Latest / Topeka Bible Church Audio Archive / February 23, 2020 | Craig Congdon - A God Who Experiences Joy

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February 23, 2020 | Craig Congdon - A God Who Experiences Joy · Topeka Bible Church Audio Archive

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_00: Morning.
• 0:02
  SPEAKER_00: My name's uh Jim Congdon.
• 0:04
  SPEAKER_00: Uh some of you in the cab are looking at the video thinking, I thought the camera was supposed to add 10 pounds, not take off 35 years.
• 0:15
  SPEAKER_00: But uh Yeah, Pastor Jim uh got the sickness that's been going around and uh hit him pretty hard all week.
• 0:22
  SPEAKER_00: So he is uh getting a little better, but still a little too weak and doesn't have a voice, which would have been problematic this morning.
• 0:28
  SPEAKER_00: So called me a couple days ago, asked if I had to fill in.
• 0:31
  SPEAKER_00: Means we're uh gonna take a break, a one-week uh hiatus detour from uh from your series in Jeremiah.
• 0:38
  SPEAKER_00: So we're gonna look at a couple parables this morning.
• 0:42
  SPEAKER_00: Have you ever experienced just complete, unrestrained joy?
• 0:47
  SPEAKER_00: Just like full out pure joy.
• 0:52
  SPEAKER_00: You know, as I think about uh my own life, some of those times um when I've experienced just that pure, unbounding joy, uh one of the times that sticks out in my mind uh it was about 12 years ago.
• 1:04
  SPEAKER_00: Uh 2008.
• 1:06
  SPEAKER_00: You're probably thinking that's about the time maybe you met your wife or something.
• 1:09
  SPEAKER_00: No, no, something far more important than that.
• 1:11
  SPEAKER_00: Uh 2008, the Kansas Jayhawks made the national championship game.
• 1:16
  SPEAKER_00: And uh, you know, I mean, you grow up a lifelong KU fan, and finally they're there in the national championship, and they're playing against a Memphis, uh, formidable team, bunch of NBA talent on that team.
• 1:29
  SPEAKER_00: Memphis had Derek Rose, who three years later would be named the youngest NBA uh MVP of all time.
• 1:38
  SPEAKER_00: And so uh KU finally makes it to this game, but the game ain't going so well.
• 1:43
  SPEAKER_00: Uh you get to about a minute 56 left in the game, and we're down nine.
• 1:48
  SPEAKER_00: Seems lost.
• 1:50
  SPEAKER_00: All hope is lost.
• 1:51
  SPEAKER_00: We made it this far only to fail at the very end.
• 1:55
  SPEAKER_00: And then about a minute and 53 seconds later, Mario Chalmers would hit that shot right there, sending the game to overtime.
• 2:03
  SPEAKER_00: And I was down at college watching this game all alone in the house, jumping up and down and screaming like a little girl.
• 2:09
  SPEAKER_00: And then as soon as overtime hit, my brothers and my dad and I were calling each other and just basically shouting through every minute of the victory.
• 2:18
  SPEAKER_00: Such pure, unrestrained joy.
• 2:20
  SPEAKER_00: But I know some of you may be uh from a different fan base, so you didn't get to enjoy this one as much.
• 2:26
  SPEAKER_00: But I think we can all get behind this next image, right?
• 2:28
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, there we go.
• 2:30
  SPEAKER_00: You know, yeah, yeah.
• 2:34
  SPEAKER_00: Mm-hmm.
• 2:35
  SPEAKER_00: You know, just three weeks ago, right?
• 2:38
  SPEAKER_00: Anyone else still watching the highlight videos?
• 2:40
  SPEAKER_00: I know you are, don't lie.
• 2:41
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 2:42
  SPEAKER_00: Uh three weeks ago, same situation though, wasn't it?
• 2:45
  SPEAKER_00: Nine minutes left in the game, down 10.
• 2:48
  SPEAKER_00: We haven't done a thing.
• 2:49
  SPEAKER_00: And it feels like it's lost.
• 2:51
  SPEAKER_00: We waited 50 years just so we could lose in the Super Bowl.
• 2:54
  SPEAKER_00: And then Mahomes just go full on Mahomes, and it was just over, right?
• 2:58
  SPEAKER_00: Um apologies if there are any San Fran fans in here.
• 3:01
  SPEAKER_00: Uh but I'm sure you've had many weeks to grieve and mourn and get over it.
• 3:04
  SPEAKER_00: So just pure, unbounded joy.
• 3:10
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe you're not a sports fanatic like I am, so I don't know.
• 3:14
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe you have some lesser joys like the day you got married or the birth of a child or something.
• 3:18
  SPEAKER_00: I don't know.
• 3:19
  SPEAKER_00: What do other people get excited about?
• 3:21
  SPEAKER_00: Uh maybe it's uh simpler joys, uh joys of reuniting with friends or family after a long time being a part, or the joy of just an excellent meal.
• 3:31
  SPEAKER_00: Uh simple joys like uh, ladies, have you ever like lost an earring that you have like great attachment to?
• 3:38
  SPEAKER_00: Right?
