The Stories Jesus Told #12 - The Lost Sheep and Coin
Message Description
Strip District Campus Leader Dan Irvin completes the "Stories Jesus Told" message series teaching about the lost sheep and the lost coin.
Message Transcript
Well. Good morning, everyone. It is so good to be here in Wexford together and wherever you may be tuning in from or whatever Orchard Hill campus you may be at today. Welcome, especially to my friends in the Strip District. I miss you all, and I'll see you soon. I'm excited about what God has for us in the Word this morning with these two stories that Jesus told.
Before I get into it; let's take a moment and pray. God, thank you for the stories that Jesus told. Thank you for this series as we conclude this week. God, thank you for the way that you worked in the life of people thousands of years ago, through Jesus, by what He said and what he did and how that still means something for us today, right here in this place. God, I pray that you would open our hearts today to the truth that comes out of your Word. It's in your name that we pray for all these things. Amen.
Well, some years ago, it was around this time of year. I love this time of year. The 4th of July is coming up. You have picnics, cookouts, lakes, water, and all the fun stuff that comes with this time of year. We were at a lake property. It was actually a camp property with high school students. There's 500 people on this camp property and a huge lake. We were up in Minnesota. At one point during this camp experience in Minnesota, there were families that worked at the camp. I was one of the families. My family was up there, and one of my best friends, his family was up there as well with their kids.
And their four-year-old daughter, Emma, went missing for about two hours. Everyone realized we didn’t know where Emma was, or it had been about 2 hours since anybody had seen her. It was starting to get dark, and when it gets dark at this lake, it gets dark, like real dark. You can't see anything. You can't see your hand in front of your face sometimes. There's a lake, you know, that's troublesome. There's a lot of bad things, woods, and a lot of bad things that could happen to Emma. And so, we shut down the whole operation. Everybody, all 500 people, high school students included, are looking for Emma, calling her name, and running all over camp. And I'll never forget the moment we found Emma.
Emma had decided at one point during the day that she was just going to walk a couple of houses next door to the property. And she had invited herself to a neighbor's barbecue that they were having in their backyard. She didn't know these people, but they got to know her quickly. She was sitting there for a couple of hours just having a pulled pork sandwich and some watermelon, having a great time. She had no cares. When we found Emma, it was like, oh, hey, guys, are you invited to the barbecue, too? Because this is great. Have a hot dog. She had no idea that the whole camp was searching for her, and she had no idea that she was even lost. No idea.
And I think when we hear these stories that the Jesus told today, I think sometimes that can be a little bit of maybe our own issue. It's definitely my issue. Sometimes when I think about it, I don't really realize and wrestle with the fact that that I'm lost. I don't understand that I'm lost. I think things are fine. I'm not as bad as those people over there, “those people,” they have the real issues. I'm doing just fine. We tend to have this view of ourselves that we can think, I got this. I'll get out of whatever mess it is, whatever issue it is. I can figure it out. I'm smart enough, strong enough. I don't need anyone or anything. We really don't want to admit that we're lost.
What we do in that instance, I think, is we look at God and sometimes we say, well, God's grace, the need for God to really forgive me and give me this gift of grace, I don't really need that. That's for other people that might need it more than me. What we do then in that moment is we say, well, God's grace then must be for other people that really need it.
The people that have maybe a different political view than me, or the people that have a different parenting strategy than me, or maybe the people that just hang out at this place when I'm hanging out over here, and this is the right place to be. Don't get me wrong, there are times when it is absolutely appropriate and necessary.
Jesus did this plenty of times to say to people or to look at people's lives and say that is a wrong choice, that is in blatant disregard of what the Bible says. That is sinful behavior. And it is appropriate to do that. But here's the difference. What I'm talking about today is when we look at people that are making those choices, and here's where it goes too far, we say they've made a wrong choice. They've made a bad choice. But then it's saying, but I would never do that. Not me. That's what they would do. I would never fall victim to what they have fallen into. I'm different than that.
As we look at these two stories in Luke chapter 15, Jesus is specifically addressing two groups of people. He's addressing the Pharisees, the religious leaders, and he's also addressing tax collectors and sinners. But mainly he's telling this story to the Pharisees and the religious leaders to help them understand their lostness, that their lost might look different than someone else's lost, but they're still lost.
