1 Peter 5.6–11 + Luke 15.1–10
The Pharisees and scribes preach a near-perfect sermon. They see tax collectors and notorious sinners coming to Jesus to hear His preaching on the kingdom of God, and they complain, “This Man receives sinners and eats with them.” They’re not wrong. And if they had said this in joy and thankfulness, rather than smug self-righteousness, it would have been a perfect sermon. This man welcomes sinners. He wants them to hear Him. This man eats with them, giving them His friendship. Although the Pharisees and scribes complain about this and think it’s unbecoming of a prophet, especially one claiming to be the Son of God, their words perfectly encapsulate the gospel. “This Man receives sinners and eats with them.”
Jesus tells them three parables—we only hear the first two in today’s gospel—to show them that their words are correct, but the attitudes are all wrong. He says, “What man of you, having a hundred sheep, if he loses 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!”” Of course any of these men would go looking for a lost sheep, just as if one of their sheep had fallen into a pit on the Sabbath, they’d most certainly lay hold of it and lift it out (Matt 12:11). They can’t deny that they would do this. Sheep, after all, are valuable. But that’s where Jesus and the Pharisees and scribes part ways. The lost sheep of the house of Israel are valuable to Christ. These tax collectors and notorious sinners had gone astray from the Lord by sinning. Tax collectors lived in greed, always looking to fleece other sheep. The notorious sinners lived in sexual immorality, envy, theft, deceit, and every other sin. Christ comes to retrieve them because they are valuable to Him. And each time He finds a lost sheep through His preaching, so that they repent of their sins and believe in His mercy, He hoists them on His shoulders and carries them along, rejoicing that He has found His sheep that was lost in sin. It isn’t just Christ who rejoices. The shepherd’s friends and neighbors join it. “There will be more joy in heaven over one sinner who repents than over ninety-nine just persons who need no repentance.”
The second parable is like the first. “What woman, having ten silver coins, if she loses one coin, does not light a lamp, sweep the house, and search carefully until she finds it? And when she has found it, she calls her friends and neighbors together, saying, ‘Rejoice with me, for I have found the piece which I lost!’ Likewise, I say to you, there is joy in the presence of the angels of God over one sinner who repents.” The silver coin is a drachma, worth a denarius, a day’s wage. Again, it is something of value to anyone, especially if you only have ten coins to begin with. The coin lost, the woman lights a lamp and sweeps the entire house in search for it. Jesus’ point is the same as in the first parable. The lost coins of the house of Israel are valuable to Him. As coins bear the image of the one who minted them, so all these tax collectors and sinners bear the image of God, though darkened and corroded with sin. And as the woman rejoices when she finds that which she had lost, so Christ rejoices when even one of these sinners repents of their sins and believes in His mercy. Like the shepherd, the woman is so filled with joy that she calls her friends and neighbors to rejoice with her. The friends and neighbors—the holy angels—rejoice in heaven every time a lost sheep and lost coin is found by Christ.
Christ shows us precisely what He does in both parables. As a shepherd seeks after the one lost sheep, going through thorns and thickets and fighting wolves and whatever else endangers the sheep, Christ endures all things for the sake of those whom He seeks. He bears hardship and persecution, suffering and death. As a woman lights and lamp and sweeps house in search for the lost coin, Christ lights the lamp God’s Word by His preaching. This is what drew the crowd in Luke 15 to Him. The tax collectors and notorious sinners drew near to Him to hear Him. What did they hear from Him? “Repent, and believe in the gospel” (Mk 1:15). “Repent of the sins in which you live. Your sins anger God. They bring His wrath upon you. Stop living in greed, fornication, theft, hatred, lust, and the like, and believe the good news that God promises to have mercy upon all who repent.” Jesus did not receive sinners by sitting with them in their sins. Jesus did not eat with sinners to show them that they were fine just as they were and that they could keep on sinning. He received them, He ate with them in friendship, to call them from their sins and find them by giving them repentance and faith in God’s promised mercy. Then carried them on His shoulders—nurturing them through His word and Holy Spirit— so that they might turn away from their sins and begin to live holy lives.
There is no joy, however, over the Pharisees and scribes. They are the ninety-nine who don’t think they need repentance. They aren’t tax collectors. They aren’t public sinners whose sins are known to everyone. They live righteously. They’re outwardly pious and respectable. Internally, however, they are sick with sin, especially the sin of self-righteousness. They had puffed themselves up with pride by ignoring the sin in the hearts, imagining that if they don’t act on their sinful desires and emotions, they were still righteous in God’s sight. But as it is written in Jeremiah 17:9, “The heart is deceitful above all things, And desperately wicked; Who can know it?” As Jesus says, out of the heart proceed evil thoughts, murders, adulteries, fornications, thefts, false witness, blasphemies” (Mt 15:19). They ignored their hearts, especially their disdain for their fellow Israelites. They didn’t work to call their fellow Israelites from their sins. They left them in their sins and then, when Jesus comes, they try to separate Him from them. Even though they preach a near-perfect sermon about Christ— This Man receives sinners and eats with them—since they do not number themselves among the sinners who need repentance and forgiveness, they exclude themselves from Jesus’ forgiveness and heaven’s rejoicing. This is written for our warning, so that we do not become self-righteous and ever think we don’t need to live in repentance and daily receive forgiveness and the Holy Spirit from Christ.
It is also written for our comfort because we are lambs of the Lord. We are the silver coins of the Savior. For though we may not be tax collectors or publicly known as sinners, though we try to live righteous lives by the power of the Holy Spirit and avoid sinning, we daily sin and fall short of the perfection—outwardly and internally—that God demands. We need repentance each day. And thanks be God, Christ forgives our sins as often as we repent them. Each time we repent and believe His gospel, heaven rejoices—and we should rejoice as well—that our Good Shepherd has laid His life down for the sheep, and that He has not extinguished the lamp of His Word, but keeps it burning bright, so that we might live in repentance and His mercy each day.
We also rejoice, for Christ picks us up and places us on His shoulders to carry us once again. He carries us by giving us His Holy Spirit, so that we humble ourselves under the mighty hand of God. The Pharisees and scribes excluded themselves from Christ’s mercy and the kingdom of God by exalting themselves. By the power of the Holy Spirit, we humble ourselves before God each day in repentance and confession, and also faith and thanksgiving. He carries us by giving us His Holy Spirit so that we cast all our care upon Him, trusting that He loves us and will work all things for the good of those who love Him. He carries us by giving us His Holy Spirit so that we live soberly and vigilantly. This means that we pay attention to the devil’s schemes so that we spot them more easily and resist him and his temptations by faith in God’s word. He carries us by giving us His Holy Spirit so that, even though we suffer a while, we know that God will perfect, establish, strengthen, and settle us, if not in this life, then in the next. He carries us, so that when we see our sinfulness, we might not despair, but rejoice in this fact: “This Man receives sinners and eats with them.”
