This sermon explores Jesus's teachings on the value of every individual in the kingdom of God, emphasizing the joy in heaven over a sinner's repentance, and encourages believers to view and treat all lives as precious.
As we get started today I want you to think about the last time you lost something really valuable. What was it? How did it make you feel? And what did you do to find it again? What was your response when you finally found it again?
In today’s passage Jesus also talks about things that have gotten lost and how it felt for their owners to find them again. He’s telling these stories in parables, as He often does, to uncover and make evident the deep realities of the kingdom for His listeners. And the main point He seems to be getting across, which happens to be our main point today as well, is that people matter. Even the ones that seem “lost” or too far gone. Every life matters in the kingdom, and there is “great rejoicing in heaven over one sinner who repents.”
Remember church, John 3:16 says that “God loved the WHOLE world, and sent His son…” Not “some of the world,” or “the nice parts of the world,” He loved all of it, everyone… And sent His son to trade His life so that we may have eternal life.
Every life matters in the kingdom, and there is “great rejoicing in heaven over one sinner who repents.”
Our main passage for the day is Luke 15:1-10, which I think is best viewed in 3 sections. The first of which being verses 1-2;
You may have heard it said that Jesus was a “friend of sinners,” and this is precisely the thing that the Pharisees and teachers were so upset about. The specific phrase, friend of sinners, is used in both Matthew 11:19 and Luke 7:34… In fact, Jesus was spending so much time at dinner parties with sinners that the religious elites called Him a “glutton and drunkard.” (Matthew 11:19) But the truth is, you share meals with people you like. You invite your friends to dinner parties, and so it makes sense that the Jewish leaders would’ve called Jesus a friend of sinners, because that’s exactly what He was, and is.
He welcomed them. He invited himself over to their homes for dinner. He spent time with those that the Jewish leaders wouldn’t even want to be seen talking to. Jesus knew that they needed a friend, and so He spent time with them, because that’s what you do with your friends.
But Jesus also knew something else about these folks. He knew that they needed a savior. He knew that they were sick in their sin. He loved them enough to seek them out and share the good news of the kingdom with them.
And He spends the next 8 verses, Luke 15:3-10, telling the Jewish leaders stories of people who lost valuable things and the lengths they’d go to in order to find them again ... View this full sermon with PRO Premium
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