The Greatest Lost and Found Department
Jeremiah 4:11-12, 22-28; Luke 15:1-10

Scene

Jesus continues to travel along with a crowd.  The crowd is made up of all sorts of folks such as sinners, tax collectors, Pharisees and Scribes.  The Pharisees and Scribes are watching and listening to Jesus to find things they can use as charges against him.  They were going about the same kind of behavior as we do when we look out over the world and find folks that we can point a finger and say, “See there, I told you.”  Their attraction to Jesus at this point was to gather words and behaviors that they could use to prove their case.

We’re not actually told why the sinners and tax collectors were following other than the hear him.  There was something about what he was saying or perhaps how he was saying it that drew them ever closer to him.

            Wrong Kind of Folks

These were the kind of folks that our mothers and father would tell us to stay away from.  I remember going home with a friend from school for lunch one day.  We had dill pickle sandwiches for lunch.  I’d never had one until that day and I thought it was pretty neat.  When I got home my mother was tapping her toes wanting to know where I had been (we had no cell phones back then).  When I told her the toe tapping got faster and she let me know in no uncertain terms that those were not the kind of folks we associate with.  I’m not sure what the problem was other than they lived in poverty and folks living in poverty just didn’t measure up plus they might be unclean.

            Jesus and Those Folks

Well, that’s the scene that day with Jesus.  The church-goers were shaking their heads in disbelief that he would associate with those people.  They had all the ammunition they needed to take him to task.

Jesus Responds with Two Parables

Actually, there are three parables that fill the entire fifteenth chapter of Luke but today we will look at only two: The Lost Sheep and the Lost Coin.  Each of these parables has a great deal to say about the Good News and they tell us about The Great Lost and Found Department.  Maybe it would have been more accurate to call it The Heavenly Lost and Found Department.

            The Lost Sheep

“Which of you,” Jesus asks the Pharisees and the Scribes, “having a hundred sheep and one gets lost would not leave the 99 and go search for the 1 lost?”  The immediate answer is no one would do that and expose the 99 to all the usual threats in order to save one sheep.  Why, the risk would be absolutely foolish.

                        You Must Not Be Captured

I remember while training at Ft. Devens our class would be told by various instructors, “You must not ever be captured.  The knowledge you have could cost tens of thousands of lives.  What is one life compare to thousands?”  We were told that we had a price on our head because the black hat guys wanted what we knew and we just not allow ourselves to be kidnapped.  It is my observation that our culture, like any other, would teach sacrifice the one to save the many.  Those who were after Jesus would argue that point when some defended him as he neared his trial.

The Lost Coin

He tells a second parable of a woman with ten coins and she loses one.  Let your mind imagine a lost coin in a house in the first century.  You couldn’t flip a switch and suddenly the room would be full of light.  There was no such thing as a flashlight that would throw a steady beam of light to search by.  Indeed, what you would have is a dark room with an extremely uneven floor made of stones with dirt filling in the cracks.  Plus, those were really tiny coins, not even as large as a dime.

The Pharisees and Scribes may have listened to this one a little more because it is immediately something that anyone can identify with since nearly everyone has looked for a lost coin at one time or another.

            They Hear the Show Stopper

At some point, those deeply religious men would have realized that Jesus has just called God a women.  They would need nothing more than this to find Jesus guilty of the very worse kind of behavior – even worse than associating with sinners and tax collectors.  Once they heard this they would have heard nothing else. 

This is the way Jesus is with those around him; he tells these stories and they contain things that can grab our attention and stop us from hearing the central point.  The point of a parable is always God and not us.  But if we are convinced the story is about ourselves then we don’t hear the actual truth of the point.  The stories are about God.

What About the God of These Parables?

There are a few points that I believe are crucial characteristics of God that I hope we can allow to sink deeply into our hearts.  In fact, I hope that we can allow this to speak so clearly to us we will live as close to the message as possible.

            God Takes Risks

Our God is not one that has to be logical and do things the way we think would be best.  Indeed, God takes risks.  Not little risks but God-sized risks.  Listen to these words from Philippians 2:5f:

5 Think of yourselves the way Christ Jesus thought of himself.
6 He had equal status with God but didn't think so much of himself that he had to cling to the advantages of that status no matter what.
7 Not at all. When the time came, he set aside the privileges of deity and took on the status of a slave, became human!
8 Having become human, he stayed human. It was an incredibly humbling process. He didn't claim special privileges. Instead, he lived a selfless, obedient life and then died a selfless, obedient death--and the worst kind of death at that: a crucifixion.

God was willing to risk everything to become a human being, a person just like you and me, and then be crucified.  Why?  Because sinners are not able to reach a level of perfection needed for the presence of God on their own.

            God Loves Sinners

Rather than pushing sinners away we find that God attracts them and then socializes with them.  He accepts invitations to eat with them and even invites them to eat with him.  God loves those people!

            God Relentlessly Seeks the Lost

God searches and searches until the lost are found.  The lost sheep is found.  The lost coin is found.  The story of salvation is one of the Savior finding the Lost and brining them home and then celebrating.

Conclusion

The Reverend Robert Farrar Capon in a radio broadcast December 29, 1996 describes the parables this way:  “The point is that what these two parables put together say is that what governs God's behavior to us is not our sins. It's not our problems. It's his need to find us. These parables go by the need of the finder to find, not about the need of the lost to be found. That's obvious. We always knew that. We could have gone to our graves knowing that. The great thing is that the universe is driven by the need of the finder to find all of us in our lostness. And that, of course, is the beginning.”

            Who Are the Lost?

Who are the lost that Jesus was talking about?  The Pharisees and Scribes would probably make our lists.  The sinners and Tax collectors would certainly be there.  Today, it would be the non-believers and those who believe differently from us.  The lost are always “those people.”  Well, the lost are all of those folks without any exceptions.  And yes, if you will look around carefully in the lost and found department you will find us.

Who among us is worthy of God’s love?  Which group of Christians can claim acceptable perfection on our own?  How many of us can stand and listen to some poor sinner confess his or her sins and can then say, “Thank you God that I am not like that sinner?” 

Paul states that we all fall short and I believe him correct.  But, let me tell you with all the power and enthusiasm I have that God is searching for us night and day.  And when God finds even one of us there is celebration in heaven.  In fact, every time God finds one of us there is celebration in heaven!  They get together and celebrate the finds in God’s Lost and Found Department.  Amen.