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I want to ask you something honestly.

Have you ever considered that you can be faithful… and still be lost?

Most of us are familiar with the story of the prodigal son. We see the younger son who ran away, lived recklessly, and eventually came back home. It is easy to identify that kind of lost.

But in Luke 15, Jesus shows us something deeper.

There is another kind of lost. One that is harder to recognize.

And that one might be closer to home than we think.

The Prodigal Son: When Wandering Leads You Away

The younger son made a clear decision. He demanded what belonged to him and walked away from his father’s house.

This is what wandering can look like.

It starts with a shift in the heart. It often begins in your thoughts. You start wondering about other things, other desires, other ways of living. And before you know it, those wonderings turn into wandering.

You slowly move away from the presence of God, away from His covering, away from His instruction.

The prodigal son didn’t just leave physically. He left in his heart first.

And what did it lead to?

Emptiness.
Lack.
Spiritual famine.

There comes a point where what once seemed exciting no longer satisfies. The life that felt free now feels empty.

But then something powerful happens.

Scripture says, “he came to himself.”

That moment is everything.

What It Means to “Come to Yourself” Spiritually

There is a moment where truth breaks through the noise.

You begin to see clearly again.

You remember what it was like in the Father’s house. You remember His provision, His peace, His presence. And you realize just how far you’ve drifted.

This is where repentance begins.

Not in shame. Not in performance.

But in humility.

The prodigal son didn’t come back demanding anything. He came back surrendered. He came back recognizing he was no longer worthy.

And before he could even finish speaking, the father ran to him.

This is the heart of God.

The Older Brother: Faithful, But Still Lost

Now here is where this story turns.

The younger son wasn’t the only one lost.

The older brother never left the house. He stayed. He served. He was faithful.

But when his brother returned, his response revealed something deeper.

He was angry.
Resentful.
Critical.

He had been serving, but not from a place of love.

He was keeping score.

This is a different kind of lost.

You can be in the house of God, doing all the right things, and still have a heart that is far from Him.

You can serve without love.
You can obey without humility.
You can stay… and still be disconnected.

The Danger of Serving God Without Love

The older brother believed he deserved more.

He believed he had earned something.

And in that moment, his heart was exposed.

Pride does not always look like rebellion.

Sometimes it looks like faithfulness without love.

It looks like comparison.
It looks like entitlement.
It looks like resentment when others receive grace.

But the Father’s response was clear.

“You are always with me, and all that I have is yours.”

The issue was never access.
The issue was the heart.

Two Types of Lost People in Luke 15

Jesus shows us two categories:

1. Those who wander away from God
2. Those who stay, but lose His heart

Both are lost.

One is obvious.
The other is subtle.

One leaves the house.
The other stays, but becomes hardened.

And both need the same thing.

A return to the Father.

The Invitation: Come Back Home

No matter where you find yourself today, the invitation is the same.

If you have wandered, come back.

If you have stayed but grown cold, come back.

The Father is not waiting to condemn you. He is ready to receive you.

He runs toward repentance.
He restores what was broken.
He rejoices when what was lost is found.

This is not about performance.

This is about your heart.

Where Are You Right Now?

Be honest with yourself.

Are you wandering?
Are you resentful?
Are you serving without love?

Or are you truly walking with the Father?

This is the moment to come to yourself.

To humble your heart.
To realign your life.
To return fully to Him.

Prayer

Our Father, who art in heaven.

Thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread and forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who have trespassed against us. Lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil.

For thine is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever.

Chapters

00:00 Introduction
02:00 Why this message matters right now
04:00 The prodigal son and what “prodigal” really means
08:30 How wandering begins
12:30 The breaking point and coming to yourself
16:30 The Father’s response to repentance
20:30 The second kind of lost: the older brother
25:00 Faithful, but resentful
29:00 Pride in rebellion vs pride in religion
33:00 The Father’s heart revealed
37:00 Where are you right now?
40:00 Final call: come back home

Full Transcript

This transcript is auto-generated and not perfect. We hope it blesses you.

Jaime Luce (00:01.516)
wandering or maybe just wondering as I was going through scripture this week and looking at the parable that Jesus taught of the prodigal son there were so many things that flooded my mind that were so kind of missed usually things that we don’t attribute

to the story about our own lives to find out how we might be represented in the story other than to think that we might be someone who has backslidden or someone who was angry with somebody who had left and is now returning and whether we’re the younger or the older brother. But I hope to bring you some different perspective today because I believe that this parable shines a great light.

on our everyday lives and the walk that we are living to pursue.

the, pursued the end result of not only being a Christian and, and being who we’re supposed to be as a Christian or accomplishing what we’re supposed to accomplish in this life, but ultimately, eternity.

Jaime Luce (01:42.006)
I am still so captivated by the understanding and the thought of the parable that we spoke about last week, which was the 10 virgins, the five wise and the five foolish.