• 3:38
  SPEAKER_00: There's like all this emotional history, and you think it's gone, and then suddenly you find it and you're really excited.
• 3:44
  SPEAKER_00: Um I got a similar story to that one.
• 3:46
  SPEAKER_00: Not an earring, that would be weird.
• 3:48
  SPEAKER_00: Um I couldn't pull it off.
• 3:50
  SPEAKER_00: Uh but uh married men, you ever lost this?
• 3:53
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I definitely lost my wedding ring once.
• 3:56
  SPEAKER_00: Uh that was a problem.
• 3:58
  SPEAKER_00: Uh I was playing pool volleyball when I was down at seminary in Dallas and jumped up, and of course, you're in the pool, so your hand's wet, and my ring goes.
• 4:05
  SPEAKER_00: And so we spent the next couple hours looking for it in the grass and in the pool, and we didn't find it.
• 4:10
  SPEAKER_00: And the next day, my friends at seminary tasked their three kids with swimming for like four hours just so they could look for it, and they didn't find it.
• 4:18
  SPEAKER_00: On the third day, I decided to literally go to like the edges of the property, and I'm looking in bushes that are like 30 feet away from the pool, and there it is.
• 4:26
  SPEAKER_00: Um, so yeah, you know, you find something that was lost and you feel excited, just pure, unrestrained joy.
• 4:35
  SPEAKER_00: And Jesus tells us that God Himself has moments where he experiences and feels this same pure, unrestrained, unbounded joy.
• 4:46
  SPEAKER_00: Is that surprising?
• 4:48
  SPEAKER_00: Is this surprising to some of you?
• 4:50
  SPEAKER_00: That God feels this emotion of joy, this absolute and utter excitement at times?
• 4:58
  SPEAKER_00: I know for some people they think of God sort of like he's off in the distance, he's this force out there, he's like a computer keeps the thing running, or like a machine that keeps all the parts going.
• 5:08
  SPEAKER_00: They don't think he has emotions.
• 5:11
  SPEAKER_00: Uh for others, they think, well, maybe God does have some emotions, but the emotions they associate with God are negative, right?
• 5:18
  SPEAKER_00: God is that mean rule setter who's always, I don't know, slapping your hands with the rulers, and he's just judgmental God, and he hates and he's angry.
• 5:31
  SPEAKER_00: Do you realize that Jesus tells us that God experiences moments of just complete and utter joy?
• 5:39
  SPEAKER_00: Well, Jesus is going to tell us that today.
• 5:42
  SPEAKER_00: He's going to tell us that in a couple parables.
• 5:45
  SPEAKER_00: Parables, these great little stories of Jesus, that he tells these stories, instead of just teaching, sometimes you just tell a story where you'd get the point, where you'd understand the message you're supposed to get.
• 5:57
  SPEAKER_00: And part of the power of the parables is their emotion.
• 6:01
  SPEAKER_00: And that they're meant to sort of shock and awe, and they sort of jolt you into thinking or realizing something you didn't realize before, and that through that emotion you feel it in a way that causes you to act, to decide to change and to follow Jesus.
• 6:18
  SPEAKER_00: And so it's in a set of parables, actually, that Jesus is going to talk about the joy that God experiences.
• 6:25
  SPEAKER_00: And we find this set of parables in Luke chapter 15.
• 6:31
  SPEAKER_00: Set of three parables here, we're actually only going to look at the first two, but in this setting, Jesus is going to tell three parables.
• 6:38
  SPEAKER_00: Parables that talk about first a lost sheep and then a lost coin.
• 6:42
  SPEAKER_00: And then the third and final is the most famous, by a way, is it's the parable of the lost son, or what we usually call the prodigal son.
• 6:51
  SPEAKER_00: But what's interesting about these three parables is we're actually given the setting to the parable.
• 6:56
  SPEAKER_00: We know when and why Jesus actually told this parable.
• 7:02
  SPEAKER_00: And so we're going to look first at the setting that caused Jesus to want to tell this parable, beginning Luke 15, just verses 1 through 3.
• 7:12
  SPEAKER_00: Luke tells us, now the tax collectors and sinners were all drawing near to him to hear him, to hear Jesus.
• 7:20
  SPEAKER_00: And the Pharisees and the scribes grumbled, saying, This man receives sinners and eats with them.
• 7:29
  SPEAKER_00: So he told them this parable.
• 7:32
  SPEAKER_00: So here's our setting, right?
• 7:33
  SPEAKER_00: We have two groups of people from the outset.
• 7:36
  SPEAKER_00: First, you have the tax collectors and the sinners.
• 7:40
  SPEAKER_00: Tax collectors are not well looked upon in the day.
• 7:44
  SPEAKER_00: Tax collectors are not your friendly neighbor.
• 7:49
  SPEAKER_00: Tax collectors are the people who collected taxes, think IRS.
• 7:54
  SPEAKER_00: But these tax collectors would go around from town to town, village to village, and just tell you what the tax was and then expect you to pay it.
