You Are Invited

Key Elements

In Luke 15:25-32, Jesus continued the parable of the lost son emphasizing the father’s invitation to the older brother to join in the celebration of the younger brother’s return and his refusal to accept it.

Main Idea: The Gospel is God’s great invitation offered to every one of us—we can choose to embrace it and share in the joyful celebration of repentance, or reject it and remain trapped in pride and self-righteousness.

I want my audience to accept God’s great invitation and refuse to be held back by pride and self-righteousness.

Intro

Open your copy of God’s Word with me to Luke 15:25-32 again today.

Have you ever received an invitation to an event and you really didn’t want to go? I think we’ve all been there. And not because it had anything to do with the particular person who sent the invitation-it may be a time of year or a season of life where you were super busy and that event falls on a weekend you were looking to just do nothing. Or maybe you had planned something else, that you don’t have to do but you were really looking forward to doing and it’s on the same day. Or maybe in your mind, you think “they really don’t want me there, they just sent that invitation out of obligation.” So, you decide not to go. And later on, when the event is over, you hear about what you missed and you immediately regret it. (talk about a concert or a game where that happened)

And as we dive back into our story in Luke 15, continuing this sermon series The Great Invitation, the theme of invitation is what we see.

Just to catch us up from where we left off last week, Jesus is talking to a crowd full of all kinds of different people-people who would have been classified in all kinds of different categories. But they all share one common characteristic, they’re lost. Not that they are roaming around where no one can find them, no, they are lost spiritually. They are living their lives caught in the trap of sin having never surrendered their hearts and lives to Jesus as Savior and Lord. And so, Jesus begins to address their lostness through a series of stories about a lost sheep and a lost coin and a lost son. And in the story of the lost son, He talks about how this son comes to his father demanding his inheritance. The father gives it to him and he goes and spends it all. He hits rock bottom and decides to come home to his father to ask to be a servant and the father welcomes him home, overwhelmed with joy, and restores him as a son throwing him a party. The father overlooks all he has done because for him welcoming his lost son home means more than anything else.

This father throws a party and everyone is invited, it’s a celebration of his lost son coming home and everyone joins in the celebration except one. There is one who is refusing to celebrate, there is one who is refusing to rejoice with everyone else, there is one who is refusing the great invitation given by the father. And here’s the truth: this story isn’t just about this one who refused, it’s about all of us as well. Because God looks at all of us and says “You are invited...” You are invited to the celebration, you are invited to rejoice, you are invited to be a part of what I’m doing in the hearts and the lives of others. The question is “will we accept God’s invitation?” You see, the Gospel is God’s great invitation to us but we must choose to accept it and celebrate or reject it and remain on the outside.

Message

Which leads us to what Jesus is showing us in Luke 15:25-32 today: The Gospel is God’s great invitation offered to every one of us—we can choose to embrace it and share in the joyful celebration of repentance, or reject it and remain trapped in pride and self-righteousness.

Jesus’ story reminds us that God’s invitation isn’t just a distant offer — it’s deeply personal and calls for a response. As we look closely at our text today, we discover three powerful truths about what God is inviting each of us into.

1. God’s invitation calls us to celebrate His grace. (vs. 25-27)

Now, the first part of this story that we focused on last week and we just briefly summarized, sets up for where we are today. Remember, Jesus is addressing a crowd filled with spiritually lost people. In fact, Luke divides them into three categories for us at the beginning of the chapter: tax collectors, sinners, and Pharisees and scribes. When you look at the first two categories, you automatically think of these people as spiritually lost. I mean if there was anyone in the crowd that Jesus was identifying in these stories, it was them. If there was anybody in the crowd that would be represented by the lost son in this story, it’s the tax collectors and sinners. Which is probably what the pharisees and scribes were thinking. Jesus gets to vs. 24 where Jesus is describing the lost son coming home and the celebration that is happening and the pharisees and scribes think they’re off the hook. But Jesus continues in vs. 25… (read 25-27)

All of a sudden things get a little more interesting. Jesus at this point introduces another character to the story: the older brother. If the younger son represented the tax collectors and sinners in the crowd that day, the older son definitely represented the pharisees and the scribes. He is the one working. He is the one doing everything he’s is supposed to do. He is the one who is careful to follow the rules and make sure all he does is in line with his father’s wishes and his family’s needs. He’s never brought disgrace to his father or his family name and compared to his younger brother, seems perfect. And as he approaches the house, he notices that something’s going on. He hears music and dancing happening. This is not just a few friends and family members gathering with some snacks and a little music playing on the blue tooth speaker, no, the father has invited the entire village and brought in a band. He’s slaughtered the best cow they have and is cooking ribeye's and filet on the grill. This is a party and celebration at the highest level. And having been working in the field all day, he has no idea what’s going on. He has no idea the reason for the celebration. So, he calls to servant and inquires about what’s happening and the servant gives him the reason for the celebration: “Your younger brother has returned home!”

