Gods Disposition toward Sinners Luke 15 Vs 1 10

Nothing like the fellowship of brothers and sisters, is it? It's good to see each of you this morning and welcome to Faith Bible Church and we hope that it's a blessed time for you as we honor the

Lord. Just for the announcements, this coming Saturday at 9 o 'clock is the men's prayer breakfast and Bible study, so keep that in your calendar, and we look forward to a blessing from the

Lord there. And also, Wednesday, March 6th, at 5 .30

in the evening is the Bible study. Pastor's going into a new book.

I think I'll ask Pastor, why don't you talk about the book and give a... It's called Praying with Paul by D .A.

Carson, and he is a phenomenal New Testament scholar. This book actually goes over various Pauline texts in which he prays, and that's why

I think it would be a great material for the Bible study, because it actually goes over the Bible, showing us how we pray.

And you would learn a lot, I've learned a lot from reading how to pray as Paul prays in the

Bible. And if you need a copy of the book, please come talk to me and we'll gladly get you a copy.

Don't let that be an obstacle to joining us. And even if you can't join us on Wednesday evening, it's middle of the week, you can join us either online on YouTube Live, or please just read the book on your own as well.

Because that will change your spiritual life. And that's really the goal here.

It's not about who can make it to the Bible study, but all of you to read

Pauline texts and learn how to pray like Paul did. We look forward to that.

Let's open with a word of prayer. Our Heavenly Father and our God, we come before you, thanking you,

Heavenly Father, for all of your attributes that shower your love on us constantly.

We realize we do not deserve it, and we just thank you for it today, Lord. We pray that as we sing, that our voices might rise to you as a sweet, smelling sacrifice.

We would pray, Heavenly Father, that you would be with each individual that's here today, that we might check our heart and our thoughts and our mind, even as we sing and as we think.

Help us to draw closer to you in all that we do today, Lord. We would pray for Pastor as he presents your word.

We would just pray, Heavenly Father, that you would speak to each one of us through your word, and we would thank you for that.

We pray, Heavenly Father, for our missionaries of the month, Jim and Joan Hanson in the ministry to the deaf and the deafblind.

As they're closing down that work yet, they are looking forward to another ministry or something.

We would pray that you would lead in their life, strengthen them at this time that's very hard with all of the moving that's going on.

We just uphold them before you, Lord, and we thank you for that. And now we pray in Jesus' name, amen.

You would stand together with me as we sing. Good morning.

Good morning. The scripture reading for this morning is from 2 Peter 3, verses 8 and 9.

That's 2 Peter 3, verses 8 and 9. But beloved, be not ignorant of this one thing, that one day is with the

Lord as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day. The Lord is not slack concerning his promise, as some men count slackness, but is longsuffering to usward, not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance.

May the Lord add his blessing to the reading and hearing of his holy word. Stand together with me as we continue to praise the

Lord in song. Please turn with me to Luke chapter 15, verses 1 through 10.

Luke chapter 15, verses 1 through 10.

Then all the tax collectors and the sinners drew near to him to hear him. And the

Pharisees and scribes complained, saying, This man receives sinners and eats with them. So he spoke this parable to them, saying,

What man of you, having a hundred sheep, if he loses one of them, does not leave the ninety -nine in the wilderness and go after the one which is lost until he finds it?

And when he has found it, he lays it on his shoulders, rejoicing. And when he comes home, he calls together his friends and neighbours, saying to them,

Rejoice with me, for I have found my sheep which was lost. I say to you that likewise there will be more joy in heaven over one sinner who repents than one ninety -nine just persons who need no repentance.

Or what woman, having ten silver coins, if she loses one coin, does not light a lamp, sweep the house, and search carefully until she finds it?

And when she has found it, she calls her friends and neighbours together, saying, Rejoice with me, for I have found the peace which

I lost. Likewise I say to you there is joy in the presence of the angels of God over one sinner who repents.

This is the word of the Lord. Let us pray. Father, we are grateful that your heart is that of joy when there is one sinner who repents, one sinner who is restored.

And you seek to see the sinners restored so much that you have sent your

Son to die on the cross for us. Father, we pray that we would understand and rejoice in such a heart, such a compassionate heart that longs to see

His people repent in Jesus' name. Amen.

