Telling the Truth

Guest (Female): When you lose something valuable, what's the first thing you do? You begin to search for it. In today's message, Jill Briscoe shares the story of the prodigal son, sharing what it means for you to be found in Christ. You'll be encouraged as Jill begins her message in just a moment.

Guest (Male): Your generous support this month is vital as Telling the Truth prepares to close out our financial year and step into a new season of proclaiming God's truths. With partners like you, we can reach even more people with biblical truth in the year ahead. Right now, more people than ever are searching for truth. Through this ministry, God's Word is reaching them where they are, across digital platforms and around the world.

Thanks to an $82,000 matching grant, your gift today will be doubled, helping extend that reach and keep messages like this one going out to you and to others who need the hope found in Christ. As our thanks for your gift, we'd love to send you Stuart Briscoe's book, A Piece of My Mind, a powerful resource to help you experience God's peace in whatever you're facing. So call today to request your copy: 262-788-4648. That's 262-788-4648. Or you can give online at tellingthetruth.org. Now, here's Jill with her message, Lost and Found.

Jill Briscoe: Probably the most favorite parable of everybody, isn't it? The prodigal son. It's about God losing something very precious and sending His Son to get it back. This is God's world, and He wants it back. It's a terrible thing to lose something valuable, like an engagement ring, an heirloom, family photo, or love letter. Of course, one of the worst things is to lose someone like a child.

Of course, there's infinite loss here. A sudden traffic accident snatches away the light of our eyes, or we watch cancer steal away a vibrant young life so full of promise. But there are more ways to lose a child than death, aren't there? There's the death of a relationship caused by a destructive lifestyle, religious views that divide, or the rejection of the faith of our fathers, beliefs we hold dear for ourselves and for them.

These losses, as Colonel Garrapey of the Salvation Army puts it, can cause emotional seismic activity that measures on the Richter scale of our hearts. When distance grows between parents and children, the sense of loss is searing. Do you know that feeling? Which child left home? Which one stayed put, yet is as far away from you as the other? Which pigsty are they in?

God hates losing things, especially valuable things, like a sheep or a coin. A coin being a piece of a woman's inheritance. She wore it in her hair, her dowry, her chance to be married. And when you lost a silver coin, like the woman in Jesus' story, you swept the house until you found it. In each of the little stories—the lost sheep and the shepherd who goes after it, the woman who finds her little silver coin, her dowry, or the father who sees both sons far away from him—in each story, there is a father, and we know who he represents.

The Father of lights, the Father of all things. And there is a loss, and there is a seeking God, and there is a saving, there is a finding, and there is a rejoicing. For there is joy in heaven among the angels over one sinner that repents. The context of Luke 15 is Luke 14. It's always good to see what was happening. When you look at what had just happened, you meet a group of people who are Jesus' enemies, who are His critics.

They are made up of various people: Pharisees, Sadducees, scribes, teachers of the law, Sanhedrin people, some of which are all of those things. Tax collectors, sinners, lepers are not in this group. This group is the group that has been around Jesus from Luke chapter 5, so we're ten chapters on and nothing has changed. So up to the point of this parable, the Pharisees had hounded Him. They had muttered. They had screamed at Him. They had yelled at Him.

They had done all sorts of things to no avail. And Jesus answered them. Sometimes He answered them with a parable, like now. Sometimes He answered them directly. Sometimes He gave it them full in the face, like in Matthew 23. He's talking to His disciples and they're listening, of course, the Pharisees et al., to everything He's saying. "Teachers of the law and Pharisees sit in Moses' seat, so you must obey them and do everything they tell you," says Jesus.

"But do not do what they do, for they do not practice what they preach." You realize that phrase comes straight out of Matthew chapter 23. "Woe to you," He says, "teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites. You shut the kingdom of heaven in men's faces. You yourselves don't enter, nor will you let those enter who are trying to." That was the nub of the problem.

"The kingdom's here," said Jesus. "Whosoever will may come. The lame, the sick, the leper, the widow, the common people. They can all come. But," says Jesus in chapter 14, which precedes 15, "if you come to Me, you must understand there is a cost. There's a cost for the common people, there's a cost for any Pharisee, Sadducee, scribe, etc., who will be My disciple."

