Sermon for September 11, 2022 – 14th Sunday after Pentecost
Jeremiah 4:11-12, 22-28; Psalm 14; 1 Timothy 1:12-17; Luke 15:1-10
Lost and Found
On more than one occasion I have so firmly believed in what I was seeking in this world that I was completely unaware of just how far away the pursuit had taken me from God. As I have shared before, I have known that I wanted to be a priest, to live a life of prayer and service, for a longtime. I was seeking my place in the world. I was seeking a way to build and create a life for myself with God at the center. I believed I knew exactly how this would play out. The way forward to what I was seeking was crystal clear. Yet, as I kept seeking that sense of place and purpose, I kept following a path that was leading me further away from that goal. I kept following that path even as it spiraled deeper and deeper into darkness, all the while, still holding on tightly to this dream. I didn’t want to let go. I convinced myself that I was still on the right path, still had God at my center. I was only deceiving myself. It wasn’t until I was forced to let go of the dream that I was finally able to see where I was and how I got there.
You would think that I would have learned my lesson after a humbling experience like that, but because we are prone to wander, prone to leave the God we love, I once again found myself wandering in a wilderness. This time I was seeking love. I was so desperate in seeking love, so desperate for a relationship with someone else in which we would walk this journey together, that I straight up followed a girl to Ohio. I had no business being in Columbus, Ohio. But I was so confident that I was on the right path that I once again convinced myself this was born out of a mutual discernment of God’s will and desire for both of us. I was so convinced I missed every single warning sign. I refused to listen to others. I believed that I had finally found what I was seeking, only to lose it all and once again realize that this is not what God wanted for me.
As the relationship that drew me so far from home deteriorated, so too did my desire to stay. I began to retreat within myself. I stopped going to class. I stopped leaving the apartment during the day to avoid others, so I would not have to lie about why I hadn’t been around. I left only when I absolutely needed to. I wanted to go home but I couldn't. I was imprisoned by my own guilt for my actions and screw-ups. I was caged in by my shame for being viewed by others as a failure and disappointment. I was paralyzed by my fear. I was so desperately lost. Out of the depths, I once again I cried out to God for help.
As I wallowed in my own pigsty, I had to make a choice; do I stay and continue down the self-destructive path spiraling out of control, or go home. That same feeling in my heart that pulled me back from the brink of the dark abyss once before, was tugging at my heart again and I knew that God was telling me that there was more to my life than this. God was calling me back. God didn’t want me alone in an unfamiliar city with zero support around me. I had no community, no friends, no family. I was utterly alone.
The hardest part about coming home, is making the decision to do so, because it means wading through those deep emotions of guilt, shame, and fear. These feelings are strong motivators for us to not come home, to continue running, so as to not have to deal with these powerful emotions. We self-medicate, numb the pain, and hope that it will all just go away. But we all know it doesn't work that way, life doesn’t work that way, and as Jesus tells us in the gospel this morning, God doesn’t work that way either.
So, I called my parents and two days later they were in Columbus with my older brother and we packed up my apartment to head home. I needed to shed the weight of my own sin and seek forgiveness from my family for my actions. Then and only then, after letting go of my will and surrendering myself to the will of God did I experience the freedom found in being welcomed home. Instead of being shamed or forced to repay my parents the costs incurred for classes and for coming home as I had feared, I was welcomed home with open arms. They were happy to have their lost sheep home. I once was lost, but was found. I was blind, but now I see.
And so it is in our gospel this morning as Jesus illustrates God’s unending love for us through several short parables about being lost and found.
In the opening verses of Chapter 15 of Luke’s gospel, the crowds are pressing in around Jesus to hear his teachings. All manner of people make up this community. They gather around Jesus for a variety of reasons. The disciples gather to receive instruction. The Pharisees and the Sadducees to keep tabs on Jesus’ radical teachings. And there are people gathered around Jesus who do not really belong anywhere because they have lived so much of life on the fringes. They are described as tax collectors and sinners, which means that they are people no one else wants to hang around with, for fear that the reprehensible reputations of the one would implicate the good reputations of the other. Somehow these outsiders have crowded into the community as well.
