Lost in…
What are you LOST IN?
What are you LOST IN that you wish you could get out of?
When I was a kid I used to love to ride my bike in the neighborhood. You remember, back in the days before video games when kids played outside! 🙂
We lived in a quiet neighborhood and my parents had no problem with me exploring the neighborhood.
One thing you should no about me if you haven’t learned this already, I have a terrible sense of direction. That’s why it was a terrible idea to try something new and go down a new street I had never been down before. At first, it was fun. But it didn’t take me long to realize that I no longer knew where I was. I thought I knew the way back, but the faster I peddled the more I realized, I have no idea where I am or how to get home.
All at once, I was lost in our neighborhood but not just that, I was lost in fear, I was lost in the anxiety that was rising within me, and I was lost in frustration over the fact that I couldn’t find my way. I was lost in more ways than one!
What are you lost in that you wish you could get out of?
Lost In More Ways than One!
I don’t have to tell you that we live in a world where people are lost in more ways than one.
Thanks to our GPS apps on all our devices there are very few times when we have to stop and ask someone for directions. And maybe that’s part of the problem, we’ve stopped asking other people for help, for direction, when we feel lost.
The other part of the problem is that even if we would stop and ask for help, ask someone for direction, we don’t know how to ask for help when what we feel lost in is something entirely different than getting lost in a neighborhood like a boy on a bike trying to find his way out.
Whenever we feel lost in fear, or lost in sin, or lost in anxiety, or lost in despair, or lost in doubt, or lost in shame… we don’t really know how to ask for help or direction. And because we don’t know how to ask for help and we don’t know how to get out of what we’re lost in, we just stay LOST.
I eventually found my way home that day. And I’m so glad I did, but I can only imagine how I would have felt inside if I couldn’t have found my way home. I can only imagine how lost in fear I would have felt. How lost in anxiety I would have felt. And I can only imagine how my father would have felt wondering where I was and why I wasn’t home.
Good fathers worry when their kids are far from home.
God Cares for those Who are Lost
Your God is a good Father. Whenever you are lost, whenever you are far from home for whatever reason, your Father in Heaven is concerned for you.
Sometimes we forget this, but Jesus came NOT just to save SOME of us who are LOST, but ALL of us who are LOST, no matter what we’re lost in.
You see this in the opening verses of Luke 15.
This may be one of the most famous chapters in all of the Bible because it contains one of the most famous stories Jesus ever told. Even if you didn’t grow up going to church, you’ve probably heard of the story of the Prodigal Son. But Luke 15 actually contains three stories back to back to back that are all similar but just a little bit different. Before Jesus tells these stories, Luke sets the scene.
1 Tax collectors and other notorious sinners often came to listen to Jesus teach. 2 This made the Pharisees and teachers of religious law complain that he was associating with such sinful people—even eating with them!
We’ll get into the three stories Jesus tells in just a minute, but before we do don’t miss this. Just consider for a moment the different kinds of people that have gathered around Jesus on this particular day.
Luke tells us that that there are tax collectors and other notorious sinners.
TAX COLLECTORS:
In the days of Jesus, to be a tax collector was worse than just about anything else. To turn on your fellow Jews and collect taxes for the despised Romans and then take more than the Roman tax so you could pad your pockets on the side at the expense of your own people who were suffering, to call you a greedy traitor is putting it lightly.
What is a tax collector lost in? Fear. Greed.
SINNERS:
Some people would say, I know I’m a sinner but at least I’m not a tax collector. Who are these sinners? These are the people who… well, everyone knows what they’ve done. That guy over there, he’s the town drunk. That woman over there, she’s the gossip. There’s the dad with the bad temper. And then there’s person who sleeps around with anyone who has a pulse. That guy’s a liar. She’s a cheat. He’s a thief. They’ve all got LABELS. Everyone knows what they’ve done.
What is a sinner lost in? The sin cycle. Shame. Regret. Pain. Despair.
But it isn’t just tax collectors and sinners that are drawn to Jesus. There’s also the Pharisees and teachers of religious law.
PHARISEES:
The Pharisees were the most influential sect of the Jews who believed that God’s grace came only to those who “did” the law. They were legalistic in their application and devotion to the Law of Moses. The name Pharisee literally means, “Separated One.” And they had separated themselves from the people believing they were the only ones who would be on the receiving end of God’s grace BECAUSE of how well they had kept to the letter the of the law.
What is a Pharisee lost in? Legalism. Desire for power. Control.
SCRIBES:
And then there were the scribes. They were also known as lawyers, or maybe more accurately law professors because they had spent so much time studying the law, transcribing the law, and teaching the law. They were so concerned that no one break the law that they took it upon themselves to add to the law essentially building a fence around the law so no one would come close to breaking God’s law. But this only made it harder for people adding requirements to the law that God didn’t require!
What is a Scribe lost in? Arrogance. Pride.
