{"id":3468,"date":"2021-06-05T16:47:17","date_gmt":"2021-06-05T16:47:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/christforus.org\/NewSite\/?p=3468"},"modified":"2021-06-05T16:47:17","modified_gmt":"2021-06-05T16:47:17","slug":"fathers-day","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/christforus.org\/NewSite\/index.php\/2021\/06\/05\/fathers-day\/","title":{"rendered":"Father\u2019s Day"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<figure class=\"wp-block-table\"><table><tbody><tr><td><strong>Trinity Three Sermon| <strong>Rolf D. Preus<\/strong><\/strong>| <strong>June 17, 2018| Luke 15:11-32<\/strong><\/td><\/tr><\/tbody><\/table><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-audio\"><audio controls src=\"https:\/\/christforus.org\/NewSite\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/06\/cfus-062418.mp3\"><\/audio><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>Jesus continued: \u201cThere was a man who had two sons.&nbsp; The younger one said to his father, \u2018Father, give me my share of the estate.\u2019 So he divided his property between them.&nbsp; Not long after that, the younger son got together all he had, set off for a distant country and there squandered his wealth in wild living.&nbsp; After he had spent everything, there was a severe famine in that whole country, and he began to be in need. So he went and hired himself out to a citizen of that country, who sent him to his fields to feed pigs. <sup>&nbsp;<\/sup>He longed to fill his stomach with the pods that the pigs were eating, but no one gave him anything.&nbsp; When he came to his senses, he said, \u2018How many of my father\u2019s hired servants have food to spare, and here I am starving to death! <sup>&nbsp;<\/sup>I will set out and go back to my father and say to him: Father, I have sinned against heaven and against you. <sup>&nbsp;<\/sup>I am no longer worthy to be called your son; make me like one of your hired servants.\u2019 <sup>&nbsp;<\/sup>So he got up and went to his father.&nbsp; But while he was still a long way off, his father saw him and was filled with compassion for him; he ran to his son, threw his arms around him and kissed him.&nbsp; The son said to him, \u2018Father, I have sinned against heaven and against you. I am no longer worthy to be called your son.\u2019&nbsp; But the father said to his servants, \u2018Quick! Bring the best robe and put it on him. Put a ring on his finger and sandals on his feet.&nbsp; Bring the fattened calf and kill it. Let\u2019s have a feast and celebrate.&nbsp; For this son of mine was dead and is alive again; he was lost and is found.\u2019 So they began to celebrate.&nbsp; Meanwhile, the older son was in the field. When he came near the house, he heard music and dancing.&nbsp; So he called one of the servants and asked him what was going on.&nbsp; \u2018Your brother has come,\u2019 he replied, \u2018and your father has killed the fattened calf because he has him back safe and sound.\u2019&nbsp; The older brother became angry and refused to go in. So his father went out and pleaded with him.&nbsp; But he answered his father, \u2018Look! All these years I\u2019ve been slaving for you and never disobeyed your orders. Yet you never gave me even a young goat so I could celebrate with my friends.&nbsp; But when this son of yours who has squandered your property with prostitutes comes home, you kill the fattened calf for him!\u2019&nbsp; \u2018My son,\u2019 the father said, \u2018you are always with me, and everything I have is yours.&nbsp; But we had to celebrate and be glad, because this brother of yours was dead and is alive again; he was lost and is found.\u2019\u201d Luke 15:11-32<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Today is Father\u2019s Day.&nbsp; It is appropriate that we read and discuss this story Jesus told about a father and his two sons.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Last week it was my privilege to be interviewed on a radio program called Issues, Etc.&nbsp; The topic was patriarchy.&nbsp; The word patriarchy means the rule of fathers.&nbsp; If you have ever run across this word, the chances are that it was used in a negative way.&nbsp; Patriarchy is supposedly sexist, misogynistic, mean, abusive, and a few other bad things as well.&nbsp; Those who attack patriarchy claim that only when we are rid of the distinctions between men and women, especially the outdated notion that a father is the head of the home, will we be free from abuse, repression, and inequality.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Now it is true that there are vicious and cruel patriarchies all over the world.&nbsp; Wherever Islam has been imposed on a people, the women have suffered.&nbsp; But the Christian teaching about patriarchy is shaped by the gospel.&nbsp; The gospel of God\u2019s undeserved kindness toward unworthy sinners is beautifully pictured for us in the story of the prodigal son.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The man has two sons.&nbsp; The first son treats him with disdain.&nbsp; He demands his inheritance.&nbsp; Now you don\u2019t get your inheritance until the one from whom you receive it is dead.&nbsp; That\u2019s the way it works.