In Hot Pursuit
September 24, 2006
Luke 15:1-24
Experiencing God #2
Deb and my oldest son Luke is in Kindergarten this year. So far he has made it through 2 weeks of school just fine and his parents are trying to do the same.
This week Kindergartners were allowed to start riding the bus to school and home from school. So each day this week Luke did just that, he rode the bus either to school or home from school. Perhaps by next week his parents will let him ride both ways. As I said, his parents are doing their best to adjust to their 1st born entering this next chapter of his life.
Tuesday was Luke’s first ride home from school on the bus. Deb waited in our yard for the bus to come by and when it did she tried to capture the moment of with our camera, but it didn’t work. She felt terrible. I too learned to feel terrible, but by the next day, the camera was fixed so she and Ben waited in our yard for the bus to capture the moment.
Only this time, the bus drove right past our house finally stopping 100 yards down the road, only after Luke yelled out to stop and to let him go home.
When I got home from work that evening, this was the main topic of our dinner conversation. The bus driver, driving past our house. The bus driver forgetting that Luke was on the bus. Or more truthfully, still learning where each child on her route lived. When I asked Deb what she did when she realized the bus wasn’t stopping.
The bus our Luke was riding.
The bus who was holding captive our son.
She said something like, "I ran after that bus and if it hadn’t stopped, I would have tracked it down."
And you know what, I believed her and I still do.
Bus drivers beware! Don’t get between a Mommy and her child. For not only Moms but Dads too will chase you in hot pursuit if you’ve got their child.
We are a peculiar people aren’t we. If we feel passionate about someone or something.
If we want someone, like a certain
-guy or a girl
-our child off the bus
or if we want something like
-a grade in school
-a car
-a house
-recognition
-a promotion
-a trophy
-or to watch a certain TV program or sporting event
we have this switch in us that turns us into a different creature.
Don’t stand in my way!
Look out!
I’m coming through! I’ll chase that bus down!
This week, I called Sarah Martin before she left for her freshmen year at the University of Washington. In our conversation, she mentioned being excited to row on WWU’s Crew Team, a high honor. When I asked about practices, she said there is an early morning one and an afternoon one. To make the team, she’ll have to let nothing get in the way of those practice times.
This week, I talked to a man who talked about going elk hunting in October in Washington. He is in pursuit of an elk, his first one. Though temperatures could be near freezing at night. Though there could be snow, he’s excited looking forward to getting his first elk. He is in hot pursuit. No temperature and no white stuff will stand in his way.
These stories and simple illustrations point to the fact that if we want something bad enough:
-a son off of a school bus
-to make an athletic team
-to get a trophy elk
we will sacrifice
rearrange our schedule
or do whatever is necessary to make it happen.
Yes?
This is a reality in my life.
It is a reality in your life.
And hear this, it is a reality for our God as well.
Our God desires to have a relationship with you and will not let anything stand in his way.
The second reality as we go through this teaching called Experiencing God is printed on the back of your bulletin.
Last week we explained the first reality - God is always at work around us.
And today we will look at the 2nd reality. Would you read it with me?
"God pursues a continuing love relationship with me that is real and personal."
We have a God who pursues us.
We have a God who is seeking us.
We have a God who is after us.
I know what some of you are thinking.
-"I know this and that’s not good news for me."
-"I know he’s after me and if he ever catches me, I’m done for."
In conversations with those in our community, it has been my experience that people know God is pursuing. They believe He is trying to pursue them. They believe that God desires to know them and them Him. But
-they feel deep guilt
-they feel separated from a life with God because of
-a shameful act
-a disgusting behavior
-because of a lifestyle that they are embarrassed about
-or they feel that they aren’t good enough
"If I walked into your church, Pastor, the walls would cave in."
They believe that God can’t handle their stuff.
Wouldn’t accept them as they are and where they are.
Would have to break all the rules - His holy rules to associate with them.
And what I want you to hear this morning is this-
"He already has."
God broke all the rules
all the traditions
all the stipulations and regulations
Our God will let nothing stand in the way of Himself and you.
"He pursues a continuing love relationship with you that is real and personal."
This fact is presented all through the New Testament. Boundaries with God are obliterated. Prejudices abolished. "There is no difference to God between male and female, slave or free, Jew or Gentile, all are one in Christ."
The beginning verses of our text demonstrated this as well.
You could not have any more different groupings of people than these.
Tax Collectors and the Pharisees
the Sinners and Teachers of the Law
the Outcasts and the In Crowd
the rejected and the Respected
those who need deep forgiveness and those that think they are and obviously need to repent and living well-pure and holy lives
Those who break the rules and those who live by them
And where is Jesus? Right in there, in their midst. Among them when it comes to people. When it comes to you and me God pursues all people. Each and everyone.
