Rejoice With Me

So, what I want to start this morning, we're going back into Luke, we're into Luke chapter 15 now. And I want to start this morning by asking you, what do you get excited about? What do you get excited about? And once you get fixed in your mind, here's what I get excited about. I want you to think for a minute, what does your excitement look like? When you get excited, is it subdued? Like, do you work to subdue it? Is the pinnacle of excitement just a really good feeling that no one else is aware of? Or is excitement this sort of exuberant, over-the-top, everyone in the house knows what's going on? Do you yell? Are you calm? How do you demonstrate excitement? Some of you are more outspoken than others, certainly. And my goal, yeah, Luis is one of them.

And my goal this morning is not to say those of you who are more reserved are wrong. My goal this morning is to say you ought to demonstrate and share your joy with other people. That's sort of the point. It's infectious. Some people have that kind of laugh. When they laugh, you can't help but laughing. When they're happy, it's infectious. Well, that's our place as Christians. To take the joy that we have and the excitement that we have and to share it. Not to hide it, not to subdue it, not to bury it, but to share it. Now, I tend to be the kind of person that wants to keep to myself about what I'm happy about. And I don't know if that's a surprise. I think it's probably a surprise to some of you and probably like, that's right, to others. Vanessa would tell you she's not at all surprised that I keep to myself about the things I'm happy about.

And so as I was preparing, I'm thinking, why am I that way? And I don't think I'm unique. Some of you aren't like me, and that's fine, but some of you are like me. And so why is it that you don't express your joy? And I think, at least for myself, part of the reason I don't express my joy is because I spend a lot of time thinking about the work. that surrounds me and all the what-ifs. Like, I don't want to get too happy about something because I don't want to have my hopes dashed on the rocks. I don't want what I'm looking forward to, what I'm happy about, to have to be taken away from me. So I'm afraid to give myself to joy. And I'm convinced that it's wrong, that it's sinful of me. I think I'm convinced from our passage this morning that our joy is something we ought to share.

that we're under obligation to share it. And so this morning, our text has to do with Jesus teaching parables about repentance and the joy that comes in heaven and on earth from even one sinner that repents. This really ought to be what brings us joy. And yet too often, especially with regard to repentance, it's easy to become skeptical. and to question and to wonder and to withhold our joy because we're not sure yet. And I think it's because we're afraid of being hurt and it ought not to be this way. And so this morning, I want us to see from scripture what we're to do, how we're to respond to repentance in our own lives and particularly in the lives of others. Would you please stand now for the reading of God's word from Luke chapter 15.

verses 1 through 10. This is the word of the Lord, and it is eternally true. Now all the tax collectors and the sinners were coming near him to listen to him. Both the Pharisees and the scribes began to grumble, saying, this man receives sinners and eats with them. So he told them this parable, saying, what man among you, if he has a hundred sheep and has lost one of them, does not leave the 99 in the open pasture and go after the one which is lost until he finds it. When he has found it, he lays it on his shoulders rejoicing. And when he comes home, he calls together his friends and his neighbors, saying to them, rejoice with me, for I have found my sheep which was lost. I tell you that in the same way, there will be more joy in heaven over one sinner who repents than over 99 righteous persons.

who need no repentance? Or what woman, if she has ten silver coins and loses one coin, does not light a lamp and sweep the house and search carefully until she finds it? When she has found it, she calls together her friends and neighbors saying, Rejoice with me, for I have found the coin which I had lost. In the same way, I tell you, there is joy in the presence of the angels of God over one sinner who repents. This is the word of the Lord. You may be seated. There's a lot in this passage. There's a lot of things that we could talk about. I could talk to you about sheep. We could have a whole sermon about sheep and what they're like and why they wander off. And then we could have a whole other sermon about money and its value and that that's good for it to be valuable but not to be worshipped. We could have a sermon about the type of people who come and talk to Jesus, who come after him.

We could have another sermon about the joy in heaven over repentance. There's all kinds of things that we could say. And so as I was preparing, I was thinking, okay, how should I divide this up? How big of a chunk should we take? How big of a bite? Because this is a big bite. Not because it's 10 verses long, but because there's a lot of things going on in here. And yet there's one theme through all of this, and it's joy. And it's joy over repentance. Joy is the appropriate response to repentance. And so that's what our topic's going to be. So if you want to know what kind of coin the woman had, or you want to know about the character of sheep, you can talk to me afterwards. I'll be glad to talk about it. What does it look like when angels rejoice? We can talk about it, but that's not our purpose this morning. Our purpose is to understand the lesson that Jesus was teaching them, which was that there is joy in heaven and on earth when even one sinner repents. Now, who is Jesus telling this to?