This was a group of strange bedfellows, hardly a dinner list that anyone would put together. And yet…here they are, eating with Jesus. If you are, after all, known by the company you keep, Jesus has completely thrown the community into panic. The side conversations begin almost immediately, and so the community of Jesus begins to crack. The whispering starts, “Who invited them? Why would Jesus embrace this woman, or this man? Does he not know who they are, what they do for a living? Who is this Jesus? He talks of godly things on the one hand, and yet he eats with them on the other.”
Perceiving the questions, Jesus begins to address the growing division in the crowd by talking about the nature of God in terms that they can understand. He approaches it on economic terms, talking about things they value. He wants them to think about what is most important to them. For example, the shepherd values the health and safety of his flock; the source of his income. The woman values the hard-earned money she has scraped and saved to feed her family. Or the parent who values the happiness and well-being of their children. Think of that thing most precious in your life and what it would be like to lose it, whether through carelessness, or intent, or theft. Something on which you place extreme value goes missing. I imagine you would be devastated. Not that you cannot continue; you can. People adapt, but life is incomplete. Part of the whole is missing.
Jesus is telling us that God is like the shepherd who values each sheep in the flock. God is like the woman who accounts for every silver coin in the purse. God treasures every child of the family. When one goes missing, God goes into search mode. God’s nature is love, and love looks like one who goes out tirelessly searching, because the one who is lost is so lost that they cannot find their way back home.
Along with love, woven in with the nature of God is the nature of the one who is lost. A lost sheep that is able to bleat out in distress often will not do so, out of fear. Instead it will curl up and lie down in the wild, hiding from predators. It is so fearful in its seclusion that it cannot help in its own rescue. The sheep is immobilized, so the shepherd must bear its full weight to bring it home. Similarly, the lost coin, an inanimate object, is unable to call out or shine brightly to bring attention to itself. Its rescue is totally dependent upon the woman’s diligence.
Jesus elucidates this point with another well-known parable, that immediately follows our verses for this morning. It is a parable about a father with two sons. The younger son, after wasting his life and sinking as low as he can go, resolves to return to his father. He rehearses an apology but does not get to use it. His father is way ahead of him. His father has been watching out for him since he left. How easily children of God wander away and become lost, so filled with regret they are unable to undo their mistakes. There seems no possible hope for reconciliation. They cannot retrace their steps or make it right. Jesus assures us that, like the father, God is a step ahead. Home is already waiting. Love’s door is open.
Jesus understands the struggle of being lost, the emptiness of being separated, and the struggle to return. Jesus does not turn away from the sinners, but toward the lost, to make a place for them, to welcome them home.
Jesus understands that those on the fringes of the community are integral to what the community in all its fullness should be. Until they return, the community is incomplete. These parables are about a hospitality that seeks to forgive and restore. These parables call us to open our doors and rejoice; to tear down the walls and barriers that would otherwise keep people out. This call is repeated again and again. Sinners and tax collectors gather at the table with the Christ? Rejoice! Laugh! Be glad! They have returned home and now sit in the presence of God. The sheep who wandered off from the rest of the flock, lost in the thicket, is now safe and sound! Hallelujah! Worry no more! The coin that fell through the cracks was easily forgotten, but is blessedly retrieved. We can Feast! Hope is Restored!
When one in our community goes missing, we are all affected. When one is restored, we are all better off for it. That is how it is in the household of God, and so it is here, in this place, in this community. It is our task to be reflections of this radical hospitality of love and inclusion. Each of us has been lost in our own journeys. And each of us has been found. Right now, someone out there is lost waiting to be found. Someone in here might be feeling lost and we are uniquely positioned to help them be found and welcomed home into this parish family. And so it is that we are all called to seek and find, to know and be known. Rejoice for you are home. Welcome home. Amen.