To this mixed audience.
This segregated group Jesus tells the 3 stories we read.
3 stories that give us a picture of what our God is like.
3 stories meant to be stories of welcome to those who don’t meet all the pre-requisites and correction to those who think they’ve surpassed them.
Contrary to the way most hurting people understand our God.
Contrary to most of the feelings out there among people who are distant from God and feeling like
the lost sheep in the 1st story,
the lost coin in the 2nd
or the wayward son in the third
The picture of God that Jesus paints in each of these stories is not one where he is idle until one of his wayward ones call out. What we need to hear and understand and plant deep within us is this fact.
Repentance - saying to God that we are sorry.
that we’ve messed up
blown it this time
doesn’t awaken God to us.
No, that isn’t the way it is in these stories.
No, in these stories, God draws near to us
-in our lost state
-in our wayward condition
coming to us first, before we ever made a move toward him.
No, just the very opposite.
The Shepherd in the 1st story.
The woman in the 2nd story.
The Father in the 3rd story do not wait for
-the sheep
-the coin
-the son to call out to spring into action. But instead they take the initiative to go out
looking
searching
pursuing
and welcoming because our God desires to personal relationship with each
one of them.
Friends, in these stories Jesus is making the point that repentance,
-turning one’s life around
-getting on the right track
is not a requirement to being found by God
does not spring God into action
No, simply the fact that you are lost causes him to pursue you.
The Bible says in Romans 5:8, "While we were still sinners, Christ died for us."
Before we had our acts together, he was willing to die. In clear Lake talk, fishermen don’t clean fish before they catch them. First they catch a fish and then clean them.
Because repentance, because us seeking God is not step #1 with having a relationship with God, we never have to be concerned with earning, improving ourselves, correcting bad behaviors in order to gain God’s attention, in order to catch his eye.
God pursues the lost one/sheep.
God pursues the lost Coin. This doesn’t make sense. But as I said, God breaks the rules.
God moves into action toward us before we ever make a move toward him.
Because our God pursues a continuing love relationship with you and me that is real and personal.
Story
Whenever writers tell stories they are asked, "Did that really happen? Is that story really true?" Well, in this case, not entirely. While what I am about to describe really did happen, it did not happen in just the way I am going to tell it to you. The names and the setting are made up and dialogue is a bit contrived, but the story is essentially what happened to me about four years ago.
I do a lot of public speaking and my work takes me to all kinds of places. Some of them are exotic and some of them are not so exotic. Sometimes I get Honolulu and sometimes Toledo, Ohio.
If you live on the East Coast and travel to Hawaii, you know that there is a time difference that makes three o’clock in the morning feel like it’s nine. If you know of what I speak, you will understand when I tell yo that whenever I go out to our fiftieth state I find myself wide awake long before dawn. Not only do I find myself up and ready to go while almost everybody else is still asleep, but I find that I want breakfast when almost everything on the island is still closed. With this background you should understand why at 3:30 in the morning I was wandering up and down the streets of Honolulu looking for a place to get something to eat.
Up a side street I found a little place that was still open. I went in, took a seat on one of the stools at the counter, and waited to be served. This was one of those sleazy places that deserves the name, "greasy spoon."
The fat guy behind the counter came over and asked me, "What d’ya want?"
I told him. I said I wanted a cup of coffee and a donut.
As I sat there munching on my donut and sipping my coffee at 3:30 in the morning the door of the diner suddenly swung open and to my discomfort, in marched eight or nine provocative and boisterous prostitutes.
It was a small place and they sat on either side of me. Their talk was loud and crude. I felt completely out of place and was just about to make my getaway when I overheard the woman sitting beside me say, "Tomorrow’s my birthday. I’m going to be thirty-nine.
Her "friend" responded in a nasty tone, "So what do you want from me? A birthday party? What do you want? Ya want me to get you a cake and sing ‘Happy Birthday’?"
"Come on!" said the woman sitting next to me. "Why do you have to be so mean? I was just telling you, that’s all. Why do you have to put me down? I was just telling you it was my birthday. I don’t want anything from you. I mean, why should you give me a birthday party? I’ve never had a birthday party in my whole life. Why should I have one now?"
When I heard that, I made a decision. I sat and waited until the women had left. Then I called over the fat guy behind the counter and I asked him, "Do they come in here every night?"
"Yeah!" he answered.
"The one right next to me, does she come here every night?"
"Yeah!" he said. "That’s Agnes. Yeah, she comes in here every night. Why d’ya wanta know?"
"Because I heard her say that tomorrow is her birthday," I told him. "What do you say you and I do something about that? What do you think about us throwing a birthday party for her—right here—tomorrow night?"
