for us, Father we thank You we worship You; thank You for life, thank You for health, thank You for family, thank You for relationship. Father we thank You that we are Your children and we can come before You and call You Father, Father thank You, thank You Jesus, glory be to Your name oh Lord, in Jesus mighty name we have worshipped.
Our Father and our God, we thank You this morning, Father we thank You because You are deserving of all worship, You are deserving of all adoration, You are deserving of all honor and we worship You this morning, be exalted oh Lord in the name of Jesus. And Father Lord, this morning even as we come before Your throne and Your word, we pray Lord that Your word will minister to us expressly this morning in the name of Jesus.
We want to talk about Your mercy that You are a merciful God, indeed You are a merciful God, this morning show us mercy in the name of Jesus. Jesus, thou Son of David, have mercy upon us in the name of Jesus; in every area that we need Your mercy this morning, Father show us mercy, show our children mercy, show our work mercy, show our families mercy, show Nigeria mercy in the name of Jesus. Thank You Father, in Jesus name we have prayed.
Welcome to church, God bless you in Jesus name! I want to appreciate the Almighty God for this opportunity to stand before you this morning and I want to thank our father in the Lord, the APICR, for giving me this platform this morning, I pray that all of us will be blessed as we listen to the word of God in the name of Jesus.
So the topic this morning is “The Merciful Father and His Two Lost Sons”; many of us are familiar right from when we were young, when we were little in Sunday school about the story of The Prodigal Son, but this morning we are not only considering the prodigal son, we are looking at the two sons because there are two sons in that story and the Almighty God will make us to identify where we stand so that we can cry out for mercy this morning in the name of Jesus.
In fact, if you look at Luke 15: 1, Jesus Christ spoke about three parables in that chapter 15; the Parable of the Lost Sheep, the Parable of the Lost Coin and the Parable of the Lost Son, so there are three parables in Luke 15 that Jesus Christ spoke about, speaking about the same thing – the heart of the Father, the mercy of the Father, the song that we normally sing, the Ome mma song, the One who would leave the 99 and go and look for the one that is missing, that is the love and the heart of our Father God, praise the Lord!
I’m going to read quickly from Luke 15, is a very long passage but I’m going to read so that we can have proper understanding of the sermon of this morning; Luke 15: 11 – 32, “And he said, a certain man had two sons: 12And the younger of them said to his father, Father, give me the portion of goods that before that falleth to me. And he divided unto them his living. 13And not many days after the younger son gathered all together, and took his journey into a far country, and there wasted his substance with riotous living. 14And when he had spent all, there arose a mighty famine in that land; and he began to be in want.
15And he went and joined himself to a citizen of that country, and he sent him into his fields to feed swine. 16And he would fain have filled his belly with the husks that the swine did eat, and no man gave unto him. 17And when he came to himself, he said, how many hired servants of my father’s have bread enough and to spare, and I perish with Hunger! 18I will arise and go to my father, and will say unto him, Father, I have sinned against heaven, and before thee, 19And am no more worthy to be called thy son: make me as one of thy hired servants. 20And he arose, and came to his father. But when he was yet a great way off, his father saw him, and had compassion, and ran, and fell on his neck, and kissed him.
21And the son said unto him, Father, I have sinned against heaven, and in thy sight, and am no more worthy to be called thy son. 22But the father said to his servants, bring forth the best robe, and put it on put it on him; and put a ring on his hand, and shoes on his feet. 23And bring hither the fatted calf, and kill it; and let us eat, and be merry: 24For this my son was dead, and is alive again; he was lost, and is found. And they began to be merry, praise the Lord!
I will go to the second son in the course of the sermon, I will read the Bible passages concerning the second son shortly, so we want to first of all look at these two sons; the father in this passage is the merciful God, is our merciful God, and the two sons represent different attitudes towards grace and repentance. The younger son got lost by leaving home and wasting his inheritance while the older son got lost in his pride and his resentment even though he did not physically leave home, so we’re going to look at this younger son that we popularly refer to as a ‘Prodigal Son’.
