There are few places more depressing than a lost-property office.
Umbrellas.
Gloves.
Water bottles.
One shoe.
Objects which at some point mattered enough to carry around, and then apparently ceased to matter entirely.
Jesus tells us today that God does not run the universe like that.
The Pharisees complain:
“This man receives sinners and eats with them.”
They mean it as an accusation.
Jesus treats it as a description of His mission.
Yes.
He receives sinners.
That is why He came.
Then He tells two stories.
A shepherd loses one sheep.
A woman loses one coin.
And both behave in a way which is almost excessive.
The shepherd has ninety-nine sheep safely accounted for.
Most committees would consider that an excellent retention rate.
Jesus does not.
One is missing.
So He goes after it.
Then the woman loses one coin.
She lights a lamp.
Sweeps the house.
Searches carefully.
And when she finds it, she calls everybody in to celebrate.
Which is perhaps more enthusiasm than most of us would manage over finding loose change behind the sofa.
But that is the point.
Jesus is telling us how God sees the sinner.
Not disposable.
Not written off.
Not forgotten.
Lost.
And there is a difference.
Something worthless can be thrown away.
Something lost is searched for.
That is what Christ does.
He comes after us.
And Saint Paul gives us the other side of the same truth.
He begins by listing all the things which once gave him confidence.
His background.
His religious credentials.
His zeal.
His observance of the Law.
An impressive spiritual CV.
Then he says:
“Whatever gain I had, I counted as loss for the sake of Christ.”
Paul has discovered something.
You can possess all sorts of things and still miss the one thing that matters.
He had religion.
He had discipline.
He had reputation.
He had certainty.
Then he met Christ.
And suddenly everything else had to be revalued.
That is conversion.
Not simply becoming slightly more religious.
It is discovering that Christ is worth more than everything we were using to measure our life.
And notice the connection with the Gospel.
The sheep is lost because it is away from the shepherd.
The coin is lost because it is away from the woman who owns it.
Human beings are lost when we are away from God.
Sin is not merely breaking a regulation.
It is separation from the One for whom we were made.
That is why Jesus does not simply say:
“Never mind. The sheep seems happy enough where it is.”
He goes after it.
Christian mercy is not leaving people lost and calling that compassion.
Mercy seeks.
Mercy carries.
Mercy brings home.
And that is why repentance matters.
Jesus says there is joy in Heaven over one sinner who repents.
Repentance is not God humiliating us.
It is the lost sheep allowing itself to be carried home.
It is the sinner saying:
“I was going the wrong way.”
Which is one of the hardest sentences human beings ever have to say.
We greatly prefer:
“I was misunderstood.”
“I had my reasons.”
“Given the circumstances…”
The vocabulary is endless.
Confession has a much shorter vocabulary:
I have sinned.
And that is where joy begins.
Because Christ does not expose sin in order to crush us.
He exposes it so that He can forgive it.
That is why He gave His Church the Sacrament of Confession.
We do not come because God has forgotten what we did.
We come because He already knows and still wants us back.
There is the Gospel.
God knows exactly what He is looking for.
Us.
Not the improved version.
Not the version with the excuses properly arranged.
The sinner.
And when He finds us, He does not stand at a distance and say:
“Work your own way home.”
The shepherd puts the sheep on his shoulders.
Grace comes first.
Christ carries.
Saint Paul finally understands that too.
His confidence is no longer in pedigree, achievement or religious performance.
It is in Christ.
That is freedom.
Because if Christ is the treasure, then everything else can take its proper place.
And if Christ is the Shepherd, then being lost does not have to be the end of the story.
The Pharisees say: “This man receives sinners.”
Quite right.
Thank God He does.
Because eventually every one of us discovers that we are not standing with the ninety-nine giving directions.
We are the sheep. And Christ is still looking.
