Have you ever lost anything? I’ve lost many things, I’ve lost my keys, my phone, money, my drivers license, one time I even lost my car that’s just to name a few. It’s a terrible felling to lose something, but if you’re fortunate enough to find what you’ve lost you know what an amazing feeling that is. Now imagine if someone dear to you went missing, a child, a spouse, maybe one of your parents. What would you do? To what extremes would you be willing to go to find that person? Now imagine a group of people that thought you were crazy for looking for your loved one, thinking you should not waste your time looking for them. Imagine a group of people who thought that the person that was lost wasn’t worth finding. How would you feel about them?

When Jesus dwelt on this earth he was attracted to the least righteous and the least religious people of his time. This caused him many problems with the religious people because they could not understand why Jesus was attracted to sinners but not to them. They would comment amongst themselves, why does Jesus like to spend his time with sinners and not with us?

Read Luke 15 NIV

1 Now the tax collectors and sinners were all gathering around to hear Jesus.

2But the Pharisees and the teachers of the law muttered, “This man welcomes sinners and eats with them.”

Jesus, knowing what they were muttering makes up three parables to attempt to explain why he spent his time with what they called, “tax collectors and sinners.”
In the first parable (Luke 15:3-7) Jesus tells them about a man who has one hundred sheep and one of them gets lost. Doesn’t he leave the ninety-nine and go after the lost sheep until he finds it? Then when He finds it doesn’t he celebrate?

7“I tell you that in the same way there will be more rejoicing in heaven over one sinner who repents than over ninety-nine righteous persons who do not need to repent.

Jesus goes on to tell a second parable (Luke 15:8-10) about a woman who has ten silver coins of great value but loses one of them. Doesn’t she light a lamp, sweep the house and search carefully until she finds it? And when she finds it doesn’t she celebrate? Jesus asked them.

10 ”In the same way, I tell you, there is rejoicing in the presence of the angels of God over one sinner who repents.”

Jesus goes on to a third parable (Luke 15:11-32) about a father who had lost one of his two sons. Not because he was a negligent father but because the son decided he was going to be a negligent and ungrateful son. Some time after the son’s decision to leave his family behind his life was turned upside-down, so he decided to return home and the father threw him a great big party to celebrate. Then the brother who had stayed with his father was upset at this celebration.

31“‘My son,’ the father said, ‘you are always with me, and everything I have is yours. 32But we had to celebrate and be glad, because this brother of yours was dead and is alive again; he was lost and is found.’”

In each one of these parables something of great value was lost and in each one of these there was a great celebration when what was lost was found.

It’s simple, Jesus came to this earth to find and save what had been lost, his prized creation, you and me.

Father, thank you for not giving up on me. Thank you for pursuing me as if you had lost something of incredible value. Give me a heart like yours, a heart that has a burden for the lost.