Stories About Lost Things
Different people all lost in different ways, and so Jesus starts telling stories. Here’s the first one…
3 So Jesus told them this story: 4 “If a man has a hundred sheep and one of them gets lost, what will he do? Won’t he leave the ninety-nine others in the wilderness and go to search for the one that is lost until he finds it?
Jesus loved to tell stories. And he knew what we all know when we hear a story, he knew what Hollywood knows when they tell stories, that stories have a way of bringing all kinds of people together.
Jesus starts with a story about a man who looses a sheep. Everyone in the crowd, from the sinner to the Pharisee, all of them understood what Jesus was talking about and everyone of them felt the exact same way when they heard that this man had lost one of his sheep. And everyone of them knew what they would do in that situation. And how they would feel if that lost sheep was somehow FOUND!
Different people, LOST in different ways, far from God for different reasons, all excited to hear that the lost sheep was found.
8 “Or suppose a woman has ten silver coins and loses one. Won’t she light a lamp and sweep the entire house and search carefully until she finds it?
This story, like the first story, begins with a question. What do you do when you lose a sheep? What do you do when you lose a coin?
Again, everyone in the crowd is feeling the same way, everyone is nodding along with Jesus… they may or may not believe Jesus is who He says He is, they may or may not even believe they are lost, but they’re all nodding along with Jesus because they know exactly what a woman would do who had lost a precious coin and they all know exactly what she would do if somehow, against all odds, she found it! She would throw a party! And they would rejoice with her.
At this point, don’t forget that the Pharisees and the scribes were the ones who were grumbling against Jesus BECAUSE He associated and ate with sinners.
Jesus came to seek and save the lost. And whenever something or SOMEONE is lost and then is found, there is rejoicing. The Pharisees and Scribes, who should be the shepherds of Israel, should be rejoicing over every sinner and tax collector who turns toward God. But they’re too busy grumbling and complaining against Jesus.
It’s easy for religious people to forget what God cares most about, isn’t it? The gravitational pull of the local church is always towards the inside.
What God cares about most are those who are lost, who are far from God for whatever reason.
A Story About Lost People
The first two stories Jesus tells begin with a question. But this last story doesn’t. It does, however, leave us with a question we’re asking ourselves.
11 To illustrate the point further, Jesus told them this story: “A man had two sons. 12 The younger son told his father, ‘I want my share of your estate now before you die.’ So his father agreed to divide his wealth between his sons.
The younger son would have gotten 1/3 of his father’s estate when he died. The older son would have gotten 2/3. But this was unheard of, to ask for your share before your father died. It’s as if the younger son was saying, “I wish you were dead already! In fact, you are dead to me. So just go ahead and give me what I’ll get when you actually die and let me get out of here!”
If I were the father in this story, I know what I would have been feeling. I’m pretty sure I know what everyone in the crowd was feeling as they heard this story. A little bit of anger. Rage maybe? Frustration, disappointment, hurt, and the list goes on and on. So many emotions to get LOST IN.
But this father does the unthinkable, he gives the son what he wants. He takes the risk knowing that both his son and his property may be lost forever.
13 “A few days later this younger son packed all his belongings and moved to a distant land, and there he wasted all his money in wild living. 14 About the time his money ran out, a great famine swept over the land, and he began to starve. 15 He persuaded a local farmer to hire him, and the man sent him into his fields to feed the pigs. 16 The young man became so hungry that even the pods he was feeding the pigs looked good to him. But no one gave him anything.
So the son goes to a distant land, meaning… he left Israel. He’s gone to live among the Gentiles. Everything is gone. He’s surrounded by literal pigs which were abhorrent to any good Jew.
He’s lost absolutely everything. He’s lost his money, his friends, his religion, his family. He’s even lost himself.
17 “When he finally came to his senses, he said to himself, ‘At home even the hired servants have food enough to spare, and here I am dying of hunger! 18 I will go home to my father and say, “Father, I have sinned against both heaven and you, 19 and I am no longer worthy of being called your son. Please take me on as a hired servant.”’
He knows he’s broken the family bond. The damage he’s done there is Irreparable. He’s not going to reassert his claim as a son. But maybe he can be a hired hand. A hired hand gets paid, but has no right to relationship. But maybe he can call on his relationship with his father to at least become a hired hand. When the story started the younger son told his father, GIVE ME… now, as he prepares to make the road trip home the request becomes, TAKE ME.
20 “So he returned home to his father. And while he was still a long way off, his father saw him coming.
The Father says, You said I was dead to you, now you are dead to me. You have no place here any longer. Now, be gone.
Ok, that’s not what Scripture says. That’s not how the story goes. No one would have been surprised if that was how the story ended.
