13th Sunday after Pentecost, Morning Worship, September 7, 2025
Sermon Series: Rick Warren’s Transformed – Week 1 Spiritual Health
Sermon: How to Get Closer to God
Accompanying Scripture: Luke 15 : 11-24
How to Get Closer to God
Luke 15:11-24
When have you run from God? Did you run at the speed of light? Or simply turn your back?
In what ways did God follow you? Or wait patiently?
Our scripture lesson today speaks to an overarching theme, which is the answer to the first question in your bulletin:
The way you think determines the way you feel, and the way you feel determines the way you’ll act.
A younger son decides to go it alone. However, he takes his inheritance with him, diminishing his father’s resources and abandoning the land of his ancestors.
This prodigal son is self-centered, wanting it all now. He has no concern for anyone else but himself.
All is well until he discovers that he needs a job. No decent work is available, so he slops pigs for a living. He’s a Jew slopping unclean animals. It can’t get any worse.
Except that it does get worse. His hunger gets the best of him, and he begins reminiscing about the “good old days.” He not only remembers his life, but he also focuses on his father’s
servants. Unlike him, they were treated well and had enough food to eat.
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He wonders. What’s wrong with me? What am I doing here? Working as a servant for my father is more than I deserve. I’ll beg his forgiveness.
It must have been a difficult journey home. He was tired and hungry and dirty. He ate off the land, or perhaps fellow travelers shared food with him. He was utterly disgraced and ashamed.
All the way home, he practiced what he would say to his father. It took a while to get the words right, but at last he managed to perfect them:
Father, I have sinned against heaven and before you; I am no longer worthy to be called your son; treat me like one of your hired hands.” (vs. 18b)
Meanwhile, back at home, the father watches at the window every day, hoping and longing for his son to return home. His hope didn’t give out. And one great day, it happened. As he stared out the window, looking as far down the road as he could, he recognized that familiar gait of his younger son.
Being no ordinary father, he failed to wait at home for his son to return. He failed to listen to him with skeptical ears and to welcome him with restraint.
No. This father hitched up the skirts of his robe and, making an utter fool of himself, ran down the road to greet his son. He greeted his son with great joy. The son stammered out his confession, and his father interrupted him with yet another hug.
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And the celebration begins. Kill the fatted calf. Get my best robe (he probably had those dirty, old clothes burned!) It was time to celebrate.
How do you return to God? We return with confession on our hearts and our lips. Are tears involved sometimes?
This scripture passage offers four steps we need to take to get back to God. You’ll find these on the back of your bulletin.
- I get fed up with my life.
We find this in verse 17 when he “came to his senses [and] said ‘How many of my father’s hired hands have bread enough and to spare, but here I am dying of hunger!’”
The prodigal finds himself in a place he really doesn’t want to be. We, too, find ourselves living a life we don’t like or doing an activity that doesn’t reflect our values and beliefs. We wake up to ourselves and say, “Enough.” - I own up to my sin.
The son owned his mistake. And he resolved to return home and make it right.
I was visiting with a new college freshman this week (no, not one of ours.) She talked about how different college is from anything she’s ever done before. I was reminded of the various changes we go through from 18 to 25 and the mistakes we make along the way. Those who have a faith to rely on and a church who has their back come through it much better than those who don’t. I know this from personal experience. - I offer up myself (my total being.)
Notice in verse 19 that the son sees himself for who he is: unworthy to be called his father’s child.
But he didn’t stop there. He took the courageous step of returning to the father and seeking forgiveness. When you hit rock bottom, there’s nowhere to go but up. - I lift up my praise.
His father ordered the fatted calf to be killed so they could
celebrate.
Do you notice what the father says? “…for this son of mine was dead and is alive again; he was lost and is found!”
How does it feel to return to God? Celebratory. Relieved. Thankful. Amazing.
The good news is that God waits for us with eager anticipation, ready to fill our emptiness. Yes, we resist. We wander, seeking the imagined green grass on the other side of the fence. We stray, yet, at the same time, we know that God is waiting for us to return.
Say yes to being fed up with life.
Say yes to owning your sin.
Offer yourself to God with great gratitude.
Get fed up with what isn’t of God.
All glory and honor be to God.
Amen.