Well, there's a number of people there. There's crowds following him. And we're told of the crowds that the crowd is full of tax collectors and sinners and also scribes and Pharisees. But the tax collectors and sinners, we're told, they're the ones who are coming near to him to listen to him. Now, why is it significant that they were coming to listen to him? Well, because a lot of people came to him to be healed. They didn't come to listen. They came to be healed. And it's noted of these people. That they didn't come to be healed, but that they came to listen to what Jesus had to say. They had regard for his words. They had regard for what he was going to say, not just what he would do. And so Jesus appeals to them. He speaks to them. And as he speaks, the Pharisees and the scribes grumble and complain. Can you believe who he's hanging out with? The scribes and Pharisees despised the tax collectors and the sinners. Now, if I say that they despised sinners, we all have a category in our mind for what...

a sinner is, what we consider to be the nasty kind of, those are not the kind of people. But what's a tax collector at that time? Well, simply, it's a Jew that's doing the work of the Roman government, collecting the taxes from the people. And they weren't always honest. They would skim, they would take bribes, they would steal. And so they were despised in Israel at this time, because they worked for the government. And they got fat off of the money of the Jews. And so the Jews didn't like them. And yet these are the people who came out to hear Jesus. And even Matthew, the disciple, the apostle, when he came to Jesus Christ, he was a tax collector. And he was brought out of it. And so these are the people who come. The people who are despised. The people who are rejected in their culture. Now, I could ask you, In our culture, who's despised? Who are the despised? And we could name them. Somebody said something. Drug dealers, perhaps, yes. Hispanics, the homeless. We could all go through and we could say we despise them. Our culture despises them. Now, we know full well that we're supposed to love them, that those are the people that Jesus came to save. And so there's this weird thing that can happen with us, which is that...

the people who are despised in the culture, we end up, in our effort to associate with them, at least in our minds, we just change who we despise. And so if you don't despise Mexicans or drug dealers or homeless people, who do you despise? Who do you have no interest in? Who do you grumble and complain that show up at church? Or who might come to church? The wealthy? The professionals? The blue-collar men? Who is it? It would be different for each of us. But there are actually people in this room who despise wealthy people because they just think it's ungodly. Now, that's not in our text anywhere, right? There's no wealthy people in there that are being despised. My point in bringing it up is not to say you shouldn't despise wealthy people. We should all love them. That's not the point. My point is to say we all have the propensity in our hearts to take groups of people and to despise them.

And they're the people we don't associate with, we don't connect with. Are they rich? Are they poor? Are they lame? Are they healthy? Are they wealthy? Are they powerful? Who are they? Who do you despise? Who would you be appalled if they showed up? What are they doing here? They don't have any reverence for Jesus and for the word of God. They're here to be a troublemaker. They're here to take. They're not here to give. They're here to despise. This is what the Pharisees are saying. This man, Jesus, he receives sinners and he eats with them. What are they doing here and why is he giving them priority? Now you remember earlier in the last chapter when Jesus was in the house of the Pharisees, he actually rebuked them for who they ate with.

And he rebuked them for eating with their friends and with their family and with the wealthy. And he says, no, he taught them parables and said, you're to go out and you're to bring in the poor, the lame, the blind, the oppressed. These are the people who you're supposed to bring in. And here Jesus is doing that very thing. And the Pharisees can't stand it. And they can't take him down and oppose what he's teaching. And so they oppose what he's doing. He's eating with sinners and tax collectors. Jesus was a threat to their way of life, the Pharisees and the scribes. They were comfortable. They had made a way for them to have their lives in ease and comfort, and he was a threat to that. He was upsetting the system, and they didn't want anyone doing that. And so when we read just these opening verses, we have to do the work of figuring out who do we align with? Who are we? And quickly, we want to say, well, I'm the tax collector and the sinner. I need Jesus. And it's possible that in our hearts, such as they are, you could be a little bit of both.

You can have a sincere interest in hearing Jesus Christ and hearing what he has to say and despise other people at the same time. It's possible to have all that going on inside of you right at the same time. And so what we see is both the tax collectors and sinners as well as the Pharisees and scribes needed to hear what Jesus had to say at this time, his parables, his teaching. And so he begins to teach them and he says, what man of you, if he had a hundred sheep and lost one, wouldn't leave the 99 and go find the one? Search for it until he finds it.