And I think that our society right now is so lost. It’s so lost. And we only have this one life to make an impact. And we only have so much time in this one life to get it right. I don’t know if you think about that at all. I don’t know if you

are so busy, so overwhelmed, so caught up, so fearful, so demanded upon that maybe these are not thoughts that you’re thinking. But I want us to be very clear. Jesus came with the distinct purpose to save

his lost children from eternal damnation and to receive us a spotless bride into his eternal glory in heaven where we are forever in his presence. And there is an enormous group of people more. The scripture tells us that there is a narrow, wide narrow road and a wide road.

The narrow road, it says there are few that find it. Few that find it, yet that’s the road that leads to life. But the road that is wide is full of people. It is full of people. And today I hope to shine a spotlight on where you are. Where am I?

Jaime Luce (03:58.936)
Where are you? What road am I on? Where is this road taking me?

There’s a lot here. I don’t know if I’ll get through all the stuff that I’ve got, but I wanted to share a little fun fact with you. Like I said, we’ll be talking about the prodigal son today and also his older brother. But Harry Houdini, anybody familiar with Houdini? I think all of us have heard the name Houdini, I think. Famous magician who would

be able to get out of just about any contraption. But at the age of 12, Harry Houdini, who was a legendary magician, ran away from his home in Milwaukee. So he was a runaway by jumping on a freight car. He spent about a year away, possibly in Kansas City, before he eventually rejoined.

his family in New York City and began working to support them. Interesting. I liked the parallels of that and we’ll get into that today. So welcome to the Jamie Lou’s podcast. am so happy to spend this time with you. It is a privilege for me to know that you have taken your precious time to study the word of God and to allow me to speak.

some Bible into you. You know, I was praying this morning saying, God, how I desperately want to be able to rightly divide the word of truth that you would anoint my lips, anoint my thinking, anoint the processes that I go through.

Jaime Luce (06:02.922)
in my mind and in my heart. Give me an understanding heart. Give me the mind of Christ. Let me, as your word says, have the mind of Christ. Because you aren’t looking to hear what I have to say because you don’t care what Jamie has to say. You’re hungry and Jesus is the bread of life.

He is what feeds us, what sustains us, what nourishes us, what gives us what we need. He’s our light. He shows us where to go. He shows us and leads us and illuminates things in the darkness and reveals things to us that are hidden. How we need him to navigate this life. If you allow yourself even a moment to begin going down

the rabbit holes of all the things that are going on right now in our world. It is not only shocking. It’s frightening. It is so crazy that it is tempting on a major level to just think it’s all not true. It’s easier. It’s easier on the psyche. It’s easier on the heart. It’s easier on the stress levels to just think none of it’s true.

and to lull ourselves to sleep and then easily become sheep that are led to slaughter.

But those who are wise, like we spoke about last week, we have oil for our lamps. We have a light for the path. We know that we have a specific job to do. We know there’s a journey we are to take. We know the end goal is to make it into the Father’s house, having actually done the things that we were responsible to do, and join him at the marriage supper of the Lamb.

Jaime Luce (08:03.394)
to have a feast with our father in our father’s house. You know, so many times it’s really discouraging to think that we can so easily wanna think about maybe a Super Bowl party and all the food and the yummy stuff that we’re gonna have at that party or a birthday party.

or Thanksgiving meal or whatever it is that we plan for that we’re just gonna have this feast and eat and just do, we can get all excited about that. We can get so worked up about it. We make plans, we make sure we’ve got the money and the budget to do all the things we wanna do. We decorate, I mean, we make time in the schedule, we move things out, we make sure everybody who we want to be there’s gonna be there.

All the preparation goes into it. All the thought that beforehand needs to take place gets done.

And yet, are we thinking and planning at all for our eternity? I mean, did we just think we got saved and we don’t ever think about it again? We just think, yeah, one day I’ll die and I go to heaven. But are you making plans? Are you excited at all? At all. About the feast that we’re going to be a part of? That we’re supposed to be inviting people?

going into the highways and the byways and compelling them to come in, that we’re supposed to have specific garments that we wear, we’re preparing the clothes we’re gonna wear, we’re thinking about it’s gonna be a feast. We’re gonna partake of things that are everlasting, that satisfy in a way that nothing else can satisfy, that we get to be reunited with the one who has paid.

Jaime Luce (10:00.834)
the ultimate price? mean, have you spent time in prayer thinking about truly the price that Christ paid for you? Like what you should have been punished with? I was so convicted. I felt by the prompting of the Holy Spirit to go looking for old.

messages that were recorded by Dr. Yang Yi-chou, the man who was responsible for the largest church in the world. At some point, I think there was over 750,000 churches. It’s mind-boggling. It’s almost impossible to wrap your mind around. And yet, I, during his lifetime, I knew his name. I kind of knew that fact.

