We're turning to Luke's Gospel, chapter 15, this evening. Luke's Gospel, chapter 15. We'll take up the reading at the verse 11 of the chapter, Luke chapter 15, and we'll begin the reading at the verse 11. And he, speaking of Jesus Christ, said, A certain man had two sons. The younger of them said to his father, Father, give me the portion of goods that falleth to me. And he divided on to them his living. Not many days after, the younger son gathered all together and took his journey into a far country, and there wasted his substance with riotous living. When he had spent all, there arose a mighty famine in the land, and he began to be in want. And he went and joined himself to a citizen of that country. And he sent him into his fields to feed swine. And he would fee and have filled his belly with the husk that the swine did eat. And no man gave on to him. And when he came to himself, he said, how many hired servants of my father's have bread enough and to spare, and I perish with hunger. I will arise and go to my father will say unto him father I have sinned against heaven and before thee and I'm no more worthy to be called thy son make me as one of thy hired servants he arose and came to his father when he was yet a great way off his father saw him and had compassion and ran and fell on his neck and kissed him And the son said unto him, Father, I have sinned against heaven, and in thy sight, and am no more worthy to be called thy son. But the father said to his servants, Bring forth the best robe, and put it on him, and put a ring on his hand, and shoes on his feet, and bring hither the fatted calf, and kill it, and let us eat, and be merry. For this my son was dead. and is alive again. He was lost and is found, and they began to be merry. We'll end our reading halfway through the parable there, and let's just seek the Lord with the word of God before us open, just briefly in a word of prayer. Oh God, our loving Father, we come to Thee again. We come confessing our need. Lord, I come confessing my need, the need of the infilling of the Spirit of God. We bless Thee for the promise that if He then, being evil, know how to give good gifts unto Your children, how much more shall Your Father in heaven give the Holy Spirit to them that ask Him? We ask for the help, the ministry, and the work of the Holy Spirit, that which we have been speaking about theoretically, In our morning meetings, we now seek to see it practically outworked in this house tonight. We pray, O God, that by thy Holy Spirit, that thou will deal with hearts and with lives. Lord, at the end of this meeting, men and women, boys and girls, will be transformed by the power of the gospel. Answer prayer. Give clarity of thought and mind and speech. We offer our petitions in and through Jesus' precious and worthy name. Amen and amen. Did you know that this world tonight is populated with an estimated nine billion pigs? Did you know that in any one time in the British Isles there are 4.9 million pigs alive? Did you know that the British meat eater eats on average 18 pigs in their lifetime? Did you know that a pig can run 11 miles per hour? That means that they can run a seven minute mile, something that human beings or most human beings cannot do. A pig will drink up to 14 gallons of water every day. These are interesting facts about pigs, I'm sure. But it is an animal that we do come into contact with within the account that we have read together in Luke chapter 15. I don't believe that I would be wrong in saying this, but this parable is the most loved and I suppose the most well-known parable The Lord Jesus Christ told when he ministered here on this earth. Charles Dickens, the great writer, called it the greatest short story ever written. And without a doubt, it is. It is a story of tragedy, and yet it's also a story of triumph. A story of a prodigal, a young man who thought he knew best, and was brought to a place where he recognized that he knew nothing. a father who loved a son dearly and loved him so dearly that he welcomed him back even with all of the sin and all of the wanderings that he had done within his life. Well, tonight we want to consider this familiar parable. We continue in our series, obviously, on messages tailored for those within the farming industry. We have thought about messages for the poultry farmer. We have thought about messages for the fruit farmer and other kinds of farmers. But tonight we're thinking about a message here for those who are involved in the pig industry, because it brings to our minds and our thoughts the attention of a young man who ends up feeding pigs, swine, in order that he might survive the hard times that had overtaken him within his life. And so tonight the message is simply a gospel message for pig farmer. Now there are a number of things that we want to think about and it is with respect to this young man that we come into contact with. A number of things we want to say about him. I want you to see first of all from the details we have in Luke chapter 15, the rebellion of the prodigal son. That's our first thought tonight. The rebellion of the prodigal son. Give me, give me, That's what the young man demanded of his father. Give me the portions of goods that falleth to me. Within that very request we see the evidence of rebellion that existed within the heart of this young man towards his father. This young man had come to a position within his life that he no longer honored or respected his father. I say that because he was so opposed to staying under his father's authority for another day that he requests to receive from him the inheritance that was