Lost and Found

Sometimes one person’s celebration can be really annoying for you, especially if you don’t understand the reason for the party.

And this was the case for the Pharisees and Scribes in Luke 15.

The three parables, lost sheep, lost coin, and prodigal son, are told because Jesus is making a habit of having parties with all the ‘wrong’ people, and some thought it was a nightmare.

Throughout Luke 15 we witness how Jesus responds to “the least of these” and, perhaps, how we should too.

At the heart of the trouble is the character of the people Jesus is eating with on a regular basis. The tax-collectors are disliked not just because they are tax-collectors – nobody much likes them in any culture – but because they are collecting money for either Herod or the Romans, or both, and nobody cared for them at all. And if they are in regular contact with the Gentiles, some might have considered them unclean. Sinners are disliked because they are considered to be unclean. (N.T. Wright)

In the stories of the sheep and the coin, the punch line in each case depends on the Jewish belief that the two halves of God’s creation, heaven and earth, were meant to fit together and be in harmony with each other. If you discover what’s going on in heaven, you’ll discover how things were meant to be on earth. That, after all, is the point of praying that God’s kingdom will come ‘on earth as in heavens.” As far as the legal experts and Pharisees were concerned, the closet you could get to heaven was in the Temple; the Temple required strict purity from the priests; and the closet that non-priests could get to copying heaven was to maintain a similarly strict purity in every aspect of life. But now Jesus was declaring that heaven was having a great, noisy party every time a single sinner saw the light and began to follow God’s way. If earth-dwellers wanted to copy the life of heaven, they’d have a party, too. That’s what Jesus as doing – throwing a party!

But throughout the chapter Jesus is NOT saying, “Because I am eating with these people, they are fit to live their lives however they choose.” No. Sinners must still repent. The lost sheep and lost coin are found. The prodigal son comes to his senses and returns home. But Jesus has a different idea than his critics of what repentance means. For the Pharisees and scribes, nothing short of adopting their standards of purity and law-observance would do. For Jesus, when people follow him and his way, that is true repentance.

The point of the parables is then clear. This is why there’s a party going on: all heaven is having a party, the angles are joining in, and if we don’t have one as well we’ll be out of tune with God’s reality. (N.T. Wright, Luke for Everyone)

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

The Most Difficult Parable Ever

Image
Theologian N.T. Wright finds the parable of the fig tree to be quite strange.  He says, “Jesus' warning in Luke 13 is at once amplified by this almost humorous, yet in fact quite sinister, parable of the fig tree in the vineyard.” And it is sinister.  It’s a hard pill to take.  Jesus' parable goes like this: A man has as fig tree planted in his vineyard.  One day he comes out looking for fruit on it, but there are no figs.  He says to the vineyard keeper, “Look at this tree.  For three years, I've come hoping to find some fresh figs, but what do I find? Nothing.  So just go ahead and cut it down.  Why waste the space with a fruitless tree?” The vineyard keeper replies, “Give it another chance, sir.  Give me one more years working with it.  I’ll cultivate the soil and heap on some manure to fertilize it.  If it surprises us and bears fruit next year, that will be great, but if not, then we’ll cut it down.”  (Luke 13:5-9, The Voice) But how is it sinister?
Read more

Leaving on a Jet Plane. . .

Image
This week I will be flying to the Middle East with about 30 seminary students to tour and explore the Holy Lands. The trip is designed for second year seminary students who are seeking parish ministries. The group is comprised of several seminaries that cover the theological spectrum. There will be men and women who are either conservative, liberal, moderate or anything else not mentioned. The thesis behind the trip is to get next generation leaders together in the Holy Lands to have an ecumenical experience. If we leaders share this experience together, it will make doing life and denominationalism a lot easier later in life. I covet your prayers and can’t wait to blog about it when I get back. Due to traveling and limited time to blog, I will be taking a short hiatus from my weekly blogs but promise for more insightful reflection upon my return. God bless to you and in your endeavors. Here is our Itinerary. May 18 Depart Atlanta at 5:20 p.m. (Delta 122)
Read more

The Bird of Dawning Singeth All Night Long

Image
This Christmas I was moved by the words of Frederick Buechner.  For my last blog of the year I offer to you his wisdom rather than my own ramblings.  I hope it does for you what it continues to do for me. Frederick Buechner says in his book The Faces of Jesus: On the dark bulwark of Elsinore, Shakespeare has Marcellus and Haratio reflecting on Christ in the opening scene of Hamlet: Some say that ever ‘gainst that season comes Wherein our Savior’s birth is celebrated, The bird of dawning singeth all night long; And then, they say, no spirit dare stir abroad, The nights are wholesome, then no planets strike, No fairly takes, nor witch hath power to charm, So hallowed and so gracious is the time These lines from the first scene of Hamlet in a sense say it all.  We tend to think time is just progression . . . as moment following moment, day following day, in relentless flow, the kind of time a clock or calendar measures.  But we experience time als
Read more