We've been studying the
Parable of the Prodigal Son.
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We're looking at
the elder brother.
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You know, I've a
hard time accounting
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for why he treated his
younger brother the way he did?
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But we do need to understand
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that the family
had been embarrassed.
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The family had
been put to shame,
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they had been
insulted and perhaps
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in the community
they were a laugh,
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maybe they were a
laughing stuff I don't know.
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And in any case
when the younger brother
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came home and
his father forgave,
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the one thing that was happening
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in the elder brother's heart
was that he could not forgive.
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He was trying to--
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Have you ever come to the place
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where someone has hurt you
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and you wonder
how you can make them
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suffer that which
they have made you suffer?
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Is there no way to make him feel
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what he has made us feel?
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And so the younger,
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the elder brother
is not able to forgive
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and I can feel a huge
frustration in his heart.
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Have you ever been brought
to the position in your life
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where there is
someone who has done you wrong
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and you don't
know how to forgive?
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Turn with me to
Matthew Chapter 6
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and we're gonna
look at verses 14 and 15.
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"For if ye forgive
men their trespasses,
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your heavenly
Father will forgive you.
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But if ye forgive
not men their trespasses,
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neither will your Father
forgive their trespasses."
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Friends, this sounds
very legalistic to me.
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It sounds like our forgiveness
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is based on what we do
and not what Jesus said,
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but this is not what
Jesus was trying to say.
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Jesus was trying to say
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is that we cannot
give what we do not have.
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If we do not forgive us
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because we've never
received forgiveness
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and so this is what
this is trying to say here.
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The elder brother had
never received the help
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that he needed from
heaven, from his father,
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therefore when his
younger brother came by
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he had nothing to offer
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but he was ruled
by his carnal nature,
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he was governed but
by what was in his heart
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and out of the abundance
of his heart came words
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that were
cutting, filled with anger,
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filled with fear
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and the elder brother
himself was loosing his way.
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