LOST IN TRANSLATION
Daniel Boone was a man, he was a big man. Eye of an eagle and tall as a mountain was he. Yes, Daniel Boone was a big man.
Daniel Boone explored the great wilderness of Tennessee and Kentucky. It was Boone who marked the Wilderness Road that brought settlers into the new land. He often wandered over vast areas of forest, living off the land and dodging arrows. Once he was asked if he had ever been lost. He replied, “No.” He said that he had never been lost, but he did admit that he was “a mite confused once for about three or four days though!”
Boone’s pride would not allow him to admit that he had ever been lost. Most men are that way. We don’t look at maps but follow our noses, our instincts and drive our wives crazy at the same time. Our women believe we are lost while we men will not admit such defeat. One more turn and it will all be clear, men say.
It matters very little if you are trying to find a restaurant in Grand Forks if you get a little lost. It matters a great deal more if our pride keeps us from admitting we are lost without Christ.
Luke 15’s three story parable is Jesus’ theology of lostness. It was his answer to the question posed by the Pharisees and teachers of the Law, “Why is this man eating with tax collectors and sinners?” Jesus was supposed to be a holy man and there he was rubbing shoulders with the lowest class of society.
In Jesus’ characteristic fashion he tells them three stories as his answer. And these three stories are so full of meaning we can hardly do justice to them in one sermon. The three stories are really one and the same, just different aspects of the same truth. They tell us about being lost, what it means to be lost, what it takes to be found and really, why Jesus came to eat with tax collectors and sinners.
1. When you’re lost, you’re lost
The fact of the matter is, when you’re lost, you’re lost. Lost is not knowing where you are or how to get out of a situation. There is just nowhere to turn. Consider the examples Jesus gives:
a) The Lost Sheep – A man with a hundred sheep loses one of them. The sheep has wandered off over a ridge or hill and has become so engrossed with eating that it is now lost. Picture the sheep cowering, frightened and vulnerable. There are predators all around and its life is in danger. With this stark realization the sheep is frozen with fear and unable to move, curled up under a bush.
b) The Lost Coin – In the next story a woman loses a coin. It is a precious coin to her as it is part of her dowry, money that she hopes to give to her groom on her wedding day. The coin is perhaps caught in a crack in the dirt floor, or it rolled under a cabinet. Unlike the sheep it can’t cry out and give the searcher a clue where it is. Both are lost.
c) The Lost Son – Finally, there is the lost son who thinks he can come back, but the truth is he can’t. Wait a minute, what do you mean he can’t? Of course he can and he does. No he doesn’t. Physically he makes his way back but in truth he is just as lost as ever.
When the son originally left home he asked his father for his share of the estate (v. 12). This is a very insulting and grievous request for a father in those days. In reality the son is wishing his father “dead” so that he can have his inheritance. Living in community as the people did then, everyone in town knows what the son has done. The son would have sold his share of the family property to someone in town worsening the public shame on the family name. He then takes the money and spends it all away.
Realizing his predicament without money and yearning for food only pigs would eat he thinks of home. He schemes that it would be better to be a servant in the house of his father than starving in a foreign country. This is how it reads: “When he came to his senses, he said, ‘How many of my father’s hired men have food to spare, and here I am starving to death! I will set out and go back to my father and say to him: Father, I have sinned against heaven and against you. I am no longer worthy to be called your son; make me like one of your hired men’ (17-19).
This is not remorse but desperation. He did not come to his senses as we understand it but developed a plan. You see he owed a great debt to his father and to the community in a way. His plan then is to work for his father to pay off his debt, even if it takes a lifetime. So, yes, he is still lost.
2. When you’re lost you need to be found
Whether you are lost like a sheep frozen in fear beneath a bush, a coin buried in the shadows of a dark room, or a conniving son who doesn’t know how blind he is, when you are lost you need someone to come and find you. Jesus shows the Pharisees three aspects of himself and what he came to do in these metaphors:
a) The Good Shepherd – Jesus makes a very direct statement to the Pharisees in this parable. And they know what he is talking about too. More than just a pastoral image, Jesus is making a link to the history of Israel here. This parable reminds his listeners of Jeremiah 23:1-6 and Ezekiel 34 where the prophets rebuke the leaders, the shepherds of Israel, for scattering the flock and doing nothing to bring them back. Psalm 23 also comes to mind. Verse 3 of that great psalm has David exclaiming “he restores my soul.” We take this to mean “he lifted my depression” or “restored my joy.” But in the original language it says “he brings me back” or “he causes me to repent.” The Lord is my Shepherd and he comes after me, David says, and it brings me to my knees. Remember, the sheep can’t find its way home – it is lost. So the shepherd needs to find it.
b) The Searching Woman – The same is true of the lost coin. Obviously an inanimate object can’t roll itself out and say “here I am.” The woman is the seeker and she lights a lamp, sweeps and finds the lost coin. And she calls her friends to rejoice with her.
c) The Running Father – Here again we see the lost one being found in a profound way. Remember the son’s scheme to work off his debt? We read, “But while he was still a long way off, his father saw him and was filled with compassion for him; he ran to his son, threw his arms around him and kissed him” (v. 20).
In Middle Eastern culture the patriarch of a family never runs. It is not respectable for an elder statesman to run. All of the community would be watching and seeing this father run to the errant son who had so shamed his family. This boy owes the community and the family so much. But the son never gets a chance to make his bargain. The father was in his rights to kill the son, but he runs to him, kisses him and finds him.