So this younger son in this story wanted his inheritance early; he told his dad, daddy, I know you have land and you have cattle and you have sheep, divide the inheritance and give me my own share while the father was yet alive. What he’s saying in effect is I wish you are dead already, just share what belongs to me and let me be on my way, and you know in Jewish custom, the first born is entitled to 2/3 of the father’s estate while the younger son is entitled to the one third, so he was saying to the father, the one third that is due to me give it to me now, I don’t want you to give me when you are dead, I want it straight away.
And so you know in Jewish tradition at that time, is not like they have money, they are estates, their net worth consist of their land and their cattle and their livestock, that what was what they had at that time that made them wealthy, so this son was essentially saying go and sell the land, divide the land that you have, sell the land, divide all the animals you have and sell the one third and give me my share, that was what the boy said, in other words, he was telling the father I want you to have a first sale; you know people in economics tell us that when you have to sell something quickly, of course you sell it cheaper, you don’t get the full value of what it is; you know we lawyers always say we are learned, we know everything, that’s why we are learned.
So this boy, by telling the father share your inheritance right now, he broke the father’s heart, he was in rebellion, is like he should be dead now and some of us are like that and that is what people call the ‘entitlement mentality’, this is what I’m entitled to; some wish that their parents were dead so they can pounce on the inheritance quickly.
Few days ago I read in the newspapers, I think Nation (or so) that there was this man, this pensioner who received his (maybe some of us read it) pension entitlements and his graduate sons that he had trained when he was working and his wife he set up two shops for, and gave her three million to do business, then he bought a car for himself worth about 12 million; so the wife and the children were not happy that he bought something for himself, so they ganged up and beat him up and tied him like a a goat and called six aboki to tie him up like somebody to be slaughtered and they were packing all his goods, so it was neighbors in the neighborhood who heard him shouting that came to his rescue, in other words, what they are saying is we wish you are dead, just give us our inheritance. So this story is not about something that happened in the Bible times, it is also happening even today, may God deliver us in the name of Jesus.
So this younger son left home chasing freedom, ‘I want to be free’, he did not want to work in the farm, he did not want to work in the family business, he just wanted freedom at all cost and so some of us also are like that, we don’t want to submit to God, we don’t want to submit to man, we want to be free; some people say I want my destiny in my own hands but the destiny you put in your own hands that destiny will crash, may our destinies not crash in the name of Jesus.
So this young boy, the father heartbroken, had to sell what he worked for and gave him one third of his inheritance and this boy said now I have money, he went to a far place, he japa-ed to somewhere else and when he went to that place he did not invest the money, money that you did not work for you will spend it anyhow, so he began to live a riotous life; he called friends, prostitutes, he was drinking, making merry, money that he did not work for, and that is what happens these days, when you see fraudsters, Yahoo boys, the Hushpuppies of this world when they get this easy money, of course easy money comes easy money goes, so they will waste all the money and look for the next person to dupe, that is what is happening.
I read some time ago, I think it was during the December, the one they call ‘detty December’, December when everybody came to Nigeria, they said some people will go to these lounges and clubs, they can spend millions in one night to drink and to carry women, you can see that that kind of lifestyle is a wasteful riotous lifestyle and that was what this boy was interested in, so you that you are looking for money, you want this you want that, what is the purpose of what you want, is it to spend it on your own lust or you want to use money to advance yourself, advance your generation? The Bible tells us in Proverbs 23:5 that money can develop wings and fly away, so money that you don’t invest that money will fly away very soon.
So the money of this boy, the inheritance, flew away and he ended up broke; he was hungry, he was feeding from swine, (swine is pigs), and according to Jewish tradition the Jews don’t eat pigs just like Muslims, they don’t eat pigs; so this boy was forced in such a state that he had to be eating and struggling for food with pigs, and the Bible tells us that nobody gave anything to him, his heaven was closed, there was no favor, nobody gave him anything, all the people that he gave the money to nobody gave something to him when he was in need and that shows us that when we go away from God, when we want to be independent of God because we say that this father we are talking about in this story is Almighty God, so when we want to live life on our own terms, when we want to say Your rules are too many, ‘don’t do this, do this’, they are too much, I want to be free, I want to live my life the way I want to live, the Bible says that kind of person, he that is often reproved and hardened his heart shall suddenly be destroyed and without remedy, may we not be destroyed in the name of Jesus.