So, I want us to pause here for a moment before we begin to talk about the brother and I want us to notice what’s happening here. God has invited us all into the opportunity to celebrate the grace He offers to all of us. That’s what the great invitation of the Gospel of Jesus Christ calls us to, a celebration of His grace. A celebration of God’s undeserved blessing in all of our lives. A celebration that God does not give us what we deserve but grants us by His grace what we do not deserve. That He invites all of us to repent from the way we are living our lives and turn to Him in surrender of our hearts to Him as Savior and Lord. And to celebrate when others make that same decision as well. And to be honest, I don’t think we do that enough. In fact, I believe we sometimes think we deserve the grace of God in our lives. I think some times we get a little entitled when it comes to the grace of God in our lives and we have totally forgotten that God’s grace on us has nothing to do with us and everything to do with Jesus. You see, when we focus in on the grace of God in our lives, here’s what we realize...

a. Grace celebrated is joyful.

The father in this story has shown his younger son grace. He has welcomed him home and is so overwhelmed by the fact that his son has come home that he spares no expense to celebrate that. It’s the party of the year, the best of the best is put out because a son he thought was dead, that he thought he might not ever see again, has come home.

It’s what we talked about last week, it’s the perfect picture of repentance. It’s what happens in all of our lives when we turn from the way we are living and turn to Jesus, when we come home. And there is no greater cause for celebration the church should experience than that. There is no occasion that should be filled with greater joy than someone becoming a follower of Jesus surrendering to and experiencing the grace of God transforming their lives. This is what God has invited us into. You and I are invited by God to joyfully celebrate the grace of God in our lives and the lives of others. This isn’t something we can rush past or overlook, in fact, it confronts us with a question this morning we all have to answer: when someone experiences God’s grace in their lives, do we celebrate with heaven or are we a little resentful?

Grace celebrated is joyful. And...

b. Grace received is reconciliation.

We see joy and celebration but just as important, if not more important, we see reconciliation. The father is not just throwing a party because he is happy that his younger has come home, he is celebrating because his younger son has been reconciled back into the family. He is now a son again. The father could have easily said to him upon his return, “you can sleep in the servants’ quarters, you can work in the fields with the rest of the hired workers, I’ll pay you and treat like one of them.” But he doesn’t. He welcomes him home as family. When the older brother asks about what’s going on, the servant says “your brother is here and your father is throwing a party to celebrate.” Indicating this is a celebration that the family is whole again.

Again, it’s what God does for all of us when we repent and return to Him. By His grace He reconciles us back into His family. He holds nothing against us but reconciles us as His sons and daughters. When we come to Him in repentance and receive His grace, that grace looks like reconciliation and forgiveness. When we celebrate God’s grace in our lives and the lives of others, we celebrate forgiveness, we celebrate restoration, we celebrate coming from death to life, we celebrate the reconciliation that only comes through what Jesus did for us by dying on the cross. Because the Gospel is not about us earning God’s approval through any good or Godly thing we do, it’s about being welcomed home as family. Let us not miss the importance of celebrating the grace of God in our lives and let us not overlook the big deal that reconciliation is between us and God. Without it we are lost.

God invites us to celebrate His grace and grace received is reconciliation between us and our Heavenly Father.

Second,...

2. God’s invitation calls us to abandon our pride and self righteousness. (vs. 28-30)

So, I’m the type of person that doesn’t like to lose. In anything. It can be card games, video games, any type of sport. First of all, if I’m playing it and I’m not good at it or not catching on quickly, then I get frustrated because I feel stupid. But mainly it’s my pride that causes me to get frustrated because I don’t like to lose. So, lately, Kristi and I have started playing pickleball. It’s like ping pong only full size. And we have been playing for a few months now. It’s actually like playing tennis but with a lot more crazy rules. But it frustrates me, because just when I think I’m getting good at it, there’s a new rule that’s revealed. Like there’s this area of the court called “the kitchen.” And you have to stay out of “the kitchen.” If the ball doesn’t bounce in “the kitchen” then you can’t go into “the kitchen” and hit the ball. And I forget about this all the time. And so the other night we are playing and I’m actually doing pretty well for me. And I’m getting a little cocky and prideful. And in the middle of a point, I go to the net and I’m outside of “the kitchen” and I hit the ball over the net and score. And I’m like yes and I’m celebrating, getting a little (a lot) prideful and then they say “no good.” And I’m like “what?” And then they tell me that in the process of hitting the ball, I fell into “the kitchen.” And that’s a violation. Another dumb rule. And then I get frustrated and I can’t get serves in, I keep hitting the ball out. It just turns into a mess.