going to fall out to him on his father's death. In a roundabout way, the young man was literally saying to his father, Father, I wish you were dead, as he wanted to receive the inheritance that was coming to him. This rebellion, it intensifies within his heart and reception, this windfall of money. We read in the scriptures that it's not many days after. Now many days after he is received from his father that the young son, the younger son, gathers all together and he takes his journey into a far country and there wasted his substance with riotous living. Such was the rebellion that existed within this young man's heart and in his life that we later read on in the testimony and within the passage, within the account, that he ends up spending most of his money on harlots prostitutes, woman of the night, woman of sin. Every moral restraint that his father tried to put upon him, he has thrown off. He's thrown off such restraint. All morality is out the window. He makes his way into the far country, drinks and sleeps around and lives for the world and lives for sin. There's a heart of a rebel in him. He's rebellious against his father's instruction, his father's counsel, how his father has tried to bring him up. And he's also rebellious against the law of heaven itself. He casts away all the commandments of God. He lives for sin and self. He loves the world and all that's in the world, the pleasures of the world, the trinkets of the world, the possessions of the world, in order to try and satisfy his soul. I find this young man rebelling against everything that was right, everything that was moral, everything that was holy, everything that was just. This young man decides no longer is he going to live life under the authority of a father. No, he's going to strike out for himself, live life as he desired to live. Whatever sin that involved, he was going to give himself to it as he lives out there in the far country. He lived as a rebel. I suppose this young man, what a picture he is of every sinner, because sin, sin within the heart of an individual causes that individual to become a rebel, a rebel to God, a rebel to his law, a rebel to his commandments. And so what a picture he is of the sinner. You see, the sinner doesn't want to live under the government of God. He doesn't want to live under the loving authority of a loving Heavenly Father. No, the sinner instead believes that a life under God's authority, under God's government, is a life that's too restrictive. And therefore, they rebel against God and God's rightful reign over their lives. And so they throw off every moral restraint and live for sin and self. They try to live a life that is independent of God. And maybe this is you tonight. You're an individual and you're living for sin and you're living for self. You're a rebel to God and to his laws and to his commandments. Just like this young man, you've rebelled against his governance and against his loving care. And tonight you live an open rebellion against God. I wonder, do you see yourself as a rebel? Because this young man was such, a young man who lived for sin and self. Are you such an individual? Well, if you're not a Christian, you are. You may not see yourself to be such. You may be a kind citizen. You might be a moral individual, an upright person who lives within the society and never in trouble with anyone. And you're a person who just lives on the clean side of life. But the Bible says that you're an enemy of God. You're an open rebellion against God. You want to come under his authority, under his control, under his loving care. You're just like this young man who thought he knew better than what his father had brought him up to believe. And so he strikes out for the world. Maybe there's an individual and you're only a teenager and you want to strike out for the world. Well, you're going to find A heartache and sorrow is going to follow you, just like this young man was going to find the rebellion of the prodigal son. But something else I see in the details of this chapter, I want you to notice in the second instance, the relinquishing of the prodigal son. The prodigal's father loved his son dearly. We can be in no doubt about that. because of what we read on his return home again. So the father loved him dearly. It wasn't as if the father was happy to see the boy go. It wasn't as if he was pushing him out of the door. There are families like that. So much trouble do they bring into the home that parents are relieved to see them leave the home and to leave the nest, to get a little relief from what they bring into the homestead. No, this young boy was not like this. I don't believe that was the home that he had. No, this young boy had a loving father, a father who loved him dearly, but a father who came to realize that there was nothing that he could say and there was nothing that he could do. that would keep the youngest of the family under his roof. Because so determined was this young man to go into the far country and to live a life of sin, that the father could say nothing. The father could do nothing to keep him at home. And so what does the father do? The father has to relinquish him. The father has to give him over to his own heart's desire. The father has to give him over to his sin. and to the world. And all that was there, he relinquishes him. He abandons him to his sin. You know, God sometimes does that with the sinner. God has to do that with the sinner. Because all of his attempts to reason with the sinner fails, and so God gives the sinner over to their sin. He gives them time and space, not only to sow the seed of sin, but also