What do you do when someone you love is lost?
Parents, you’ve probably experienced this at the grocery store or some other public place. I know I have. You’ve got your kids with you. These kids that you love beyond compare!
You look away for what feels like 3 seconds & when you turn back to check on your kids they are no where to be found.
Panic strikes. You start calling them by name. Other shoppers are looking at you but you don’t care.
You’re trying to find your kids & make sure they’re ok!
A couple of weeks ago I was traveling during the week. Thursday afternoon, I get a call from my wife. Have you heard from Will?
My son Will rides his bike to school everyday. He’s supposed to send me & his mom a quick text when he gets home from school so we know he’s good. But we hadn’t gotten a text.
I start trying to text Will to check on him. I try to call him. No answer. My guess is, he’s ok. He just forgot to check in with us.
He’s either busy at home doing his homework, or probably over at his friend’s house. Turns out, he was at home & he was fine. But in the moment when we didn’t know for sure where he was, there was a little anxiety rising in us.
What do we do when someone we love is lost?
There is no worse feeling as a parent, as a person in charge of other people, than to lose someone you love.
It’s one thing when we lose our glasses or our car keys. But to lose a person? We know the urgency we feel, the anxiety we feel, the desire we feel to find the person who, for whatever reason, is lost.
What about God?
I think this is how God feels.
In fact, Jesus once told a similar story. Jesus was speaking to a group of people & he told a very similar story that fit their context.
“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? And when he has found it, he will joyfully carry it home on his shoulders. When he arrives, he will call together his friends and neighbors, saying, ‘Rejoice with me because I have found my lost sheep.’ – Luke 15.4-6
At this point, everyone is nodding along with Jesus. Yes. We know exactly how that man felt. Nothing worse than losing a sheep. Absolutely. You always leave the 99 to find the 1.
Jesus is going to tell 2 more stories about things that were lost that were found, but He starts with this story about a lost sheep. Why? Because people were familiar with shepherds & sheep.
They would have all agreed that this is what you would have done, what a shepherd would have done, when there is a lost sheep.
Even if it meant searching in the wilderness, even if it was dangerous. Leaving the 99 to search for the one could mean going into unfamiliar terrain & territory.
But this is what you do when someone you love is lost?
Then, Jesus says this. And this is the curve ball. This is what they didn’t expect, what they didn’t see coming.
In the same way, there is more joy in heaven over one lost sinner who repents and returns to God than over ninety-nine others who are righteous and haven’t strayed away! – Luke 15.7
Wait, what? I thought we were talking about sheep. Now were talking about people?
[Tweet “”there is more joy in heaven over one lost sinner who repents…” – Jesus”]What about us?
Jesus uses a story about sheep to remind the religious people who were happy keeping each other happy about being right & being the people of God that the heart of God is for the one who is lost. The heart of God is not just for the found but for the one who needs to be found. This is what the heart of the Good Shepherd is like. The Good Shepherd came to seek & save the lost!
[Tweet “The heart of God is not just for the found but for the one who needs to be found.”]And here’s something I want you to think about today: If we’re not careful, we can fall into the exact same trap these religious leaders fell into.
So often we want our leaders, our shepherds, the edlers in our church, to be consumed & concerned primarily with those who are here. We want them to keep us happy. To keep things the same. To focus on keeping the saved, saved.
But Jesus, the Good Shepherd, says the chief concern of the shepherd’s heart is for the 1 who is lost! He tells the religious leaders who are supposed to be the shepherds of God’s people that shepherds after God’s heart are SEARCHERS, not just KEEPERS.
[Tweet “We need shepherds who are SEARCHERS. Not just KEEPERS.”]We need shepherds who are SEARCHERS. Not just KEEPERS. Because Jesus is a SEARCHER. His purpose, His mission, was to come to seek & save the lost. Those are His words. And we see them reveled all thoroughout scripture.
[Tweet “We need shepherds who are SEARCHERS. Not just KEEPERS. Because Jesus is a SEARCHER.”]“For the Son of Man came to seek and save those who are lost.” – Jesus, Luke 19;10
[Tweet “”For the Son of Man came to seek and save those who are lost.” – Jesus”]Jesus & His Mission
Jesus is the Good Shepherd. Even when he’s dying on the cross as the Lamb of God.
And the heart of the Good Shepherd is always to find the 1 who is lost & bring him home.
Jesus had said. “I Am the Good Shepherd. The good shepherd sacrifices his life for his sheep.”
This is what love looks like.
This is what leadership looks like.
This is what it means to be a shepherd for God’s church. It’s being willing to love & love sacrificially.
It’s being willing to love & love courageously.
[Tweet “Courageous leadership begins & ends with LOVE.”]
