The Seventeenth Sunday after Pentecost One Sinner Who Is Repenting Grace, mercy and peace to you from God our Father and our Lord Jesus Christ! Amen. There are two things you need to know right away about today’s Gospel: · First, when Jesus speaks about “one sinner who repents,” He is talking about you personally. · Second, when Jesus speaks the word “repent” in this Gospel, He is using a word form that indicates ongoing action. Really, Jesus describes you in today’s Gospel as “one sinner who is continually repenting.” This is what the Lord says concerning you: There will be more joy in heaven before the angels of God over one sinner who is continually repenting than over ninety-nine righteous persons who need no repentance. Dear Christian friends, Jesus likes to use common, everyday Words when He speaks to us. Jesus likes common Words because He wants us to understand His thoughts and know His ways. Today’s Gospel is a good example of our Lord’s simple speech. We may not have many shepherds in the congregation, but every preschooler knows what a sheep is. So, too, with the coin: who among us has not felt that surge of urgency when we realized we lost some amount of money? Who would not take time to look for it again? Jesus uses coins and sheep and other common images because He wants us to understand, and He does not want us to work too hard in order to do it. Yet even when Jesus speaks with such simplicity as you heard in today’s Gospel, we should still be prepared and ready for two things: · First, we should be ready for Jesus to define His words and phrases in any manner that He pleases. For example, when Jesus speaks about “righteous persons” in today’s Gospel, He might not be defining the phrase “righteous person” in the way that you define it. · Second, we should always be ready for Jesus to say surprising things to us, things that seem to be the opposite of the way we naturally think. Using the common, everyday concepts of coins and sheep, Jesus has a wonderful surprise for you in today’s Gospel: Jesus wants you to know that the angels in heaven rejoice exceedingly over you because you are “one sinner who is repenting.” Now I will explain to you how this is so, that you are the “one sinner who is repenting” in today’s Gospel. 1. Begin with the unusual and surprising way Jesus defines the Words and phrases He used in today’s Gospel. 1.a) The first surprise is that phrase “righteous persons,” where Jesus speaks about “the ninety-nine righteous persons who need no repentance.” When you and I think and speak of “righteous people,” we usually mean those people who go to church every Sunday to get God’s gift of righteousness from Jesus. To be sure, there are many places in God’s Bible that speak of righteousness in that manner (for example, Psalm 118:20, Matthew 25:46, and Hebrews 11:4). But that is not how Jesus uses the phrase “righteous persons” in today’s Gospel! Jesus turns things upside down in today’s Gospel. Surprisingly, Jesus uses the phrase “righteous persons” in today’s Gospel as a way of speaking about unbelievers, impenitent people, and those who have no desire to hear God’s Word. How do I know this? Jesus said earlier in St. Luke’s book, “I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance” (Luke 5:32). What is a “righteous person,” according to the surprising and unusual way Jesus uses the phrase in today’s Gospel? A “righteous person” is a person who has no interest in Jesus; a person who has no sins that need repentance; a person who does not feel lost and in need of being found. According to the surprising and unusual way Jesus uses the phrase in today’s Gospel, a “righteous person” is that person who refuses God’s Word and rejects His gift of faith. You are not that guy, are you? 1.b) Jesus also speaks in a surprising and unusual manner when He describes you and me as lost sheep and lost coins. Generally, you and I think of “the lost” as those who are still outside the church, those who have not yet been gathered into Christ’s salvation. We generally think of “the lost” as unbelievers. Jesus turns things upside down in today’s Gospel. In an unusual, even surprising manner, Jesus defines the lost in today’s Gospel as those who need Jesus, those who gather in the presence of the Lord, those who want to hear Jesus’ Words. After all, what prompted Jesus to tell the two parables we have here? The first sentence of today’s Gospel: “Now the tax collectors and sinners were all DRAWING NEAR TO HEAR JESUS.” 2. Knowing the surprising way Jesus defines things for you in today’s Gospel, listen again to what Jesus says for your comfort and joy: What man of you, having a hundred sheep, if he has lost one of them, does not leave the ninety-nine in the open country, and go after the one that is lost, until he finds it? And when he has found it, 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 one sinner who repents than over ninety-nine righteous persons who need no repentance. Or what woman, having ten silver coins, if she loses one 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.” Just so, I tell you, there is joy before the angels of God over one sinner who repents. Understand from today’s Gospel the diligence and faithfulness of your Lord! By turning things upside down—by calling you and all His Christians “lost sheep” and “lost coins”—Jesus NOT condemning you and He is NOT calling you unbelievers. By turning things upside down—by calling you and all His Christians “lost sheep” and “lost coins”—Jesus is putting you into a position to see what He continually does for you through His grace and by His mercy. According to today’s Gospel, · Jesus is your Good Shepherd who rejoices to carry you upon His shoulders and who feels great delight that He has now found you and gathered you safely in. Jesus commands His angels concerning you, “Rejoice with Me, for I have found My sheep that was lost.” · Jesus is a careful and painstaking woman who happily finds you laying helplessly in the dust, who sweeps through sand in His earnestness to have you, and who attaches great value to you. “Rejoice with Me,” says the Lord to His heavenly host, “for I have found the coin that I had lost.” Take comfort in these Words, Christians! Return frequently to these Words! Each day as you rise and go your way, thank your Father in heaven that you ride continually upon the strong and broad shoulder of Christ, your Good Shepherd. As you heard Jesus explain in today’s Gospel, “When He has found His Sheep, He lays it on His shoulders.” Each night as you lay down to rest, know that you sleep securely in the coin-purse of your Lord, who has diligently sought and found you through the light of His Word. Thus says the Lord, “I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners—that is, lost sheep and lost coins—to repentance” (Luke 5:32). Be glad, therefore, that you are a sinner in need of repentance. Your sinfulness is good and faithful proof that Jesus came for you! 3. We still have one final horse to hook up to the cart. When Jesus speaks the word “repent” in today’s Gospel, He is using a word form that indicates ongoing action. Really, Jesus describes you in today’s Gospel as “one sinner who is continually repenting.” Jesus makes this Gospel more beautiful for us by letting us know that we shall never escape our sinfulness, so long as mortal life endures. In the very moment that you and I stop being sinners, we likewise in that very same moment stop needing Jesus. Stated another way, in the moment that we stop sinning, we become “righteous persons who need no repentance.” That is why our Lord so graciously says in today’s Gospel that you and I are both “sinners who are continually repenting.” It is a good and blessed thing to be “one sinner who is continually repenting” because hell is full of “righteous persons who need no repentance.” Rejoice in your sinfulness, Christian! Gladly take your place among “the tax collectors and sinners who were all drawing near to hear Jesus.” There is no better place to be! Jesus says today concerning, now that He has found you and gathered you in: There will be more joy in heaven before the angels of God over one sinner who is continually repenting than over ninety-nine righteous persons who need no repentance. _______________________________________________ Sermons mailing list Sermons@cat41.org http://cat41.org/mailman/listinfo/sermons