• 8:02
  SPEAKER_00: And they would often tell you that the tax was more than it really was, and they'd line their pockets, known for being dishonest, they're hated in society.
• 8:09
  SPEAKER_00: And on the other hand, included with these tax collectors, tax collectors and sinners, which is just sort of a catch-all word for quite bad people, right?
• 8:18
  SPEAKER_00: Not the righteous, nice, kind, good people.
• 8:21
  SPEAKER_00: Tax collectors and sinners is group number one here.
• 8:24
  SPEAKER_00: Group number two, on the other hand, you've got the scribes and the Pharisees, the scribes and the Pharisees who are supposed to be the religious elite.
• 8:31
  SPEAKER_00: They're the righteous people, they're the rule followers, they know what's supposed to be done.
• 8:36
  SPEAKER_00: And so here are these two groups of people, and Luke tells us that this group over here, the tax collectors and sinners, they're drawing nearer to Jesus to hear him.
• 8:48
  SPEAKER_00: And the righteous people over here, the supposedly righteous ones, the Pharisees and the scribes, are grumbling about it.
• 8:55
  SPEAKER_00: They're grumbling.
• 8:56
  SPEAKER_00: This man receives sinners and eats with them, and eats with them.
• 9:03
  SPEAKER_00: And that should actually stand out to us.
• 9:05
  SPEAKER_00: Because to eat a meal with someone, to share a meal with someone was a real statement then.
• 9:11
  SPEAKER_00: You might have like a wealthy benefactor or a noble, or some wealthy person would maybe out of his generosity provide a meal for the poor and the needy.
• 9:20
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe would pay for them to eat, would hand out food or have his servants hand out food.
• 9:26
  SPEAKER_00: But never in a million years would anybody who was wealthy and noble eat with the poor.
• 9:31
  SPEAKER_00: To actually share a meal with them?
• 9:33
  SPEAKER_00: That makes a statement.
• 9:36
  SPEAKER_00: Because we got to think, uh, okay, number one, we need to transfer our minds all the way over to the Middle East and to Israel for their context, and we gotta go back 2,000 years to say, what is the significance of a meal?
• 9:49
  SPEAKER_00: Well, number one, meals are gonna take all night.
• 9:51
  SPEAKER_00: Some of you maybe have been over in Europe.
• 9:53
  SPEAKER_00: When you go over for a meal, you show up at 6, maybe thinking that the food was gonna be ready at 6:30 and it's ready at 9, and you eat and you leave at 11.
• 10:00
  SPEAKER_00: Because that's the way it works overseas.
• 10:02
  SPEAKER_00: When you share a meal with somebody, you show up at 5 or 6, you leave at 10 or 11.
• 10:07
  SPEAKER_00: So when it says Jesus is eating a meal with them, it's not like, hey, let's go grab burgers for 20 minutes.
• 10:13
  SPEAKER_00: This is spending hours upon hours fellowshipping and talking and sharing and teaching and being with these people.
• 10:22
  SPEAKER_00: To share a meal with someone was a statement of trust, of brotherhood, of acceptance, of respect that you wanted to spend that much time with them.
• 10:31
  SPEAKER_00: And so here is Jesus with the tax collectors and sinners, and the Pharisees look at him and say, You're receiving them and you're even eating with them?
• 10:39
  SPEAKER_00: The fact that they say this man receives sinners seems like Jesus maybe is even doing the inviting.
• 10:44
  SPEAKER_00: He might even be hosting this thing.
• 10:48
  SPEAKER_00: And here he is eating with the people who are at the bottom of the rungs in society.
• 10:53
  SPEAKER_00: And the Pharisees don't like it.
• 10:55
  SPEAKER_00: They don't get it.
• 10:56
  SPEAKER_00: They don't see that Jesus' meal here is an expression of his mission.
• 11:01
  SPEAKER_00: It's a meaningful picture of the redeeming love of God, but the Pharisees are just over there grumbling.
• 11:08
  SPEAKER_00: They grumble and grumble.
• 11:10
  SPEAKER_00: This man receives sinners and eats with them.
• 11:14
  SPEAKER_00: He seeks them out, he enjoys their presence.
• 11:17
  SPEAKER_00: None of this makes sense.
• 11:19
  SPEAKER_00: And Jesus, being Jesus, hears their grumbles and knows their grumbles, and he's gonna respond.
• 11:25
  SPEAKER_00: But how does Jesus respond?
• 11:26
  SPEAKER_00: He doesn't respond with just standing up and saying, Now let me tell you why I like hanging out with these people more than you.
• 11:32
  SPEAKER_00: Let me tell you why we're here.
• 11:34
  SPEAKER_00: And say what does he do?
• 11:36
  SPEAKER_00: He tells them a story.
• 11:37
  SPEAKER_00: Not just one, though, he tells them three stories back to back to back, triple parables here.
• 11:43
  SPEAKER_00: Which seems to be unique in scripture.
• 11:45
  SPEAKER_00: And no other time do we see Jesus just lay out several parables in a row like this.
• 11:50
  SPEAKER_00: Usually Jesus preaches a parable and then he expands on it with normal teaching.