So when this boy began to be in want and he was eating with pigs, the Bible tells us that one day, (that is in verse 17) he came to himself, what is the meaning of coming to oneself? It means that you now begin to think, you do a self-examination, ‘how did I get here, what happened to me’, he started to remember his father – his father’s love, his father’s house, the care; they never mention the mother in this story, you can imagine how the mother’s heart will be broken in this story and so he came to himself, he had a self-examination, and some of us need to have a self-examination this morning, where am I now, what happened to me, what kind of life am I living, do I need to retrace my steps? Some of us need to do a self-examination.
So he came to himself when he reached ground zero; it’s like he woke up from a deep sleep and he saw the condition that he was in and he remembered from where he fell and he decided to retrace his steps; deciding to retrace his steps means he repented, there was a repentance, he was sorry for what he did, he was sorry for the life that he was living, praise the Lord!
We can see that in verse 18 and 19 he was sorry, he acknowledged his sin, he says I will arise and I will go to my father, I’m going to repent, I’m going to say father I’m sorry, I have sinned against heaven, I’ve sinned against you, I’m sorry.
Some of us need to come to that place of repentance this morning because the life that we are living now is a riotous living life, what are we doing, we have left the love of the Father, the Father is God who has given us everything, He has given us life, He gave us His only begotten Son, the Lord Jesus Christ, to die for us on the cross of Calvary; He that has the Son has life, not only life, He has given us life more abundantly but we have told the Father ‘I don’t have time for You, I want my own life, I want to live my own life on my own terms’, but this boy came to himself and said I’m going to go back to my father, my father’s arms are still wide open, let me go back and ask for forgiveness. Some of us need to go back this morning and ask for mercy, as we go back the Lord will receive us back in the name of Jesus.
You can see the heart of the father in verse 20, he arose, he made a decision to go back, he did not only make that decision, he took action by going back; some people can feel sorrowful, ah, I wish I can stop this sin, I wish I’m not doing this hook up again, I’m going to change, I don’t want to do it again but they never take action, but this boy realized his situation and he arose and went to his father and you can see that the father was yearning for him, the father was missing him, the father was praying for him, the father was longing for the son that had gone astray because when he was still far away the father saw him, is that not my son coming? The love of the father was evident in this passage, his father saw him and had compassion and you can see an old man whose son took away his inheritance, the son was not the one running, it was a father that was running to meet the son, let’s clap for our Father.
The father ran, he fell on the neck of his son and the father kissed him, you can see the love of the Father; that song has just been ministering to me, that Ome mma song, it says He will leave the 99, that one soul that is lost, the Father can do anything to bring that lost soul back to Himself; so the father ran and kissed the son; and in verse 21, what did the father also do? The son repented and the father called the servant, this my son, change his clothes, this filthy clothes; when you come back to God, the Lord God Almighty will clean you up, He will clean the filth, He will he will accept us back as His children.
So the father removed the dirty clothes and gave him a ring, the ring means authority, meaning, this boy, even though he left but is back, he’s my son, so you have to respect him as my son, every benefit of son-ship belongs to this boy, praise the Lord! And then what happened, the father now said go and kill one big cow, we want to have a barbecue, and call musicians, we want to celebrate because this my son was dead and now is alive, you can see the love, let us clap for our Father.