Chapter 15 follows Jesus' warning and teaching against the

Pharisees of how they would not be a part of the eschatological banquet, the banquet in the last days where they enjoy with God if they don't respond in faith to Jesus.

Here we see Jesus teaching on God's heart toward restoring sinners back to Himself.

The main theme of chapter 15 is God's compassionate desire to see a single sinner repent, to turn away from sin and turn toward God, and how much joy there is in heaven to have that one person repent.

The first parable is from verses 4 to 7, and the second parable is from verses 8 to 10.

Seemingly, they are very, very similar. They both result in a joyful celebration upon the restoration of the lost, whether it's the sheep or the coin.

However, they're not exactly the same. While the first parable emphasizes the cost that God will take on to restore one single lost sinner, the second parable highlights the exceptional effort that God will put into restoring the lost sinner.

The first emphasizes the risk and cost. The second emphasizes the effort.

Overall, the question that this text asks us is, what does

God feel when He sees a sinner? What does God feel when

He sees a sinner? Oftentimes, I think we're overwhelmed by the holiness of God and the fact that He knows everything.

He is the holy God who knows everything. His standard is perfectly pure, and He is unflinchingly just.

Moreover, there is nothing that is hidden from His unsleeping eye. Everything you've done, said, and thought about is wide open.

It's revealed to God. There's no corner of your life that is too dark for God's light to pierce through.

He can see it all. And for all of us, this ought to be threatening.

This God is scary. He's frightening. He is intimidating.

And with this in mind, we falsely believe that God cannot possibly want to be near a sinner.

God cannot possibly have a sinner nearby. He cannot possibly want us.

He would want to be far away from us. And in fact, we say things like,

I've got to get my life together before I trust God, before I trust Jesus. Or, Jesus doesn't want anything to do with someone like me.

Or, I can't follow Jesus because what I've done in my life. And these are all the lies that we tell ourselves only looking at a glimpse of God's attribute of holiness and justice.

However, this text teaches us, it shows us, there's far more to God than just justice.

He is loving. He's compassionate. And we get to see a glimpse of his heart toward sinners.

So the main point of this text is, what is God's disposition toward sinners? What is

God's disposition toward sinners? What is his attitude toward sinners? First, God rejoices at the restoration of one sinner for whom he leaves everything behind.

God rejoices at the restoration of one sinner for whom he leaves everything behind. The first three verses set up the context for this text.

Verse 1 shows that all the tax collectors and sinners approached

Jesus to hear his teaching. And similar to the previous passage, there's a large crowd surrounding

Jesus. This is not a private event. The tax collectors were a despised group of people in ancient

Israel. And that's because Rome did not individually collect taxes from their colonies, basically.

They're conquered people. The empire was huge. There was no way that Rome could levy tax from each individual, especially from foreign countries.

So what did they do? They hire the natives to collect taxes. So these tax collectors were

Jews. The direct taxation done by the fellow

Jew, they were commissioned to take a specific amount for Rome. But if there's any other cost incurred during this tax collecting venture, they could take a little more.

Now, one can imagine how the personal surcharge would often rise to an unethical amount.

And it's not like Rome would audit these Jewish tax collectors to make sure that they're actually taking just the right amount.

Hence, there was a lot of fraud done by these individual Jewish tax collectors.

In fact, even the secular people in those days grouped the tax collectors with the adulterers and pimps.

They were seen as the utmost sinners. You didn't want to have your kids grow up to be the tax collectors.

But it is precisely these people who are gathering to hear Jesus teach.

Now, as Jesus paid attention to the tax collectors and sinners, it irks the religious establishment, the

Pharisees and scribes. And the Pharisees and scribes complained, saying, this man receives sinners and eats with them.

The immediate response upon seeing the sinners and the tax collectors gather around Jesus is that of grumbling.

They grumble because they see

Jesus, who is supposed to be a religious teacher, associating with the tax collectors and the sinners.

And the act of grumbling is the outward expression of their internal unbelief.

Remember, they don't actually like Jesus at this point. So they already rejected

Jesus before this. And now Jesus welcoming the tax collectors and sinners was just that precise excuse that they just needed to cement their rejection of Jesus.

See, I know there was something wrong with this guy. He's eating with the tax collectors.

I was right all along not to trust him. That's the picture here.

And furthermore, if you consider in ancient Israel, eating together was a quite an intimate fellowship.