And we have to ask, okay, well, he's teaching in a parable. He's taking something that's familiar to them, caring for sheep. It's not familiar to us, but it would have been familiar to them. And he says, here's what it's like. Here's what the kingdom of God is like. Here's what my work is like. Here's what should be important to you. And you have this one sheep that is lost, that wanders away. And we have to ask, what does this sheep need? What does this one sheep need? Well, above all else, this sheep needs to be found, right? It may have all kinds of other needs, but it needs to be found. It needs to be saved. And so who are the sheep? When Jesus speaks in a parable, he's taking something familiar that they would have understood, and he's using it to explain something that's unfamiliar to them. So who are the sheep? Well, the people are the sheep. Those who are hearing him are the sheep. And what he's saying is, they're a sheep of mine.

who when they wander away, I go find them. They're lost. They've wandered off. Or they've never been a part of my sheepfold yet. They're out there. They're wild. They're not in my sheepfold yet. I'm going to go find them and bring them in. And so whether they've wandered away from the sheepfold or whether they've never been a part of the sheepfold, the need is the same. They need to be found. They need to be rescued from the danger and certain death that awaits them. And so we, if we're sheep, have to consider we're lost? And how did we get lost? And what do we need if we are lost? What we need is to be found. We need to be found out. And what does being found out look like? Well, it looks like repentance. When Jesus explains this text, this parable, after he says there's 99 and there's one and the one leaves and the shepherd goes and he finds it and he brings it back and everyone rejoices. Then he says, I tell you,

That there is more joy in heaven over one sinner who repents than over 99 who don't need repentance. And so what does being found mean? It means that they would be brought to repentance. That you, that I, would be brought to repentance. So how is it that we're brought to repentance? Well, we're told here that the shepherd goes and he finds his sheep. He pursues him until he finds it. Now, if you had lost something, let's say a child of yours. One of your children is missing, is gone. There would be a cost and an intensity associated with the searching out of this child, right? Earlier this week, I was home. I was with my kids, and Vanessa was out. And my boys go, there's someone coming to the door. And I said, oh. So I went and go in. It's a young guy. He's probably in high school. He's riding his bike. And he came and knocked on the door, and he said, do you mind if I go in the woods behind your house? I said, you know, sure. They're not our woods. There's just a field back there. Sure, yeah, you can go back there.

I said, what are you looking for? And he says, my sister. She ran away yesterday and the cops found her and now she's run away again. And he was sad. I mean, he was like numb, like not sure what to do. He sent out to go find his sister in the neighborhood. 13-year-old girl, she took off. And I say, yeah, sure, you can go back in the woods and look for your sister. And I'm sitting here thinking, is this something going on? Like, is there, like, there's this part of my mind that there's, that it's a lie, that he's lying to me, that he's, you know, because I don't know what's going on. Well, then when he finally comes back, he knocks on the door and says, you know, 15 minutes later, and he goes, I'm leaving. And he asked if I could help him fix his bike, and I did. And then two undercover cops pulled up that had been out looking for his sister. And then I knew that it was serious, that it was real, that he wasn't lying to me. And I felt helpless. What was I to do? What was he to do?

And I don't know if they found his sister or not. He was talking to the police and I just thought, I'm a stranger to them. All my kids are inside. I just went back in my house, prayed for them. But searching for someone that's lost is costly business. It's costful with money. It's costful with emotions. It's costly with time. It's scary. And so when you read that this shepherd goes after his lost sheep, it's not like how you look for your keys in the morning when you've misplaced them. It's much more severe than that. The stakes are much higher than that. You can imagine that if one of your children was lost or in this family, if they didn't find the young lady, that there wasn't going to be any sleep that night, that they were going to enlist the help of others.

That their other responsibilities were going to be neglected. If your child was missing, you probably wouldn't be going to work the next day. And so searching for your lost child, your lost sheep, is a serious thing. It's not something we should take lightly and go, oh yeah, but we know Jesus is going to find them, so it's all good. No, Jesus tells us a parable, something that's familiar to us, that if something that was dear to us was lost, we would expend every bit of ourselves and all of our resource in finding them. And Jesus gives us this example to teach us about how we are lost and need repentance and how he pursues us to that end. Why is it that we as parents, if we had lost one of our children, would search for them in the way that I've described? It's because we love them. What if they were wicked and what if they went and did it themselves and brought all this trouble onto themselves? Does our love for them change?

