Lost Sheep or Deadbeats 1982

I'd like to begin by reading the first seven verses of Luke 15. Luke 15, the first seven verses. Now the tax collectors and sinners were all drawing near to hear him.

And the Pharisees and scribes murmured, saying, This man receives sinners and eats with them. So he told them this parable. What man of you, having a hundred sheep, if he has lost one of them, does not leave the ninety and nine in the wilderness and go after the one which 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 which was lost. Even 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.

This fifteenth chapter of Luke is one of the most beautiful passages in the whole Bible. In this chapter, Jesus really gives us a vision of his own heart. Describes his own heart and the heart of the Father, and truly the heart of the Spirit as well, as that of a man who leaves his ninety-nine sheep in the wilderness and goes looking for that one lost sheep.

Or a woman who has ten silver coins and loses one of them, and turns the house upside down until she finds that one coin. When the man finds the sheep, when the woman finds her coin, they gather their friends and neighbors together and celebrate. The chapter ends with the parable of the prodigal son.

Goes out and wastes his inheritance in wild living. Almost starves to death. Comes home a broken man.

And what a welcome he gets when he comes home. What a celebration the Father has for him. This chapter is wonderfully encouraging to us, because we know that we are that lost sheep, that lost coin, that prodigal son.

We strayed so far from the goodness of God. We drifted into all kinds of vanity and confusion, and the living God came looking for us personally. What an awesome thing! And yet, and yet the joy that Jesus describes as coming to the lost sheep, coin, prodigal that is found.

The joy which we know should be the continuous experience of everybody in the kingdom of God. That joy, for us, still seems to be missing. Now, we understand that the Lord welcomes tax collectors and sinners like we are.

And we know that the atmosphere of the Father's house when we come home is to be unmitigated joy, continuous and constant, not clouded by anything at all, just wonderful joy. But, somehow, in trying to translate this 15th chapter of Luke into reality in our own lives, we lose the way. Somehow we never really get to that celebration.

And the reason we lose the way, and somehow seem to miss out on that heavenly party which should be the atmosphere of our daily life. Every day should be a holiday in the kingdom of God. The reason we miss out on this is because in our spiritual blindness we have failed to see that there is a difference between a lost sheep and a dead beast.

On the outside, at first, a lost sheep and a dead beast look identical. You can't tell one from the other. Sometimes they're all dressed up, sometimes they look like slobs, but you can't tell.

But when a lost sheep comes home, when the lost sheep is found, it repents, it changes. It lives. Whereas when a dead beast is found, it wants to be buddies with Jesus, it makes all kinds of verbal promises, but it never changes.

Peter was a lost sheep. Judas was a dead beast. The woman at the well was a lost sheep.

The rich young ruler was a dead beast. Now the tax collectors and sinners were all drawing near to hear him. And the Pharisees and scribes murmured, saying, this man receives sinners and eats with them.

Now if these tax collectors and sinners came to Jesus just to hang around, if they came for dinner but never even, you could say, even offered to help with the dishes, never did anything, never made any attempt to change, then they would have been dead beasts. And you can be sure that they would not have seen Jesus very long. But that's not how it was.

Those tax collectors and sinners came to Jesus, and they repented, they changed, they turned their lives around, they were not dead beasts. They were lost sheep who allowed themselves to be found. Now, what man of you having a hundred sheep, if he has lost one of them, does not leave the ninety-nine in the wilderness and go after the one which 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 neighbors, saying to them, Rejoice with me, for I have found my sheep which was lost. Even 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. And we see clearly in this entire chapter, the lost sheep repents, the lost coin repents, the prodigal son repents.

So what's repentance? Repentance is two things. Repentance is a change of heart. Repentance is action.

And if these two things are missing in our lives, if we don't continuously have, constantly have change of heart going on, action taking place in terms of God, all the time, every day, if this isn't happening, we are flattering ourselves to think of ourselves as lost sheep. We're really nothing but dead. Repentance is a change of heart.

There was a man who had two sons. And the younger of them said to his father, Father, give me the share of property that falls to me. And he divided his living between them.

Not many days later, the younger son gathered all he had and took his journey into a far country. And there he squandered his property and loose living. And when he had spent everything, a great famine arose in that country and he began to be in want.

So he went and joined himself to one of the citizens of that country who sent him into his field to feed the swine. And he would gladly have fed on the pods that the swine ate. No one gave him anything.