And Jesus has just laid it out. Listen, if anyone comes to Me and doesn't hate his father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters, yet even his own life, he cannot be My disciple. "Read My lips," He says. Hate? Did Jesus really say this? Didn't He say we are to love everybody and especially our own? "In comparison to" it means.

If the love you have for Me isn't so much bigger than the love you have for others that it looks in comparison like hate, you cannot be My disciple. It's another way of saying you can love Me with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength. Examine yourselves, disciples, all you that would follow Me, and take up your cross. Because if you don't take up your cross, He says again in the same way, any of you who does not give up everything he has cannot be My disciple.

Measure yourself. I measure myself by that as I prepared this talk. How do we know if we've given up everything to become a Christian, to become a disciple? Only if you're tested, I guess. Mother Teresa said you cannot say Jesus is all you need until Jesus is all you've got. So I cannot stand here and say to you Jesus is all I need because I've never been down to the pigsty.

I've never been out, totally out. As far as I know my heart, I can say, "Lord, I hope it's true that my love for You, in comparison to the love I have for those I love most, supersedes. Lord, You know my heart."

Guest (Male): This is Telling the Truth. Today Jill Briscoe shares the story of the prodigal son from Luke 15, talking about the joy God has in finding His lost children. Before we get back to Jill, here's a note from Lawrence, who shares, "Telling the Truth pricks my heart and strikes my nerve to be faithful while on this earthly journey. These messages teach and encourage me to fight the good fight and finish the race and never give up. Thank you for being enduring in bringing the way, the truth, and the light through this ministry. God's grace to us all. Amen."

Thank you for your encouraging words, Lawrence. That's the kind of impact your gift can have right now, helping more people encounter God's truth at the very moment they need it most. As Telling the Truth approaches the end of the financial year, finishing strong is critical so that many more people can be reached in the coming year. Through expanded digital outreach, biblical teaching is reaching people across the world who are searching for peace, direction, and hope.

And when you give this month, your gift will be doubled thanks to an $82,000 matching grant to extend that reach and keep broadcasts like this one going strong all year. We'll say thanks for your generous support with Stuart Briscoe's book, A Piece of My Mind. Stuart wrote this resource to help you experience the peace of God in the midst of whatever you may be facing.

It's our thanks for your financial year-end gift, worth twice as much when paired with the match, to help more people experience life through the teaching resources of Telling the Truth. So request your copy when you call 262-788-4648. That's 262-788-4648. Or give online at tellingthetruth.org. Let's go back now to Jill Briscoe.

Jill Briscoe: I knelt in front of Jesus and said, "What You see? What You see?" Have you ever dared to say, "Tell me. Tell me"? Jesus has just told a parable of a great banquet for the important people, but none of them want to come. So the host says, "Go into the highways and byways, bring in the riff-raff, the scum of the earth, the sinners and the tax collectors, that my house may be full."

The Pharisees have just heard it. Then they hear Him saying, "If you're going to follow Me, you need to give up everything and follow Me, and then you can come into the feast. Then you can come in." And the tax collectors and sinners were all gathering around to hear. But the Pharisees and teachers of the law muttered, "This man welcomes sinners and eats with them." They haven't moved in ten chapters, folks. It's still getting to them.

And Jesus told them this parable, and then He tells the sheep parable, a bit of it, and then He tells the woman bit, and then He talks about the parable of the lost son. And don't tell me they didn't get it. Don't tell me they didn't see in the picture of the younger son, the prodigal who ends up in the pigsty, the common people.

And don't tell me they didn't see in the elder son the picture of themselves as Jesus tells the story. And note, the Father wanted both the sons to come home. I mean, have you ever thought, were there any Pharisees, were there any Sadducees, were there any of these people that hated Jesus, that were after His blood? Did any of them come to Christ? Did any of them enter the kingdom? Yes, they did.

