Faith Venture

— Gary Mintchell

Now that we are celebrating after Easter, this passage from Luke seems even more meaningful. I’ve been contemplating on Luke 15 for months now, and finally decided to write about it. During my study of Luke, I visited Willow Creek Community Church in suburban Chicago. Founder/Pastor Bill Hybels was concerned that his church had lost a little edge and brought out one of his original “Contagious Christians” talks. The outline is his, other thoughts mine.

It seems that well into his ministry, Jesus heard the grumbling of the church people–those who observed all the laws (so they thought anyway), attended services, hung out with the right people and all that. These are things we can recognize today from “church people.” So he told three stories to answer their question about why he hung out with “sinners and tax collectors.” The first story is about a shepherd who has a flock of a hundred sheep. Upon discovering that he has lost one, he leaves everything to find it. The second story is about a woman who has lost a coin and searches diligently until she finds it. The third story is about a man who loses one of his sons and looks longingly every day until that sons returns.

These stories have three things in common: aching, searching, rejoicing. And they all describe God. And as we live in remembrance of the Easter events and celebrate the risen Jesus, remember this context.

God aches for every lost person who cannot find the way to salvation and wholeness. Just as we should ache for those same people. Ache is deeper than shallow emotion. It is as if something in us is missing and we won’t be complete without it. Do we care about those who are lost? Or are we comfortable with those around us? Do we always sit an empty chair in our small groups in remembrance that we need to fill that chair with someone who needs to be brought into relationship?

The aching leads to action–searching. The shepherd diligently searches though all the rocks and crevaces until he finds the lost. The woman sweeps the floor, moving furniture, looking under things until she finds the coin. The man goes out to the hill and looks everyday for the return of his son. Do we ache so much for the lost that we search for them? Are we trying to bring wholeness through Jesus to people in need?

Finding leads to rejoicing. In each case the finder is so overjoyed that they invite all their friends over for a big celebration. Just as Jesus was telling the Pharisees and other “church people” (including us) that God rejoices for every person who was lost and then was found, so we should rejoice when a person finds the way and comes to God. As we live in this after Easter celebration along with facing a chenge in pastoral leadership, it’s important to remember we can have Easter celebrations every week that we find lost people and help them find wholeness. That’s what has grown our congregation, and what we need to continue to focus on.