St. Paul’s United Church Sunday, September 16, 2007

God Seeks the Lost – Rev. David Mundy

Jeremiah 4:11-12, 22-28 Luke 15:1-10

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We remember the film footage and the photographs from that fateful day and the days that followed. The moments of impact as the airplanes slammed into the twin Trade Towers, the billowing smoke, the collapse of the two targeted buildings as well as those around them.

Then there were the scenes of emergency response amidst the chaos and then within hours the bewildered faces of loved ones searching for those who had left in the morning for their places of work only to be counted among the disappeared, the lost.

For all the dark drama of the crashes and the collapse, the photos of the missing posted on the wall of the emergency response centre were among the most heart-rending. It brought the horror and senselessness of it all so close to home. These were real, everyday people, folk like us, who were in the wrong place when catastrophe struck. We anguished with those who would not give up hope of recovery even when reasonable hope had disappeared. Hospitals were searched by families and wreckage was combed for survivors. Those who were missing couldn’t be lost.

Our family was living in Halifax on September 11^th 2001 and the events of 9/11 were accentuated in Nova Scotia by the thousands of airline passengers who were suddenly in and around the city as their flights were grounded. Some churches opened their doors to these displaced travellers. During the week memorial services were held and downtown churches tolled their bells. And all the while we watched as the search continued.

The following Sunday congregations acknowledged the pain of those who had experienced loss and worship leaders attempted to make sense of a changed world. Where was the Christian hope in the midst of barbarism?

On that Sunday six years ago which was also September 16^th, the scripture readings in the ecumenical lectionary were the same as they are this morning. The passage from the prophet Jeremiah spoke of desolation, of a world from which the birds of the air had fled and the cities were in ruins. How appropriate. We couldn’t help but wonder if God was absent or angry and some preachers capitalized on the notion by suggesting that the attacks were God’s punishment directed toward the wicked ways of stupid and unfaithful children.

Also that Sunday there were two parables about the lost who were found from Luke’s gospel which offered a glimmer of hope in a world which felt hopeless at the time. At the beginning of chapter fifteen we hear that Jesus is challenged by some religious leaders about the company he kept, especially for meals. I don’t think we like the Pharisees very much because in the gospels they tend to be sanctimonious and self-righteous and we can be just like them, can’t we?

The gospels tell us that over time these religious leaders move from irritation to anger over his bad habits, but Jesus doesn’t respond in a confrontational way. Instead he tells stories and there are actually three here. The one which wasn’t included is the longest and the best known, about a child who takes off from home and then is reconciled with his forgiving, accepting father. We tend to think of the parable of the wayward son as the “star”of the three parables that Jesus told but the other two about a lost sheep and a lost coin are important in their own way.

A colleague suggested to me recently that while the story of the lost son is the compelling and dramatic one the two we heard today are just as realistic. Like the sheep we nibble ourselves away from the flock bit by bit until we look up and wonder where we are. Then the shepherd comes looking for us. Or because of neglect we end up in the dark under the sofa with the dust bunnies until the homeowner searches us out.

Lost, lost, lost. That word is used in all three of these simple, concrete stories that Jesus uses to invite people into a greater truth. Although he never actually says it to the Pharisees or to anyone else that day, the message is that God seeks the lost and that he, Jesus seeks the lost.

Are you lost? I don’t know that we really appreciate the notion that we are lost. We may be temporarily misdirected but it is a bit much to say that we are lost. And when we hear it in certain religious settings, the implication is that our eternal souls are in peril and that we risk the fires of hell. It often sounds judgmental because the implication is that the person saying it is saved and others aren’t.

Yet virtually all of us do feel lost and confused at certain times in our lives. Some people tell me that when they walk into church after moving from another community or from a period away from a regular worship experience or even for the first time they ask themselves “what am I doing here?” Nothing is familiar and the disorientation is hard to overcome.

