Are You The Lost Sheep?

Before the parable there is a complaint, and it is the reason the parable exists.

"This man receives sinners and eats with them."

The Pharisees and scribes meant it as an accusation. It is, in fact, the finest summary of Jesus' ministry anyone ever produced — and they produced it by mistake, while trying to discredit him.

Notice what specifically bothered them. Not that he taught sinners, or rebuked them, or called them to repent from a safe distance. That he *ate* with them. In that culture a shared table meant acceptance, association, belonging. He was not conducting outreach at arm's length. He was having dinner.

Drake said God pursues the sick more than the healthy — that is the logic of everything that follows.

So the tax collectors and sinners were all drawing near to hear him. Not being dragged. Drawing near. Something about him made the people with the worst reputations in town want to get closer, and that alone should make us examine what we are like.

Drake did something clever that morning. He asked whether there were any shepherds in the crowd — and there was one. Nilo. Welcome, he said, we are honoured you are here. I have a very warm place in my heart for shepherds.

Who is watching your flock right now?

*My brother. We take turns.*

How many sheep?

*A hundred, teacher.*

Say one of them wanders off. What do you do?

*I would go find it, of course.*

Of course. But what about the other ninety-nine?

*I would have to leave them behind. I cannot lose that sheep.*

There it is, from a working shepherd who did not know he was illustrating the gospel. It was not a hard question for him. Of course you go. The math that says ninety-nine is more than one is not the math a shepherd uses.

God does not do actuarial tables on souls. He goes after the one, and "of course" is the right response.

"And when he has found it, he lays it on his shoulders, rejoicing."

Two details, and both matter enormously.

First: he carries it. A sheep that has wandered far enough is exhausted, injured, and frequently unwilling. The shepherd does not find it and then march it home under its own power with a lecture about staying close. He picks it up and takes the weight himself.

Second: rejoicing. Not sighing. Not resentful about the trip. The whole way home, glad.

That is not how most of us imagine being found. We imagine the finding, and then we brace for what comes after — the disappointment, the accounting, the conversation about how we ended up out there.

Jesus puts none of that in the story. There is no rebuke anywhere in this parable. Just a shepherd with a sheep on his shoulders, walking home happy.

If you came back to God this week, that is the face you are coming back to.

He gets home and throws a party.

"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.'"

Drake pressed the shepherd on this too. And if you find it? *I'd put it on my shoulders and bring it home. And I'd probably do a little dance.* And what would you say to your friends who have been worried about you? *Rejoice with me. I have found my lost sheep.*

Did you catch what he just said, Drake asked the church. He is happier over one sheep than over the ninety-nine.

That is the offensive centre of this parable, and it was aimed squarely at the men who were grumbling. They could not understand why Jesus made such a fuss over the wrong sort of people. This is the answer: because that is what finding something lost does to you.

And notice the invitation — *rejoice with me*. The grumblers were welcome at the party too. They just did not want to come.

"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."

That last phrase has an edge to it. *Ninety-nine righteous persons who need no repentance* — Jesus is describing the men standing in front of him, who were quite sure that was them.

There is no such person. That is the joke, and it is a serious one. Everyone in this story is the lost sheep. The only question is whether you know it.

Which is why the sermon's question was *are you the lost sheep?* Not: do you know one. Are you.

Because the moment you decide you are one of the ninety-nine — settled, secure, not the sort who wanders — you have quietly placed yourself outside the story where the rejoicing happens.

Heaven throws parties for people who admit they were lost. There is no party for the ones who never thought they needed finding.

Be the one. It is where the joy is.