But I really never, I never heard him speak. I never heard much else about him. And that’s astonishing to me that I didn’t. I mean astonishing. And I really felt the prompting of the Holy Spirit to go looking for some of that and to listen to that. So I began doing that and he spoke so much on prayer and intercession. And

He gave during one of his messages a blueprint, so to speak, on prayer because he would spend a minimum of three hours of prayer a day, usually five hours of prayer a day. If you were on his staff, you were required three hours of prayer a day. He expected and taught his people that his people should pray a minimum of one hour a day.

that according to Jesus’ own testimony when he was in the Garden of Gethsemane, that he went to his disciples and put the question to them, could you not tarry with me even an hour? And he came back and repeated this to them multiple times. So this coming back to them and finding them asleep and finding them not in prayer was

Jaime Luce (12:22.126)
really shocking that they had not built this muscle in them to be able to pray at least an hour, which seemed small to him. And boy, I mean, I’ve heard that, I’ve heard that taught. I believe that there was a time when God called me to 40 days where every day for 40 days, I was to pray in the Spirit for 40 days.

and make sure now there were times that that 40 days during that 40 days and praying in my holy language that I would then be able to almost know what I was praying and be praying like Paul says with my understanding and then without my understanding and I would kind of go back and forth and I was able to then know what to pray with my language. could then pray things that I didn’t know to pray because that

is what we do. That’s the gift of the Holy Spirit. Scripture teaches us that when you don’t know how to pray as you ought, you pray in the Spirit. He will bring to you. He will either pray through you, which you don’t know what to pray because he knows the heart of the Father. They are in complete unity and he will only pray the will of the Father. But at the same time, I am able to glean from that time. Whether I ever fully understand what I’m praying or not, the Holy Spirit will bring things up.

the deep things of God can be brought up. And so this burden of prayer has been on me. So for the last several days, I have made sure to pray at least an hour a day. And it’s amazing when I heard Dr. Cho’s outline, he said, if you will learn this pattern of prayer, it will be easy to pray an hour, easy. And boy, was he right.

I mean, it’s before, you know what, an hour’s over and you realize, no, I need more time. I now know what, there are many things I need to pray about so much more. So many times we could pray and think I prayed all my words. I don’t know what else to pray. I’ve prayed all my words and you look at your clock and it feels like it’s been forever and it’s been five minutes. know, you’re thinking, my gosh. And prayer can then seem so laborious because you’re relying.

Jaime Luce (14:43.52)
on your understanding at the moment. And in that moment, your mind can be a million miles away. Your mind can be thinking of every possible thing and the depths of those things. And you could have endless thoughts about those things, but coming to pray, coming to submit yourself under the Father, to submit yourself to the will of God, to submit yourself to the knowledge of what the Holy Spirit could bring.

of what God needs from you that day, just so that you have the power and the anointing to do what you need that day.

Jaime Luce (15:25.422)
I should have looked it up for you. I’ve quoted it before, but there’s a saying that, that some famous minister said that basically says that I have so much to do today that I can’t afford not to pray, which it’s true. And it’s so, it’s so fills it’s filling. And at the same time it is feeding a deep hunger.

to be more hungry. Do you lack hunger today? Do you need more of God today? Do you need more hunger for Him? Are you grasping, thinking, I’ve gone so long without food that I don’t have hunger anymore. I feel like I’m wasting away and I don’t know how to hear Him anymore. I don’t know how

to feel that closeness anymore. I feel like I’ve been gone a long time from our relationship. I feel like I haven’t really been with the father for so long.

Well then today is for you. Today is for you. before I move on, I don’t want to forget what the pattern was. You should go look this up. You should go look him, Dr. Cho up. I believe one of the messages was, it literally says in the title, and this was a long time ago, so don’t look for any of the stuff that looks recent. He’s been gone for a while now, and we need to look at the.

Look for older things because there’s a lot of AI AI out there that’s fake and it puts a picture of him and it’s just Some kind of motivational speaker and it’s not him. So look for the older stuff But this is stuff that was live that was recorded live. That’s your safest bet but it literally says intercession and prayer on there so Look for that, but he uses the tabernacle the picture of the tabernacle as a way to pray

Jaime Luce (17:35.542)
and he comes first to the brazen altar and he goes and he takes you through each piece and what those pieces represented. So how you can see yourself in those places, whether whether you are thankful at the brazen altar for the sacrifice of Jesus Christ and everything he did for you and the price he paid for you and that he willingly gave himself up and what that should have looked like for you. I mean just and to take yourself down that road all the way through.

You’re in the porch, you finally make it inside. There’s the golden candlestick and there’s the showbread and I mean each piece, but it takes you through a form of prayer of seeing yourself and knowing how to pray yourself through to the Holy of Holies. It’s beautiful. I don’t want to forget to give that to you. That’s not what we’re talking about today, but making it into his presence and being with him.

having close fellowship with him, coming back into the Father’s house, coming back into relationship, back into fellowship, not being lost. That’s what we’re talking about today. So if you will go with me in your Bibles to Luke chapter 15. Now Jesus tells three parables right here. He starts by telling the parable of the lost sheep.

about leaving the 91 and going after the one that was lost and carrying him back on his shoulders and calling all his friends and rejoicing that the lost sheep was found. Then he turns around and in verse eight it says, or, so he’s telling you the exact same principle, the exact same plot, the exact same method of correlation here.

to tell us the same truth, but telling us in two different stories. And it’s the lost coin. Someone who had the woman who has 10 coins and she loses the one coin and she searches and searches for the coin. And when she finally finds the coin, she calls all of her friends together and she rejoices and celebrates because she has found her lost coin.