I want to start again by just reading Luke's introduction to this story that Jesus told in Luke 15. It says this, “Now the tax collectors and sinners were all gathering around to hear Jesus. But the Pharisees and the teachers of the law muttered, “This man welcomes sinners and eats with them.” So, here he is. He's addressing all the tax collectors and the teachers of law. And they're wondering, they're looking at Jesus and saying, what in the world are you doing with these people? Don't you know that there's better people to spend your time with?
The tax collectors, you might be familiar with this term in the Bible, they weren't just, you know, normal, run of the mill doing their job, 9 to 5. They were criminal tax collectors. They were taking more from people than what was owed and giving it to the Roman government so they could become more powerful. So known criminals, people in the community knew what they were doing. They couldn't be stopped because Rome was too powerful. And here's Jesus hanging out with these notorious bad guys.
Something I don't want you to miss, right here in the first part of these two verses, it says this. The tax collectors and the sinners gathered near Jesus. They gathered around to hear Jesus. For a group of people that probably didn't belong very many places, that didn't have a lot of allies outside of maybe their tax collector group, here they are feeling a safety, a connection, a draw to this man Jesus Christ. There is something about his very presence, I think, that drew them in.
I don't stand up here today and presume to know much about anyone's story in this room that's listening or watching even. But I can imagine that there's some here today that might say, well, if Jesus really knew what I have done, if he's known the roads I've traveled and where I've been, I don't think Jesus would want to be near me. I definitely don't want to go near Jesus for fear of what he might say or do. I knew he wouldn't approve of me. And maybe that's you today. Maybe it's not. But maybe if it is you, maybe you've thought times in your life, I'll just run, I'll hide, I'll go other places, so I won't have to deal with God. And when we think God doesn't approve of us, we run. We run.
The other things that we think might approve of us, that we could get approval from. Searching for the approval from others, hiding from God, and trying to really manage our own lives, be the CEO of our own lives, thinking, I'm really not that lost. I got this. I'll figure this out.
C.S. Lewis wrote about this once in his book Mere Christianity, and he took it all the way back to the very beginning of the Bible, talking about Adam and Eve. C.S. Lewis said this, “What Satan put into the heads of our remote ancestors, Adam and Eve, was the idea that they could be like gods, could set up their own life if they had created themselves, be their own masters, invent some sort of happiness for themselves outside God, apart from God. And out of that hopeless attempt has come nearly all that we call human history money, poverty, ambition, war, prostitution, classes, empire, slavery. It's the long, terrible story of man trying to find something other than God which will make him happy.”
You know, we think if God isn't happy with me, isn’t approving of my life, then I'll find something that is going to approve of my life that will make me happy again. Maybe this is a familiar story for you. Maybe not. But these were the people that Jesus was with, the tax collectors and the sinners, searching for approval, looking for life. Their lives didn't look the part, but they felt a safety, a connection, a nearness with Jesus.
Here's the other thing from these first two verses that I don't want you to miss before we move on. Look at the response of the Pharisees and the tax collectors. They muttered. They grumbled. This man welcomes sinners. Look at this guy. Look at this rabbi. Why is he associating with these people? He shouldn't waste his time with these people. Not only does he associate with them, but he eats with them. This was a sign of friendship; I want to be your friend, when you invited someone to share a meal together. This was what they were saying essentially. I think here is their complaint.
The Pharisees, the teachers of the law were trying to build a faith community of people that did the right thing, that loved God, obeyed God, good things. And there's Jesus. They're saying, Jesus, there's never been a faith community in the history of the world that has involved these types of people. These are the people we're trying to keep out. We've got to build a faith community of people that love God, obey God, listen to him, trust him. Why are you with these people?
They didn't agree with what Jesus was doing. Jesus sees that, he understands that, and he tells them these parables to help them understand the heart of God. And I think before we can sit here today in our seats and say, okay, Pharisees, get your act together, come on, don't you see what's going on here? I think their concern was probably fair. They were trying to do the right thing. They were trying to build a community to point people towards God. Jesus wasn't saying in this case, don't miss this party. Jesus wasn't saying, you know, I agree with the lifestyle choices here of the tax collectors and the sinners. But what he was saying is I have something better for them and I want them to know about it. I want them to know that what I offer, this chance to have real life, is something that they can be a part of too. That's why I've come, so that anyone who knocks the door might be open.
So, Jesus, in telling these two stories, was leveling the playing field, showing how all people, regardless of who they are, are God's beloved creatures and beings. As we look at these stories today, I want you to remember three words, very simple, three words today that I think accurately describe our humanness, all of us, the human condition that we all find ourselves in. In three words that I think Jesus was trying to help them understand about themselves in this moment.