Do we finally say, fine, go do what you want, I don't care? This is not how parents who love their children and who love God respond to their children, even if they're in sin. And what can we conclude except that if we respond to our children that way, and scripture tells us that even Wiccan fathers know how to give good gifts to their children, how much more our Father in heaven, is it not reasonable for us to conclude that this shepherd loves his sheep, that Jesus Christ loves us? and pursues us to the end, that we might repent and turn away from our sins. So much of Christianity today doesn't have repentance as a part of it. And so we're sort of immature in our understanding of repentance. And so how does it that you get someone to repent? You scare them into repentance? You terrify them? Sometimes. I'm not saying that never works. That is certainly a part of it. But what are we being taught about the shepherd here?

and his disposition toward the sheep. We're being taught that he loves them, and he cares for them, and he pursues them until they're found. And so we should understand that that is one of the primary ways that God brings us to repentance, is through his love and through his mercy and through his forbearance and long-suffering with us who don't deserve it, who are prone to wander off. Isaiah says, all of us like sheep have turned away, each of us to his own way. And yet because he chose to, chose to love us, he pursues us. As a father would a child. And it's meant to produce something in us. It's not something that we're supposed to exploit. When a father loves his son and he's got a son who exploits his love and takes advantage of it, it's incredibly wicked. A son ought to love his father. He ought to seek to please his father and to do his father's will. And when he fails and when he sins, he ought to repent.

Too many Christian parents teach their children not to sin or to hide their sin, but they don't teach them to repent. They don't teach them what to do when they sin. And yet there's no greater joy as a parent than when your son or your daughter comes to you and said, I've sinned, and I need to tell you, and I need your help, and I need your forgiveness. There's no greater joy that comes to a parent than when their children confess their sins and say, here's what I did. And yet we as parents too often don't teach our children to confess their sins. In fact, what we teach them to do is to hide their sins. And we do damage to the gospel and to their understanding of it because there's no place for them to come and to say, here is what I did. I remember sitting in a counseling session one time with a family, and one of the children was having trouble. And I was there, and the parents were there, and he was there, and I don't remember who else was there.

But he'd been in sin. There was an obvious sin that we'd had the meeting over. And while we were there, I asked him, do you have any other sin that you need to confess while we're all here? And he started crying, and he said yes. And he proceeded to confess that he'd been fornicating with his girlfriend. And his parents had thought they'd raised a Christian son who would not do that. And they're just finding out as I'm finding out. And he's telling them. It's very difficult, very sad. And we worked through that situation, and in the moment, it was sweet. But I left leaving thinking, having the thought, parents have to make room. The parents should have asked him that question. His dad should have asked him. If he saw that his son wasn't doing well, he should have asked him. Did he teach his child to repent or not? Did he not just say, you can come to me, but did he pursue his son until he found out?

Or was he unwilling to know? Was he unwilling to pursue? Did he stumble in his love? And that is a temptation of parents is to not want to know their kids' sins. You don't want to know what they're doing. You don't want to know what's going on because it hurts. It's scary. And yet we don't do them any good if that's how we treat them, if that's how we love them. And so this shepherd pursues his sheep, his one sheep. He leaves the 99 who don't need repentance. And for those of you who are Reformed, we want to talk about, well, who are the 99 and what's it mean that they don't need repentance? Well, it could be that they're self-righteous and proud and going to hell. Or it could be that they're justified by the blood of Jesus Christ and in that sense, they don't need repentance. But that's not the point. The point is the shepherd goes after the lost one because he loves them and he pursues them until he finds them. And then when he finds them, he rejoices. He doesn't chastise.

and run the child through the ringer. Now, I'd love to go into right now to talking about the prodigal son and how that all happened, but that's our text for next week. And so we'll leave that till next week. But suffice it to say now that when the lost one is found, rejoicing is what's appropriate. That's the order of the day. When the shepherd finds his sheep, he puts it on his shoulder. He carries it, rejoicing. And with him, he's by himself, he's out, you know. And it says, And so his joy over finding his sheep is not a private matter. It's something that he shares and invites other people into. And Jesus says, Precious persons who need no repentance. And what we understand from Jesus' explanation of the parable is that that shepherd's response in that parable is a reflection of what goes on in heaven. That as we care and as we rejoice in repentance, the same thing goes on in heaven. God is not indifferent to our lives, indifferent to our struggles, indifferent to our wanderings, or indifferent to our return. There's rejoicing in heaven.

