And if we remember back six weeks in stark contrast to the grumbling of ago we’ll remember that this series of the scribes and . parables was introduced by St. Luke this way. He wrote: Notice something important about these stories. The shepherd owns the Now the tax collectors and sinners sheep. The woman owns the coin. A Sermon for the Ninth Sunday were all drawing near to hear him. The problem is that they were lost. after Trinity And the Pharisees and the scribes And just so with the tax collectors, the St. Luke 15:11-32 grumbled, saying, “This man prostitutes, the sinners in Israel. They Fr. William Klock receives sinners and eats with were part of the people of God. They them.” (Luke 15:1-2) were his children—and brothers and sisters of the scribes and Pharisees. August 1, 2021 Notice, didn’t tell the parable in They belonged to God. but they were

response to someone asking, “What lost, and so he sent his son to seek Today’s parable of son is must I do to inherent eternal life?” A them out, to find them, and to restore a familiar one. We’ve all heard plenty rich young ruler who had been faithful them. The problem isn’t with the of sermons on the story. Some of us in keeping the law once ask that of righteous—with the Jews who kept the have preached plenty of sermons on Jesus and, interestingly, Jesus didn’t law—although Jesus has things to say it—although it’s interesting that it condemn him for his works. Instead, to them in other places and at other isn’t part of the historic we he told him to go even further—sell times. No, they were faithful to those use on Sundays. The folks who everything you have and give it to the things that marked them out as God’s revised the American Prayer Book in poor. That’s a sermon for another people: circumcision, sabbath, diet, 1928 included it to replace the time. Today we need to grapple with and all those other things. Unlike the traditional reading of the parable of the parable we’ve been given and we “sinners”, they didn’t need to repent. the unjust steward, probably because need to do that in its context—which What they needed was a heart for their they thought the parable of the is the grumbling of the scribes and lost brothers and sisters. Judgement was more positive. It’s Pharisees over the fact that Jesus was was coming. It was a judgement certainly more familiar. And yet welcoming sinners. they’d been praying and longing for, we’ve become so familiar with this but instead of longing to see their lost parable that I think we often fail to So Jesus responds to their outrage with brothers and sisters repentant and really listen to it. We tend to forget or three stories. In the first a shepherd restored, they seemed to be looking to ignore the context. Most often we loses one of his one hundred sheep. forward to their judgement. They saw think of this parable as teaching our He secures the ninety-nine in the fold Jesus showing mercy to sinners and doctrine of salvation by grace. The and sets off into the night to find the instead of rejoicing, they grumbled young prodigal rebels, but eventually lost one. When he finds that lost that Jesus wasn’t giving these folks returns to his father and learns that sheep, he carries it home on his their comeuppance. And that revealed salvation is not by works, but by shoulders, and rejoices with the other a problem on the part of the righteous. grace. Then, as often as not, we leave shepherds. What was precious had They were doing everything right, but out the part of the parable about the been lost, but was now found. In the their hearts were, in at least this very older brother, which doesn’t quite fit second story Jesus tells of a poor old important way, in the wrong place. In and throws a wrench in the grace woman who loses one of ten silver Jesus the Lord was fulfilling his versus works narrative. If we do coins, probably her dowry. She can’t promises to his people, promises of include that last bit, we then ask: find it anywhere. The story is very forgiveness, restoration, and new life. “Who am I? Am I the younger brother short, but we nevertheless get a vivid Think of Mary’s song, the one we call who received the grace of the father or sense of how frantic she was as she , where she sings about the the older brother confident in his searched. Eventually she sweeps the Messiah and glorifies God, know he works?” whole house and finds the lost coin. was about to do what he promised: In her great joy she runs to tell her Bring down the strong and raise up the Now, our doctrine of salvation by friends so that they can rejoice with lowly, fill the hungry with good things grace is important. It’s wonderfully her. and send the rich empty away. true. But this is not about that. You might remember that not very long And Jesus likens the joy of the He remembering his mercy hath ago, on the Third Sunday after Trinity, shepherd who found the lost sheep and holpen his servant Israel. our lesson included two the joy of the woman who found the As he promised to our parables, one about a lost sheep and lost coin to the joy in heaven when a forefathers, Abraham and his seed the other about a lost coin. This story lost sinner repents—a joy that stands forever. of the lost son is the third in that triad. Sinners needed the mercy the Lord the worst possible light. When Jesus woman lost a coin, it was her own had brought through Jesus to take part says that the boy squandered his fault. In those cases it was simply the in those fulfilled promises. But the money and ended up feeding