The first word that I want to talk about this morning is helpless. In the first story, it was about a man who left 99 sheep to find the one that had ran off missing. And this image of a sheep and a shepherd in the Bible, it's not uncommon. It's used a number of different times. And it's really not a flattering comparison. There's one pastor that calls this comparison a spiritual insult to mankind. Sheep are really not intelligent creatures at all, and when they get lost, they can't find their way back. And not only that, when they are found, it's not just like, hey, follow me back to where you belong. Now you have to tie them up, throw them over your shoulders, and carry them back because they're not smart enough to even follow you back.
Leaving the 99 to find the one. Finding it and finding the journey of it, the pursuit of it. Isaiah 53:6 talks about this idea as our condition, our human condition. We all like sheep, have gone astray, Isaiah says. Each of us has turned our own way, and we see Jesus's heart in talking about this again. There's an account in Matthew's gospel where he feeds 5,000 people, probably more, and it says this in Matthew's gospel. He says, when Jesus saw the crowds, he was moved with compassion for them because they were harassed and helpless like sheep without a shepherd. Sheep without a shepherd are in a dangerous spot. A lot of bad things could happen.
You know, you might be hearing all this and thinking, well, yeah, that's spiritual thought. I don't know if I'm here for that today. That's not why I showed up. You might be saying, well, I consider myself pretty intelligent, I've done well in my field. I've got degrees. I'm doing well with my family. This is not me. Certainly, this is not me. I know I've thought that before. But imagine for a second from God's perspective, how see us, God, the Creator, the knower, the doer of all things, infinitely wise and supreme. There's no way we can outsmart God or be at a level that is up to his standard.
If you think for a moment about the smartest child you've ever met, just get that child in your head. Four or five or six years old, that age range. And you've all met children that are probably that brilliant. You say, oh, that child's different. Even the smartest child, though, if you would ask their parents and say, hey, you know, your child's five years old now, they're pretty smart, are you ready to send them out into the world? Just go ahead. Let them go. They'll be fine. They'll figure it out. No parent in their right mind would say, oh, yeah, they're ready. They're ready for the real world because they've got it figured out. There's something that a parent needs to give a child, to train a child before they have to be at a certain age of maturity. And as hard as it is maybe to understand for us, we're always like children in comparison to who God is.
Matthew 18, talks more about this. Jesus talks more about this idea of becoming like a child, understanding that we are children in the eyes of God. He says, this is starting in verse two of chapter 18, “He called a little child to him, and placed the child among them. And he said: “Truly I tell you, unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven. Therefore, whoever takes the lowly position of this child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven.”
Jesus calls us to become like little children, because I think children have the ability and capacity to ask questions. If you've ever been around a child, they ask questions. They wonder, they doubt, they get scared, and they run to safety, to what they know is safe. Even the most confident child wouldn't say in every situation, oh, I got this. I can figure this one out. We're helpless, like children, like sheep. Have you understood this? Have you come to grips with this reality? It's not an easy thing to come to grips with, that we are in need of rescue, in need of someone to save us.
This reminded me of a story. I actually shared this not too long ago with my friends in the Strip District. So, don't spoil the ending if you're out there. Four years ago, I was on a whitewater rafting trip, again, with some high school students. And on this whitewater rafting trip, there's pretty good rapids. I'm not a very good swimmer, so the whole experience is making me kind of nervous to begin with.
We're in this whitewater rafting experience, and we're doing what's called a surf. So, if you've ever been, you kind of you get the boat to a place, you have a guide in the boat, and there's about eight high school students in the boat as well. And you get the boat to a place where you're stuck in this rapid, intentionally, and you're kind of surfing. T e water's crashing over your head. It's kind of this fun experience, but it's dangerous. I mean, the boat could flip over, people could fall out. There's a lot of things that could go wrong.
And I'll never forget the moment. We’re on the boat, and we're having a great time. We're surfing, we're doing it, look at us. Woo! And we look back, and the guide has fallen out of the boat. This is the one guy who knows what's going on, who's shouting directions, is telling us what to do, is keeping us alive. He's gone out of the boat in the water. We don't even know where he went. We look around and everyone's looking at me. I'm the oldest in the boat. It's like, do you know what to do? I was like, listen, guys, I was nervous about this whole thing to begin with. Just hang on. I don't know. Hang on tight.