You ate together and it really showed that there was friendship there. There was love toward the other person.

So the religious establishment viewed this particular table fellowship as corrupting and defiling.

They thought Jesus was sinning by eating with the sinners. What they did not understand was that Jesus loved the sinners to restore them without sinning with them.

I think that's really important for the church. Oftentimes, we think of a particular group of sinners.

Drug addicts, drunkards, LGBTQ, fornicators, name it.

Oftentimes, the spectrum is one or the other. One is you avoid them like the plague.

And the other is you go join them. What we see

Jesus is that he didn't do either one. He welcomed them and did not participate in their sin but called them out of their sin.

And that's really what we're called to do. The Pharisees assumed that Jesus was sinning with them.

But that's actually not the picture here. Jesus is not sinning with them. He's not committing fraud with the tax collectors.

And he's not committing fornication with the prostitutes.

That's not the truth. Yet, Jesus didn't avoid them.

His heart went out towards them. He desired to save them. And now in response to their complaints, instead of a clear rebuke,

Jesus paints a portrait of God's heart toward restoring a sinner. Verse 4,

Verse 4 starts with a rhetorical question. This is not a show of hands, which of you are willing to leave the 99 that's left to find that one sheep that's gone?

It's not a question to find which of you is cruel. Rather, it assumes that anyone who has 100 sheep would undoubtedly leave behind the rest to find that one lost one because that one lost one is precious to the shepherd.

In ancient Israel, a flock of 100 was a moderate size. And considering this, the owner probably wasn't extremely wealthy.

He was just a moderate shepherd. What that means is he probably didn't hire a guardsman for this.

He was looking after his sheep personally. He was intimately a part of tending the flock.

He was the one who individually cared for the flock. So you can almost see the concerned look on the owner's face when it's nighttime and he's counting his sheep and he gets to 99.

And there's one missing. The most natural response for this modest shepherd is to go out himself to find the lost sheep.

He will leave the 99 behind to track down the one who could be who knows what and where.

The sheep might not even be alive at this point. But the owner's concern for this sheep overwhelms his desire to stay safe with the 99 others.

He will not rest until he finds the lost sheep. Hence, verse 5 shows the result of the search.

And when he has found it, he lays it on his shoulders rejoicing.

Joy runs through both of these parables. And we do have to emphasize the difference between joy and happiness.

Happiness depends on happenings. Happiness depends on circumstances. Joy depends on the truth of the matter.

Joy depends on evidence. Joy is not just a flimsy feeling you get after you have a good vacation that will last the moment you drive to work on Monday morning.

Joy does not depend on circumstances. Joy depends on what is true.

And what is true here is that this shepherd has his sheep on his shoulders.

And he got it back. And that is the source of his joy.

Hence, the shepherd returns rejoicing. Verse 6 expands the joyful response to the rest of the community.

And when he comes home, he calls together his friends and neighbors, saying to them, "'Rejoice with me, for I have found my sheep which was lost.'"

The shepherd's joy cannot be contained. His joy involves the whole community.

His joy is proclaimed publicly. And verse 7 ends the parable with the punchline, "'I say to you that likewise there will be more joy in heaven over one sinner who repents than over 99 just persons who need no repentance.'"

The lost sheep here represents a repentant sinner. Repentance means to turn around.

It means to turn away from sin and turn towards God in faith. It is not just a mental agreement, but a complete change in life's trajectory.

It's the complete change in direction. Before repenting, you were just headed towards hell.

You were just living the lifestyle of sin. But after repenting, you live for Jesus.

And this is not to say you're perfect after you're repenting. It's that your life's direction has completely changed.

You're headed closer and closer to Jesus. You're following more and more, maybe slowly, maybe gradually.

But you're following Jesus more and more. It's not perfection.

It's not perfect obedience. It's the direction where you're headed. The moment you place your faith in Christ, it's a complete direction change.

It's not about more education that's needed, right?

Because that would be just mental assent. Like, yes, I believe gravity works, right?

That's more education. But a transformation of the heart. And that comes with faith.

And that comes by the work of the Holy Spirit, who changes you because you believe in Jesus.

Now, what is astounding here is that God and His angels rejoice more when a single person responds to Jesus in faith than the rest who stay the course in righteousness all along.

Mathematically, it doesn't sound good. Well, you rejoice more over that one sinner who repented, over the 99 who remained righteous.