to reap the harvest. God will allow a man, if they refuse to come, a boy, a girl, a teenager, if they refuse to heed the counsel of God and the entreaties of Christian parents and of a faithful minister of the gospel, God will give that person over to their sin. So does sin. but reap to sin as well. He'll allow them to reap the harvest, but it does not mean that the Father still does not love them. Maybe such has been the case with you through the godly counsel of parents, the earnest entreaties of pastors and ministers. God, He attempted to spare you. He attempted to spare you the hurt and the shame of a life of sin, but their counsel, their entreaties, they fell on deaf ears. You were determined to go in your own way, to choose your own pathway through life, to give yourself over to sin, and so you walked away from God, you walked away from the gospel, and you've indulged in a life of sin, and God gave you up to your sin. Let me ask you the question, what has that life of sin brought you? Has it brought you the peace that you long for? Has it brought you the satisfaction that you yearn for? The joy that you crave for in your life? I don't believe that it has. And here you are, a miserable individual, having wasted many precious years. God gave you over. God forbid that God would give you completely over. We read of such there in the book of Romans chapter 1. God gave them up. Sinner think of it. God giving you up. Giving you up to your sin. Giving you up to your loss and your passions and your immorality. God giving you over to it. Never to speak to you again. To give you up forever. Would that happen in this meeting tonight? I tell you, if God gives you over completely to your sin, you'll never experience any further promptings or any warnings with regard to your sin. You'll die and you'll go to hell. You'll die and you'll be lost. and you'll reap eternally the wages of your sin. I wonder, are you here tonight, and you took the path that this boy took, and here you are tonight. Maybe you're about to take the path. God knows. God has sent a message to you tonight. God has sent this preacher tonight to plead with you to choose a different course, to choose another path in life, a path that begins at the cross and ends at the very gates of glory in God's heaven itself. It's sad to say that there'll be some. The pathway that you have chosen will entail many a life and many a heartache and many a trouble. You know what you're going to come to realize someday? You're going to come to realize that the Christian life was the best life that anyone could live this side of eternity. But between that realization and your departure from God, there's going to be trouble and heartache and tragedy all in between. The Father relinquished him. He had to let him go. And parents, there's times, and how difficult it is, maybe daughters, maybe sons, they choose a different course in life. And sometimes you'd have to relinquish them and believe that the God of providence will bring them back up the road again. The God of providence will so work and engineer circumstances in their life that they'll return to their father's God and their mother's friend. It is not for you to go down the road, as it were, and live as they now live in order to try and win them. No, because the place of reconciliation was the place of departure. And many a time, we have to let them go. and they'll reap the harvest that they sowed. Well, may God in his grace bring the wandering one back to him. There is a third point. Note the riotous living of the prodigal son. The Savior recounts in the verse number 13 how this young man wasted his substance with riotous living until there wasn't a penny left. The windfall that he received from his father was quickly scattered to the wind. That's literally the rendering of the word wasted. It brings to our minds the winnowing process. Whenever the chaff and the corn were brought in, placed upon a high hill where the wind would have been blowing, the farmer would have taken up the chaff and the grain and thrown it up into the air. And as the wind blew, it took away the chaff, the corn fell back onto the ground again. The word wasted is the word to be scattered to the wind. He scattered it to the wind, all the money. He didn't invest it. He didn't buy property. No, he just lived for the here and the now. And is that not the life of the sinner? They live for the here and the now. They haven't enough to pay the mortgage next month. They need to wait for the next installment of their money, their wages to come. And they live from hand to mouth. It seems to be that they try to scrape a living because they just waste their money. And is that not the life of a sinner? It's a life of waste. I tell you, sinner, you're wasting your life. Wasting it in sin. Wasting it in the pleasures of this world. You're wasting your life. This young man was finding true what the Bible teaches, because that's what sinners find in the far country. They find that God is right. Proverbs 23, verse 5, riches certainly make themselves wings. They fly away as an eagle towards heaven. sinful living brought this young man to a place of financial and moral poverty. And here you are tonight, and maybe that's you, bankrupt, bankrupt spiritually speaking. You've wasted your life on riotous living. sinful pleasure, every sinful pleasure imaginable you've indulged your life in, you've given yourself over to the sinful passions of that wicked and depraved heart that exists within you, places you never thought you would have went, and you've gone. Things you never thought you would have ever done, and you've done