Welcoming the Repentant Sinner
O Lord our God,
Grant us grace to desire you with our whole heart; that so desiring we may seek and find you; and so finding you may love you; and loving you may hate those sins from which you have redeemed us. Amen.
(Anselm of Canterbury)
Luke 15:1-10 NRSV
Now all the tax collectors and sinners were coming near to listen to him. And the Pharisees and the scribes were grumbling and saying, “This fellow welcomes sinners and eats with them.” So, he told them this parable:
“Which one of you, having a hundred sheep and losing one of them, does not leave the ninety-nine in the wilderness and go after the one that is lost until he finds it? When he has found it, he lays it on his shoulders and rejoices. And when he comes home, he calls together his friends and neighbors, saying to them, ‘Rejoice with me, for I have found my sheep that was lost.’ Just so, I tell you, there will be more joy in heaven over one sinner who repents than over ninety-nine righteous persons who need no repentance.
“Or what woman having ten silver coins, if she loses one of them, does not light a lamp, sweep the house, and search carefully until she finds it? When she has found it, she calls together her friends and neighbors, saying, ‘Rejoice with me, for I have found the coin that I had lost.’ Just so, I tell you, there is joy in the presence of the angels of God over one sinner who repents.”
Michael Green
Jesus is continuing to stress God’s love for outsiders, whom the pious Pharisees spurned. God is like a shepherd, roaming the hills to find one lost sheep. He is like a peasant woman living in a small house with a low door and no windows, desperate to find one of the coins from her head-dress that had gone missing. Two remarkable pictures of God! God goes to endless trouble to find us, and he rejoices over the salvation of one lost person: so does Jesus, and so can we. These two images give us a clear idea of what it is to be lost: it is like a sheep cut off from the flock, like a coin separated from the others in the headdress. Jesus was on a journey to the cross, where he would demonstrate the Father’s passion for lost people and would himself end their alienation by enduring his own. The joy of the shepherd and the housewife are noteworthy. God rejoices over lost people who come back to him. The Pharisees should rejoice too, instead of looking arrogantly down their noses.[1]
The Sheep Restored to Verdant Fields
When one ailing sheep lags behind the others
And loses itself in the sylvan mazes,
Tearing its white fleece on the thorns and briars,
Sharp in the brambles,
Unwearied the Shepherd, that lost one seeking,
Drives away the wolves and on his strong shoulders
Brings it home again to the fold’s safekeeping,
Healed and unsullied.
He brings it back to the green fields and meadows,
Where no thorn bush waves with its cruel prickles,
Where no shaggy thistle arms trembling branches
With its tough briars.
But where palm trees grow in the open woodland,
Where the lush grass bends its green leaves, and laurels
Shade the glassy streamlet of living water
Ceaselessly flowing.
(Prudentius, Hymns for Every Day 8.33-45. Ancient Christian Devotional Year C)
O Lord,
The helper of the helpless, the hope of those who are past hope, the Savior of the tempest-tossed, the harbor of the voyagers, the physician of the sick; you know each soul and our prayer, each home and its need; become to each one of us what we most dearly require, receiving us all into your kingdom, making us children of light; and pour on us your peace and love, O Lord our God. Amen.
(Liturgy of St. Basil the Great)
God of Every Grace
If you have found this meditation helpful, take a moment and give thanks to God. Then share what you learned with a friend. This is how the grace of God spreads (2 Corinthians 4.15).
[1] Michael Green, Through the New Testament with Michael Green: Matthew to Revelation (Nashville, TN; Bath, England: Kingsley Books, 2019), 84–85.