Jaime Luce (19:56.61)
What’s interesting here is we have two parables that talk about a lost coin, a lost sheep. The implication is that they were lost, but we don’t know how they were lost. It just says that they were lost. You know, there are many who can be lost because they’ve never heard the truth.

They weren’t born into Christian homes. They could have been born into terribly heathen homes. The only way they know the word God or the name Jesus is by people swearing. By things that don’t represent God at all. Being born completely into an environment that is totally atheistic. That there’s no belief that there even is a God.

So there’s no thought of God, there’s no knowledge of God, there’s no growing up in the church and in Sunday school. And I mean, there are generations now that haven’t been raised in Sunday school. I was fortunate enough to be raised in an era where there was Sunday school. Before you went to church service, you went to Sunday school and you were taught the Bible stories, you were taught scripture versus going…

Then after receiving teaching, then you went into the main service and you had a preacher preach the fire of God and faith into your soul. And so you, you had a double whammy. You had a full day of preaching and then we’d go back to church that night and get some more preaching because you needed to be filled up. And then you’d go on Wednesday night or Tuesday night or Thursday night or something midweek service because you, you could leak so much of living in this crazy corrupt world.

that you needed more faith put in and you needed to be with the believers. You needed to constantly be in the fellowship of other believers because you were sent out into a world. Jesus says, I send you out as sheep among wolves. So it’s so important to be a part of the house. It’s so important to be a part of the body. It’s so important to be a part of fellowship. And it’s so important to be a student of the word and to be fed the bread, the

Jaime Luce (22:16.27)
The feasting is on the bread. The feasting is in the, the Jesus said, am the bread and he is also the wine. We partake of him. He, it’s his blood and his body that feed us that not only wash us, sanctify us and, and carry us and nurture us. It feeds us every day. It satisfies us. But we go from these two parables that are about the loss.

in general. They’re just lost. There is a slight pivot on this third parable. Though it is about the lost, Jesus is driving home this parable of being lost. But now he breaks it down. Now he’s talking about two more categories of very lost people. Not just the lost, okay?

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Jaime Luce (24:15.606)
and we start that in verse 11. So let’s start there. Then he said, he being Jesus, a certain man had two sons and the younger of them said to his father, father give me the portion of goods that falls to me. So he divided to them his livelihood.

And not many days after the younger son gathered all together, journeyed to a far country and there wasted his possessions with prodigal living. Now the word prodigal sounds like a really, you know, old kind of word and we can wonder, you know, what exactly does prodigal mean? And just to give you a little background into the word prodigal,

it really means a couple of things. First, it’s, it denotes kind of living and speaking to a wildlife living in a wild abandoned manner. So you just give yourself to things. There’s no using discernment. You just, whatever you want to do, however you want to do it, no consequence in mind, just abandoned. also has the idea of living recklessly. So.

It’s not, it’s not just wild for wild sake. know, when you have little boys raising little boys, they’re just wild jumping here and there and they show no fear. But there’s a difference between being childlike in that versus being more grown in that more entrenched in that. And then it becomes reckless and riotous and loose living. Okay. It pertains to senselessness.

and reckless behavior. It also points to wasteful wastefulness. And as I was praying about this this morning, it definitely means ungodly living. But as I was praying about this this morning, God showed me this picture.

Jaime Luce (26:28.328)
of someone who is living this life and they come to the place that they’re just wandering. They’re now just wandering because this riotous, reckless, sinful, abandoned living at the first

As scripture teaches that sin is fun for a season, that’s the hook. Satan always has a great bait on that hook and at first it’s enjoyable. But the end of sin is death. That’s what scripture teaches. The end of the thing. When it finally lives itself out. When you, it’s like lighting a fuse on TNT. And for the long time that fuse just burns, just runs, just, it’s just

running and burning, running and burning. But the end of that is massive destruction. It’s just destruction. It ends in nothingness. There’s nothing left. And so let’s continue reading because you’re going to see this. Prodigal living verse 14, but when he had spent all

There arose a severe famine in the land and he began to be in want. Means he doesn’t have anything left. He has needs now. He can’t just meet them. He doesn’t have the money, the supplies gone. Then he went and joined himself to a citizen of that country. He’s in a far country, so in that country. And he sent him into his fields

to feed swine. So now he’s living such ungodliness. It’s so unclean to what he came from. Being raised, this whole, well, every bit about the Old Testament, New Testament, we’re talking to the Jewish community. Jesus himself was a Jew and he’s speaking to a Jewish community. And pigs were unclean.

Jaime Luce (28:50.124)
want anything to do with pigs. You didn’t eat them, you didn’t touch them, they were an unclean animal. You kept yourself from them. And this young man is now living a life that he once had lived so many years, working hard to stay away from. But this lifestyle that he has been living has driven him to a place that he is now a partaker.

of something he once himself shunned, he once kept himself from, but he is now living in abandon. He has now given himself to things that are unclean for him.