Nicodemus, the teacher of the Jews. Yes, in secret. Yes, he comes at night. "Are You really the one who should come? Are You God? Are You really God? Are You the Messiah, right?" Nicodemus. Joseph of Arimathea. Ruler of a synagogue, a rich man, a wealthy man. He's the one who is a friend of Pilate's, they say. He's the one that went to Pilate and said, "Give me His body."

And Nicodemus joins him. And they carry a dead body, which makes them unclean, unfit to even go to the Passover feast the next day, and they defile themselves. And Joseph gives his tomb, but in secret, for fear of the Jews. What about the Sadducees? Any Sadducees come to Christ? When Jesus offered "whosoever will may come"? Yes.

There's a wonderful incident where the Sadducees, who didn't believe in the resurrection, were arguing the toss and testing Jesus and talking about a man who had a wife and then he had another wife and another wife and they all die, and then whose wife will he have in the resurrection? Some story like this. Jesus just takes that whole thing and turns it around, ties them up in knots and throws it back at them.

And it says some of the Sadducees and teachers of the law that were listening said, "Well said, teacher. Well said." He got them. Well, He got us. And it says that many of the Sadducees and the leaders began to believe, but secretly in case they were put out of the synagogue, etc. It took Pentecost.

It took Pentecost before the leaders and all these people I've been talking about came in groups and droves into the kingdom. But in the Gospels, there was one here and one there. I don't think any priests—we don't read any before Pentecost came to Christ, but after Christ, they did. For everyone may come: the younger brother, the older brother. The offer is the same.

So what about the younger brother? What happened to him? Well, the younger brother and the older brother came to the Father one day, and the older brother heard that something was happening of great importance. And so what he did was he made sure he was in the room because he got this rumor that his younger brother was going to get some money from the old man. And so he wanted to be there, and he was listening.

And the younger brother said, "Give me." That's his language. If you're a younger brother, that's your language. "Give me, give me, give me, God." And God gives you and gives you and gives you. And you take it all, and then he turned it into cash and took off for the pigsty. He didn't intend to take off for the pigsty, of course. He intended to take off for what he'd always wanted to do but had been hampered by being a younger son, not expected to behave in those ways.

The older brother listened. And the Father said, "All right," and divided it, it says, "to them." Them. The older brother that was there and the younger brother. The older brother got two-thirds. The younger brother got one-third. He turned it into cash, he took off, and the older brother stayed. And maybe that was the point he took off, too.

Both ended up in a pigsty of sorts. One a promiscuous pigsty, the other the pew, the prejudice, the hypocritical life of looking like a son and living like the devil inside. Both a pigsty of sorts. And the younger son went fine while his fair-weather friends were there, right? But then there came a day where the actions that led to consequences came to an end.

Our actions are free. You can act how you like. Go to the far country, waste your life and your substance and your privilege, riotous, rebellious living. Spend everything you've got. You're perfectly free to do it, but you're not perfectly free to choose the consequence of those actions. End in a pigsty. And added to that, circumstances of life, isn't that right? Doesn't that happen?

Just when you're down, there's a famine. Just when you're down, there's a war. Just when you're down, your husband walks out on you. Just when you're down, the child dies. Circumstances. The famine came, and he began to be in want. He'd never really got that far down. And that's when he came to his senses. And unfortunately, sometimes when you're the younger son, that's what it's going to take.

You have to wait till you're spent, till you're out, till you're sitting in a pigsty. And he came to himself. Good idea. He started to have a little talk with self. "Self, what you doing in this muck and mire? I don't need to be here. I could go back to my father and cast myself on his mercy and his grace and say I've sinned against heaven and against you, Father. I'm not worthy to be called your son. Make me a slave."

"That's what I'll do." And he gets up and takes the first step home. And the angels in heaven say, "Look, look, look, look, look, he's coming home! There's rejoicing in heaven! He's coming home!" What you do when you pray for your prodigal? Do you spend all the time saying why? Why? Why did he end up in the pigsty? Why did it happen?

Why didn't You send someone? Why didn't You intervene? Brought him up right. Did the best I could. Why did You let those friends take him into the muck and the mire? Why? Well, don't waste your time saying why. Stay up there long enough to ask God for faith to start and say when. Father stood and stands and says, "I expect the people My Spirit is working with in answer to your prayers to come home."