• 11:55
  SPEAKER_00: Or Jesus preaches a parable and the disciples come to him and they're like, hey, um, Peter over there, he didn't get it.
• 12:00
  SPEAKER_00: So maybe you could explain it to him and we could listen too, right?
• 12:03
  SPEAKER_00: Because the disciples usually don't get it, and so they ask for explanations.
• 12:06
  SPEAKER_00: This is the only time where we see Jesus give three parables in a row, and they're all pointed at the same message.
• 12:12
  SPEAKER_00: It's like Jesus is so frustrated with the scribes and Pharisees that they completely miss the heart of God that he gives them three stories, not just one, to realize how Jesus and how God then feels about these groups of people, about the tax collectors and about the sinners.
• 12:33
  SPEAKER_00: So he fires off three parables: a lost sheep, a lost coin, and then a lost son, but we're only looking at the sheep in the coin today.
• 12:41
  SPEAKER_00: And so here are the stories that Jesus tells them.
• 12:44
  SPEAKER_00: Beginning in verse 3 again.
• 12:46
  SPEAKER_00: So he told them this parable.
• 12:49
  SPEAKER_00: 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.
• 13:03
  SPEAKER_00: And when he has found it, he lays it on his shoulders, rejoicing.
• 13:06
  SPEAKER_00: 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.
• 13:16
  SPEAKER_00: 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.
• 13:26
  SPEAKER_00: And he launches straight into a second parable.
• 13:28
  SPEAKER_00: 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.
• 13:38
  SPEAKER_00: 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.
• 13:46
  SPEAKER_00: Just so I tell you, there is joy before the angels of God over one sinner who repents.
• 13:55
  SPEAKER_00: Here are Jesus' parables, the stories he tells, to show the scribes and Pharisees just how wrong they are to grumble about who is in Jesus' presence.
• 14:08
  SPEAKER_00: There's some really interesting aspects to these parables.
• 14:11
  SPEAKER_00: The first one isn't even about the message of the parables necessarily, it's about the characters that Jesus chooses.
• 14:19
  SPEAKER_00: He opens the first parable like this which one of you having a hundred sheep and being a shepherd?
• 14:26
  SPEAKER_00: And I can tell you, the minute he says, which of you, if you were a shepherd, I can tell you how the scribes and Pharisees would respond.
• 14:32
  SPEAKER_00: No, no, no, no, no.
• 14:34
  SPEAKER_00: We would not be shepherds.
• 14:36
  SPEAKER_00: We're scribes and Pharisees, we're not shepherds.
• 14:39
  SPEAKER_00: We hear shepherd often in the church, and we think, well, we know the Lord is my shepherd, and David, wasn't he a shepherd?
• 14:45
  SPEAKER_00: And so we think shepherd and we think positive thoughts.
• 14:48
  SPEAKER_00: First century Israel shepherd does not create positive thoughts.
• 14:53
  SPEAKER_00: You can imagine why.
• 14:55
  SPEAKER_00: What does a shepherd do?
• 14:56
  SPEAKER_00: They live in the country with sheep.
• 14:59
  SPEAKER_00: You know what they don't do is spend a lot of time around other people, other humans.
• 15:03
  SPEAKER_00: They live with the sheep.
• 15:04
  SPEAKER_00: They stink, they smell.
• 15:07
  SPEAKER_00: You know, we've got documents dating from the first century that talk about how the shepherds are down here.
• 15:13
  SPEAKER_00: You don't want to be a shepherd.
• 15:15
  SPEAKER_00: Shepherds are looked down upon.
• 15:17
  SPEAKER_00: So Jesus chooses the shepherd as the first main character here, as the first hero of the story.
• 15:23
  SPEAKER_00: And says, which of you, if you were a shepherd, you can already immediately see the scribes and Pharisees saying, oh no, no, no, no, no, thanks.
• 15:32
  SPEAKER_00: And then, of course, who does the shepherd turn out to be in this parable?
• 15:35
  SPEAKER_00: He stands for God.
• 15:37
  SPEAKER_00: How about the second parable in the main character Jesus chooses to use?
• 15:42
  SPEAKER_00: It's a woman.
• 15:44
  SPEAKER_00: Or a woman loses coins and searches for it.
• 15:47
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, thank God we've come a long way in 2,000 years, but 2,000 years ago, women were not top class in society.
• 15:56
  SPEAKER_00: Women are second tier in society 2,000 years ago.
• 16:02
  SPEAKER_00: And these are the two main characters that Jesus decides to use: shepherds and women as the main characters.
• 16:11
  SPEAKER_00: It's as if Jesus is already making a point.
• 16:14
  SPEAKER_00: Because the whole problem the Pharisees have is their attitude towards other groups of people that they don't respect or like.
• 16:22
  SPEAKER_00: And Jesus in his parable just goes ahead and chooses two groups that the scribes and Pharisees would not want to be and would naturally look down on.
• 16:33
  SPEAKER_00: And Jesus is gonna say, Oh, and by the way, the shepherd and the woman in these two stories, um, yeah, they're the symbol for God.
