Jeffrey Heine: Well, good morning. Good
Connor Coskery: morning. Good
Jeffrey Heine: morning. It's lovely to see you all. We are going to be in Luke chapter 15 this morning. Luke chapter 15. We're going to be continuing our study, the parables of Jesus, this summer.
We're going to be looking at 2 parables today. First, the parable of the lost sheep and then the parable of the lost coin. So we're going to be in Luke chapter 15 verses 1 through 10. We're going to begin with verse 1 and let us listen carefully for this is God's word. Now the tax collectors and sinners were all drawing near to him and the Pharisees and the scribes grumbled saying, this man receives sinners and eats with them.
So he told them this parable. What man of you having a 100 sheep, if he has lost one of them, does not leave the 99 in the open country home, he lays it on his shoulders rejoicing. And when he comes home, he calls together his friends and his neighbors saying to them, rejoice with me for I have found my sheep that was lost. Just so I tell you, there will be more joy in heaven over 1 sinner who repents than over 99 righteous persons who need no repentance. Or what woman, having 10 silver coins, if she loses 1 coin, does not light a lamp and sweep the house and seek diligently until she finds it.
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. Just so I tell you, there is joy before the angels of God over 1 sinner who repents. This is the word of the Lord. Let's pray together. Oh Lord, whether we know it or not, our souls are desperate for You this morning and so we ask that in your grace and kindness you would meet us here by your spirit in your word.
You would speak peace to those who are near and peace to those who are far off, that we would learn by your spirit to love you and to trust you. So we ask that you would speak, Lord, for your servants are listening. We pray these things in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Amen. Do you remember in elementary school when you would have a class assembly?
At my school, we would gather in the cafeteria and sit on the floor in little rows, much like you are doing now. All the teachers would be standing in the back watching for any trouble, any misbehaving, and there was always misbehaving. It would be so exciting mostly because we were doing something different out of the ordinary schedule of spelling and math. Sometimes it would be a firefighter or a police officer coming to speak on safety. Other times, it was the high school show choir singing acapella Billy Joel songs.
I remember one particular assembly. I was in 4th grade and a man came to the school to give a presentation on the history of Kentucky. He was a storyteller, a professional storyteller. His job was to tell stories. I'd never heard of such a thing before.
I was completely enthralled. He told his stories masterfully, connecting different stories together, weaving repeated words and phrases. It's a tool for storytellers to repeat words and phrases in hopes of keeping a crowd's wandering attention and driving home their point. I don't think I'd ever listen to anyone so intently in my life. In Luke's gospel, chapter 15, Jesus is speaking to a crowd of people gathered around Him sitting on the ground in little rows much like you are now.
The teachers, the scribes, and the Pharisees were standing in the back watching for any trouble, any misbehaving because there was always misbehaving. But this time, it wasn't from the listeners sitting on the ground. Trouble was coming from the man who was speaking. You see, the crowd wasn't made up of the right kind of people. It wasn't a crowd of respectable, upright, and pious people.
The crowd was gathered around this man who was causing trouble, a crowd full of outcasts, sinners, lowlifes, and tax collectors, they were drawing near to this rabbi who had garnered a reputation with both the Pharisees and the sinners. Not only were they drawing near to this man, he was receiving them. Maybe rumors had spread among the unacceptable, the outcast that there was a rabbi who would welcome them, who would eat with them, who would receive them. They drew near to him listening more intently than they listened to anyone in their lives. For this, the teachers, the scribes, and the Pharisees, they grumbled.
Verse 2 says, They grumbled saying, this man receives sinners and eats with them.' Jesus takes note of these dueling reactions. The sinners with whom Jesus has shared meals and extended kindness, they are drawing close. The scribes and the Pharisees, they whisper and grumble with disapproval. In response to both the captivated crowd and the grumbling Pharisees, Jesus tells a story. The first story is about a shepherd tending his sheep.
To the Pharisees, from the very start, this story was offensive. Similar to tax collectors, shepherds were some of the most maligned people in their society. The shepherds had the Pharisees had particular contempt for these shepherds. Their lowly vocation demanded that they were never around for the required sacrifices and expected worship practices. Instead, they were out in the fields taking care of sheep, failing to meet this high standard that the Pharisees had made up themselves, which meant that the shepherds were unclean, unrighteous, and unacceptable.
What was so troubling to these Pharisees is that the unclean, the unrighteous, and the unacceptable were the precise types of people that Jesus chose to hang out with. Jesus addresses the crowd in verse 4. Look with me. What man of you, having a 100 sheep, if he has lost one of them, does not leave the 99 in the open country and go after the one that is lost until he finds it? When he has found it, he lays it on his shoulders rejoicing.
