Beloved

“Beloved”

Luke 15:1-32

If there were one word I could use to describe how other people see you what would it be?

Maybe it would be “smart” or “athletic” or “funny” or “popular” or “loner” or “nerd.”

Think about it for a minute.

What is that one word I could use to describe how other people see you?

(pause)

What would be the words you would use to describe yourself if you are being truly honest?

Beautiful?

Ugly?

Shy?

Lonely?

You fill in the blank…

What if I were to use this word: Loved.

Would you say that word fits you?

Because if there is one word I could choose for each of you, it would be the word: Loved.

What does it look like to be loved?

Our Gospel Readings from Luke Chapter 15 for this morning give us a pretty awesome picture of what it means to be loved.

The context for the three Parables Jesus gives us in Luke 15 can be found right at the beginning: “Now the tax collectors and sinners were all gathering around to hear Jesus.

But the Pharisees and the teachers of the law muttered, “This man welcomes sinners and eats with them.”

Jesus was hanging out, speaking with, teaching and sharing a meal with the only crowd that ever wanted to hang out with Him.

In high school we might have called them the “dirt bags” or the “losers” or the “loners” the “uncool people,” the kids that were always “in trouble,” “skipping class,” “in the principal’s office,” and “detention”…the “unpopular crowd.”

They were the people with the lowest self-esteem.

They had been bullied to the point of being broken by the bullying.

They had been shunned their whole lives.

They were the unlovely, and the people who felt unloved and unloveable.

They never did seem to fit-in anywhere…

…except when they were around Jesus.

Jesus had changed everything for them.

He was unlike anyone they had ever met.

Jesus loved them.

Jesus accepted them for who they were—no matter what they looked like, whether or not they were cool or fit-in.

No matter their financial situation or what side of the tracks they lived on.

Jesus loved them unconditionally.

And so, in Jesus’ presence they felt something that had been dead in them, come alive.

And because of this, they loved Jesus right back.

To the world they had been a lost cause.

Like a lost sheep or a lost coin that would never be found.

They were the rebellious child who had truly acted like a selfish jerk to their parents—taking all they could get and then running away to squander everything on drugs, drink, sex, you name it.

For some, this child would have been easy to “write off.”

Just like the son in our parable, they had made themselves very grotesque and undesirable characters.

Yeah, these were the kinds of people who liked to hang out with Jesus and Jesus was more than happy to hang out with them.

And this made the popular people, the powerful people…or in this case, the Pharisees and teachers of the law—sick!

“This man welcomes sinners and eats with them.”

In Jesus’ day, meals were major symbols of togetherness, especially meals that took place beyond your immediate family circle.

Food was precious.

Hosting a meal for a number of people cost something in a time of scarce resources.

So, understandably, in the ancient world people took these large community meals very seriously.

It wasn’t catching a quick bite at the local coffee shop and moving on.

Eating—that is, table fellowship—was a mark of friendship and acceptance.

And so, in eating with tax collectors and sinners, Jesus is expressing a deep and abiding acceptance of those whom society had deemed less than and morally reprehensible.

Imagine if people would accuse Jesus’ church of “welcoming sinners and eating with them”?

Luke is pointing us toward a fundamental mind shift in our understanding of God.

Although we say that God is a God of love, we tend to think of that love as conditional.

It’s conditional on our repentance; it depends on our keeping the rules, rules which are too often somewhat arbitrary habits that support our local prejudices.

This sense of conditional love leads us towards, or allows us to live in a mindset of disapproval.

This makes it easy for us to believe that God disapproves of us and loves us only when we fit in with what we imagine to be God’s expectations of what is acceptable.

And this imagining of God’s expectations shapes the way we treat others and the way we think of ourselves.

But look how unconditional God’s love is for us.

The Pharisees and Teachers of the law misunderstand God’s love and this leads Jesus to tell the parable of the lost sheep, the lost coin and the lost son.