pigs just rejoicing over what was lost that Jesus scribes and Pharisees and those like to have a place to sleep and that to eat wanted to highlight. Even the them also needed something if they he had to steal the pig food, as much Pharisees rejoiced to find things were to participate in this new thing as this would foster even more disgust they’d lost. But in the third story the Lord was doing. They needed to for the boy, most people would have Jesus gives them a not-so-subtle recognise that mecy for what it was thought, “Serves him right!” The pig picture of Israel. The father, like God, and rejoice. sty is a metaphor for the boy’s loves his sons and there were many reprobation. He rejected his family, sons and daughters in Israel who were And so this third parable in the series he rejected his people, he rejected his “lost”—people like the tax collectors, takes things a step further than the lost God, and he ends up in a place of the prostitutes, and other “sinners”. sheep and the lost coin. It’s less abject ritual uncleanness in a foreign Like the prodigal son, they had abstract. Now Jesus puts both the land. He rejected God and now God rejected their father and abandoned his sinners with all their ugliness and the has rejected him. covenant. And while there were many Pharisees with all their righteousness in Israel who were faithful to the Lord unmistakably into the story. But then, having hit rock-bottom, this and to his covenant and thought divine impious lout of a son decides to go judgement was likely the best thing Jesus presents the younger brother as a back to his father. Now, he knows that could happened to such impious truly despicable character. He that he has no rights. He knows what louts, the fact is that Israel belonged to demands his share of the heritance he’s done and that his only chance is God. The lost were his sons and from his father. Now, a father could to beg. And nothing will be the same. daughters as much as the scribes and give his property to a son while he was The best he can hope for is to be a Pharisees were. The Lord had a claim still alive, but this didn’t mean the son hired hand, not a son. And so he on them all, those who knew their could do whatever he pleased with it. rehearses his spiel all the way home. place and those who were lost. And Ordinarily the son wouldn’t have the But to his surprise, his father, having so, like the shepherd, like the old right to sell the property until his seen him from a distance, comes woman, and like the father, he rejoiced father died and until he died, the father running down the road to him, sandals when what was lost to him was would have the rights to everything flapping and robe billowing out recovered. I can’t help but think that the land produced. But this brat behind him. What Jesus describes is a Jesus must have had in mind, too, the demands more than that. He wants horribly undignified thing for a father great cost at which the Lord was money to go off on his own, so he’s in Israel. But this father loved his lost recovering his lost people: humbling not just demanding his father give him son, in spite of everything he had himself and taking on their flesh and the right of possession, but the right of done, and when he saw his repentant soon to be giving his life in payment disposal so that he can sell the son at a distance, out of love, he ran to for their sins. This is what the scribes property and run off with the welcome him home. He didn’t wait and Pharisees needed to understand. proceeds. It’s wrong in all sorts of for his son to come to him, but threw ways. In selling the property, he’s propriety to the wind and ran to meet So Jesus continues. This last bit that depriving his father of the living that him. Not only that, but he called for we often leave out when we tell the was rightly his. The other thing that shoes and robe, put a ring on his parable is where the point actually people today easily miss is the issue of finger—Jesus brings to mind the lies. Jesus started out telling us that a this boy leaving his family. We up exaltation of Joseph in Egypt—and he man had two sons, but so far we’ve and move across the country, leaving calls for a feast to celebrate the return only heard anything about the parents and family behind and we do it of his son. To kill the fattened calf younger. Now Jesus gets to the older pretty regularly in our culture, but was a big deal in a society where of the two. He’s a good son. While such a thing was virtually unheard of animals were kept more for what they the father is welcoming home the in Jesus’ world. Family was produced than for their meat. prodigal, the older brother is hard at everything and to abandon it this way work in the fields—or what’s left of was impiety. Not only that, but to go At this point I expect the point of the them after the younger son liquidated to a far country meant leaving Israel to parable was sinking in on the his share. He asks one of the slaves go and live amongst unclean gentiles. Pharisees as Jesus was digging deeper what all the festivities are about and is I’m not sure we have an equivalent with each of his stories. Sheep are told how his brother has returned and offense today other than for a child to stupid and if one gets lost, you can’t how their father has welcomed him. abandon the covenant family of the really blame the sheep for it. Coins Instead of rejoicing, he becomes Church. So Jesus paints this boy in have no will of their own. If the angry. He refuses to join the party.

