Sermon - The Prodigal Son
Remembrance Day talk 2004 �The prodigal son� Luke 15:11-32
(Sunday 14th November 2004)
Last weekend, this weekend and the next two weekends, have been designated by a branch of the Christian church through a series of meetings called �Bringing Home the Prodigals� as a time to pray for all those who once held a Christian faith, whether, family or friends, who have now left that faith, who have wandered away into the world and in some cases have become tragically and deeply entangled in the evils of this present age; some even, who have not contacted home for many a month or year, homes where the sadness of that loss is never far from a parents heart. Some may even have been damaged by church life, by so-called Christians who have voiced unloving comments, or shown a lack of loving understanding. The names of these prodigals were written down and placed at the foot of a cross at each meeting whilst prayers were offered up for them; tears flowed freely as hearts were breaking before the Saviour of the world.
The parable of the prodigal that we read earlier can find its modern parallel in many a home around the world, but for many there have not been, and may never be, such a happy ending as the biblical story Jesus told! In many homes, hearts are breaking whilst they wait for news of a loved one, or tears are being shed over someone who will never come home, like the soldiers of the Black Watch regiment and others recently killed in
The evil in the world that has drawn those loved ones away or damaged their lives, is always ready to show itself in one way or another, and has caused many to give up their faith in God and Jesus Christ.
We live in a land, where generally, Christ is not wanted, not wanted in our schools, in our homes, in our lives; we do not want God too close as we prefer to do or say the things he dislikes for he is a holy God. Yet when tragedy strikes and wars increase, and suffering comes, we cry out and blame God, we say �where is God in all of this? There cannot be a God�. Every day we reject him we are pushing his hand of protection away. Is it not surprising that things are getting worse rather than better in our nation, and in our world. In reality, wars and suffering are not decreasing, but increasing; yet through the pain and suffering, a loving caring God is knocking at the door of our lives to say there is a better way, a way of hope, a way of joy and peace that is obtainable through faith that is strong in Jesus Christ his Son. Deep inside us all there is an inner voice crying out to know and experience God in our lives; as St Augustine reminds us in his prayer, ��because you made us for yourself, our hearts find no peace until they rest in you.�
The Bible tells us there is a new world soon to appear that will not have wars and suffering, it is not a pipe dream, its not a myth, its not part of a fairytale, it is a basic belief of the Christian faith; it will be a world where there will be no hunger, no pain, no sickness, no suffering, no tears and no death. This will happen when Jesus Christ returns, and soon he will, to a world where many have rejected him, but many are waiting with joy to see him, for in him they have placed their hope and trust.
Remembrance day is a day to reflect and give thanks for those who gave their lives in two Worlds wars, and other wars since, and in places like
The children of Beslan being one such group in our time where many young lives were lost only a few weeks ago. Yet it is not enough to just remember the sacrifices many have made of their lives, for their sacrifice to mean anything, it must lead to change, it must lead to us standing up and being counted among those who are prepared to voice our demand for a better way, it must lead to us being determined, in God�s strength, to live at peace with each other as much as it is possible for us to do so! There must be personal and social change that will create a world as close as possible to the
Many stories of wartime bravery and senseless tragic death can be told from the histories of wars this world has seen. There is the story that I read about this week of some of the towns and villages of North East France, where during the two world wars the enemy treated those places as their soil, soil that had been reclaimed rather than occupied territory. The residents were considered German, the young men forced into the German army. For years after the war and even still today there has been terrible anguish among the population of those towns and villages about their experience, about the fact that the lives that were lost from their communities had been taken to defend a country they did not consider their own, to fight a cause which they did not believe in, and eventually to be numbered among the troops of a defeated army.
In
The greatest war the world has ever known, and the greatest love sacrifice and bravery that was ever recorded in a war, led to a young mans death to secure a much more important freedom for mankind. It was not a tragedy, but a deliberate act of love! I speak of course of Jesus Christ who loved the world. He fought head on with mankind�s enemies and vanquished them for all time by his own death on a cruel cross some 2000 years ago. The Bible says he led those dark forces as �prisoners in his victory procession�, all this, that we might know freedom from that which separates us from the creator of all things, sin and its power.
Let me tell you the story of a 20th Century prodigal, an ordinary man who was in the services in the last World War of, who lived and died an ordinary life, a man unknown by the world and known only to his circle of family and friends like millions of others; yet a man loved like all others by God.