&nbsp; So, when the son demands his inheritance it is as if he is telling his father to drop dead.&nbsp; The young man wants his father\u2019s wealth, but he doesn\u2019t want his father.&nbsp; And so it is with those who want the blessings God gives, but would rather run away from God than to run to him.&nbsp; They inevitably abuse the gifts God gives them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The boy\u2019s wealth did not last long.&nbsp; He lived to please himself and eventually found himself broke.&nbsp; The only job he could find was as demeaning a job as there could be: to feed pigs, an unclean animal.&nbsp; He was so desperate, so hungry, that he would gladly have eaten the pigs\u2019 food.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Then he remembers.&nbsp; He remembers his father.&nbsp; This young man is a picture of a Christian who has fallen away from the faith and is on his road back to the faith.&nbsp; He\u2019s not quite there yet.&nbsp; He recognizes his sin.&nbsp; He knows he is to blame for the mess he made of his life and that he doesn\u2019t deserve anything good from his father.&nbsp; He resolves to confess his sin to his father.&nbsp; He knows that his father is full of mercy.&nbsp; That\u2019s why he has the courage to return to him.&nbsp; He knows his father will provide for his needs.&nbsp; He rightly figures that his father\u2019s servants are better off than he is, with plenty to eat.&nbsp; What he doesn\u2019t quite understand, however, is the depth of his father\u2019s love.&nbsp; He is willing to be a servant.&nbsp; He will not claim the right of a son.&nbsp; He is too ashamed to ask for it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>But look at his father\u2019s love!&nbsp; He sees him coming.&nbsp; He\u2019s been waiting for him.&nbsp; He runs out to meet him.&nbsp; He kisses him.&nbsp; The son begins to make his confession.&nbsp; He confesses his sin.&nbsp; He confesses he is not worthy to be called his son.&nbsp; But before he can ask to be made a servant \u2013 which was all he could have hoped for \u2013 his father treats him as a son.&nbsp; He puts the best robe on him, a ring on his finger, and sandals for his feet, and kills the fattened calf to prepare a feast and throw a party to celebrate his lost son\u2019s return.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>This is the Father\u2019s love.&nbsp; If you are the sinner who has seen his own wretchedness, the depth of his guilt, and his utter unworthiness, this love is the most wonderful thing in the world.&nbsp; You offended and despised your father.&nbsp; You dismissed his law and scorned his teaching.&nbsp; You traded off his love for selfish pleasures.&nbsp; All you can offer him is your guilt and unworthiness.&nbsp; What does he do?&nbsp; He receives you back.&nbsp; He doesn\u2019t scold you.&nbsp; He doesn\u2019t put you on trial.&nbsp; He doesn\u2019t make you prove yourself worthy.&nbsp; What a wonder!&nbsp; Who can understand such a love?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The older son didn\u2019t understand it.&nbsp; He resented it.&nbsp; He thought it was wrong.&nbsp; He was angry.&nbsp; He thought his father was unfair.&nbsp; He won\u2019t call his brother his brother.&nbsp; His father refers to him as \u201cyour brother,\u201d but the older son, speaking to his father, calls him \u201cthis son of yours.\u201d&nbsp; What is unfair?&nbsp; The older son had been slaving away under the father\u2019s authority and had been given nothing for his efforts, while the younger son had been living an irresponsible life of blatant disobedience to his father and he was being treated better!<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The father\u2019s appeal to the older son is an appeal to love.&nbsp; Can\u2019t you see?&nbsp; Your brother was dead.&nbsp; Now, he\u2019s alive.&nbsp; He was lost.&nbsp; Now, he\u2019s found.&nbsp; How can we not celebrate when a sinner repents of his sin?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The older son despised God\u2019s grace.&nbsp; He saw it as license to sin.&nbsp; He saw God\u2019s law as a burden to be borne.&nbsp; And he bore it.&nbsp; He was living under the law; not under grace.&nbsp; In a sense, both brothers were suffering from the same thing.&nbsp; The younger brother left his father by disdaining his law and trampling it under foot.&nbsp; He couldn\u2019t get rid of the law, however.&nbsp; It convicted him as guilty and unworthy.&nbsp; The older brother looked at his obedience to the father\u2019s law as the means of obtaining status in the family.&nbsp; That left him embittered and disillusioned.&nbsp; Those who reject God\u2019s law, feed their flesh, and refuse to repent of their sin are outside of the father\u2019s love.&nbsp; Those who rely on their obedience to God\u2019s law and slave away under it are likewise outside of the father\u2019s love.&nbsp; The father\u2019s love is there where there is no repentance.&nbsp; But no one can know this love or receive this love except through repentance.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Father\u2019s Day could just be a way for merchants to make money selling stuff.