Security in Difficult Circumstances (The Autobiography of God)
Written by Ed Allen
Saturday, 19 June 1999 19:00
Today is Father?s Day. A day of neckties. A day of cologne. A day of Hallmark Cards and eating out. For some of us it draws up memories of warmth and strong hands. For others of us, memories of dad are a little chillier. For me, Father?s Day carries with it a sense of mystery. My own died when I was 11. At just the point when I would have begun to put some real meat on the skeleton of who he was, he was gone.
For the next several years he was more easily forgotten than remembered. Initially, because it was too sad to remember him. Later, because I simply could not remember him very well. Then for some reason, when I got into my early 20?s it became important for me to know him ? really know him. I visited his grave on several occasions. I would stand over the aging tombstone and talk to myself. "Who were you? What were you like? What did you think about? What did you think about me?" I milked my older sisters and my mother for information. I would ask aunts and uncles when I saw them. What was his childhood like? What were his dreams? How did he react when he knew he had a boy?
As my relationship with God has matured over time I have come to realize that I have a Heavenly Father of whom my own earthly Father could only at best be a poor representative. I remember the first time I heard someone say that the deepest roots of our feelings about God are often connected with our feelings about our own earthly Father. That revelation took my emotional breath away.
My earthly Father was warm. He was inviting. But he was a mystery. A memory. Not connected with my life in a real way. And my feelings for my heavenly Father? Warm, inviting, but distant and mysterious. In many ways disconnected. A nice, far away reference point, but not a lap into which I could crawl.
You can understand, I?m sure, why it was startling and important for me to recognize that God had attempted to remove the mystery. He had bridged the distance. He had come to me, close up and personal. That?s who Jesus was ? God, close up and personal. Not only so, but God left me an autobiography. He knew it would be important for me to know Him. What are His dreams? What does He think about? What does He think about me? How did He feel when he knew a boy was born?
He answers those questions for me in His autobiography.
Think about it. That?s exactly what we have in Jesus? stories about God ? an autobiography. An autobiography is the life story of a person?s life written by that person. In many of Jesus? stories, he illustrates the God?s character, His priorities, His dreams, and His hopes. Here is God the Son telling us the inner workings of God the Father. For my own reasons, I desperately want to hear what He says and for different reasons so do you. Let?s listen in.
LUKE 15:1-10
1 Now the tax collectors and "sinners" were all gathering around to hear him. 2 But the Pharisees and the teachers of the law muttered, "This man welcomes sinners and eats with them."
3 Then Jesus told them this parable: 4 "Suppose one of you has a hundred sheep and loses one of them. Does he not leave the ninety-nine in the open country and go after the lost sheep until he finds it? 5 And when he finds it, he joyfully puts it on his shoulders 6 and goes home. Then he calls his friends and neighbors together and says, `Rejoice with me; I have found my lost sheep.' 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.
8 "Or suppose a woman has ten silver coins and loses one. Does she not light a lamp, sweep the house and search carefully until she finds it? 9 And when she finds it, she calls her friends and neighbors together and says, `Rejoice with me; I have found my lost coin.' 10 In the same way, I tell you, there is rejoicing in the presence of the angels of God over one sinner who repents."
The first thing we learn is that God feels about us the way shepherds feel about their sheep.
Three things come to mind.
- Sheep are the life?s work of the shepherds.
- Shepherds are close to their sheep.
- Shepherds care deeply for their sheep.
- - Theologians call this immanence.
- Look at the depth of His compassion and caring. He is not content to loose even one.
- Aggressive compassion.
- We also learn that God takes the initiative toward us.
- The shepherd leaves the 99 sheep to go search for the lost one. He does not simply wait patiently for the lost one to come home. That would be amazing enough. But He goes out into the darkness to find the lost one.
- In the second parable, the woman lights a lamp and sweeps the house in search of her coin. So God brings His light into the darkness of our confusion and finds us.
- In another place Jesus summarized his whole ministry like this. "I have come to seek and to save that which is lost," he said.
- He places it over his shoulders and goes home. Can you think of a more beautiful image of aggressive compassion? I read something about sheep this week that slightly changed the way I look at this image. I learned that when sheep get lost they are immobile. They literally cannot move. You cannot call them. You cannot lead them back to the flock. They can?t move until they are reunited with the flock. When the shepherd places the sheep over his shoulders he does so not only from affection, but also out of necessity. The sheep cannot walk. It must be carried.
- What does God do when He finds us? The first thing He does is to carry us.
- The second thing He does is throw a party. (This forces me to make some adjustments in my view of God.)
- Funny Jesus used the word "lost."
- Bill's father was an engineer whom Bill could never satisfy. Bill couldn?t get anything right. He believed everything the Bible says about Jesus but still did not consider himself a Christian. He called me late one night and told me he had accepted Christ. "Why Bill? What made the difference?" He told me, "Someone finally told me I didn?t have to get it all right. I didn?t have to be good enough. That God wanted me just like I am. He had, in fact, come after me just where I was."
- What does the shepherd do when he finds the lost sheep?
Believe that God is compassionate and wants to have a relationship with you.
Admit your lostness.
Receive His initiative ? say yes.
Enjoy His sovereign control.
Some of you today feel more like the 99 sheep, or the 9 coins.
- David has a younger sister. She just can?t get her life together. She is always dependent on everybody else in the family to get her out of messes. David has no compassion for her. He told me once he didn?t think he could handle it if she became a Christian. "Why?" "I think she would give God a bad name," he said with a smile. "And you don?t?" I asked with a smile.
- Israel was in charge of building maintenance in his church building. His church reached out to a lot of inner city kids. They had very little respect for any property including church buildings. Israel was always complaining about the youth ministry because they couldn?t control the kids. They created so much work for everyone else.
If you feel like David or Israel, then you must remember that God is our Father and children take after their fathers. That means we must be bearers of the good news.
Express God?s love to others.
Admit my own lostness.
Receive those whom God draws with grace and affection.
This morning we celebrate communion. The meal is a great symbol of God?s aggressive compassion. God did not wait for us at a distance. But He came to get us. He did not stand with arms folded in impatience over the mess we had gotten ourselves into, but He opened his arms in welcome. And to make sure we got the point, he had his arms nailed open in eternal welcome.