I think we all can relate to this struggle with pride and self righteousness. In fact, pride and self righteousness are at the core of most of the problems in our lives. When we have problems in relationships with other people, most of the time it’s because one or both people have too much pride to admit they’re wrong. When we are hypersensitive to what other’s say, it’s because of the pride in our lives. When there is any type of conflict in our lives, usually pride and self righteousness is the core issue.

And as we begin to specifically focus in on the older brother in this story, pride and self righteousness are front and center. The older brother comes in from working in the fields all day for his father and, after inquiring about the party, he finds out from one of his father’s servants that his younger brother has come home. Now, his reaction should have been joy. His reaction should have been celebration, but it’s not. His reaction is the exact opposite of what it should have been. Everyone else in the family, in the entire village, is celebrating the return of his younger brother but because of his pride and self righteousness, this older brother refuses to celebrate. He refuses to join in on what’s happening. His pride, self righteousness, and entitlement keep him from being a part of the party that the entire family is participating in. And in the immediate context of Jesus sharing this story with the crowd around Him, at this point He is zeroing in on the pharisees and the scribes, who were full of pride and self righteousness. These men who saw all of these people, these sinners, that they considered unworthy because of what they were doing and how they were living, repenting and following Jesus and instead of celebrating and rejoicing at lives being transformed, in that pride and self righteousness, they refused. In fact, they were adamant about doing what they could, in the name of religion, to shut down what Jesus was doing. You see, Jesus had extended to them the same invitation that He was extending to everyone-to repent, to follow Him, to be forgiven, and live a transformed life, to abandon their pride and self righteousness; but they refused to see their need for that and instead stood in opposition outside of the celebration of God’s grace.

And if we aren’t careful, as members of the church, we can fall into the same pattern of religion where pride and self righteousness cause us to stand on the outside of the celebration of grace with our arms folded refusing to be a part of the transformation God is doing in the hearts and lives of others. God’s invitation calls us to abandon our pride and self righteousness because...

a. Pride breeds anger at God’s generosity.

Look at what’s happening here. It says in vs. 28, “Then he became angry and didn’t want to go in.” I want us to see the seriousness of the situation here. So, the word for anger here isn’t just “irritation” or “frustration.” The word Jesus uses here means “wrath.” In fact, Jesus uses this same word for anger in two other stories He tells and in those stories the wrath of the person leads them to the harsh punishment of another. This older brother isn’t just frustrated with his younger brother, the strong language Jesus uses here indicates he wants him to be harshly punished for what he’s done. There’s a grudge and a hatred that seems to have built up in his heart for his younger brother that has been festering for a while. And the fact that he’s being celebrated after all he’s done only makes it worse. Now, I have to be honest with you and maybe you can identify with this this morning, he’s not totally incorrect. What’s happening here isn’t exactly fair. The response or the punishment doesn’t exactly fit the crime here. The younger brother goes off and lives how he wants to and disgraces the family and comes home and all is forgiven. The father shows great generosity and welcomes him back without any recourse. What’s fair about that? But that’s the Gospel, right? The Gospel is inherently unfair. Because salvation isn’t based on good works or what you and I do or don’t do, salvation is based on what Jesus has done for us. Salvation is the unmerited grace of God poured out in love on all of us. Jesus’ death on the cross makes the Gospel unfair, but also good. You see if God treated us fairly, we’d be in trouble. We’d spend eternity separated from Him; but because of Jesus, the Gospel reminds us that the church consists of people who are God’s children because of His love for us and not because of what we’ve done or not done. But this older brother is angry. He is so upset by the situation that he refuses to attend the celebration, he refuses to have any part of celebrating this sinner who has come home. Can’t you hear this older brother saying about his father what the pharisees have said about Jesus, “This man welcomes sinners and eats with them.”

Pride in our lives can breed anger at God’s generosity in the lives of others. And when that happens, instead of rejoicing over what God is doing in the lives of the people around us and being a part of that, we find ourselves frustrated and mad. We find ourselves focusing on how unfair things are and how undeserving people are and even questioning God’s generosity in their lives. And the whole time we are forgetting that God has shown us that same generosity. That we are where we are spiritually not because of anything we’ve done but because of the generosity of God in our lives. God invites us to abandon our pride because pride breeds anger at God’s generosity in the lives of others.

He also invites us to abandon our self righteousness because...

b. Self righteousness breeds comparison instead of compassion.

So, the older brother refuses to go in. He’s not having anything to do with this. So, the father comes to him. Vs. 28,...

Just as the father had gone to meet his lost son who had come home, he now goes to seek out his other son who is lost in his pride and self righteousness. Again, the father goes to him. And not only does he go to him but it says he “pleaded with him.” He “begged him” to come into the house. He “begged him” to be a part of the celebration. But he is met with frustration. His older son verbally throws up on him and years of pent up frustration come out. He says in vs. 29-30...