&nbsp; Or, we could regard it as an opportunity to reaffirm what a true, genuinely Christian, patriarchy is all about.&nbsp; Obviously, if the father is the head of the home the children are required to obey him.&nbsp; His wife, the mother of the children, is to submit to him.&nbsp; In this way she teaches the children respect.&nbsp; But if Christ, who is the father in this parable, is to teach us Christian fathers how to be fathers, we must listen to this story, paying close attention to the father\u2019s behavior.&nbsp; As we do, we learn three things that God would have us know about godly patriarchy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>First, the father doesn\u2019t excuse the prodigal son\u2019s sins.&nbsp; Neither should we.&nbsp; It isn\u2019t fatherly love to excuse our children\u2019s sins and to redefine sin so that our children will no longer be guilty of it.&nbsp; Nowhere in this parable do you see a hint of the father condoning the younger son\u2019s sinful conduct.&nbsp; In fact, he said that this boy was dead.&nbsp; He was lost.&nbsp; That\u2019s the father\u2019s view of sin.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Second, the most important authority of the father is the authority of the gospel.&nbsp; How was the prodigal restored as a son?&nbsp; If he had had his way, he wouldn\u2019t have been a son, but only a servant.&nbsp; He was restored by the grace of the father.&nbsp; The father covered up the son\u2019s sins, not by excusing them, but by forgiving them.&nbsp; He forgave without requiring any payment.&nbsp; The Christian father looks to Jesus and sees him pay the payment for sin on the cross.&nbsp; He shares that forgiveness with his family.&nbsp; He insists that that forgiveness is the final word.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>This brings us to the third lesson this story teaches us about Christian fatherhood.&nbsp; Christian fathers teach their children to love each other.&nbsp; We regard one another, not as servants under trial, or sinners to be judged, but as saints.&nbsp; We were walking the walk to death and damnation.&nbsp; Left to our own devises, we would be bound in the chains of sin and death.&nbsp; But God saw our misery, had mercy on us, forgave us, drew us back to him, converted us, and honored us.&nbsp; He put the best robe on us: the robe of Christ\u2019s blood-bought righteousness.&nbsp; This is how we treat one another.&nbsp; A son or daughter of God is a brother and a sister.&nbsp; Jesus says that what we do for one of the least of these, we do for him.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Christian patriarchy isn\u2019t men bullying their wives and children.&nbsp; It is Christian fathers imitating their Lord Jesus.&nbsp; They teach their families to find rest and peace in his wounds.&nbsp; Their homes are refuges for the lost.&nbsp; Forgiveness is given freely.&nbsp; It binds the family together in the unity of the Spirit and the bond of peace.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Amen&nbsp;<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Trinity Three Sermon| Rolf D. Preus| June 17, 2018| Luke 15:11-32 Jesus continued: \u201cThere was a man who had two sons.&nbsp; The younger one said to his father, \u2018Father, give me my share of the estate.\u2019 So he divided his property between them.&nbsp; Not long after that, the younger son got together all he&#8230;<\/p>\n<p class=\"read-more\"><a class=\"btn btn-default\" href=\"https:\/\/christforus.org\/NewSite\/index.php\/2021\/06\/05\/fathers-day\/\"> Read More<span class=\"screen-reader-text\">  Read More<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8,17,4,63],"tags":[529,238,206],"class_list":["post-3468","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-latest-sermons","category-sermons-by-historical-lectionary","category-sermons-by-rolf-preus","category-trinity-3","tag-luke-15","tag-rolf-preus","tag-trinity-3"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/christforus.org\/NewSite\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3468","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/christforus.org\/NewSite\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/christforus.org\/NewSite\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/christforus.org\/NewSite\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/christforus.org\/NewSite\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3468"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/christforus.org\/NewSite\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3468\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3470,"href":"https:\/\/christforus.org\/NewSite\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3468\/revisions\/3470"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/christforus.org\/NewSite\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3468"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/christforus.org\/NewSite\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3468"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/christforus.org\/NewSite\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3468"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}