I’ll never forget, this one 17-year-old looked at everyone in the boat, in this moment of panic, he threw his paddle out of the boat, looked around, and he said save yourselves. He jumped out of the boat. True story. He thought the best decision in that moment was to be in the water with the guide. He said if he's in the water, I'm going in the rapids too. Save yourselves. I'll never forget that. By the way, everyone was okay and made it back in the boat with a happy ending.
But in that moment when he said that I'll never forget it. Save yourselves. I think that's a little bit like our human condition. We just want to believe deep down that we can save ourselves. When it really gets bad, when things get serious, we're like, we got this. Save yourselves. It's hard. It's hard to admit they were helpless. But to truly understand the reality and hope of the gospel, we have to understand this, that we can't save ourselves. We are helpless. That was Jesus's first word I wanted to point you to.
Here's the second word that I think really describes our humanness really well, that Jesus was getting at today. We're helpless, but we're valued. Valued. Back to Luke 15, our story today, and this is verse eight. This is the second story he told. “Or suppose a woman has ten silver coins and loses one. Doesn’t she light a lamp, sweep the house and search carefully until she finds it?” This coin that this woman lost, we know from what scripture tells us, it had value. It was not a penny; it was not a nickel. It was a valuable coin to this woman. She searched for it high and low. You know, when the car door flies open and a penny falls out on the ground, you're not you're not looking for that penny. But if your car door flies open and $100 bill flies out and blows around the parking lot, you better believe you're getting out of your car and running after that $100 bill. It has value. It has real value.
And you rejoice when it's found. Jesus says in verse ten, “In the same way, I tell you, there is rejoicing in the presence of the angels of God over one sinner who repents.” What does this mean over one sinner who repents? It's a celebration of a person realizing they're helpless and they need rescued. This was Jesus's point in the story of the lost sheep too, talking about the sheep that had value, incredible value, and he went in search for it.
And maybe for some that were hearing these stories more than 2,000 years ago this wouldn't have been enough. This wouldn't have been convincing for them to really say, okay, Jesus, I'm in. But you know what probably was more convincing and did convince a lot of people, was when Jesus backed up what he said. He said you have value. You have extreme value. When he went to the cross, when he paid the price for our sins so that we could have eternity with God, he saved us from what we couldn't save ourselves from.
And so, here's the great paradox of this whole thing today, is that we're helplessly lost, but we're infinitely valued and cherished by the God of the universe. That's the good news. And sitting and thinking about your own sinfulness, it can be easy to doubt value saying, oh, God, what have I done? How could I have done this? Do you even know what I've done? How could I possibly draw near? But remember the Pharisees, the tax collectors, and the sinners, they drew near even though their offense was great. They were with Jesus. They were eating with them. Maybe in these moments, as Jesus was together with this crowd, he was telling them just how much they're valued, just how much they're cherished by God. Maybe he was just eating with them, we don't know. But it communicated something to them that they were valued, they were loved.
So, we're helpless, and we're valued. And here's the the final word that I want you to remember today, equal. I’m not talking about math. Don't worry. Here's what I mean. Jesus was trying to emphasize something here about our life. There might be a difference in lifestyle choices being made between the Pharisees and the tax collectors, yes, but Jesus wanted them to understand something. That each of them was lost in their own way. You can be lost in your goodness. You can be lost in your badness. But either way, the Pharisees and the tax collectors were both trying to do something apart from God.
And these two stories that we're looking at today actually link up pretty closely, and it's usually a set of three told with verses 11 through 32 in Luke Chapter 15. I'd encourage you to maybe check that out this week on your own time. We don't have time today and it's often called the story of the Prodigal Son, but Jesus actually never calls it that. As you read the first few verses, Jesus actually says there was a man who had two sons. Jesus doesn't say there was a prodigal son and then we'll talk about this other guy. Jesus said there was a man who had two sons, and he goes on to tell a story. Perhaps you're familiar with it.
A son asks for his father's inheritance, takes all the money, and goes off and blows it all on wild living. He's in trouble and realizes what he's done, the offense he's caused. He comes back, and he begs for his father's forgiveness. And his father was already ready to forgive him. He runs out in the middle of the road and he greets him with a hug. He throws a big party and says, rejoice, my son was lost, and he is now found.
Then there's the other brother at home who's done everything right, followed all the rules. And he says, why in the world are we celebrating this brother of mine who absolutely blew it? What in the world is going on? And Jesus tells this story as a way to say, you know what, you can be lost in your waywardness, you can be lost in thinking, you're going to follow all the right rules, and that's going to do something for you, to draw, to get me some sort of prize.