When he came to himself, he said, How many of my father's hired servants have bread enough to spare? But I perish here with hunger. I will arise and go to my father and say to him, Father, I have sinned against heaven and before you. I am no longer worthy to be called your son.

Treat me as one of your hired servants. Until the man gets to this point, to the point where he repents, humbles himself, I say, until he gets to this point, he's a deadbeat. He has all kinds of insights into what's going on in the world.

He can see how futile life is. And he is aware of the injustices that are taking place on all sides. He can speak of them with great eloquence.

But where's he at? He's still feeding swine. He's a deadbeat. And many of us think of ourselves, quite piously, as poor little lost sheep.

We talk about God, we pray a little bit, we are very, very impatient with all the hypocrites around us. But we haven't changed our lives one inch in five years. And as long as it continues like that, we're deadbeats.

You know, we think about what we really should be doing, we weigh the options endlessly, we compare ourselves with other people, we meditate about our problems, talk about God endlessly, read books perhaps, but we're still feeding swine, so we're still deadbeats. Then, the man wakes up. And he says to himself, this is ridiculous.

How many of my father's hired servants have bread enough to spare and here I am perishing with hunger? I'm going to go home. I'm going to go to my father and I'm going to say to him, Father, I've sinned against heaven, and before you I'm not worthy to be called one of your sons. Treat me as one of your hired servants.

When we see this, we're looking at a changed heart. See, and this change of heart needs to take place not only at the beginning of our walk with Jesus, but all along the way. There needs to be a change at the beginning indeed.

But there needs to be change, change, change, all along the path. What happens to us so often is that we start walking with Jesus, we face the power of the world to come, we find ourselves able to minister life to somebody else, but then ever so subtly, perhaps very, very slowly, we slip into a comfortable rut where we are no longer really serving God with all our heart. We're actually looking after ourselves in every way and on the side serving God a little bit, perhaps to soothe our conscience or to keep people off our back.

As long as we continue walking along in this little rut, pretending to be serving God, when we're not, we're deadbeats inwardly and we will remain deadbeats until we reach the place where we say, this is ridiculous. I'm off the track. I've lost my way.

I need help. God help me. Many of us even know very specifically exactly what we need to decide in order to come back into a burning relationship with God.

And we've been thinking about this for so long. Well, do it. Make the decision.

Make it today. Make it now. I'm going to turn.

I'm going to make that change. I'm going to go and ask that person for forgiveness. I'm going to cut that ungodly relationship.

Whatever I have to do, I'm going to do it. But the prodigal not only changed inwardly, but the inward change sealed itself with an outward action. First he decides what he's going to do.

I will arise and go to my father. But then he doesn't. And he arose and came to his father.

But while he was yet at a distance, his father saw him and had compassion and ran and embraced him and kissed him. And the son said to him, Father, I've sinned against heaven and before you. I am no longer worthy to be called your son.

Treat me as one of your hired servants. But the father said to his servants, Bring quickly the best robe and put it on him. Put a ring on his hand and shoes on his feet.

Bring the fatted calf and kill it. Let us eat and make merry. For this my son was dead and is alive again.

He was lost and is found. Every decision, every inward change, calls for action. And it's only when we perform the action, when we actually fall on our knees, or go and get reconciled to that person, or give to that one that God showed us to give to so long ago, or make whatever change we have to make, it's only when we do that thing that the celebration begins, that we begin in fact to taste the joy of the kingdom of God.

I will arise and go to my father. And then he arose and came to his father. Now the father, who waited for so long for his son to change from being a dead bee into being a lost sheep come home, is waiting for us, individually and as a flock, to rise up and act.

Your prayer life is in shambles. Do something about it. Your neighbor is in need.

Do something about it. Your right hand is causing you to sin. Do something about it.

And he arose and came to his father. And it's only when we rise up and come to the father and do the thing that we need to do that the celebration begins. Repentance is a change of heart.

Repentance is action. And the time to change our hearts before God, the time to act, is now. Now let's just take some time before God, and if there are things that he's calling us to do, let's do them.

Let's not wait till tomorrow or next week or when we feel better or when nobody's looking. Whatever we need to do, do it. Let's wait on God now.

Lord God, you know our hearts. You know what we're thinking about and what we've been wrestling with. Some decision or some action or some clear-cut act of repentance.

Whatever it is, Lord, you know what it is. And we're asking that you help us to see what we have to do. And whatever way you can help us, Lord God, I know you won't violate our wills, but whatever you can do, we're asking that your help will come to us now as we take care of things that we've let go for so long.