He left home at the age of 19 and as a volunteer he joined the Royal Navy; the year was 1941. As an ordinary seaman and gunner he sailed away into war. Life was never easy, especially later on convoy duty in the North Sea and Atlantic. He served on various ships like HMS Norfolk that shadowed the Bismark in the days just prior to her sinking. He became interested in radar and later served in that area on board other ships. He went to the USA, I believe for further training. On this visit he became seriously ill, and during his recovery he came under the preaching of the Gospel, possibly from a very young Billy Graham.
Later he was baptised in a large Baptist Church in Boston, but life on board ship, and war, soon stole away his faith, like the birds in the story Jesus told of the sower sowing his seeds in his field. He became a prodigal!
On leaving the Royal Navy he settled into ordinary life again. He could not afford further training in radar although offered the chance with a leading company of the day. He went back to his porter�s job on British rail where over the years he progressed to a station Forman. He married and had two children, but there was always something missing in his life, he was restless. He had found peace within through faith in Christ and lost it. An emptiness, which had been filled, was empty again. After his death letters were found stuffed up a chimney breast, they were sad letters, writings from his empty heart and from his empty past never sent and long forgotten in their hiding place. His family never knew of the faith he once had, although at times it would show itself when he could be heard singing or humming to himself the old time song, �The Old Rugged cross� or encouraging his children to go to Sunday School at the local Methodist church.
He found life as most of us do very hard at times, broken only by the affordable days out to the coast with his family. He found expressing his love for them difficult, maybe because of his difficult youth spent in the harsh reality of war. He was scarred on the inside as so many are by life, yet he, although not able to say, wanted to be loved by all, he wanted to be everybody�s friend.
He lived an ordinary life during which he worked hard and sacrificed much for his family. At the age of 40 he had his first heart attack.
Over the next ten years he suffered further attacks until things came to head in his fiftieth year in 1972. At home, and on his sickbed, with a heart now in such a serious condition it was beyond surgery, a local Baptist minister visited him.
That pastor drew out of him his life�s story, which covered his conversion in America. On his sickbed, soon to be his deathbed, this prodigal came home! He found forgiveness; he found the peace long lost and the love of a heavenly Father once again. He found peace and a sure hope of a better life to come! He put aside his doubts and questions, laid them at the feet of Jesus Christ his friend and Saviour. Gone was his emptiness, Jesus had filled his heart with his presence.
From this moment on his bible never left the room but lay on the side table close by. The room was filled with the awful smell of sickness for he was being sick several times a day, yet he kept commenting on the sweet and most pleasant smell he was aware of around him all the time a fragrance unnoticed by everyone else who came into his room. Somehow this smell comforted him, and later his family came to realise that God had given him during his last days a tangible awareness of his presence with him, for the bible speaks of the fragrance of Christ. The apostle Paul writes, �We are the aroma of Christ to God�� (Corinthians 2:15.)
He died a few days later in peace. He now waits with all the other saints of God in paradise to return to this world with Christ on the day of his returning, which I believe is soon! I know this story of a modern day prodigal is true, because that prodigal was my father!
Rightly, today, we remember those who sacrificed their lives in war, but it is also a time to remember the love of God that lay behind our deliverance, who worked with his unseen hands in answer to many a prayer during those dark days to bring us victory and the freedom we enjoy today.
It is a good day to remember we have all been prodigals at some time or other, our faith shaken by the evil and suffering in our world; maybe there is a prodigal here today in this service. Its time to come home to faith again; time to put aside our questions, our anger, and our foolish ways, its time to come to our senses and ask forgiveness like the prodigal in the story; to fall into the arms of Almighty God, who �so loved the world (You) he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him may not die but have everlasting life.�
God the Father waits to welcome us back, indeed he is running towards us now with open arms like the father in the story Jesus told. To think that God runs to us as we return, and yet he is Almighty and the creator of all things; it is too amazing to fully grasp! Such is his love for us!
I pray that if anyone here is a prodigal, and you cannot find it in yourself to come home to God today, that God will grant you grace to remember him in your last moments like my father, so that you may not be numbered among the eternally lost, but the eternally saved at the end of the age when God makes all things new and peace through Christ our Lord. Amen.
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