them. You've followed your own sinful heart. And here you are, wasted time, wasted health, wasted talents, wasted wealth, all of which God so graciously bestowed upon you. I tell you, there's folly in living such a life, for that life is going to lead to misery, not only in this life, but certainly in the life that is to come. Sinner, you need to break off Such living. You need to leave off such living and you need to start to live for God. No longer waste the time and the talents and the gifts that God has given you. Invest in those things that are eternal and live for God. Those things that are enduring. What shame he brought on his family. You see, news came from the far country to his older brother of the type of life that he was living. Can you imagine how his daddy must have felt whenever the news came that his son, that boy that he brought up, most likely schooled in the things of God and took him through the book of Proverbs, I'm sure, Speaking of those individuals who appealed to the base desire of the sinful flesh of a young man, you just think of what his daddy must have felt like when news got about that his boy was now living with harlots. What shame and what disgrace, and yet his daddy received him back. the riotous living of a young man, the prodigal. Now, you'll recall what happens within the narrative. We've read it together. The money runs out, and then the fun runs out. The rubber hits the road, we would say, and he now comes out of the fantasy world that he lived in, because that's what he really was living. He was living in a kind of fantasy world. And now, really, reality hits. He's now in the real world. And he soon realizes all the friends that he thought he had were not really friends at all, because they, like him, were just out for themselves. The famine hits the land. It reduces the young man to such poverty that he takes up employment on a pig farm. It would have been a shameful thing for a Jewish boy to do that. The pig was an unclean animal. We know that to be so. So reduced is he in want that he looks at the foods one day of the pig and thinks, that looks tasty. That looks nice to eat. He must have been famished. I don't know how long he was in that particular situation, but you know, It just shows you the stubbornness of the human heart. He could have went back to his dad. He could have went back to his father long, long before he reached that state. But you see, pride, pride wouldn't allow that, would it? Because he would have been admitting to his friends and his dad and his older brother that the far country just wasn't as good as he thought it would have been. And you don't want to lose face, do you, among your family and your friends? And is it not the case that you, the sinner, you would come to Christ, but you want to see a face among your friends? You don't want to admit that when you stand at the bar on a Friday night, that it really isn't as enjoyable as you make it to be, or you let others think it is. You don't want to be the one that's standing at a dance floor and admitting that really this is all so trivial and really it's not satisfying at all. No, you want to continue to put on the bravado appearance and you want to show to others that really I'm going to continue to live in this type of lifestyle. Well, this young man, he continues in the far country, but it gets to a position that he becomes so desperate. That's the key. He becomes so desperate that he can do nothing else but go home. I tell you, sinner, And I tell you back, Slater, that's where you need to get to, a point of desperation, that you actually realize that this life that I am living, I need to leave this life behind, and I need to get to Jesus Christ, God's intervention. Because that's what it was, God intervened. How do I know that? I know that because it tells us that God, there in the book of Chronicles, it speaks about days whenever God would shell up the heavens and he would bring famine into the land because of the sins of the nation. God was in control. God was providentially within control, and he's starting to work, and he's starting to engineer a chain of events that's going to lead the young man back to his father. And that journey home begins with a fourth thing, the realization of the prodigal son. Note the words of verse 17, and when he came to himself, that suggests to me that he wasn't himself. He wasn't thinking straight. And sinner, you cannot think straight because of the heart that exists within you, because of the mind that exists, a mind that is darkened by sin. He wasn't thinking right, he wasn't thinking straight. But God begins to work, and now he's starting to think right. He comes to himself, and he said, how many hired servants of my father's have bread enough and to spare, and I perish with hunger. Here was a young man who'd been trying to persuade himself that he was enjoying life. And all of a sudden, he begins to realize that he was a stranger to real happiness. Can you not see him? I can picture him in my mind there, sitting there in the filth of the pigsty. I can see him as he sits there, recalling the wasted years of sinful living. I can see him as he hides his face with his hands because of the shame of his sin. I can see the tears flowing through those hands. buries his head within his hands and the tears just stream through his fingers and he says, what a fool am I, what a wretch I have been, what a sinner, what a sinner am I, what regret It dawns on him that he sinned. That's what has happened. Yes, he sinned against his father, we know that. But most importantly, he had sinned against his God. Father, I have