Being Lost as Being Valued

17 Pentecost, Cp19, September 15, 2013

Exodus 32:7-14   Psalm 51:1-11

1 Timothy 1:12-17  Luke 15:1-10

Lectionary Link

   It is said that necessity is the mother of invention and there was a great human need:  The need to convince men that they needed to stop and ask for directions.  As men it is humiliating to admit that we are lost and so it is great blow to our ego to have to admit that and ask for direction and take the advice of our spouse to pull over and ask for direction.  And so now we have voice navigation through GPS devices in our phones and automobiles.  And irony of ironies, we men take directional advice from Siri and other women’s voices that give us directional advice and so women do have  the last laugh on the “lost” men of their lives. It is obvious that the parables that Jesus told about the lost cannot apply to men, since men never believe they are lost and now a woman’s comforting voice in a navigational system can help them maintain the illusion..

  The parables of Jesus about “being lost” provides us with a metaphor to give us some insights about the human condition.

  There is on the grand scale of things the mystical value of being lost.  When one stops for a moment and looks in the sky or at the oceans or at the mountains, one can compare oneself with the grandeur of the encompassing environment of Plenitude and in the humble moment of acknowledging the perspective of all things, one can feel lost in this Plenitude.

  Where do I fit in this vastness or as the Psalmist pondered, “What is man and woman that you are mindful of us.”  Indeed we can feel lost in the Plenitude of all.

  But being lost also has more poignantly felt contextual meaning.    “Being lost” is both bad and good news.

  The bad news about being lost is the sense of disorientation.  It means that nothing seems familiar.  It means that while you are lost, there is no one present to help you.  Being lost takes you away from the care of those who can help you.

  The good side about being lost is that if one is lost, by definition it means that the one who is lost is valuable to the one to whom one belongs.  Being lost means that you are valued and it means that someone is making the effort to seek you out.

  When Jesus came he found the emergency rescue services of the religious establishment to be completely lacking.  There were lots of people in Palestine who were not on the religious radar.  The message of the temple and synagogue was not accessible to lots of people. The religious leader regarded all of these people as being unacceptable to their religious message and Jesus believed that their attitude was a misrepresentation of God.  If these forgotten people were lost, the religious leaders did not know or care.

  Jesus said that these forgotten people were lost and they were worthy of rescue.  Why?  Because they were God’s creation and they were made in the image of God and so they were very valuable to God.  It is the responsibility of any who claims to represents God’s plan on earth to seek out all people who need to know that God loves and cares for them.

  So Jesus offered a resounding critique of the religious establishment.  And certainly that critique is still valid for all people of faith today who neglect the lost.  People of faith are supposed to understand the heart of God.  And the heart of God is to care for everyone.  And those who are lost from reach of care are to be sought out because they are valuable to God.  And if the lost are valuable to God, then they should be valuable to us as well.

  Our inability or unwillingness to recognize the lost is perhaps our greatest sin.  When we look at the puritanical sensitivities of our country, we find that sins that pertain to sexual behavior tend to be the only sins that people recognize today, while the scandal of poverty, illiteracy, injustice, illness and hunger seem to thrive without notice.  There are many people lost in our world in many ways and yet there is blindness or unwillingness of leaders to respond to the lost of our world.

   The message of Jesus was rather straight forward in his time:  God cares for the lost.  And his message is also this:  If we claim to be people of faith, we need to be people who seek out the lost ones, the ones who are valued by God and the ones who have fallen through the cracks of significant human care.

  We should be thankful about what Jesus shows us about the priorities of God.

  First, even in our lives of privilege, we too can feel at times lost.  Lost in loneliness or lost in a situation of loss or crises.  There are many times in our lives that we wish that we could know that God cares for us.  And in those times, the care could come from someone if they only knew about our dilemma.

  The parables of Jesus use the lost and found metaphor for the Christian mission of search and rescue.  But it is also a reminder that we too are often lost in a significant problem or dilemma of life when we need to be found by someone who cares.  Sometimes we find ourselves in need of being befriended by the right person who can get through to us and make us feel like we belong.

  Lost and found is a metaphor for life.  There are many people in life who at any given time are lost.  And there are many people who have the ability to be in the search mode.

  And the truth of it all is God is not going to directly intervene in getting to those who are lost.  God wants to inspire us to a sensitivity to look for the lost and the needy and let them know that they are valuable.  Why would God have so much faith in humanity to leave it up to us to fulfill the search and rescue mission in life that is needed to bring dignity of living to all people?

  God has faith in humanity because God values human freedom.  God has given us enough resources in our world to care for one another. We need to have the insights from our relationship to God to understand what our roles are to be in this lost and found dynamic of life.

  If you are feeling lost, I hope and pray that God will use someone to find you in the way in which you need to be found to affirm to you God’s love and care for you.

  There is another aspect of being lost that is addressed in the parables of Jesus in its specific context.  The tax collectors and sinners were people who obviously knew they needed to change their lives.  They went to Jesus for help and the religious leaders criticized Jesus for having anything to do with them.  So, in the thinking of Jesus, these lost people were valuable to God because they were seeking to change their lives.  The religious leaders were not seeking to change their lives; they were acting as though they had arrived at such a plain of perfection that they could judge the obvious sinners.  Through out the Gospels, Jesus is shown to be one who does not care what a person’s condition is, as long as a person is on the path of repentance or seeking to become better.  A person who is willing to repent is the one whom Jesus is seeking.

  Being lost and found is a metaphor for our lives.  Hopefully, life is showing us that we need to repent and in our efforts to repent, we need God to find us with grace and mercy.  And if we have found grace and mercy for our lives, let us be those who help God find those who feel lost from God’s love and mercy and from human care.  With God’s help you and I can become part of the search and rescue mission that God always wants to do in this world.  Amen.