Both sons were lost. And when we realize this, this equality, that we're all lost, we're all equal in need of God's grace in different ways. It can do something. It can draw communities together. It can transcend differences, neighborhoods, social classes, races, and education levels. We can all be together because we realize we're all equal.
I love looking at the Book of Acts and at the early church movement. In the Book of Acts chapter two, there's a few verses that have always been important for me, and this is verses 42 through 44. “They devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and to fellowship, to the breaking of bread and to prayer. Everyone was filled with awe at the many wonders and signs performed by the apostles. All the believers were together and had everything in common.” They had everything in common. It was the teachings of the Gospel. It was the understanding that they were in need of God's grace. They were helpless. It drew them together into a kind of community that ended up changing the world. It's the reason we're sitting in this room right now because their community was built on the grace that they understood, that was afforded to them.
They had been through something together. And if you've ever been through something with a group of people, think about it for a moment. Maybe it was an extreme loss, a family member, perhaps. Maybe it was a high moment, a triumph, a team success, a victory, or something at work. If you've ever been through something really galvanizing. You think about it. Think about the bonds you now have with those people, that you went through it with, they were in it with you.
You know, the Olympics are coming up this summer. I love the Olympics. One of my favorite Olympic moments of all time. It's Winter Olympics, the miracle on ice. The U.S. hockey team won the gold medal in 1980. And the movie that was made about that, the Disney movie, there's a scene in that movie that I love. There's a scene where it's got all these college kids from around the country. They're from different schools and they're come together to form Team USA. They haven't understood yet that they are team USA, and it's a tough loss. The coach gets them back out on the ice after a tough game, and he just starts blowing his whistle. They skate back and forth, doing suicides on the ice. They're tired, they're exhausted, and dehydrated. And he keeps asking them. He stops and asks a random player, who do you play for? What team do you play for? And they name their college teams that they're playing for even though they're one team. He blows the whistle, and he says it again and again. Nobody's understanding what's going on.
Then finally, there's one player as he blows the whistle, and he asks what team do you play for? And he's exhausted. He says, Team USA. And then at that moment he decides, we get it, we've had enough. And they get off the ice. They've been through that experience together, probably thinking, I don't know if I'm going to make it. I don't know if I'm able to walk or crawl home at this point. They went through something. And from that moment on, if you watch the rest of the movie where they really come together as a team and they do what they did, it was the experience, it was the bond. It was the the moment of understanding we're together in this. We went through something together, and it's causing us to live in a different way together.
When we understand God's grace together as a community, it will change this community, the communities you live in, we were created for. God didn't create us to live alone. He created us to be in relationships with other people, not just family members, not just friends, but relationships with other people that know and love God to build on the foundation that we're all equal, we're all lost.
And maybe you're here today and you're saying, well, I don't know. I just don't know if this is me. I'm doing all right. I'm a family person. I have a good job. I'm honest. I've tried to do the right thing in my life. I just don't know if this is me. And just remember that the heart, the very heart of sin is wanting to break free from God to do things your own way.
It can look like breaking the rules, or it can look like keeping the rules simply so that you don't need God's grace. We're helpless, but we're valued. We're cherished by the God of the universe so much so that He sent His Son Jesus to pay a penalty that we deserve to pay. And now there's no condemnation for those that are in Christ Jesus.
Helpless, valued, equal. When we understand these things, when we know these things, our lives can change, our communities around us can change. Knowing that the grace that God extended to us, to me, can now be extended to other people because I've understood it first in my own life.
I'd like to close today with the Apostle Paul's words in his letter to the Ephesians chapter two. “Like the rest, we were by nature deserving of wrath. But because of his great love for us, God, who is rich in mercy, made us alive with Christ even when we were dead in transgressions—it is by grace you have been saved.”
Let's pray. God, thank you for your grace. God help us in this moment, right now, all of us, everyone in this room, whoever we are today, to know our helpless state, to understand that, to know that we are also valued and cherished and loved. To know that we are equal in need of Your Grace. God help us. If there's anyone here that hasn't understood that or wrestled with that, I pray that this could be a moment that they could consider your love for them. They could consider that you want them to draw near to you, to your very heart, to who you are. God, thank you. We pray all these things in the name of your son Jesus Christ. Amen. It was good to see everyone. Have a great rest of your weekend.