Kenneth Bailey puts these words into Jesus’ mouth: You wonder why I receive sinners and eat with them? I do so because in my person God is fulfilling his great promise hinted at in David’s Shepherd psalm and spelled out clearly in Jeremiah and Ezekiel. Through these prophecies he pledged himself to rescue the flock from the shepherds who destroy them. This is who I am, and this is why I do what I do (Jacob and the Prodigal, p. 69, Kenneth Bailey).
3. When you’re found, you need to admit you were lost
Our pride makes this admission a little tough to swallow. We don’t like to admit that we are or were lost. When you’re found, you need to admit you were lost. What does that mean exactly?
If we asked each other what this parable is about we might conclude:
* It’s about a shepherd who loses a sheep.
* It’s about a good shepherd who goes after it.
* It’s about the price paid to go after the sheep.
* It’s about rejoicing over the lost now found.
And these could be said about the Lost Son as well. But Jesus says it is about REPENTANCE.
How do we understand repentance? I have asked different people to list the steps of repentance and the answers are generally the same. I would have answered the same way. Repentance is:
a) The confession of sin.
b) Prayer to God for forgiveness
c) The payment for injuries of loss done to another person as a result of our sin.
d) The promise and genuine resolve never to do it again.
This is how we have always understood it. In fact, this is what the rabbis taught before and in Jesus’ day. Jesus however, teaches us a different definition of repentance in these parables. For in our definition of repentance there is no incarnation, there is no Jesus. God does not need to come to us. Instead, through this definition of repentance, we go to God. We are like the Lost Son who planned to pay for his own debts. We want to work off our guilt and our shame and show ourselves worthy.
Jesus redefines repentance as simply this: Admit that you are lost. When Peter preached to the crowd at Pentecost and they asked what they should do, Peter responded “Repent and be baptized every one of you, in the name of Jesus Christ so that your sins may be forgiven” (Acts 2:38). We could say, repent and believe in the name of Jesus – it’s the same thing. It’s as simple as that. Jesus has come to find us and we need only to lift our arms up to him and admit “Yes I am lost without you.” Anything we add to that makes repentance a work and diminishes the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ.
4. Who’s really lost?
Have you ever wondered at the absurdity of a shepherd going off to find one sheep, taking it to the town for a celebration, while 99 are still in the field? Who are the 99 sheep?
They represent the same people that the older brother represents in the parable of the lost son, the people who don’t think they are lost. Jesus wields a two-edged sword. On the one hand he shows us how the lowest sinners can repent through grace. And on the other he shows us how self-righteous we can be when we think we are not lost.
The 99 and the older brother are the Pharisees and the teachers of the law. They were the shepherds who were supposed to be caring for God’s flock. They were the older brother who complains that he obeyed God’s law all his life and never got the appreciation and approval he desired. And Jesus eats with tax collectors and sinners…come on!
We can easily slip into the mindset that we are not lost, that we are the obedient ones who have stayed faithful and have never strayed. But we all know that isn’t true. How quickly we find ourselves wandering and getting lost in a world of temptations. We insist that we are not lost. Yet we know we have wandered away from the life that Jesus wants for us.
In my personal reading this week I ran across this phrase in Romans 13:14 “And don’t let yourself think about ways to indulge your evil desires.” Simply and beautifully put, this is how we get lost. Just like the sheep eating a bit of grass, looking up and seeing another tuft of grass, then seeing another, only following its nose until it is lost, this is how we get lost. Our minds run over a myriad of possibilities to indulge our desires. Sometimes one takes hold and voila, you’re lost.
How do you get back? You pray, you plead, you beg forgiveness, you promise God never to do it again, and then wallow in your guilt. Working to earn back God’s approval doesn’t work. Just admit that you got lost. It is so painfully simple it confounds us.
Consider 1 John 1:8-9 with the word “lost” inserted: If we claim we are not lost, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us. If we confess our lostness, he is faithful and just and will forgive us our lostness and purify us from all unrighteousness.
One other thing stings badly when we realize what Jesus is saying to those who don’t think they are lost. Jesus came to eat and be friends with tax collectors and sinners because the Pharisees forgot it was their job to do so. Jesus came to show the Pharisees how to have compassion on those who are lost. For you see, if you’re not looking for the lost, you’re lost. You are not among the found, you have not the mind of Christ, and you are lost.
A. J. Gordon once said, “I have long since ceased to pray, “Lord Jesus, have compassion on a lost world!” I remember the day and the hour when I seemed to hear the Lord rebuking me for making such a prayer. He seemed to say to me, “I have had compassion upon a lost world, and now it is (time) for you to have compassion.”
Daniel Boone could not admit that he was lost. That’s okay; he was a bit of a dufus in reality anyway. Our parable today challenges us to rethink repentance and to consider our response to our lostness. When we find ourselves straying from God, or having slipped into that sin that makes us wonder if we have genuine faith, remember that we have a lostness in us that brought Jesus into the world in the first place.
“…the Son of Man came to seek and to save what was lost” (Luke 19:10). To be found you must admit that you are lost. And even though you have been found in Christ each of us must admit we get a little lost in this life. It is then that we can confess once again our lostness and be found securely in Christ alone.
AMEN
