and yet indulge me if you will in the luxury of extrapolating from this text an additional thought for the benefit of the hearer as we discuss the Prodigal Son not every man is a father but all of us are Sons and if we become fathers we do not forfeit our sonship for fatherhood that duality of roles is of Paramount importance because in the oldest man in the room there is still a child for that matter in the oldest woman in the room there is still a little girl and at different moments and times you are dealing with both of them
and this text is what I’m going to use to talk to all of the many different versions of you I told them yesterday I said there’s so many people sitting in your chair yeah yeah there’s so many versions of you the happy you the sad you the Restless you the stable you the impulsive View the overlooked you the Curious you they’re repenting you the you that is given to mischief and the you that is given to wisdom all of them are wearing your clothes this morning Midway is the story we start in the 15th verse of the 15th chapter of the Gospel
of Saint John and it reads this wise out of the King James version and he went and joined himself to a citizen of that country talking about the prodigal son left his father’s house and went and joined a citizen of this far country who were not Covenant keeping people and when you join yourself to a different kind of person they send you to do things you said you would never do and he sent him into his fields to feed swine so the prince has been sent into a field to feed swine and he it looked good to him [Music]
he would train have filled his belly with the husk that the swan did eat and maybe he’s hungry because no man gave unto him when no man gives unto you it creates a natural appetite you cannot pour out what has not been poured in and when he came to himself [Laughter] ah I don’t know what age that is [Applause] they told me it was 18.
but it’s not at 66 I am still coming [Applause] to myself divesting myself of all the accruements that other people placed on me and finding out who I am outside of what you want me to be is a process when he came to himself he said how many hired Servants of my fathers have read enough and despair and I I I I I I perish with hunger anybody hungry I will arise and go to my father and will say unto him father I have sinned nobody talks about Sin anymore father I have sinned everybody has their
own opinion but he said father I have sinned his admission of his sin is what gives him access back to the father if you confess your sin he is faithful and just to cleanse you from all unrighteousness father I have sinned I have sinned against heaven and before thee and I I am no more worthy to be called thy son I don’t even deserve to be your son boy you don’t hear that much make me as one of the hard servants and he arose and came to his father but when he was yet a great way off listen to his father’s his father saw him