• 16:43
  SPEAKER_00: And so here is parables, and and the shepherds are dirty and unclean and beneath them, and women are inferior.
• 16:50
  SPEAKER_00: And Jesus says, here they are, and they lose something.
• 16:54
  SPEAKER_00: And in these parables, of course, the the situations are the same in a way.
• 16:59
  SPEAKER_00: It's somebody has lost something.
• 17:02
  SPEAKER_00: The shepherd has lost a sheep, and the woman has lost a coin.
• 17:07
  SPEAKER_00: And these situations would be common enough in their day.
• 17:10
  SPEAKER_00: Um so shepherds and lost sheep.
• 17:14
  SPEAKER_00: Sheep are not the smartest animals around.
• 17:16
  SPEAKER_00: All right, you'd have a group of a hundred sheep, and I don't know, one of them would just wander off.
• 17:21
  SPEAKER_00: Literally, I don't know, squirrel, and it just goes and leaves.
• 17:26
  SPEAKER_00: All right?
• 17:26
  SPEAKER_00: And so uh sheep, not too bright, is a common thing for sheep to live.
• 17:31
  SPEAKER_00: It's why in scripture we have, all we like sheep have gone astray.
• 17:35
  SPEAKER_00: Why?
• 17:35
  SPEAKER_00: Because it's just a common thing.
• 17:36
  SPEAKER_00: It's what sheep do, they go astray.
• 17:39
  SPEAKER_00: We have stories in the Old Testament of uh David himself when he was a shepherd and uh a sheep got lost and he had to go find it.
• 17:46
  SPEAKER_00: And it was a dangerous task because he might run into lions, bears, might run into animals.
• 17:51
  SPEAKER_00: We want to kill you.
• 17:52
  SPEAKER_00: And so a common occurrence.
• 17:54
  SPEAKER_00: And you know what doesn't happen after a sheep gets lost?
• 17:57
  SPEAKER_00: It doesn't just find its way back.
• 17:59
  SPEAKER_00: They're not that bright.
• 18:00
  SPEAKER_00: Right?
• 18:01
  SPEAKER_00: If the sheep is lost, the only the only chance it has at returning to the flock is if the shepherd actually goes out, looks for it, seeks it, finds it, and brings it home.
• 18:13
  SPEAKER_00: Then we have the second picture here.
• 18:16
  SPEAKER_00: The second picture is a woman losing something in the house.
• 18:19
  SPEAKER_00: Common enough occurrence even today.
• 18:21
  SPEAKER_00: But now you gotta imagine we're 2,000 years ago and you drop something on the floor.
• 18:25
  SPEAKER_00: When we drop something on the floor, pretty easy to find.
• 18:27
  SPEAKER_00: If you got wood floors or you got carpet or something, or tile or something, pretty easy to see.
• 18:32
  SPEAKER_00: 2,000 years ago, the floor of a house is likely just packed dirt.
• 18:36
  SPEAKER_00: And there's constant dirt coming in from the road and blowing in through the open door.
• 18:42
  SPEAKER_00: And so you drop a coin, easy for it to get covered up.
• 18:45
  SPEAKER_00: It's why the woman has to sweep the whole house, looking underneath the packed dirt to see if she can find the coin.
• 18:52
  SPEAKER_00: So you have two common occurrences of things being lost that need to be sought so they can be found and restored.
• 19:01
  SPEAKER_00: And when we look at the woman's situation, it's maybe even more surprising that she has ten coins at all, just that anyone would have ten coins.
• 19:08
  SPEAKER_00: Unless you're wealthy, you didn't usually have actual physical currency.
• 19:13
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, you know, it's common to be day labor.
• 19:15
  SPEAKER_00: It's truly you worked during the day, at the end of the day, you received your day's wage, usually a single silver coin, and then you would use that coin to buy whatever you needed for the next day.
• 19:25
  SPEAKER_00: So when it says she has ten silver coins, it probably means total, right?
• 19:28
  SPEAKER_00: It's not like she has some other bank account.
• 19:30
  SPEAKER_00: This is all her money in the world.
• 19:32
  SPEAKER_00: And she loses one.
• 19:34
  SPEAKER_00: And so now we have two situations where something is lost and it needs to be found.
• 19:40
  SPEAKER_00: But what's interesting about these parables is that ultimately they're about finding what is lost because the thing that is lost just matters.
• 19:50
  SPEAKER_00: That which is missing matters.
• 19:52
  SPEAKER_00: The lost sheep matters to the shepherd, and lost coin matters to the woman.
• 19:57
  SPEAKER_00: The object is still valuable to them even after it's lost.
• 20:01
  SPEAKER_00: Imagine your shepherd, you got a hundred sheep, and you lose one of them.
• 20:05
  SPEAKER_00: That's one percent.
• 20:08
  SPEAKER_00: You've only lost one percent of the flock, you have 99 safe sheep.
• 20:12
  SPEAKER_00: And couldn't you see yourself saying, hey, it's a business, it's natural to expect some loss.
• 20:16
  SPEAKER_00: If I go out looking, something bad could happen to me.