Jaime Luce (29:38.328)
Verse 16, and he would gladly have filled his stomach with the pods that the swine ate and no one gave him anything. He had come from a place where his father gave him everything was provided for. He was never in want and it was given to him at his demand. It wasn’t even a request. This young man,

came that the scripture is implying that he came with a rebellious attitude a very rebellious attitude this was not he he did not come with with a right heart and and saying father there’s i need your help there’s something i’m wanting to build but i don’t have what i need would you give to me no he demanded it give to me he demanded his living

Give to me the portion of goods that falls to me, which also shows there is no regard. He’s giving no regard to his father’s wellbeing. What I am taking from my father’s welfare, he’s still alive, he has life to live, and I want what’s mine, irregardless of how this affects my father and what’s left from my father. Give to me now, he’s disrespectful in so many ways.

Not caring for his father, not caring for what his father cares about, not caring what concerns the father.

Jaime Luce (31:17.282)
This is where we have to look at the parallels of our own life because we tend to think, well, I’m not running from God. I’m not running away from God. I love God. But we don’t realize that we are showing no respect, no regard for our Father. That we go to Him so many times without realizing we’re even doing it, but we are.

putting demands on God, give to me. God, give this to me. God, do this for me. And we are putting demands on him with no regard to how this affects the father. Let me put it another way. We are supposed to seek ye first the kingdom of God and his righteousness. Then all these things,

will be added unto us. Our first responsibility, our first desire is supposed to be for God and his kingdom.

God, what do you want from my life? You saved my life. You have completely saved my soul from hell, from destruction, from the life I should have had, for the consequences I should be bearing and living out, and for eternity spent in hell. You gave your son, you gave everything for me. You went and you reached, you sent Jesus to get…

me out of the lost place that I was in, my regard should be for your kingdom first. I should now, according to what Paul wrote, be living my life as a living sacrifice. I should be living for him. Not living for me, but living saved. Not living selfishly, but I have a get out of jail free card.

Jaime Luce (33:25.994)
not living for my own desires, my own wants, my own pleasures, because I’m the lucky one who has an eternal ticket in heaven. I have the golden ticket. So now I can go spend all my life however I want, free from the Father’s house. The Father has a house. He has a house. And we’re supposed to be living

abiding under his authority in his house.

but we can sometimes not realize we we’re kind of living with a rebellious spirit.

I have to repent. God, where have I been looking to please myself? My own desires, my own fleshly wishes, what I want.

Jaime Luce (34:29.454)
I want resubmit my life, my desires. God, I want my desires to be your desires. I want my life to be spent pleasing you, accomplishing every good work that you have designed for me to participate in and do. That I would live seeking you with all my heart, all my strength.

All my soul.

Jesus told us we are to love the Lord your God with all your heart all your mind all your soul all your strength with Everything you love him you love him When you love somebody you are thinking about how to please them how to care for them how to serve them Their priority is your priority. You know this if you’re a parent You love your child

You want to give them everything you can possibly give them, but you know that comes through serving them. You sacrifice for them. You give everything for them. You protect them. You feed them. You watch over them. You give gifts to them. You care about them. You’re looking at a future. You’re looking at what’s out there. What do I need to help them to prepare them? You’re preparing them. There’s so much giving and serving that goes into loving.

But are we doing that for God? I mean, how many actually pay their tithe to care for his house?

Jaime Luce (36:11.096)
That’s why I liked the story of Harry Houdini, because when he came back home after his runaway for a year, he then began working to take care and support his family.

When you have come to a place, we’re gonna read this in a moment, when you come to a true place of repentance for where your heart has wandered.

He went into a far country. If you feel far away, if your heart without you realizing it has wandered away. I mean, we think how does the wandering happen? The wandering happens so often because we allow our wonderings, our thought life to take us into other places.

that we begin allowing our thoughts to be consumed with other matters, other things, other people, other places, other desires, other goals. And we just start wandering. We allow the wonderings to cause us to wander from the house, wander away from the presence of God.

Wander away from being right under his instruction, right under his teaching, right under his authority and his commands, right under his protection. We just begin to wander.

Jaime Luce (37:51.608)
We make demands, we wander away. And when we get far away, we begin to forget the way we were called to live. We begin to join ourselves to people in a far country and we join ourselves to customs and ways and things that we once kept ourselves from.

what we used to think was unclean or unholy. We might now have our hands in that mess and now we’re covered in it and we’re dirty and we’re wishing that we could be fed by what’s feeding this ugly thing just to satisfy the hunger and the starving place that we have found ourselves in that we were just so hungry and we don’t have anything to eat. And we’re at a place where no one

gives us anything. No one’s giving us anything. That unclean thing doesn’t feed us anymore. That riotous living isn’t fun anymore. And this faraway place seems so far away from home and it’s lonely and it’s dry and it’s in famine and it’s not doing anything for me. It just left me desolate.

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Verse 17.

But when he came to himself, he said, how many of my father’s hired servants have bread enough and to spare, and I perish with hunger.

I will arise and go to my Father and I will say to Him, Father, I have sinned against heaven and before you and I am no longer worthy to be called your son. I’ve lived so ungodly. I haven’t been doing anything that you’ve asked me to do. I haven’t done what you’ve taught me.