BUT… that’s not the Good News. Jesus writes a different end to this story that they needed to hear then and that we need to hear today…
20 “So he returned home to his father. And while he was still a long way off, his father saw him coming. Filled with love and compassion, he ran to his son, embraced him, and kissed him. 21 His son said to him, ‘Father, I have sinned against both heaven and you, and I am no longer worthy of being called your son.’
22 “But his father said to the servants, ‘Quick! Bring the finest robe in the house and put it on him. Get a ring for his finger and sandals for his feet. 23 And kill the calf we have been fattening. We must celebrate with a feast, 24 for this son of mine was dead and has now returned to life. He was lost, but now he is found.’ So the party began.
Unlike the first two stories, this story doesn’t begin with the father going out and searching for the one who is lost. The father loves the son enough to let him choose to stay with him or to leave and go into a distant land. The father loves the son enough to risk everything, even him being lost forever, hoping that one day he will come back home. And the father loves the son enough to keep his eyes down the road every day so that if and when he returns, the father will be waiting. And when he sees his son who was lost coming down the road, the father runs to him.
Why?
Because his son was dead, now he is alive! He was lost, now he is found!
Whenever we’re lost in whatever we’re lost in, the problem isn’t that we’re bad and that we need to be better, the problem is that we’re dead and we need to be resurrected. When this son comes home to his father, it’s not just that he’s FOUND, it’s that when he’s at home with his father, he’s ALIVE!
The Rest of the Story
However, the story isn’t over yet…
25 “Meanwhile, the older son was in the fields working. When he returned home, he heard music and dancing in the house, 26 and he asked one of the servants what was going on. 27 ‘Your brother is back,’ he was told, ‘and your father has killed the fattened calf. We are celebrating because of his safe return.’
28 “The older brother was angry and wouldn’t go in. His father came out and begged him, 29 but he replied, ‘All these years I’ve slaved for you and never once refused to do a single thing you told me to. And in all that time you never gave me even one young goat for a feast with my friends. 30 Yet when this son of yours comes back after squandering your money on prostitutes, you celebrate by killing the fattened calf!’
31 “His father said to him, ‘Look, dear son, you have always stayed by me, and everything I have is yours. 32 We had to celebrate this happy day. For your brother was dead and has come back to life! He was lost, but now he is found!’”
I wonder if the Pharisees and the scribes felt like the older brother in this story? And I wonder what happened with the older brother? That’s the question we’re left with. Jesus doesn’t finish the story. Does he come in to the party? Does he join in on the celebration? What’s the rest of the story?
For those tax collectors and sinners in front of Jesus, we know what many of them did. They came home. They became followers of Jesus. (Luke 3.12). For those who knew they were lost in sin and shame, for those who were desperate and on the verge of despair, they came home to God.
But what about those who didn’t know they were lost? What about those who were lost in their own pride, arrogance, and legalism? What about those who were so mad that the father could welcome the rebellious son home that they couldn’t rejoice at the good news?
What about you?
What if the question isn’t, Are you lost?
But, What are you lost in?
What are you lost in that you wish you could get out of?
And what if you were able to be honest about that to the point that you were ready to get out of whatever it is you are lost in?
That time riding my bike in the neighborhood wasn’t the last time I would get lost.
A few years later I was driving in the downtown area of my hometown. And like a lot of downtowns, there were a lot of one way streets. I got so turned around I didn’t know how to get home. Back in those days, I didn’t have a GPS. I don’t think it had been invented yet! I didn’t have a cell phone. Not many people did.
So I finally pulled over to a gas station and called my father from a pay phone. My dad has a great sense of direction. I told him I was lost. He calmly said, “Ok. Tell me what you see.” I started describing the area around me. The street names, landmarks, names of businesses.
After a minute he said, “Ok. I know where you are. Here’s the way you need to go to get home.”
Good News for Those Who Are Lost
The Good News about our Father in Heaven is that no matter how lost we get, and no matter what we get lost in, He knows exactly where we are and the way we need to go to get home.
You might be lost in sin and shame today. You might be lost in despair. You might be lost in frustration and anger. You might be lost in fear and anxiety. Or, you might be lost in something else.
You might be lost in your own pride and arrogance. You might be lost in entitlement and greed. You might be lost in the need to control or the desire for power. Or, you might be lost in something else.
You might be lost and not even know you’re lost. But if you’re lost and you’re ready to come home, even if you don’t know the way to get home, here’s the Good News for today. Just call on your Father in Heaven, He knows the Way home. And by the way…
Jesus is the Way to come home to the Father!
Will you come home today?
Doesn’t matter if you’re a tax collector or a notorious sinner, a Pharisee or a scribe, everyone is welcome to come home to the Father.
I wonder, what would happen if we loved the lost as much as Jesus loves the lost?
Today, if you’re feeling a little lost I just want you to know you’re welcome here. And if you’re ready to be found, we’ll do everything we can to help you find your way back to the Father. Just so you know, He’s on the front porch watching for you to take the first step. And when you turn toward Him, He will start running to you.
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