sinned against heaven and before thee. I tell you, that's the realization you need if you're not a Christian. A realization that is twofold. First of all, there needs to be a realization on your part that you have sinned. You have sinned. Now that's the hardest thing for a person to admit, that they've sinned. Not I. Surely, not I, preacher. I'm not a sinner. I come to church. I do my bits in the community. I'm loyal to this nation and country. Not I. I'm not a sinner. To get an individual to admit that they've sinned, that's a difficult thing. You see the sinner likes to blame others, they like to deflect. attention away from themselves, and so they blame others for the life that they have lived. But the Holy Ghost must bring the sinner to a realization that they have sinned. The sinner must be brought by God to take ownership of their sin. Are you there tonight, sinner? Has God brought you to that point in life? Has the Spirit of God brought you to a place on the journey of life that you're willing to hold up your hands and say, I have sinned. I have sinned. Such an admission is a starting point when it comes to salvation. Because God only saves sinners. He came to seek and to save that which was lost. He came not to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance. Whenever a sinner becomes self-awakened, they become sin-awakened. And we need such an awakening in this house tonight. You need to be self-awakened and then sin-awakened. I have sinned. Not only is the realization that you have sinned, but the realization must be that you have sinned against heaven, against God. You sinned against his law. You sinned against his love. You've sinned against His grace. You've sinned against His mercy. You've sinned against His longsuffering. You've sinned against His holiness. You've sinned against His grace. You've sinned against God. Do you understand that? That you've sinned against God? Your sins are against God tonight. Consider what is going to befall you if you then do not repent of those crimes, those offenses. You need to be reconciled to the one whom you have offended by your sins. Yes, he realized this all, but what's the point in just realizing it and sitting there in the pigsty? He had to arise. He had to make movement towards home. He had to retrace the steps, his steps, to the exact place where he left his father. And so I caution every troubled sinner, and I caution every anxious backslider Your resolutions are not enough. Your good intentions are not enough. You need to go further. You need to arise and go to the Father. The returning of the prodigal son, we see that he comes to himself before you must before you get to the father you must come to yourself he understood the folly of a life and so we read that he arose and he came to his father and He was making a clean break with his sin. He was leaving it behind forever. That's what true repentance is. A saying goodbye forever. He was leaving, turning his back and turning again to the one who loved him so dearly. And that's what it is in salvation. A saying goodbye to sin and a coming to Jesus Christ. I asked you, will you arise? Will you go to the Father? Will you be reconciled to Him? Will you go to the place where you can be reconciled to your God? Sinner, arise. Arise from your prophetic life of sin. Arise from your misery. Arise from your shame. Arise from your disgrace. Arise from your guilt. Arise from your despondency. Arise, and make your way to the place of reconciliation. Arise, and make your way to the place of blood sacrifice. Arise, and make your way to the cross of Calvary, and there be reconciled to God. And backslider, arise! Oh, backslider, arise! Arise from your regret. Arise from your remorse. Arise from your many wasted years. Arise from your hurt. Arise from your bitterness. Arise from your loneliness. Arise from your stubbornness. And return to the place of reconciliation. place of the cross. Oh, may you say tonight in the words of the hymn writer, I will arise and go to Jesus. He will embrace me in his arms, in the arms of my dear Savior. Oh, there are 10,000 charms. Oh, that young man's fears and apprehensions of returning home were dispelled immediately when he saw his father running down the road. And that brings us to think about the reconciliation with the prodigal son, a number of things. First of all, the reconciliation did not take place in the far country. Do you ever notice that? His father didn't buy a ticket to the far country and say, I'll be reconciled to my boy in the far country, no. No, the far country had to be left behind. The father wasn't going into the far country to lose his testimony. The father wasn't going into the far country to compromise his purity. No. No, he's staying out of the far country. He's waiting for his boy to come out of there. He's waiting for his boy to get so sick of sin that he's willing to leave that sin behind in the far country and return to the place of departure. I tell you, sinner, God is not going to compromise his purity. And God is not going to compromise his character to be reconciled to you. He's not going to be reconciled to you if you're not willing to leave the places where you've committed your sin, the bookies, and the nightclub, and the public house. No, no, He's going to be reconciled at the cross. Don't imagine, sinner, or backslider, that you can be reconciled to God and still live in the far country. The reconciliation that took place out of the far country. Secondly, the willingness of the father to reconcile him. As a prodigal approached home, the scripture says, when he was yet a great way off, it says