Lots of us keep coming to worship when we aren’t sure what we believe. We may be disappointed with God for circumstances which crush our hopes and our plans. We may have lost a loved one and feel drained of spiritual hope.

Sometimes we have made mistakes that we feel are so huge that we are a walking, talking version of Humpty Dumpty and that we can’t be put back together again. The people around us may have no idea of what we have done, or that we feel guilt and shame but that doesn’t matter because we know. I don’t care much for the phrase “stupid children” in Jeremiah, yet we often feel that way about ourselves.We don’t talk about sin very much anymore or suggest that there will be punishment for our misdeeds but that may be a mistake because we often punish ourselves and lose the opportunity to say we’re sorry and to start again.

Lost, lost, lost. Aren’t you glad that Jesus didn’t stop there? The Christian message, the Jesus message, is that even when we feel lost we are loved. We can be reconnected, and reconstructed. We can begin again.

When we come to an awareness that we are all both lost and found it will keep us from becoming spiritually arrogant, of saying that we have something that others should have but without the love and compassion which is essential to true evangelism.

When we take these parables to heart we will have the desire to share what we have experienced as Christ’s Good News with others. We often speak about being a welcoming congregation but we usually imagine this is passive terms. If people just show up we will be really friendly! Surely there has to be a passion and a commitment to creatively seeking those who may have a deep spiritual need, of going the extra mile or kilometre to allow that reconnection and reconciliation to happen.

During the summer I spent time with another of my colleagues who is very involved in the Living the Welcome project of our United Church. I asked him why he has become so enthusiastically involved in this effort to make congregations more hospitable places. He began by speaking of his own commitment to Christ and then he paused before telling me his own parable.

There is a Lost and Found box at his church where all the stray eyeglasses and mittens and other miscellaneous flotsam and jetsam of forgetful people go to live. One day an elderly woman came in looking for a lost scarf. She wasn’t really sure where she had misplaced it but when she looked in the box her face lit up with recognition because it was there. The lost was found! His comment to me was that while we assume that all of these items are homeless they just need to be reunited with their owners. That’s the way it is with us in our relationship with Christ.

Later in Luke Jesus is walking along the road with his disciples and he sees a man up in a tree, watching them go by. Jesus calls him down and tells him that he belongs. Again Jesus has a meal with the one who had thought he was an outcast and he says: “today salvation has come to this house . . . For the Son of Man came to seek out and to save the lost.”

Of course Jesus knew the cost of saving love. I want you to look at another photo from Ground Zero in New York city which shows one of the steel beams from the wreckage. One of the demolition workers used a torch to burn a cross into the steel. What a statement. Even though the bodies of many of those who were lost on 9/11 were never found this etched cross reminds us they were still cherished by the God who was crucified at Calvary and who knew sorrow as well as resurrection joy.

For me this image says that even in our darkest moments and when our lives seem to be in shambles Christ will be present. And always we hope and pray for the sheep to be found and the coin to be rediscovered and the wayward child to come home. When that happens, there will be joy in our hearts and rejoicing in heaven.

God seeks the lost. God seeks you. Christ loves you and will never stop loving you. Simple yet true. If you need to, say you are sorry to God and to others. Then accept the forgiveness which is God’s gift to you and begin again.

There is an old gospel song with a haunting melody and lovely words which is a good way to end this message of God seeking the lost. You can listen and you are invited to join the chorus at the end as a reminder that Christ’s welcome never ends.

Softly and tenderly Jesus is calling-- Calling for you and for me; Patiently Jesus is waiting and watching-- Watching for you and for me! Come home! come home! Ye who are weary, come home! Earnestly, tenderly, Jesus is calling, Calling, O sinner, come home! Oh, for the wonderful love He has promised-- Promised for you and for me! Though we have sinned, He has mercy and pardon- Pardon for you and for me!

Come home! come home! Ye who are weary, come home! Earnestly, tenderly, Jesus is calling, Calling, O sinner, come home!