• 20:19
  SPEAKER_00: The sheep might already be dead.
• 20:21
  SPEAKER_00: If I leave my 99 here, something bad could happen.
• 20:25
  SPEAKER_00: It's a costly move to go looking for the one that's lost, and yet the shepherd cares, cares about the sheep.
• 20:33
  SPEAKER_00: What's missing matters, and so he goes, and the woman, and the woman loses the coin.
• 20:37
  SPEAKER_00: She could look for a few minutes and say, I give up.
• 20:39
  SPEAKER_00: I'll just go work for the rest of the day.
• 20:41
  SPEAKER_00: I will make a coin.
• 20:43
  SPEAKER_00: That can replace the one that I've lost.
• 20:46
  SPEAKER_00: But instead, she seeks, seeks diligently all the way until she finds it.
• 20:53
  SPEAKER_00: And notice the focus of the parable, these two parables, isn't actually on the thing that's lost, but it's on the feeling of the one who has lost it.
• 21:05
  SPEAKER_00: It's not about the object that's lost, as much as it is about the feeling of the shepherd and the feeling of the woman, the feeling that they've lost something that matters to them.
• 21:16
  SPEAKER_00: So these parables aren't just about how we feel when we are lost.
• 21:20
  SPEAKER_00: Jesus begins with the loss sustained by God Himself.
• 21:24
  SPEAKER_00: That God is the shepherd who feels the loss of every one of his wandering sheep.
• 21:30
  SPEAKER_00: He is the woman who experiences the loss of the coin, that God feels the loss of every person who isn't following him.
• 21:38
  SPEAKER_00: And here we find just the infinite emotion of the parables and of God Himself.
• 21:45
  SPEAKER_00: God is the shepherd whose sheep has wandered.
• 21:47
  SPEAKER_00: He is the woman whose piece of coin has disappeared in the darkness and debris of the house.
• 21:53
  SPEAKER_00: That because of our sin, God lost something that he had formerly possessed and that he highly valued, and that was us.
• 22:02
  SPEAKER_00: God experienced the loss of his sheep going astray.
• 22:05
  SPEAKER_00: He now, in these parables, we see this beautiful picture of what God does for what he has lost.
• 22:14
  SPEAKER_00: That the shepherd leaves the 99 and goes after the lost one until he finds it.
• 22:21
  SPEAKER_00: Without giving up.
• 22:22
  SPEAKER_00: That the woman lights a lamp, sweeps the house, seeks diligently until she finds it.
• 22:28
  SPEAKER_00: That they never stop seeking until it's found, and that God never stops seeking the lost until they are found.
• 22:34
  SPEAKER_00: God is not content in leaving the lost lost.
• 22:38
  SPEAKER_00: That he seeks, he searches, he goes on a mission looking for us, and he doesn't stop until he finds us.
• 22:44
  SPEAKER_00: He is unrelenting.
• 22:46
  SPEAKER_00: And when he finds us, it is complete, unbounded, electrifying, pure joy.
• 22:54
  SPEAKER_00: Verse 7, 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.
• 23:04
  SPEAKER_00: Verse 10, just so I tell you, there is joy before the angels of God over one sinner who repents.
• 23:13
  SPEAKER_00: It's really interesting in the shepherd's case that when he finds it, he experiences joy.
• 23:18
  SPEAKER_00: Because when the shepherd first finds the sheep, it tells you what he's got to do.
• 23:24
  SPEAKER_00: He's got to put that sheep on his shoulders and carry that thing back.
• 23:28
  SPEAKER_00: Fully grown sheep is gonna weigh at least 100, 150 pounds.
• 23:32
  SPEAKER_00: Right?
• 23:32
  SPEAKER_00: Look, I got a couple dogs.
• 23:34
  SPEAKER_00: Sometimes they tend to run away from me when I let them outside to go to the bathroom.
• 23:37
  SPEAKER_00: When I find them, I'm not experiencing electrified joy.
• 23:42
  SPEAKER_00: I'm rather angry and frustrated that they ran away in the first place.
• 23:46
  SPEAKER_00: But here's God the shepherd, who when he finds that lost sheep, it's not about time.
• 23:52
  SPEAKER_00: Now stop running away.
• 23:55
  SPEAKER_00: Instead, the shepherd just experiences joy and gladly throws the sheep up on his shoulders and carries him back.
• 24:06
  SPEAKER_00: If you want to know what these parables are about, they're just telling you that God loves lost people.
• 24:12
  SPEAKER_00: That every single lost person matters to God.
• 24:15
  SPEAKER_00: In some ways it's that simple.
• 24:18
  SPEAKER_00: That God loves lost people, he's gone to great lengths to bring them home.
• 24:23
  SPEAKER_00: But have you ever talked to lost people and non-Christians?
• 24:28
  SPEAKER_00: They usually don't believe that there is a God out there who loves them.
• 24:32
  SPEAKER_00: If they believe in a God at all, usually it's, well, if there's a God that exists, maybe he loves people, but he loves the good people.
• 24:38
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe he loves the churchgoers or the nice, beneficent people, or he doesn't love me.