I’ve just ignored it. I’ve just acted like it wasn’t. I wanted no part of it. I wanted out from underneath the covering and underneath the eye of those who might be watching, who might bring conviction into my life. And I’ve run away from that safe, protected place. I’m no longer worthy to be called your son. I don’t look like a Christian. I don’t sound like a Christian. I don’t act like a Christian. I don’t talk like a Christian. I’m not really a Christian.

away.

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Make me like one of your hired servants. Just somebody that you let me come in and you just pay me for the work that I do and I’ll just take that and that’ll satisfy me. I just need a little bit so I can eat.

and he arose and came to his father. But when he was still a great way off, his father saw him and had compassion and ran and fell on his neck and kissed him.

and his son said to him, father, I have sinned against heaven and in your sight and I am no longer worthy to be called your son. Do you see his humility? Instead of his demanding from God, instead of him saying, I don’t like this about the way the church does it and I don’t like what that person said and I don’t like the way that they just.

are always telling me, I need to change the way I do this, or I just think that the Bible is judgmental and these people are just too judgy. and I, you know, I don’t like those songs that they sing and I would, I think I need to do things differently. And why aren’t they doing it this way? Instead of making all the demands and the pride of thinking that you know better than God how to care for you. You know, that’s why the scripture teaches us that the,

Clay cannot say to the one, the potter who’s made it, you messed up. You didn’t do this right. The created doesn’t get to tell the creator that he’s wrong in the beautiful creation that he’s making.

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And yet this boy came to himself. He finally saw his father for the wonderful father and covering and provider that he was. And he’s humbled himself and he says, not even worthy father.

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But the father said to his servant, bring out the best robe and put it on him and put a ring on his hand and sandals on his feet.

You know, this is a beautiful picture of body ministry. We run and we cover one another. When someone comes home and they’ve been gone a long time, don’t judge them for the wrong. They know they did wrong. If they’ve come home, wrap them up. Love them. Tell them God’s got a plan still for you and we rejoice that you have come home.

Do you realize before the son could even get out all that he had planned to say the father was already hugging him, loving him, kissing him and sending his servant to bring out the best robe. He sent his servant. We are his servants. We are his servants. We are to go get the robe and clothe them. We are to provide for them. We are to cover them. We are to love them. Put the ring on their finger. Put the shoes on their feet.

and bring the fatted calf here and kill it and let us eat and be merry for this son was dead. I mean, there’s the truth. There’s the spike boy. There’s the sword going right to the heart of the matter, the two-edged sword. He’s allowing us to see my son wasn’t just lost.

The rebelliousness he was living in, he was dead.

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For the longest time, he still thought he was the son of the father. He didn’t realize he wasn’t even really being a son to him until he came to himself. He was dead. But this, my son, was dead. And now he is alive again. He’s born again. My son is alive again. The Spirit of God has regenerated this in him and brought him back to life.

Again, resurrection power has been poured out in his spirit and he is alive again. He was lost and now he is found.

What’s interesting folks is that the rebellious heart, we don’t see the father go chase him down.

In the first two parables we saw that those things were truly lost and the person whose those things belong to, it was his responsibility to go out and find those things. But here we have a son who was in the house and he was rebellious and he has left the house and the father didn’t chase him down. The son knew

about the father knew where the house was. Is this a different kind of lost? This is the wandering off. This is the leaving the house. This is coming out from under authority and out from underneath someone else’s protection. This is not wanting to be accountable. This is wanting to do what you want and not recognizing that you are lost, that that is

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you are choosing to not be in the house of God, not be joined to the father, not be a Christian. You cannot live your life outside of the body. Be cut off from the body. The scripture tells us that we are a body. And if you are cut off from the body, you will die. You will die. It hurts us, the body, but you will die.

You are the limb that is cut off. You are the digit that is cut off. You are the part that is removed. You’re cut off. You will die. You have to be a part of the body to live.

If COVID or any of the other shenanigans of the last several years, of the last 10 years, of anything that has gone on in the church, if you have come out from underneath a body of believers, out from underneath authority where there is a shepherd who is accountable for your soul, my friend, you have to consider you are not living biblically. That is not what the Bible teaches.

It says, do not forsake the assembling of yourselves together. is for your protection. It is for your nurturing. is for your, for your blessing to cover you, to, to rejoice with you, to pray with you when you are sick, to have hands laid on you so that you can recover. You need to be in the house. You need to humble yourself. If you don’t like authority, you need to humble yourself.

You need to humble yourself.

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You don’t have all the answers. What you know eventually will run out. What you have will eventually lead to desolation in your life. It will leave you in want.

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Come back to the house. And if it’s not you, if you’re in the house, praise God. But if you have a child or you know someone who is outside of the house, my friend, I am giving you a ton of stuff to pray for. I’m telling you what to pray for.

We have to pray about their attitudes. We have to pray that they come to themselves. We have to pray that they recognize that they are no longer in a place of provision that it was better for them to be in the house that they realize if they need be to be in a place of famine that God will take them to a place that they become so in want and they recognize the lie that the that the enemy has sold them and that they bought it hook line and sinker they bit the carrot they took the hook and now they are living

And it is depleting them. is robbing from them that they would see their condition and recognize it wasn’t this way in my father’s house. And it’s so much better in my father’s house. You have so many for their wanderings, their mental health, their thinking, you can be praying about all of these things. And you can get with the body and ask the body to pray with you. Use the body. Be a part of the body.