2 Eventually his father comes out to and one that was particularly faithfulness to Jesus the Messiah. him, not only welcoming him into the meaningful to the Pharisees. Think Jesus had taken on Israel’s identity, he party as well, but even pleading with back to Ezekiel and to his vision of the had picked up her failed mission, he him when we refuses. If the older valley of dry bones. Those dry bones died the death that she deserved, and brother had had any sense, it would represented Israel. She had forsaken when he rose from the grave and sent have been natural for him to join the the covenant and the Lord had God’s Spirit, he formed a new family, party in the first place and to rejoice disciplined her by sending her into a new covenant people not centred this over his brother, but something’s gone exile. But the Lord promised that one time on law, but on himself. As St. wrong with him. Even as his father day his word would come and restore John wrote, “To all who did receive pleads with him—and here we see his wayward and faithless people to him, who believed in his name, he Jesus telling these stories to the scribes life. What was dead would be made gave the right to become children of and Pharisees—even as he pleads with alive again. And not just in some God, who were born, not of blood nor him, the elder brother only gets figurative sense. One of the central of the will of the flesh nor of the will angrier—to the point where he finally doctrines of the Pharisees was the of man, but of God” (:12-13). rebukes his father. “I’ve spent my dearly held belief that one day the And, Brothers and Sisters, at the heart whole life working for you! I’ve Lord would literally raise the dead of of Jesus’ ministry was mercy—and worked like a slave! I’ve been Israel to life in his presence. One day God the Father rejoiced in heaven to faithful! I’ve done everything you he would set everything to rights, see that mercy at work amongst his ever asked of me! And where was the beginning with his people. people, and especially as what was celebration? And now this no-good lost to him was restored by it. son of yours”—notice he won’t own And by way of the parable, Jesus is him as his own brother—“this no- now saying to the Pharisees that he’s So the story doesn’t easily apply good son of yours, this impious lout the one who’s come to do it. But he directly to us because we’re not who rejected you and our family and hasn’t just come to reward them with Pharisees, but it does have something our God and spent what you worked the life of the age to come, he’s come to say to us. Brothers and Sisters, this so hard for on parties and prostitutes, to offer that life even to the prodigals is a story about the love, grace, and he comes home and you throw a party of Israel. Prostitute and Pharisees, mercy of God. Reading the parable in for him? What are you thinking, both are part of the people of God, context reminds us of the faithfulness Dad?” both are the Lord’s children, both of God revealed in Jesus as he fulfils belong equally to him. The Lord had his promises to his people. And it was Now, I’m sure, the scribes and rescued the ancestors of the prostitute that faithfulness, revealed in Jesus and Pharisees clearly saw Jesus’ point. from Egypt just as he’d rescued the proclaimed by those first Jewish Here they were, angry with him that ancestors of the Pharisees. He desires believers, that brought the first he welcomed tax collectors and life for the prostitute just as much as gentiles into the Church. And that, sinners—their wayward brothers he does for the Pharisees. That’s what itself, was a fulfilment of the Lord’s whom they’d rather see under God’s they need to wrap their heads around, promises. This new people of God, judgement than restored to the because if they don’t, despite all their this new Israel centred on faith in household of Israel. And to make it faithfulness to the Lord, they will not Jesus, brought the nations to the Lord, even clearer Jesus continues, telling have a place in the age to come if they to the God of Israel, in awe, in them how the father responded: “My aren’t willing to submit themselves to reverence, and in faith. That son, you’ve always been with me. the Messiah. membership in this new family was What is mine is yours.” The scribes based not on law but on faith in Jesus and Pharisees understood the You see, judgement was coming for made it possible for the nations—for covenant. They understood duty and Israel, but not quite like the Pharisees you and I—to become children of God obedience. They loved the Lord. But thought. They thought that in the end, and fellow heirs with the natural now they needed to grasp what the the Lord would recognise his people brothers and sisters of Jesus. And this Lord was doing through Jesus as he by their faithfulness to the law—to opens that category of “the lost” to finally fulfilled his promises to his circumcision and sabbath and diet. encompass an entire world. In the people. “Celebrate and rejoice,” says That meant the tax collectors and parable Jesus was talking about the the father to his faithful son, “because sinners were out. But the fact was— lost of Israel, but through Jesus the this brother of yours”—yes he’s your and this is the point of Jesus’ sort of restoration that the Lord sought brother!—“he was dead, but is now parables—that when judgement came with the lost of Israel has been opened alive.” The words the father speaks on and on Judah, what to all of humanity—to the sheep not of recall an image that had been with would mark out the people of God was Israel’s fold. You and I ought to see Israel since the time of the prophets not faithfulness to the law, but the lost of our own world, people

3 created to bear the image of God, but faith to Jesus the Messiah—a faith by lost to him because of their sin, you which the Father has welcomed us, and I ought to see those people and too, into the sheepfold. Rejoice in the desire for them the same mercy and mercies of God and carry that restoration that God has shown to us rejoicing to the lost that they, like us, through Jesus. We ought not only to might see and know themselves the rejoice when we see that mercy at mercies of God at work in Jesus. work, the joy of our own experience of God’s mercy ought to be sending us Let us pray: Grant us, Lord, we pray, out to the lost. But all too often we to know your mercy and never to take become blasé about what God has your salvation for granted. Make us done for us. We lose the joy we once faithful stewards of your mercies that found in our salvation. Or, for those we might rejoice as you do at the of us who have never known life apart restoration of the lost; through Jesus from God’s covenantal mercy—like so Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns many in Israel—we take his mercy for with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, granted. Brothers and Sisters, take now and for ever. Amen. time to think on what the Lord has done for us in Jesus and rejoice. Make a point of it. As you read scripture. When you come to the Lord’s Table. Make a point of it. Rejoice at the mercy of God.

And, I think, if we do that, we will avoid the stance of the Pharisees who had forgotten the nature of God’s mercy, who chafed at Jesus offering the mercy of God to sinners while they worked so hard to be faithful. We’re prone to something very similar. We forget the mercy of God. We forget his forgiveness. We forget that as much as God is pleased with us when we are faithful and pleased with our good works, we too are only part of this family because of his mercy and his forgiveness. And then we start looking at the lost, not as people to be found, but as people who deserve their comeuppance, who need God’s judgement rather than his mercy. And, in that, we forget what the kingdom of God is all about.

Brothers and Sisters, think on the mercy of God and rejoice. Come to his Table this morning and be reminded that he sent his Son at great cost to seek out the lost and to restore them to the fold. Here we see the faithfulness of God, a witness that has now brought you and I who were not even of that flock. A witness that has brought us in awe and wonder and in

4