When he comes home, he calls together his friends and his neighbors saying to them, rejoice with me for I have found my sheep that was lost. This story would have made no sense to the Pharisees because unless you've raised sheep, the logic doesn't reason out. Leave 99 for 1? It's likely you'll come back to far less than 99. Losing the 1 is just the cost of doing business.
You've got to spend money to make money, crack a few eggs to make an omelet. Sometimes you lose sheep, but you've got 99 to look after. Who would leave behind the 99 sheep to go after the one? No one except a shepherd. My grandmother, Mary Elizabeth, turned 95 recently, and she gave me a book that was my grandfather's by April Armstrong.
It was published in 1956. It's called The Tales Christ Told. It's about the parables of Jesus. There's one line that I read a few weeks ago and I haven't stopped thinking about it. She says, The affection shepherd has for his sheep is more than its wool could warrant.
In other words, the love a shepherd has for his sheep is inordinate to the value of its wool. He loves the sheep more than its worth. Why? Because to the shepherd, the sheep is worth more than its wool. And these people who are drawing near to Jesus, these outcasts and sinners, they are worth more to God than their reputations, than their good works, than how other people might say they are worth.
And the Pharisees could not understand that. For them, they thought you'd only take care of a sheep for what they were worth, and going after the one lost sheep was a waste of time. It wasn't worth it. That was precisely why they were grumbling at Jesus. The one sheep isn't worth it.
These people, these ragamuffins and lowlifes, these sinners just weren't worth it. Here's Jesus eating with sinners, showing them kindness and hospitality. The Pharisees say these people aren't worth it. They aren't worth a well thought of rabbi's time and attention. And yet, Jesus is no ordinary rabbi.
Just think how appalled and offended these Pharisees would have been if they had known it was God himself misbehaving in such an embarrassing manner. So they grumbled. To quote Armstrong again, she said, It was an audacious parable. It contradicted everything the Pharisees preferred to believe about God. End quote.
The emphasis of the first parable is made clear by Jesus in verse 7. Look with me where he says, Just so, I tell you, there will be more joy in heaven over one sinner who repents than over 99 righteous persons who need no repentance. The one lost sheep is the image of 1 person turning from trying to save themselves to trust in God's grace. To reiterate this point, Jesus tells a second story, a parallel parable, and repeats words and phrases from the first story. It's a tool that storytellers use to repeat words and phrases in hopes of keeping a crowd's wandering attention and driving home their point.
This time, the story is about a woman who has lost a silver coin. Verse 8, Or what woman, having 10 silver coins, if she loses 1 coin, does not light a lamp and sweep the house and seek diligently until she finds it? And 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. Jesus responds to the grumbling of the Pharisees with 2 stories, both parables about seeking, finding, and rejoicing. Jesus is revealing to the Pharisees and to this captivated crowd exactly why he is there, to seek and save the lost.
Jesus says the woman lit a lamp which was a costly act. Lamps were not cheap and to light 1 during the day, To thoroughly search her home would have been a costly decision. Jesus is describing fervent searching, relentless, not giving up until she finds it. The woman then sweeps the dirt floor trying to uncover the coin. She seeks diligently.
And when she does find it, when she finally finds what has been lost, Just like the shepherd, she says to her friends, Rejoice with me. The friends of the shepherd and the friends of the woman are invited to join in the rejoicing because that's what friends do. Friends join in rejoicing. So if you're grumbling, what does that make you? Jesus closes the second parable with a line that's parallel to verse 7.
He says in verse 10, there is joy before the angels of God over one sinner who repents. Once again, Jesus references the depth and the breadth of joy in heaven over one soul turning to God in repentance. I want us to consider a couple of questions this morning together. First, am I grumbling or am I rejoicing? It's a critical question for each one of us today.
Am I grumbling or am I rejoicing? Am I grumbling or am I joining in God's rejoicing? How am I responding to Jesus when he seeks and finds what has been lost and says to me, rejoice with me? How do we know? How do we know if we're rejoicing or grumbling?
I don't think that the Pharisees understood that what they were doing was wrong. They just thought they were being holy and righteous. How do I know if I'm grumbling? What does that even look like today? I think grumbling takes many forms.
But to stay specific to Luke chapter 15, the basis for the grumbling of the Pharisees is rooted in their prejudice, their hatred for the people drawing near to Jesus, then their grumbling is intensified by their disdain for Jesus as he welcomes such people, showing them friendship and hospitality. And we too can grumble about God's lavish grace. We too can grumble about the unreasonable love of God, His love that is inordinate to the value of what people can do or accomplish or what we perceive their worth to be. We too can grumble because of the kindness of Jesus, his hospitality, which all of his disciples still today are called to embody. The followers of Jesus are still called today to show fellowship to the loved and unloved, to the righteous and the unrighteous, to eat with saints and sinners, the elite and the outcast, to show no partiality, and to do so in such a way that whether we eat or drink or whatever we do, we do it all for the glory of God.