Don’t allow your fears and your wonderings to take your mind away from faith. Don’t let your wonderings take you into a place of fear and paralyzation. Let your wonderings be about the wonder of God, how wonderful he is, how beyond imagined and power that he is, beyond knowing, beyond.

His creativity and his ability to reach out and go get the lost is unmatched.

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that he can cause a severe famine to come in the land. He can cause a mind to begin to see and recognize truth from a lie.

This, we belong in the house. We belong as part of the body.

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My son who was dead is now alive again and he was lost and is found and they began to make merry, to rejoice, to have joy again, to be full of happiness and joy, satisfaction and peace.

And now there’s another kind of lost. There is a second category of lost.

And this might be you. This has been me sometimes. If I’m honest with you, I have been this second category of lost before. I have been there.

Verse 25, now his older son was in the field. And as he came and drew near to the house, he heard music and dancing. So he called one of the servants and asked what these things meant. And he said to him, your brother has come. And because he has received him safe and sound, your father has killed the fatted calf. But he was angry and would not go in.

Therefore his father came out and pleaded with him. Now he was in the house. He had never left the house. But he is very angry and bitter and resentful for his brother. Now it doesn’t mean that he didn’t have a reason to be resentful and angry.

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His brother showed no regard for the father and no regard for the brother and no regard for the home and all the things that they had built. And he took and demanded his portion and left with no regard about the relationship that he left, the friendship of his brother and the fellowship of his brother and his father, no regard for their relationship. He didn’t care about them anymore. Showed no respect for them. Showed no care at all, no love, no…

No regard for them.

So he had reasons to be upset.

but he can no longer consider that he had the same heart as the father because his love for his brother stopped short with his disappointment in his brother. I will love you as long as you don’t disappoint me. I will be joined to you as long as you do things the way I think they should be done.

Now who has pride? Now who thinks he knows better? The one who’s in the house. The one who’s critical in the house, always critical in the house. Faithful to the house of God, but critical. The older brother’s resentment represents that phariseeical spirit, Jesus was talking to Pharisees who could hear this, their lack of love, their lack of mercy, and that they were highlighting the fact

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that being faithful, which we think is the prize to be the faithful son, the faithful servant, they were faithful but without love, which is a form of being lost. Now this lost, we see the father pleads with him. He pleads with him. It’s just like the lost coin and the lost sheep. He goes out.

and he pleads with him to come in.

So he answered and said to his father, lo, these many years I have been serving you. I never transgressed your commandment at any time, and yet you never gave me a young goat. That I might make merry with my friends. Well then a real spirit begins to come out and show itself.

that this person was faithfully serving, but they were serving for their own purpose. And the longer they served, the more resentful they got because they felt they should have been recognized for their service. They weren’t serving out of love just to serve. He wasn’t serving his father simply because he loved his father. He was serving wanting recognition and he was feeling slighted.

and he was feeling like he should have had more than what was given to him and that he should have been able to have more blessings from God, that he didn’t get more blessings from the Father.

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That’s the very same lie and the same pride that Satan used when speaking to Adam and Eve. God’s holding out on you. God’s holding out. He gave you all this, sure, but this thing over here, he’s holding out on you. Did God really say, is God really for you? Does he really care about you?

You really want what you aren’t getting. You really want this fruit from this tree. This is what you really want. And if you really had this, that would make you truly, you’re the one. You’ll get the recognition. I mean, it’s pride all over it. Satan’s trick every time. Pride. Whether your pride is the arrogance and foolishness of the younger son.

Or it’s the pride of the elder brother.

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But as soon as this son of yours, he didn’t even call him his brother. He wouldn’t even acknowledge that the younger brother was attached to him. This son of yours blaming the other Christians, your people. How many times have we heard that? You Christians. But as soon as this son of yours came, who has devoured your livelihood.

He squandered everything you gave him, every blessing you gave him. He wasted it. And he did. He did. The wandering young son did. He wasted his gifts and talents that God had given him. He wasted all the goods and the blessing and all the bounty of being a saved son. He wasted it all.

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when he had devoured your livelihood with harlots, you killed the fatted calf for him.

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Verse 31, and he said to him, son, you are always with me.

and all that I have is yours. I mean, he’s trying to correct his thinking. You’re believing you don’t have. You’re right here with everything that I have to give. You are right here. You’re right here. It’s all right here. You’re not missing out on anything. Everything is available to you. This was a heart issue. This wasn’t what he had at his disposal.

This was a heart issue.

Everything I have is yours. It was right that we should make Mary and be glad for your brother was dead and is alive. He’s trying to show his son, you don’t have a right understanding, a right heart about what’s dead or what’s alive. You don’t understand, you don’t have discernment here.