In self righteousness, he begins to compare himself with his younger brother. He lists all the good things he’s done over the years, how he has been the model son, how he has never disgraced the family, on and on with all the things he has done and all the sins of his brother. Not only is he pointing out the good in him but he is pointing out the disgraceful life his brother has lived. In self righteousness, he seeks to paint a picture of how unworthy his brother is and how worthy he is based on the lives they have lived and all they have accomplished. And it gets worse. In his self righteousness, he angrily accuses his father of not appreciating him and giving him what he thinks he deserves. He says, “You killed the best cow for this son of yours and you’ve never even given me a goat.”

One theologian says it best, “The proud and the self righteous always feel that they are not treated as well as they deserve.” (Leon Morris)

Instead of compassion for his brother who was lost and has now come home, in self righteousness and anger at his father and his brother, he refused to go in, missing the joy of celebrating with the family and the joy of forgiving his brother and welcoming him home.

And how many times are we guilty of doing the same thing? Think about it, we look at the lives of others around us who’s sins are “greater” and we think “well at least I’m not doing that.” Because we’ve not been down the same path as others, we feel superior to them spiritually. We begin to compare our lives to theirs, when God is calling us to show them the same compassion He has shown us. And then that person gives their life to Jesus or God moves in a mighty way and transforms their lives and instead of joining in the celebration, we refuse. Instead of being a part of the celebration of the family of God for a life that has been changed and transformed, we sit in our self righteousness, remembering all the things they’ve done and we miss out on the blessing of being a part of what God is doing.

And God is calling us out of all of that. He’s inviting us to abandon our self righteousness and humbly serve Him and others, not for recognition and not for glory, but for the sake of the Kingdom of God. To see others as fellow recipients of the grace of God and celebrate what God is doing in their lives. And as we do that, we will be driven by compassion not comparison; and we will love others, we will serve others, and we will celebrate what God is doing in their lives.

God invites us to abandon our pride and self righteousness.

Third,...

3. God’s invitation calls us to trust His pursuing love. (vs. 31-32)

And we really saw this come out last week as we looked at the father running to greet his lost son who had come home. This pursuit of the father after his son is seen clearly in him running to him and embracing him. But we also see this same pursuit in the father with the older brother as well. Go back to vs. 28, “The father came out to meet him,...” The father doesn’t just tell the servant to invite the older son to come into the party, he goes out after him. Again, he goes to him. And then we see his love for his son in how he responds to him. He says in vs. 31-32...

Instead of scolding him for his attitude, he speaks to him out of the heart of a loving father. It’s very similar to his response to the return of his younger son. Instead of punishment or chastising him, he pursues him in love and invites him into the celebration. His response indicates that he can trust him as his father, that everything is secure and because of that secure relationship there is no need to doubt the love of his father or to resist the invitation to celebrate the return of his brother.

And God pursues all of us with this same relentless love. Whether you’re someone who feels lost and separated from God right now or you’re a follower of Jesus, a son or daughter of the King. God’s invitation to all of us is to trust His pursuing love in our lives. And here’s what’s so beautiful about God’s pursuit of us...

a. God pursues us in our pride and our rebellion.

Both of these young men were sons of the father. One was lost and had come back home and one was committed to doing his duty for the sake of his family. One, the father pursued in his rebellion and one, he pursued in his pride. His invitation to come home was extended to both of them.

And that’s the beautiful thing about God’s pursuit of us. No matter what state we are in, no matter what is going on in our lives at this very moment, God is in pursuit of us. And He is inviting us to trust Him and His pursuing love in our lives. Just like the father looked at this older son and said, “Everything I have is yours.” God looks at us and says “I am inviting you into a life like you’ve never known before, a relationship with the God who created you for that relationship and has a purpose for your life.”

But it is up to us to accept that invitation. Because...

b. God’s love multiplies when shared.

When we choose to accept the invitation that God gives us to join in the celebration of repentance and to trust His pursuing love for us and others, joy increases. The father says in vs. 31, “we had to celebrate,...” It was necessary, it was the right thing to do. Because the lost was now found and the dead was now alive again. For the father in this story and the family, joy was the only reaction to the return of the lost son.

And when we choose joy and we join in the celebration of lost people being transformed by the Gospel, God’s love is amplified in our lives, in our church, and in the community around us.

Closing

This story ends with us not really knowing what choice the older brother makes. Does he accept the invitation or does he remain outside? And I think Jesus does this on purpose. Because for the people in the crowd that day and for us today, we have to write the ending to the story. What choice will we make? Will we choose to accept the invitation God is offering to us to celebrate His grace, to abandon our pride and self righteousness, and to trust His pursuing love of us; or will we remain in our pride and self righteousness standing on the outside refusing the new life God is offering us?