A cute smile slowly crossed his chubby cheeks and he answered with measured delight, "That’s great! I like it! That’s a great idea!" Calling to his wife, who did the cooking in the back room, he shouted, "Hey! Come out here! This guy’s got a great idea. Tomorrow’s Agnes’s birthday. This guy wants us to go in with him and throw a birthday party for her—right here—tomorrow night!"
His wife came out of the back room all bright and smiley. She said, "That’s wonderful! You now Agnes is one of those people who is really nice and kind, and nobody ever does anything nice and kind for her."
"Look," I told them, "if it’s O.K. with you, I’ll get back here tomorrow morning about 2:30 and decorate the place. I’ll even get a birthday cake!"
"No way," said Harry (that was his name). "the birthday cake’s my thing. I’ll make the cake."
At 2:30 the next morning, I was back at the diner. I had picked up some crepe-paper decorations at the store and had made a sign out of big pieces of cardboard that read, "Happy Birthday, Agnes!" I decorated the diner from one end to the other. I had that diner looking good.
The woman who did the cooking must have gotten the word out on the street, because by 3:15 every prostitute in Honolulu was in the place. It was wall-to-wall prostitutes . . . and me!
At 3:30 on the dot, the door of the diner swung open and in came Agnes and her friend. I had everybody ready (after all, I was kind of the M.C. of the affair) and when they came in we all screamed, "Happy birthday!"
Never have I seen a person so flabbergasted . . . so stunned . . . so shaken. Her mouth fell open. Her legs seemed to buckle a bit. Her friend grabbed her arm to steady her. As she was led to sit on one of the stools along the counter we all sang "Happy Birthday" to her. As we came to the end of our singing with "happy birthday dear Agnes, happy birthday to you." her eyes moistened. Then, when the birthday cake with all the candles on it was carried out, she lost it and just openly cried.
Harry gruffly mumbled, "Blow out the candles, Agnes! Come on! Blow out the candles! If you don’t blow out the candles, I’m gonna hafta blow out the candles." And, after an endless few seconds, he did. Then he handed her a knife and told her, "Cut the cake, Agnes. Yo, Agnes, we all want some cake."
Agnes looked down at the cake. Then without taking her eyes off it, she slowly and softly said, "Look, Harry, is it all right with you if I . . . I mean is it O,K, if I kind of . . . what I want to ask you is . . . is it O.K. if I keep the cake a little while? I mean is it all right if we don’t eat it right away?"
Harry shrugged and answered, "Sure! It’s O.K. If you want to keep the cake, keep the cake. Take it home if you want to."
"Can I?" she asked. Then, looking at me she said, "I live just down the street a couple of doors. I want to take the cake home, O.K."? I’ll be right back. Honest!"
She got off the stool, picked up the cake, and, carrying it like it was the Holy Grail, walked slowly toward the door. As we all just stood there motionless, she left.
When the door closed there was a stunned silence in the place. Not knowing what else to do, I broke the silence by saying, "What do you say we pray?"
Looking back on it now it seems more than strange for a sociologist to be leading a prayer meeting with a bunch of prostitutes in a diner in Honolulu at 3:30 in the morning. But then it just felt like the right thing to do. I prayed for Agnes. I prayed for her salvation. I prayed that her life would be changed and that God would be good to her.
When I finished, Harry leaned over the counter and with a trace of hostility in his voice, he said "Hey! You never told me you were a preacher. What kind of church do you belong to?"
In one of those moments when just the right words came, I answered, "I belong to a church that throws birthday parties for whores at 3:30 in the morning."
Harry waited a moment and then almost sneered as he answered, "No you don’t. There’s no church like that. If there was, I’d join it. I’d join a church like that"
Wouldn’t we all? Wouldn’t we all love to join a church that throws birthday parties for whores at 3:30 in the morning? (Tony Coupdo, Kingdom of God is a Party)
Friends, your God is a God who looks forward to throwing a party for you.
Our God looks forward to welcoming you.
Saints, Saints with a spouse
a child
a friend distracted
lost
made to feel uncomfortable by we religious types.
Know and remember that God pursues them.
God is pursuing them.
This is our God.
One last thing-
Only 1 verse about the sheep being lost and 3 about the party celebrating being found.
-in the 2nd story, there is 1 verse about the coin being lost and 2 about the party
afterwards.
-in the 3rd story, there are 4 verses about the boys lostness and many more about
the party upon his return.
Friends, this is our God, the life of the party, not the party-pooper.
This is our God.
One who puts the lost sheep on his shoulders.
One who calls his friends to rejoice.
One who yells out, "My son was lost but now is found."
This is our God, he pursues a love relationship with you. Amen.
A God who will let nothing stand in his way of knowing you.
Amen.