These Pharisees are grumbling because Jesus wasn't doing what they expected or wanted. He wasn't aligning with their preferences or their priorities. So rather than drawing near to Jesus like the sinners, they sit back and grumble. Rather than yielding to the agenda of Jesus and rejoicing over what was lost being found, they grumbled, and we can do this too. We can grumble about Jesus' extravagant love for people that we demean or dismiss.
And we can grumble at Jesus' call to live like him and embody his generous friendship and fellowship. So if we're going to ask this question about whether we are grumbling like the Pharisees or not, then we need to ask, am I yielding to the agenda of Jesus and humbly living out his generous hospitality, or am I letting prejudice lead me to grumble? Church, we can fall into these same sins too. We're humans just like the Pharisees. We can sit in self righteousness and prejudice, and we can both grumble and judge and hate.
These sins, they bring no joy to God in heaven. So we must go to the Lord and humbly ask, Is there grumbling in my heart? We must ask him, Do I dismiss my brothers and sisters who are loved and welcomed by Jesus? The prejudice that the Pharisees had led them to grumbling and prejudice to get particular to our place and time here in the summer of 2020, prejudice produces grumbling. Prejudice causes us to refuse love for someone that Jesus says he loves.
We can refuse to obey Jesus in generous friendship and fellowship and both model and embody Jesus's grace. There's no room for that kind of grumbling in the family of God, which is why John, the beloved disciple of Jesus wrote in 1st John chapter 4, if anyone says, 'I love God,' and hates his brother or his sister, he's a liar. For he who does not love his brother or sister whom he has seen cannot love God whom he has not seen. And this is the commandment that we have from him, Whoever loves God must also love his brother and sister. Why?
John says, Because God first loved you. That's why we love one another. So are you joining in Jesus' joy and the rejoicing of heaven? I'm sure some of the Pharisees who were grumbling that day later repented of their self righteousness, turned away from trying to save themselves, and trusted Jesus. And they joined him in his rejoicing.
The Apostle Paul referred to himself as having once been a Pharisee. Before his conversion, Paul oversaw the execution of Christians with great satisfaction. Paul despised both Jesus and the sinners who drew near to him. He despised these followers of Jesus who would welcome such sinners. He hated Jesus until the day that Jesus came to him and silenced his grumbling, Which brings me to our last question for us: How do we stop grumbling and start rejoicing?
Are you ready for this? Listen carefully. Be ready to write this down. You can't. Not on your own, you can't.
You can't just flip some switch and say, I'm gonna stop this grumbling, and now I'm gonna be a person who rejoices. Have you ever been to an engagement party for a couple that you weren't so sure that they should get married? I'm going to take it by your laughter that you have. There's probably a photo out there somewhere of you sitting in the back of the party with a look on your face like, we'll see how this works out. We are called to join in the rejoicing of Jesus.
And the only way that that's possible is not when we just pull ourselves up by the bootstraps and say, I'm just gonna change this on my own. It's when we yield before the Holy Spirit, and we ask him to transform our hearts to make us rejoice with Jesus, to accept this invitation of Jesus to rejoice with him. We need the spirit of the living God to give us the grace to stop our grumbling and to rejoice with Jesus. So how do we stop? We pray.
We repent of our grumbling. We ask God to help us to rejoice. You see, this crowd here today isn't made up of the right kind of people. It's not a crowd of respectable, upright, and pious people. It's a crowd full of outcasts, sinners, lowlifes, and even a few tax collectors.
But you are the sheep of his pasture, sheep whom Jesus loves more than you are worth, more than what you can offer him or accomplish for him, and he has left the 99 to come for you. How can you not then join in the rejoicing of heaven? They are rejoicing because of you, what God has done for you, that you were lost and you are now found, rescued, and saved by the great shepherd who loves you and calls you his own. And you get to show his unreasonable grace and love to the other sheep who are being found. So let us stop our grumbling and join in the rejoicing of heaven.
Let's pray. Oh God, by Your Spirit, would You meet with us in this common place and do your uncommon work in our hearts. Lord, lead us by your grace to respond to the invitation of Jesus to rejoice with him Help us to look humbly at our own lives where we might grumble. And help us to understand that you came for us. You came and found us when we were helpless and lost.
And in your grace, you rescued us, you placed us on your shoulders, and you carried us, calling out, Rejoice with me, for what was lost has now been found. Help us to join with you, Jesus. We pray these things in the name of the father, the son, and the holy spirit. Amen.