And then Jesus goes on and gives another parable, which is same message, different moving parts. A woman who's lost her money. Now, think for a second categorically, okay? When men lose something, how do they generally respond? Curses, anger, they get mad. That's generally how men respond, okay? If a man loses his keys, just as an example, he's going to be angry. that he's going to be late to work and he's going to have to hear it from his boss and his whole day is going to be, he's going to be angry about it. How would a woman generally respond if she loses her keys or loses something? Worried, she's going to be sad. Is this universally in every circumstance with every man and every woman that's ever been, is this true? No, it's not. Some men get sad and some women get angry. That's not my point. But generally speaking, Men get angry when they lose things and women get worried when they lose things. They get sad when they lose things. And the reason I'm bringing it up is because Jesus says a woman lost a coin. Why didn't he say a man lost a coin? Because it would actually respond differently. The shepherd loses his work. He loses his sheep. He loses his business. And he cares because he loves them. But when a woman loses something, she's going to become upset. She's lost 10% of her wealth. Lost it.

Don't know where it's at. Didn't lose it in the market, and I'm going to get it back. Didn't loan it out, and I'm going to get it back. Didn't lose it in a bet. Lost it. I don't know where it went. I don't know if I'll ever get it back. So she lights a lamp and sweeps the house and searches carefully for it again until she finds it, just the same way that the shepherd searches for the sheep, until they find it. If you have kids, you've lost parts and pieces to toys and different things, and then you go looking for them. And sometimes you find them, and sometimes you don't.

But you know in your head that thing never left this house. I know it's here somewhere. But we give up the search, and then it turns up. Six months later, in the coat pocket, in the coat that's hanging at the back of the coat closet, where one of your children decided, here's a good place to put it. I found a toy in my bag, a puzzle piece in my bag this week. We've been looking for it for two weeks. No idea. Kids, find the thing. It was here. One of them stuck it in my computer bag. And just in me looking through it, it was this bright yellow thing. I'm like, oh, well, there it is. What was lost has been found. And so this woman who's lost her money, she searches until she finds it. And we laugh when we say, oh, well, kids lose things, and we look for it, and we kind of give up the search. But sometimes, sometimes you have a child who has a tendency to lose things.

And you determine that you are going to find what you have lost. And what you're telling them is you're going to pursue it until you find it. I already looked in there. You're going to look again. It's not in there. Go look again. This is the way that this woman searches for her coin. She searches for it relentlessly, carefully, until she finds it. Why? Well, because it's valuable to her. She's not willing to lose it, to have it be lost. I told you at the beginning that we were talking about a response to repentance and that it should be joy. But let me ask you now, how should we respond to a lack of repentance? Or, let me ask it this way, how do you think that the shepherd or this woman would have responded to the loss? Would they have been indifferent? We know that they weren't indifferent because we see the level of effort that they put forth to find it.

But would there have been grief? Would there have been sadness? Will we share that too? If that shepherd comes home with a lost sheep before he's found it and tells no one that he's lost the sheep, do you have confidence that he's going to tell them when he finds it? I don't. So often in our lives when we're dealing with sin, we talk about it in the past tense. We talk about what happened or how things used to be hard. or when there was a struggle. And oftentimes when you talk to people who operate this way, when we do this, what you find out is that when they were struggling, they were very lonely, they were very depressed, they were very discouraged, and they were also alone because they wouldn't tell anyone about their grief. And I want you to know that if you don't share your grief when it's happening, you won't share your joy when it comes. It's inconceivable that this shepherd, would have been alone by himself out in the open pasture, searching by himself. Maybe he was alone when he found the sheep, but he couldn't have been the only one looking because he loved his sheep. You say, well, what's this have to do with repentance? And I say, well, looking back on my life, I can see lots of people who loved me that God used to ultimately to save me.

I had a fifth grade teacher who was a Christian woman who never told me that but was very kind to my family, to my mom and me. I was a part of Big Brothers Big Sisters. My big brother was, the Big Brothers Big Sisters had come to his church and said, hey, we need people to do this, and he decided to do it. And he loved me. And I didn't know at the time what was going on, but those were people who were very, very happy. And you know what they said to me when I told them I became a Christian? We've been praying for you. We prayed for you. My fifth grade teacher, she was a little Italian lady. She'd have lots of things to tell you about what I was like as a child. But they loved me, and they cared for me. And once I realized what was going on, then that made sense to me. I thought they were just nice people. But I was a sheep that was lost, and God was using his people to call me, to find me, to save me.