You don’t have a right understanding of how this works. You don’t have my heart. My heart is that people go from death to life. That my mission is to bring them back from the dead. This is my mission. This is why Jesus came. If we don’t have that heart about being a part of the body, we’ve got a wrong agenda. We’ve got a wrong goal. Got a wrong mission. We’re not on his mission. We’re on our mission. We’re on a mission we think

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is righteous. What we think is is righteous. We need to be on his mission.

He was dead and is alive again. It was lost and is found.

Folks, we have got to be.

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We’ve got to be honest with ourselves about where we are. And if you’re in the house, praise God. Praise God if you’re in the house. If you’re not in the house, come back.

house come back I don’t care what you’ve done I don’t care how bad it was I don’t care how many lives were destroyed come back to the father’s house

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And if you are in the house.

if you have never left.

that I’m asking that you examine your heart toward God’s people, towards his house. Do you want what he wants? Do you love like he loves? Are you willing to rejoice over what he rejoices over? Or are you critical? Are you demanding in the house? Are you resentful? Are you angry in the house?

No matter where we are, folks, we have got to come to the place that we humble ourselves. We stop our wondering. We stop wandering. We humble ourselves. We repent before Him. We rejoin the fellowship and rejoice with the Father.

Let’s serve the Father with all our heart, all our soul, all our mind, all our strength. That’s the first commandment. And the second is to love your neighbor as yourself. What are you concerned about for yourself? What are the ways and the things that you are concerned about right now for yourself?

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Be those kinds of concerns. Have those kinds of concerns. Be that concerned about those very things for your neighbor. I was thanking the Lord this morning. I was so overwhelmed and blessed.

I was very fortunate. know this is not very many people’s testimony, but this is my testimony. And I really think this is my testimony because the Lord knew I was so weak. I was so, I was so weak. was the least because I was raised in a godly home. My mother taught me it’s she is to

She gets the credit. She taught me the first commandment. I mean, she lives it to this day with all of her mind, all of her soul, all her strength, all her might, all of her mind. You serve God at any cost and you serve him with everything you’ve got. That was poured into me by my

But I was so fortunate because my dad, he is the one who taught me love your neighbor as yourself. You love your neighbor. You give for your neighbor. You’re concerned about your neighbor. You cover your neighbor. You show mercy to your neighbor. If you can, you provide for your neighbor.

I literally was overwhelmed by the goodness of God in prayer that He gave me the two of the most incredible teachers to understand the two that all the law and all the prophets all the commandments they all rest on those two commandments. Love the Lord your God and you love your name.

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I was raised with that.

And yet I realize there are those, whether in this country or the countries of this world.

There are people who that are so precious, who serve God with every bit of their strength, every bit of their mind, their heart, their soul, their strength, just to survive. They don’t live in a blessed nation with godly parents and protection and care and provision. They don’t live

in the blessing that the United States and the people of the United States better be very careful because we have squandered what we were given. We have squandered. We have squandered it away on such an excessive level that if we’re not careful, we are going to be in desperate want. And it will come like a thief in the night against us. We have got to be ready for the second coming of Jesus Christ.

There are those who sacrifice life and limb for the gospel of Jesus Christ all over this world. They are his prize, strong ones. They are the ones who are, they’re so godly, so holy, and they have so little, if anything,

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Wow, are they precious in his sight. Wow, they’re worth. I am not worthy, God. We have got to recognize we are not worthy, but he was so merciful to us. He was so merciful to me.

And if you’re willing to accept it, he will be so merciful to you.

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so grateful for what I have. And I can only hope to spend my life the best that I can with all that I have. To live this life, to grow his kingdom, and to make him pleased. To build and take care of his house. It is the highest calling.

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hope you can hear my heart today. Come back from your wanderings. Come back from your faraway places. Come home. Come home to the Father. And if you’re at home already, love your neighbor. Forgive people. Forgive. Forgive them. You’re right, they did do wrong. They are guilty. But my friend, without the forgiveness of Jesus Christ, you are no better.

We have to forgive those who have wronged us.

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Our Father, who art in heaven.

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Thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread and forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who have trespassed against us. Lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil.

For thine is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever.

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I pray so strongly that this has ministered to your heart.

and that you will do your part as the body.

If you don’t know what to say, share this message. Just share this message. Say, this blessed me and I just want to bless you with it. If you need to call somebody, if you need to repent for something, if you need to go somewhere and make something right, do it. Do it today.

Let’s be the body. Let’s work on bringing the lost into the self, the saving grace of Jesus Christ. Let’s bring them all back home. Let’s clothe them and feed them. Let’s throw a feast. Let’s celebrate.

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Thank you so much for taking time with me today. truly am praying that, I’m praying for you, I’m praying that you have what you need, that you find what you need in the body of Christ, that you are blessed beyond measure with all that the Lord has provided for us, and that you are fed today and sustained by the bread of life himself.

I’d love to see you and hear from you. I’ll see you next week, but hear from you. If you have any prayer requests, if you have any praise reports, I want to rejoice with you, or I want to pray with you. You can reach me by sending me an email at mail at jaimeluce.com or you can go to my website and find all the information there. That’s jaimeluce.com. Thank you again for taking time in the word today. I love you, my friends. Stay strong in the word, stay strong in the Lord. We’ll see you next time. Bye bye.