But that shows God's compassionate heart. He desires even that individual who's a crackhead, who's a prostitute, who's a wayward sinner.

He desires even that one person to return to Him. And He rejoices even more when

He returns than the 99 who just remain the same. And frequently, when we consider how holy

God is and how wicked we are, we falsely believe that God could not possibly want us.

If anything, He would prefer to keep His distance. Right? I'll stay in heaven.

You just stay down there. You're not coming up here. However, Jesus' parable shows us that such a notion could not be farther from the truth.

The portrait of God's compassionate heart is precisely the opposite. Jesus is the perfect portrait of God's heart because He is

God incarnate. He became man who is God.

And what do we see in Jesus? Jesus is not repulsed by our sinfulness, but is drawn to us despite our sins.

This is not to say that God approves of all your sins. Right? Oh, it's okay.

God is fine with me sleeping around, doing drugs. It's okay. God is okay with me idolizing other things instead of worshiping

Him. Rather, His desire to restore us to Himself overwhelmingly overrides any of our sins.

His desire to see you saved overrides any repulsion

He might have in seeing your sin. Nothing you have done and nothing you can do can keep the ultimate shepherd from finding you to bring you back home.

And we know this because of what He was willing to give up for God to bring you to Him. This is most clearly seen in the life and death of Jesus Christ.

In order for God to bring you back, Jesus left His heavenly domain and all of His angels.

Remember, the angels in heaven, they don't sin. They're holy angels. Talk about that.

He came down to the realm, the world that is covered in sin by leaving the heavenly realm where there is no sin.

It's not because He enjoyed sin because He didn't sin. It's that He looked forward to saving sinners.

And in order for Jesus to restore the sinners to Himself, the Creator God took on mortality.

When Jesus became man, the untiring God got tired.

God who didn't need anything had to eat and drink in order to survive.

God who was never mocked up in heaven, only praised for all eternity, was mocked and scorned and whipped.

God took on mortality and became killable. That was precisely the point.

In order to rescue the lost, Jesus took our place on the cross and suffered the wrath that we deserve so that He may bring us back home safely.

There was nothing Jesus was willing to hold back in order to restore you to Himself.

He took on the highest cost so that you may be redeemed from the lowest hell. So when people say,

I'm too sinful for God, I've done such horrible things.

I can't stand before God. God wouldn't want me. Jesus dying on the cross is precisely so that you would never say that.

He deals with the sin Himself. God wants to save you despite your sinfulness, and He gets rid of that obstacle in Jesus Christ.

God longs to be with you for all eternity. That's because He loves you.

It's just that sin is in the way, and that's why He deals with it even if it costs

Him His life. And if Christ did not hold back

His life to redeem you, what makes you think you're too wicked to be saved by God this morning?

What more can Christ give up to have you if He's given up His life?

Second, God rejoices at the restoration of one sinner for whom

He diligently pursues. God rejoices at the restoration of one sinner for whom

He diligently pursues. After showing the cost that God is willing to accrue to save the sinners,

Jesus narrates another parable. Or what woman, having ten silver coins, if she loses one coin, does not light a lamp, sweep the house, and search carefully until she finds it?

The silver coins here are, depending on your translation, sometimes called drachma.

It's a Greek coinage. It's kind of like denarius of Rome, right?

They're basically similar in terms of what they represent. A drachma, or this silver coin, is a day's wage.

It's how much a normal laborer would gain from working. Now, the main difference between the first parable and this one is the detailed account of the effort this woman puts into finding the lost coin.

She lights the lamp. She sweeps the house. She carefully searches. While Jesus emphasized the cost of the search in the previous parable, the diligence of the search is the highlight of this parable.

This woman will go all out to find that lost coin. There's no part of her house that she will not leave untouched just to find this coin.

Here's a modern illustration, because oftentimes, how many of you even touch coins anymore?

And coins have such low value that it's like, what's the point of looking for a quarter, right?

Imagine Sally, a single middle -aged woman. She works various side jobs to make the ends meet, make ends meet, and she's been saving up to visit her grandkid, who lives across the country.

There's an envelope, there's an envelope that she keeps hidden in a place only she knows.

But it's been touched so many times, it's no longer that white color anymore, they're smudges.