So where's your part in it? Well, your part at first is to be used in that way, to seek the lost, to seek the lost in your family, your own children, to seek the lost around you. How do you seek them? Well, the question that I usually ask myself when I'm trying to figure out how to interact with someone is I think, okay, I think about their situation and I think, if I was in their shoes, if what's going on in their life was going on in my life, What would be comforting to me? What would be helpful to me? What would I need? And I actually put more stock in what I think I would need in that situation than what they tell me they need. Because when I am in that position, I know what I would like to have, but I also know what I will tell other people. And they're not the same thing. What I need is someone...

to put their arm around me and hug me and tell me it's going to be, you know, we're going to be okay. Or I need someone to tell me you need to get, you need to get up and you need to do what the work that's in front of you, because it's not, I know what I need, but what I tell people I need, it's not that. And so I ended up putting more stock in thinking, what would I need if I was in their shoes? And then that's what I do. And sometimes they get really offended by it in the moment. And sometimes they, they really love it. And sometimes I have no clue how it goes over, but that's what, that's what it means to love somebody.

And you have to be content to love them and trust God to use it how he uses it, when he uses it. I was only in fifth grade for one year. And Miss Wallace loved me for that year and loved me and remembered me. And I knew her husband. He was a high school math teacher. And he knew me. And their son that was on the wrestling team, he knew about me. The son of man came to seek and to save that which was lost. The great commission is that we would go into all the nations and we'd make disciples of them. That is the work of seeking and saving that which is lost. And this is what the Pharisees grumbled about, that Jesus was seeking and saving that which was lost. They had no regard for them. They didn't care about them. They were happy for them to stay as they were. But that's not a Christian's part. That's not our place. We ought to seek repentance ourselves, and we ought to seek repentance for other people, calling them to it. Now, if we're doing this work, it's going to, it should,

have an effect on us. Well, what should that effect be? Well, first, it's probably going to be some level of grief. Because when you give yourself to loving people and you open yourself up to them and their lives and the choices they make and you don't just go, that's your thing, do your own thing, but you come alongside of them and you start to care what they do, it becomes sad to you when they choose foolishness, when they choose wickedness. And you know what? That's what you should feel. It should grieve you when you have family that's giving themselves to sin. And you don't have to be ashamed that it's a grief to you. You don't have to hide that it's a grief to you. You can't be overwhelmed by it. You can't be consumed by it. But to say that it's a grief to you would only be to be natural. My son that I love has gone off and is a fool. My brother who's gone off, he's doing things that are going to kill him. Of course that's a grief to you. You shouldn't bear that alone.

It takes faith to talk about those things. Faith in God to trust that he seeks and saves that which is lost. And so you have to talk about it. You have to share your grief, not just your joys. And then when there is repentance, there ought to be joy. There ought to be real joy. I remember when we still lived down in Bloomington, in our small group there was this Sri Lankan woman. who was a grad student, who had grown up Hindu? Buddhist? Buddhist. And she started coming to church. And she came to church, and she came to church, and she came to church. She was very sweet and very curious. And eventually, one time at small group, she just said, I've decided to become a Christian. And the small group leader, small group's just kind of going on the way it's just going on. And she's talking with, some people and he's there and he hears it. And all of a sudden this loud, just everybody, everybody come here. I got to tell you something. And everyone's going, what's going on? Okay. And they all come over and he's hugging her and he's crying and he's just very happy. And he says, you'll never believe what she just said. We need to sing. And the whole small group sings. And it was sweet. The joy was shared amongst everyone.

And it stood out to me. I remembered it. And I went, that's how it's supposed to be. That's right. That's good there. That was how it should be. And so this is our place. Share the grief of the loss. Share the joy of the recovery. As you participate in that, you'll only be participating in what's going on in heaven. Don't shy away from sharing those burdens with other people. Don't shy away from asking. If you know someone has something going on, it's difficult, it's hard, it's current, it's past. Be willing to share grief, your own grief and other people's grief, and then share your joys as well. There's no better joy in the world than repentance, yourself and seeing it in other people. You'll never find anything more satisfying, more fulfilling, more strengthening. And so this is the work we're to be about.

We're to love as the shepherd loved his sheep. Because we're the physical manifestation of Jesus Christ as the church here on earth sent to fulfill the great commission. To seek and to save that which is lost. This is our place. So we should be about that work. And we should do it by faith. And we should expect to see harvest in time. We don't know how and you don't know when and you don't know what it will be. But we ought to expect that God will seek and save and do what he says. Because if we don't, then we think he's a liar, that he doesn't seek, he doesn't save, he doesn't leave the 99, he doesn't care about the one, that we and someone else is not important. And it's not true. Let's pray.