• 24:44
  SPEAKER_00: I'm unlovable.
• 24:46
  SPEAKER_00: Have you seen the way my life is going?
• 24:48
  SPEAKER_00: He definitely doesn't love me.
• 24:52
  SPEAKER_00: But the truth of these parables is that while we were lost, God went on a search for us, and the only reason for that can be because he loves us.
• 25:10
  SPEAKER_00: Came down to this wilderness of an earth seeking every sheep that he had lost.
• 25:15
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, why did he traipse all over the Judean hillsides?
• 25:18
  SPEAKER_00: Why go all the way up to Galilee?
• 25:20
  SPEAKER_00: Why on earth go to a cross that means suffering and persecution and death?
• 25:27
  SPEAKER_00: Certainly didn't do all that just so he could judge us at the end and say, ha, take that.
• 25:31
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, this is the picture of ultimate love.
• 25:36
  SPEAKER_00: He does it because he loves us.
• 25:39
  SPEAKER_00: And then what he does after he leaves is he sends his apostles and disciples and says, go, and he sends the church and he says, Now this mission is yours, go, search, seek the lost, go and make disciples.
• 25:52
  SPEAKER_00: Because he never stops seeking those who are lost.
• 25:57
  SPEAKER_00: Even now he's looking for those who are lost, and he doesn't come searching like a police officer, looking for a fugitive.
• 26:04
  SPEAKER_00: Right?
• 26:04
  SPEAKER_00: I'm a bit of a musical nerd, uh book nerd.
• 26:07
  SPEAKER_00: He doesn't come like Javert looking after Jean Valjean and Le Mes.
• 26:11
  SPEAKER_00: Right?
• 26:12
  SPEAKER_00: Let me find him so that I can see him safe behind bars.
• 26:15
  SPEAKER_00: I want to come find them so I can punish them.
• 26:23
  SPEAKER_00: He came because of love.
• 26:24
  SPEAKER_00: He came because he loves and wants to save.
• 26:26
  SPEAKER_00: He wants to restore the sheep to the rightful shepherd so they can experience the joy and safety in life that comes from being in a relationship with him.
• 26:37
  SPEAKER_00: God loves us, every single one.
• 26:40
  SPEAKER_00: God takes the initiative.
• 26:41
  SPEAKER_00: He's the one who goes to great lengths to seek and save the lost.
• 26:45
  SPEAKER_00: It's the image of the parables.
• 26:48
  SPEAKER_00: God who's desperately searching for what he has lost.
• 26:53
  SPEAKER_00: And then what happens when even one that is lost gets found, rejoicing great joy, great joy in heaven over one sinner who repents, joy before the angels of God over one sinner who repents.
• 27:07
  SPEAKER_00: This is what Jesus is calling out this group over here for.
• 30:46
  SPEAKER_00: So if you're here and you're still lost, we just want you to know that God loves you.
• 30:52
  SPEAKER_00: That's what Jesus wants you to know.
• 30:53
  SPEAKER_00: He wants you to know that he loves you.
• 30:56
  SPEAKER_00: That you are so valuable to him.
• 30:59
  SPEAKER_00: He's the one who made you, he is the one who is searching for you, who is hoping beyond hope that you will see that he loves you, that he died for you, and that you'll come back home.
• 31:10
  SPEAKER_00: Because he's looking.
• 31:13
  SPEAKER_00: Or maybe if you have been found, but then maybe you have been wandering a bit, you still have a bit of that sheep tendency, and you're out in the pasture leaving the flock, uh, just remember how joyful it makes God when his people come back to him.
• 31:30
  SPEAKER_00: And they return and they say, Here I am, I'm here to follow you again, shepherd.
• 31:37
  SPEAKER_00: And if God feels this way about the lost around us, then shouldn't we feel this way too?
• 31:43
  SPEAKER_00: If there is nothing closer to God's heart than the lost people, and there's nothing that makes him rejoice more than when a lost person comes home, then shouldn't that be our goal and our mission too?
• 31:56
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, in the end, I think Jesus would say, this whole Christian life, sometimes we complicate it.
• 32:01
  SPEAKER_00: Sometimes we make it a little more difficult than it is.
• 32:03
  SPEAKER_00: The whole Christian life, this whole gig, just comes down to sort of a search and rescue mission.
• 32:10
  SPEAKER_00: Just go find the people who are still lost and bring them home.
• 32:16
  SPEAKER_00: Go therefore and make disciples.
• 32:20
  SPEAKER_00: Go therefore and find my lost sheep.
• 32:24
  SPEAKER_00: Go therefore and find my lost coins and return them to me.
• 32:31
  SPEAKER_00: No matter how many people we see around us that come to faith, there's always one more.
• 32:36
  SPEAKER_00: There's always somebody who's lost around us.
• 32:39
  SPEAKER_00: And the reason that we should care is because God cares.
• 32:42
  SPEAKER_00: Because God loves them deeply and wants them so badly to be restored.
• 32:48
  SPEAKER_00: So are you gonna join in this search and rescue mission with God?