But that's because she's been saving up, and she has carefully set aside now 10 $100 bills.

It took months, but just the desire to see her grandkid made it all worth it.

One evening, she opens up the envelope to count. One, two, three.

She counts nine. Well, in a slight panic mode, she counts again.

After all, maybe some of the bills got stuck together, and she forgot to count one.

They're not crisp anymore, right? So she counts those wrinkled, smudged bills again.

One, two, three. Again, there's nine. Her search begins now.

That's the level of diligence and intensity that's portrayed in this parable, because that lost coin is that precious.

She's basically wiping the floor with her face to look under every furniture. She's aggressively rearranging all the knickknacks that she's hoarded for decades.

It looks as if a tornado has passed through, but that's how far

God is willing to go to save one sinner. Now, in verse 9, she finds it.

And when she has found it, she calls her friends and neighbors together, saying, "'Rejoice with me, for I have found the peace "'which

I lost.'" The impact of finding this lost coin is so significant.

She invites others to celebrate with her. And similar to the shepherd, her joy is shared all around, and that's because the level of joy is and cannot be contained just in herself.

Finally, Jesus states the punchline. Likewise, I say to you, there is joy in the presence of the angels of God over one sinner who repents.

You would think the angels are perfectly joyful, standing before God, no sin in their sight, no death, no disease, no lack.

What more can they have when they have God? Yet what

Luke tells us, what Jesus tells us, is that the whole heaven celebrates when one sinner is brought back to God.

They celebrate because, in the end, God celebrates. God rejoices at the return of one sinner.

The emphasis of this parable is God's extensive effort to restore one sinner.

God is not some distant, impersonal deity who views the world with his binoculars, right?

A deistic God. Well, he's created everything, but, you know, he's not really involved. That's the deistic

God. God, in this parable, personally and intimately seeks and brings you back.

He does not send angels. He does not try to locate through an app. The effort

God puts in to bring a sinner back is extremely close and intimately personal.

And again, we see that in the ministry of his son, Jesus Christ. Jesus' search and rescue mission involved him entering into the world that he's created.

He has entered the world that has rebelled against him. It's an evil world.

It's dark, right? The apostle John tells us in John 1, the light has entered the world, and the world knew him not.

The purest being in the world not only visited, this is not a day trip here, but dwelt among us.

When he came across sinners, he wasn't disgusted by the impure, like we may be disgusted by slugs that we may see on the ground after the rain.

He didn't ignore the public sinners to favor the outwardly obedient, like the

Pharisees. He sought the religious rejects out.

He never drove them out. He received them warmly, and he restored them.

The ultimate effort God puts to bring back the lost was when he chose to suffer the judgment that we deserved on the cross.

He didn't just take a couple minutes to seek out the lost sinners.

Oop, that's it, I guess. I tried. He went all in. His effort to seek out the sinners was complete.

There was nothing lacking. He couldn't have done any more than what he's already done, and that's to die on the cross on our behalf so that you may be reconciled to the holy

God. His effort to retrieve the lost reaches to the highest heavens and drops down to the lowest hell.

There's nothing that he won't do to save you, to restore you.

That's why when Jesus, before the cross, was bleeding, he was sweating blood in deep distress because he knew that was the only way to retrieve the lost sinners.

There was no other way. He knew it. The Father knew it. So he carries his own cross.

And for Christians, that's how we ought to see people who need to be saved.

They're potentially the ones whom God is working in their hearts now. Yes, they might be gross.

Yes, they indulge in their filth. The words that come out, you can barely stand them, but you never know.

That specific sinner may be the one that God is reaching out in that moment, and the heavenly realm might be preparing a party to celebrate the restoration of that sinner.

That's how we have to view the lost. That's the point of these two parables.

People who follow

Christ must view the lost the same way God views them, precious in his sight, and he will go the distance to retrieve and restore.

Let us pray. Father, we're grateful that nothing can ever stop

Jesus from saving the lost. And, Father, we pray that for those who are lost, even among us, that they will return to Christ, repent before it's too late, and know that Jesus and even the whole heavenly realm look forward to and rejoice at the return of one lost sinner.

And with that in mind, help us to have that kind of mindset when we run into people who are not believers, run into people who are

Satanists, run into people who are Buddhists, Muslims, homosexuals.

See that they are lost, and if Jesus restores them, they're worth celebrating.