So you can see in this story the mercy of God; the mercy of God reaches out to us irrespective of the sin that we have committed, no matter the gravity of the sin we have committed, once we repent, once we come back, God is faithful and just to forgive us of our sins and to cleanse us of all unrighteousness, He’s only waiting for us to come, to make a move, it’s just a move that we need to make, He is the One that will run to us and He’s running to us this morning by this message, He’s telling us come home, you that you are weary, My son that you are lost, My daughter you are lost in the world, you are lost in sin, you are lost in unrighteousness, you are lost doing all these things that will take you to hell fire but I don’t want you to go to hell, I did not prepare hell for you, hell is prepared for Satan and his demons but you are My son, you are My daughter, heaven is your place, come back home, that is the love of the Father and He’s reaching out to somebody in this audience this morning, He’s telling you stop running, there is no help where you are running to, all those lifestyles is not going to help you, I am your Father and I’m calling you come back home, may we hear this morning and return onto our Father in the name of Jesus.
I titled this ‘Enter the Older Brother’; you know I said the two brothers are lost, so we’ll look at the older brother in Luke 15: 25-32, “Now his elder brother was in the field: and as he came and drew nigh to the house, he heard music and dancing. 26And he called one of the servants, and asked what these things meant. 27And he said unto him, thy brother is come; and thy father hath killed the fatted calf, because he hath received him safe and sound.
28And he was angry, and would not go in: therefore (this same father went to meet him) came his father out, and intreated him. 29And he answering said to his father, lo, these many years do I serve thee, neither transgressed I at any time thy commandment: and yet thou never gavest me a kid, that I may make merry with my friends: 30But as soon as this thy son was come, which hath devoured thy living with harlots, thou hast killed for him the fatted calf. 31And he said unto him, Son, thou art ever with me, and all that I have is thine. 32It was meet that we should make merry, and be glad: for this thy brother was dead, and is alive again; and was lost, and is found”, praise the Lord!
So why do we say this elder brother was also lost? This elder brother was angry and self-righteous, he did not rejoice that his brother who was lost had come back and some of us are like that, when we see somebody that we have judged was a very terrible sinner and that person has made peace with God and is doing well and we begin to judge, this person, ah I know this person in school, this one na real olosho when we were in school but that person has moved on, that person has received mercy, and so you are self-righteous, why should good things come to those kind of people, those people who were very terrible, me I’ve been righteous, I’m SU, from school I’ve been SU so why should they get things and I am not getting them, why should that olosho now get married, have children and me that I was SU from school nothing has happened in my life and you are angry with God, that is self-righteousness, that is also a lost son, may God deliver us from that spirit in Jesus name.
So this older brother is saying to his father, I’ve been obedient, I follow all your rules and I’ve not been appreciated, I’ve not been rewarded, why is that so that I’ve not been rewarded for being good? This also shows that he had a spirit of pride in self efforts and self achievement. So this older brother, he never left home but his heart was also distant from the father, he was expecting to be rewarded for being good and that is why some of us we tell God, I pay my tithe, I fast, so I deserve – we tell God what we deserve, we don’t ask for His mercy and the Bible tells us that He shows mercy unto whom He will show mercy; He will show compassion unto whom He will show compassion, so we cannot go to God and tell Him the reason why you must bless me, if you don’t bless me then this Christianity is a scam.
Some people say na scam church na scam, why are they saying so? They are saying so because they are looking for a transactional God, is a transaction, so I come to church, I sing, I dance. I pay tithe, I fast, then I expect a reward, I expect to be paid back, so that is not the kind of God that we serve God, God is a God of relationship, so God wants us to have a relationship with Him. This elder son did not look at the relationship that this is my father, everything he owns belongs to me, I should thank him, I should be grateful that he’s even rejoicing because his younger son is back, but this older son said no, what is due to me is that I should be reverenced, I should be celebrated, I should be acknowledged because I’ve been the good boy, the Lord will show us mercy in the name of Jesus, I say God will show the older brothers among us, including myself mercy in the name of Jesus.
So this older brother did not see the need for mercy and grace, the father had to remind him, the father also, like I said before was the one that went to him when he refused to join the party, he refused to come in, the father looked around, where is my older son, the father went to look for him, he went to engage him that why are you angry, why aren’t you happy that this your brother that was lost is back home, you should also rejoice, you are with me you should rejoice that everything that I own belongs to you, which is a relationship.