Ask Him for faith. I had two parents come up to me last night and say, "We have stood on the rooftop and prayed for our two children for two decades. And one of them's coming home. And sometimes we nearly gave up. And sometimes all we could do is say why, why, why? And then God turned it into when. We'll watch, we'll pray, we'll believe. We'll do the Father's work." It's hard. Miracles take time, though. No less a miracle, as Lewis says.

Guest (Male): Jill Briscoe on today's Telling the Truth. She's coming right back to answer a question about the joy God has when He finds His lost children. We're in a pivotal moment for Telling the Truth. As the financial year comes to a close, your support now can help us reach even more people with God's Word in the year ahead. More people than ever are searching for real peace.

And through this ministry, biblical truth is reaching them in those moments across digital platforms and around the world. Thankfully, a group of generous friends has offered an $82,000 matching grant, doubling your gift this month to extend that outreach even further. Your generous gift today, worth double when matched, will help more people experience life through the teaching and resources of Telling the Truth.

As thanks for your gift, we'll send you Stuart Briscoe's book, A Piece of My Mind. Stuart wrote this resource to help you experience the peace of God in any circumstance you might be facing. Simply request your copy when you call today and give a gift to help keep the ministry of Telling the Truth going around the world. Call 262-788-4648. That's 262-788-4648. Or give online at tellingthetruth.org. Now, here's Jill to wrap up today's message.

Jill Briscoe: I've just been reading a book that has really worried me this week. It's called Already Gone. And it's a system of statistics that people that work with youth have compiled. And they're talking about junior high kids in church and senior high kids in church. And this book is called Already Gone. And they have done research, and really it's talking about the older son.

And he looks like an older son, and he's never ended up in the pigsty, and he's been a good little boy or a good little girl. And he's been through youth group, he's even been on mission trips, and he's done the Father's work and all of that, and he's gone. He's gone. So it isn't actually in college, which I've thought up to now it was, they lose their faith.

They're already gone. And we've had kids come and say, "I was gone. I need to come home." The older brother, mad with the younger brother. Why was he mad? Because he'd been a good boy. His sister or brother been a loser, had a baby out of wedlock, etc., etc., on drugs. They get converted and they come back to church and they get to give their testimony and everybody says, "Yay, yay, yay!" and has a party.

"And I've been here slaving. I have no relationship with my Father. It's of no interest to me. There's no joy in coming to church. There's no joy in doing church stuff. No joy not in here. Not in here." The older brother. And as surely as the Father ran down the road—incidentally, older men in the East never run. It's not dignified. They never run. He ran. Didn't make him crawl, remember.

He went out to the older brother too and said, "You need to come home. Come in, please come in. It's right. The kingdom's open to the Pharisee. The kingdom's open to the Sadducee. The kingdom is open to all the people that have tried so hard to keep the rules and done a pretty good job. But it didn't do anything in the heart, you see. Come in to the joy. Come in to the party. Come in to your brother." Listen to his language: "This son of yours." "No, no, no, this brother of yours." So where are you in the story? Your kids? Are you a prodigal? Are you in the pigsty? Nobody knows. Are you in the pew? And nobody knows how far away you are from God.

Guest (Male): We hope today's message encouraged you. And before we go, here's something important to remember. There's still time to make a meaningful impact before the end of this financial year and help reach many more people with the truth of God in the year ahead. Right now, your gift will be doubled through an $82,000 matching grant, helping extend biblical teaching to people searching for peace, hope, and direction.

As thanks for your gift, we'll send you Stuart Briscoe's book, A Piece of My Mind, a resource designed to help you experience God's steady peace in whatever you're facing. So call now to give, knowing your gift will be doubled, and remember to request your resource with our thanks when you do: 262-788-4648. That's 262-788-4648. Or you can give online at tellingthetruth.org. Be sure to come back tomorrow as Stuart and Jill share more life-changing truth from God's Word. Tune in and experience life right here on Telling the Truth.