that the father ran and fell on his neck and kissed him. The father was ready to be reconciled to his son. I tell you in the gospel, it's no different. God the Father will be reconciled to you, the sinner, the backslider. Dr. Talmadge said, when the sinner starts for God, God starts for the sinner. God does not come out with a slow, hesitating pace. The infinite spaces slip beneath his feet and he takes whirls out of bound in order to get to the sinner. I tell you, he's ready to forgive you. He is. Psalm 86, 5, For thou, Lord, art good, and ready to forgive, and plenteous in mercy unto them that call upon thee. You're yet a great way off, sinner. But thank God, though afar off, God in a moment of time can make you now. How? By the blood of Christ, by the blood of his own dear Son. Reconciliation, a father was willing to be reconciled to the son. Reconciliation, thirdly, only takes place when there's repentance. We know the young man repented of his past actions and deeds because, as we said, he's left his sin behind and he confesses his sin to the one whom he had offended. That's the evidence that there's repentance on your part. You're going to leave your sin behind and you're willing to confess your fault, your sin, to God and to God alone. Do not be deceived, sinner, in thinking that you'll ever be reconciled to God if there is no repentance on your part. If you are to know your sin's forgiven, then you must obey the command to repent and to believe the gospel. One final thought and we're finished. The rejoicing over the prodigal son. The father commands the household staff to attire his son with the best robe, put shoes on his feet, put a ring on his finger and slay the fatted calf. Let us eat, he says, and be merry. For this my son was dead and is alive again. He was lost and is found and they began to be merry. The word merry is the word rejoice. And so we find them rejoicing over the return of this wayward son. They return, the return of this boy brings great joy to the heart of the father. And I tell you, whenever a sinner comes to Christ, there is rejoicing. Zephaniah 3, verse 17. The Lord thy God in the midst of thee is mighty, and he will see if he will rejoice over thee with joy. He will rest in His love. He will joy over thee with singing. Think of it. God sings over the repenting sinner. He joys in them as they make their way to the cross. It brings delight and joy to His heart. as he sees the sinner repent of sin and trust in Jesus Christ. Look at the verse down there, the verse number 10 of the passage. Likewise, I say unto you, there is joy in the presence of the angels of God over one sinner that repenteth. I tell you, there's joy on earth when the sinner repents. Sure, there's nothing like it. Whenever someone stays behind after a meeting or maybe contacts the minister, they tell the minister that they've come to Christ, what joy it brings. What joy does it not bring to the heart of God? Where are you tonight? What part of this story are you at? Maybe you're just about to go into the far country. Don't. Maybe you're in the far country. You maybe haven't lived with harlots, but you're still there. The heart's there. It's time to rise. Maybe you're on the road. Maybe God, by his spirit, has spoken to you over past weeks, and you're on the road. Let me, in this message, just push you up the road a little bit quicker. Let me encourage you back to the Father. All your fears and all your apprehensions, they're never going to materialize because He's waiting to forgive you. He's waiting to pardon you. He's waiting to be reconciled to you. What joy that will be. Be for you the sinner, be for you the backslider. Here he is, a young man who realized that the far country really had nothing to offer him. And so he comes full circle. I pray that God will bring many, and I look into the congregation and I see many apparent. And their boy, their girl is in the far country. May God bring them full circle. May God bring them to the place where they're reconciled to their Heavenly Father. May this Lord's Day end with joy in this house. Over a backslider returning, or over a sinner trusting in Jesus Christ for salvation. Come. The Father waits, and He waits with open arms. Come. Home. Come home. Let's bow our heads in prayer, please. While I'm here, There's always to help in any way, whatever your spiritual need would be. God knows where you are. There's no place like home. No place like home. Remember that backslider, no place like home. Center, no place like the Father's house. No place like it. May you enter in to that very experience of being reconciled to God tonight through the blood of His cross. If I can help speak to us at the door, I'll be there to help and assist in this great matter. Our loving Father, we rejoice, O God, in this account before us. What an account it is, it brings us It brings us great relief, Lord, because there have been times that we have found ourselves in the far country, and yet, Lord, thou hast reconciled us and brought us nigh to thee. We think of those among us, Lord, and here they are. They sit and they wander and they ponder, could God ever reconcile me to himself again? But we thank Thee, O God, that this account reminds us that there is reconciliation possible, and there is the opportunity to be back with God where we used to be. Lord, work in hearts, challenge lies, we pray. Take that which has been of Thy Spirit, apply it to the consciences of men, woman, And may, O God, there be signs following the preaching of thy word, for we offer our petitions and prayers in and through Jesus' precious and lovely name. Amen and amen.