So God is calling us to relationship, He’s not calling us to a transactional relationship, that’s because I come to church, because I do this then I deserve this, that is not the heart of the Father, and this morning, as many of us who have that kind of heart, the heart of the older son, the Father is also reaching out to us this morning and what is the Father telling the older sons among us this morning, He’s telling us have a relationship with me, when you have relationship with me, everything you are looking for will be handed over to you, everything I have belongs to you, you don’t need to struggle, you don’t need to quote for Me, you don’t need to remind Me what you have done for me, I see what you have done, I see you are doing it out of love, you are not doing everything you are doing out of a bargain that because I do it then I will expect a reward; everything we do for God, whether we are singing, whether we are preaching, whether we are fasting, whether we are tithing, whatever we are doing for God let us do it out of love and that love that we do it from, He responds to love, the Father will respond to love and He will do for us much more exceedingly abundantly and above all that we are even asking of Him, let’s clap for Jesus.
Jeremiah 9: 24, but he let him that glorieth glory in one thing, that he understands and knows me, that I am the Lord which exercise lovingkindness, judgment, and righteousness, in the earth: for in these things I delight, saith the Lord. So if you want to glory in anything, let us glory in the fact that we know God, that we have a relationship with Him, that we love God and that God loves us; we should glory in the fact that our names are written in His Book of Life, that is what we should glory in, so don’t let self-righteousness blind you to God’s grace for yourself and for others.
Like I said, some people don’t celebrate other people’s victories and blessings, they become envious and angry, thinking they deserve what that other person has because in their own estimation, they are more righteous than the other person, so why should this person have this when I’m more righteous than him, not knowing the Bible tells us that our own righteousness are like filthy rags, we are not righteous outside of Christ, He’s the One that gives us righteousness and so when God decide to show mercy to somebody we should not become angry with God to say why should that person be blessed and not me, and that seed, that seed of bitterness, that seed of anger, that seed of envy, it breeds other terrible feelings and terrible devices, may God show us mercy this morning in the name of Jesus.
So the younger brother was not looking for anything material, he just wanted to come back home, he wanted his father’s love, he wanted his father’s presence; the older brother wanted things, he wanted recognition and the father showed both of them mercy, he met both of them at their point; you, my son that was lost, welcome back home; you that you’re my son that is home but your heart is lost, also welcome back home, the Lord will show us mercy this morning in the name of Jesus.
So whether you are the rebellious younger son or you are the resentful older brother, the Lord is inviting you to come into His warm embrace; the father showed mercy to both of them, the father embraced both of them; this morning as we rise up on our feet, we are going to take this song and then I’m going to make an altar call, the first altar call I’m going to make is for the younger son, the one who is lost, the one who left the Father, the one who is still living in sin, the one who is still living in unrighteousness, and the second call is for us to do a self-examination, where am I standing as a son, am I having a transactional relationship with God or do I love the Father? Let us rise up.
Say after me; I am loved, I am loved unconditionally just like the father love both sons, God’s love to me is not based on what I have done or what I have not done, it is not something I earned or something I worked for, the Father’s arm is stretched out to me this morning and is calling me home. Pray for yourself now, say Father, thank You for Your unconditional love, thank You for Your love, thank You for Your mercy, it’s not based on what I’ve done or what I have not done but because You’re a merciful God, Father I’m coming back home this morning in the name of Jesus.
[Altar Call]
Our Father and our God, we thank You; merciful Father, we thank You, we thank You for Your love, the love that leaves the 99 and goes looking for one; thank You because it is because You love us that You are always looking out for us and You want our relationship with You to be a relationship of love. Father we pray this morning, as many whose hearts have strayed away from You, bring them back home, bring us back home, bring us back to relationship – a Father daughter, Father son relationship, a relationship of love in the name of Jesus; thank You our Father and our God, in Jesus name we have prayed.