• 32:52
  SPEAKER_00: Are you active in this task that God has given every one of us?
• 32:58
  SPEAKER_00: You know, the clearest, most obvious way to get involved is just you gotta share the gospel.
• 33:04
  SPEAKER_00: I bet you know at least one lost person in your life.
• 33:06
  SPEAKER_00: You gotta share the gospel.
• 33:09
  SPEAKER_00: And I get it.
• 33:10
  SPEAKER_00: It's easy for Christians for us to get worried and scared at the prospect of sharing our faith.
• 33:16
  SPEAKER_00: We get worried that we might hurt that relationship, we get scared that it might mean rejection or persecution.
• 33:22
  SPEAKER_00: But don't you have to keep your eyes on the positive side, on the fact that when you're sharing the hope of the gospel, it is hope.
• 33:31
  SPEAKER_00: That you're telling them that God loves them and that there's an opportunity for joy for them in life like they've never experienced.
• 33:38
  SPEAKER_00: There's a God who loves them and that if they come home, that God will rejoice over them.
• 33:44
  SPEAKER_00: Because we gotta be, we gotta be out there looking for those lost sheep and lost coins.
• 33:51
  SPEAKER_00: Uh there's more ways, though, as well, to do this than just to explicitly preach the gospel.
• 33:57
  SPEAKER_00: Right?
• 33:57
  SPEAKER_00: Get involved in places that are doing this, that are seeking the lost.
• 34:02
  SPEAKER_00: You go to a church where you know the gospel is gonna be proclaimed, just bring your lost here and maybe somebody else will help them find their way.
• 34:10
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe it means uh how about you teach a kid Sunday school?
• 34:14
  SPEAKER_00: You know how many kids in the church actually come to a saving faith?
• 34:18
  SPEAKER_00: That they set off that cosmic celebration in heaven because of uh interactions in Sunday school with a teacher?
• 34:24
  SPEAKER_00: Or volunteer at a VBS or a kids' camp or something this summer.
• 34:28
  SPEAKER_00: Do something where you can be preaching the gospel into people's lives.
• 34:33
  SPEAKER_00: Or get more involved in a ministry or some mission opportunity where you know that the missions group is about preaching the gospel and is about finding the lost.
• 34:43
  SPEAKER_00: And serve, give, be a part of it, do whatever you need to do.
• 34:48
  SPEAKER_00: But it's time that we, the church, really got involved here.
• 34:53
  SPEAKER_00: That we realized that the reason that God keeps us on this earth after we believe is so that we can be about his work.
• 35:02
  SPEAKER_00: And he's tasked us now with looking for those lost sheep and seeking diligently for those lost coins and not giving up, not until every single one of them is found.
• 35:13
  SPEAKER_00: Knowing that when they're found, we can help set off a cosmic celebration.
• 35:17
  SPEAKER_00: Isn't it cool to know that you could be the cause for a party in heaven?
• 35:23
  SPEAKER_00: You can be.
• 35:26
  SPEAKER_00: On the other hand, I imagine the sadness in Jesus' eyes as he looks over at this group, as he looks over at the scribes and the Pharisees, and he says, You're supposed to understand the heart of God.
• 35:39
  SPEAKER_00: You're supposed to understand just how full of love God is, and you don't get it.
• 35:46
  SPEAKER_00: You don't get that every single lost person, no matter their status, no matter their race, no matter where they are in life, every single person matters to God.
• 35:57
  SPEAKER_00: That he loves them, that he seeks and looks for them.
• 36:02
  SPEAKER_00: Great would it be if we had that same heart, if we too realized that every lost person is loved, that every lost person is valuable, that every lost person will be sought after, and that every found person is worth a celebration, and that we too can be a part of that.
• 36:18
  SPEAKER_00: Let's make that our task.
• 36:20
  SPEAKER_00: I'm gonna invite Jeremiah up here to sing a song, uh, a song that is actually based off of these parables.
• 36:27
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe it's been going through some of your minds.
• 36:29
  SPEAKER_00: Uh it's called the Reckless Love of God.
• 36:33
  SPEAKER_00: It says, Oh, the overwhelming, never-ending, reckless love of God.
• 36:38
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, it chases me down, right?
• 36:41
  SPEAKER_00: Like a shepherd chases down a lost sheep.
• 36:43
  SPEAKER_00: It fights till I'm found, it leaves the 99.
• 36:48
  SPEAKER_00: I couldn't earn it, I don't deserve it, yet you give yourself away.
• 36:53
  SPEAKER_00: As the song is played, uh feel free to either join in or singing or just sit and reflect on the words.
• 36:58
  SPEAKER_00: Reflect on just how much God loves every single person.
• 37:04
  SPEAKER_00: On what that means for what we're called to do.
• 37:07
  SPEAKER_00: Uh would you pray and ask God to show you the lost people in your lives that you need to be searching and seeking after?
• 37:14
  SPEAKER_00: Would you pray that God would just impress upon your heart just how important this task and this mission is?
• 37:23
  SPEAKER_00: And then I pray that you're just overwhelmed as you hear these words of how much God loves you.