Lost

​Luke 15.1-10
Plymouth Congregational Church, UCC
Fort Collins, CO
The Reverend Jane Anne Ferguson

​1 Now all the tax collectors and sinners were coming near to listen to him.
2 And the Pharisees and the scribes were grumbling and saying,
"This fellow welcomes sinners and eats with them." 

3 So he told them this parable:
4 "Which one of you, having a hundred sheep and losing one of them,
does not leave the ninety-nine in the wilderness
​and go after the one that is lost until he finds it?
5 When he has found it, he lays it on his shoulders and rejoices.
6 And when he comes home, he calls together his friends and neighbors,
saying to them, 'Rejoice with me, for I have found my sheep that was lost.'
7 Just so, I tell you,
there will be more joy in heaven over one sinner who repents
than over ninety-nine righteous persons who need no repentance. 

8 "Or what woman having ten silver coins,
if she loses one of them, does not light a lamp,
sweep the house, and search carefully until she finds it?
9 When she has found it, she calls together her friends and neighbors,
saying, 'Rejoice with me, for I have found the coin that I had lost.'
10 Just so, I tell you,
there is joy in the presence of the angels of God
over one sinner who repents." 

What was the last thing that you lost? Mine was my keys! This week. Replaced but the originals not yet found. I am still searching. Losing something. Getting lost .... really vulnerable feeling. We all hate to be lost! It's very uncomfortable. We don’t like to lose things. We really don’t like to lose our way, literally or metaphorically. Even with Google maps it still happens. How many of you really don’t like to ask for directions when you are lost? Come on, be honest! Its hard to be lost!

Lost .... a bad, gut wrenching, sometimes guilt producing, feeling. For human beings since time immemorial. Jesus knew that people hate to be, to feel lost. It’s a primal fear. Our text today gives us two of Jesus’ most familiar stories and you might know that they are the first two in a trilogy. The third being the story of the prodigal, or lost, son who returns home to a joyous father and a resentful elder brother. 

As our passage opens, Jesus is gaining notoriety for his stories, his teachings, his healing. And not with the popular people in town, but with the sinners and tax collectors. The tax collectors were those who made their living collecting taxes for the Roman empire and adding a bit (or more) of interest to the top for themselves. They made their living by raising taxes on the middle class and poor. And it was condoned by the government. And sinners? They could be any number of folks. Technically “a sinner” in the theological parlance of New Testament theology is one who is separated from God, one who “misses the mark” of relationship with God in someway.  In view of the purity laws of the Pharisees, sinners were most likely those on the margins of society....from prostitutes to thieves to beggars or those who simply did not or more likely could not keep all the purity laws because of income or illness. They could be the poor, the lame, the lepers, the mentally and physically ill. Outcasts for whatever reason. Something made them ritually impure and so separated from God in the eyes of the religious establishment. Jesus was welcoming “sinners” and eating with them. They were seeking him out. Instead of scolding them for impure living he welcomed them! 

So the religious elite, the keepers of the purity laws grumbled. Complained. Pointed fingers. Folded arms and pursed lips. They were scandalized and they were jealous. Crowds did not come to hear them teach in the local synagogue the way they flocked to hear this rebellious rabbi, Jesus. They were mad because Jesus welcomed all the people, not just the people who kept the religious laws. I suspect Jesus even made an effort to welcome the scribes and Pharisees but they didn’t want to hear it. And when he heard his religious brethren grumbling and saw their sour faces, he tells them stories about being lost. 

Because Jesus knows that everyone knows what it is to be lost or to have lost something or someone dear to them. He knows that the desperation of being lost is universal. In his two parables the shepherd and the peasant woman lose something of great economic and maybe sentimental value. Something that  affected their livelihood. A sheep and a coin that was probably a drachma, worth the price of a sheep or a fifth the price of an ox. And in each story the shepherd and the woman goes to great lengths to find what is lost. There is story hyperbole going on here that makes a point we could almost miss. 

Think about this....the shepherd leaves the 99 sheep in the wilderness to go and find the one. Doesn’t leave them in their nice safe fold all tucked in at home, but in the wilderness. This says to me that as soon as he notices the one is gone he goes in search. That’s how precious each sheep is. Not waiting to secure they others....boom...where is my lost sheep? Gotta find my sheep! And when the sheep is found he calls together his friends and neighbors to celebrate. You might think he would just want to crawl in bed exhausted but no he has a party! And the woman cleans her house in a way she never has to find where that coin has gone, to discover what crack it has fallen into. She lights the lamp with precious, expensive oil to find this precious coin. And when she finds it she, too, throws a party! Which may have cost a lot more than the coin was worth. Both of these people have extravagant celebrations to celebrate that the lost is found. And Jesus says “there will be more joy in heaven over one sinner who repents than over ninety-nine righteous persons who need no repentance... there is joy in the presence of the angels of God over one sinner who repents." That would be one sinner, one person, who is no longer separated from the love of God....one person who now knows that God seeks and welcomes and loves them. 

And isn’t that what we all want to know ... that we are sought after, welcomed and loved. All the good works that we want to do as followers of Jesus, do not make us the seekers. God is the seeker. God is the shepherd in the wilderness seeking, the woman cleaning house with a lighted lamp and seeking. God pursues us for we are the precious things, like the sheep and the coin. And we do not have to do a long enough list of good things  or live in certain ways so that God will find us. God seeks and finds us! And then we join God’s party!

I speak with people all the time who are seeking faith, who worry they have lost their faith, who don’t know if they ever had a faith. And I confess that I have those times myself. I count myself humbly as one of the sinners who wonders away from God, is separated, loses the lifeline, feels completely lost and desperately in despair. Seeking love in materialism or the escape of entertainment. My friends, “what is it to “lose faith,” but to lose the conviction that one has been found, to begin to wonder if one is sought at all?” And to be completely in the dark about what to do....to not know how to seek. Yet with God our seeking is simply the willingness to be found. The openness of heart and mind. The willingness to throw up our hands and say, “I can’t find myself! Please find me!” The willingness to sit waiting in the dark.

That’s the difference between two groups of folks listening to Jesus, the sinners and the Pharisees. Pharisees are not willing to be found. And they do not join the party where all are welcomed into relationship with God! So I wonder who are really the lost ones in Jesus’ parables.

I’d rather be a sinner. I’d rather be willing to be found. I’d rather go to the party! 

So I found this crazy video on Facebook of all places and it spoke to me about the extremes God will go to just to find us. 

God will go this far, my friends. We are not really lost because we are sought. 

By the continually seeking God of love. The shepherd, the house cleaning woman. Let’s have a party!

Amen. 

©The Reverend Jane Anne Ferguson, 2019 and beyond. May be reprinted outside Plymouth Congregational Church, UCC, by permission only. 

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Author

Associate Minister Jane Anne Ferguson is a writer, storyteller, and contributor to Feasting on the Word, a popular biblical commentary. Learn more about Jane Anne here.