Two of the popular shows on tv which are my least favourite are “Fear Factor” and “Survivor”. Each of these shows, is in the genre called ‘reality television’. In the first the contestants are requited to attempt downright disgusting, very frightening or actually quite dangerous challenges in order to win a prize. In the second, the goal is to survive being stranded in the wilderness or on a tropical island or some other exotic and isolated place and then to form and re-form alliances so that in the end you will be the last to be “voted off” of the show and out of the running for the grand prize. Most of the broadcast seems to be taken up with the contestants giving the reasons for the way they have voted or intend to vote.

However, if the ratings of these shows are any indication, they will be around for some time to come.

If we are honest, we will admit that these shows are not actually very real and when it comes to the life of faithfulness they are actually antithetical to almost everything that biblical faith teaches us. While we all experience fear in our lives, how we cope with it has very little to do with the skills needed to win on a show such as “Fear Factor”.

The life of faith as outlined in the biblical record is about journeying. When the Apostle Paul reflected on the life of faith, and faith examples, the person he thought of most readily was Abraham. While Abraham was a member of the so-called “old covenant” he was also a man of faith. You see, we make a mistake when we divide the Bible into two great halves where one, the old side, is a salvation by works and the other, our side, is a salvation by faith. This is one of the reasons why I don’t like to use the term “Old” Testament, as if ours was new and better and completely took its place. As Paul attempts to show to the early church, there is plenty of faith in the stories of the past.

Abraham lived in trust, and his faithfulness was not an attempt to earn his salvation, but rather, to respond to the presence of God in his life. We know that Abraham had his ups and downs, that he had his times of doubt, but Paul was able to affirm that his life was one of faithfulness.

What do we know about this man Abraham and his wife Sarah? The basics of the story are this: a really old and childless couple was asked to leave the security of their family tribal unit and move to a place they had never been, all based on a promise of a god who promised loyalty and many children. I am quite sure their family and friends would have told them that they were crazy, but they stepped forward in faith. Remember, there was no Bible then, no tradition of a god calling two people to be in a special relationship of trust and love.

Yet, Abraham is remembered by Paul, because he ventured forth in trust, contrary to the accepted wisdom and norms of his culture. Paul is seeking to guide the early Christian community in the ways of faithfulness because they are, in a sense, setting out on a new journey, as a new people, called in a new way, by this Jesus from Nazareth.

One of the best things that happened to the Church was when the state stopped persecuting believers and embraced the faith. One of the worst things that happened to the church was when the state stopped persecuting the believers and embraced the faith.

Over time, that is over 1500 years, the church had become synonymous with the world, and as the distinctions began to disappear the church’s success hinged on the success of the society in which it existed, we lost the ability to be a light to the culture, and a witness to the gospel in that culture.

Now, as fewer people are seeing the church and organized religion as having any claim on their lives, the church is probably much closer to the biblical reality than we have been for generations.

You see the early church presented a model very different from that which was around them. The model of their society was the ‘Survivor’ one, while the Christian community presented a way of being in the world that was not about power, competition, forming alliances and then stabbing those friends in the back when it’s time to vote them off the island.

The Olympics are coming soon; maybe even this week. I don’t care for many sports, but mostly because I’m not athletically inclined. I can’t follow the fast action of baseballs, footballs and pucks and I couldn’t imagine lifting that much, swimming that far or running that fast. In the Olympics the best athletes of the world gather to compete against one another and to seek personal bests. Yet, we all know that the Olympics are about winning; and not the bronze or the silver, but, we must admit, they are really about winning the GOLD. The Gold is so important that some athletes take performance enhancing drugs, risking not only their health and their lives but also their careers because the win and the financial endorsements that go with it.

One of the events taht receives very little attention are the ‘Special Olympics’. These are events for the mentally challenged and are designed to provide fund and a sense of achievement for those members of our society who receive little recognition. One day though at a special Olympics race an athlete taught the organizers something about the importance of community. The runners all lined up at the starting line and at the sound of the starter’s pistol the entire group took off running. Half way along one of the runners fell and rolled on the ground in obvious pain from a skinned knee. The organizers were about to run onto the track when the rest of the runners stopped, then tuned around, and went back, helped the injured runner to his feet and they all ran across the finish line together. Their smiles told the organizers that these athletes knew that they are all winners.

I believe that as a people of faith in the third millennium, we are called to recover the roots of our faith. We are called to remember that the life of faith is a call to community, to caring and to mutual dependancy. We are called to trust that this way of life, is the way of faith and then live that out in our lives, not just as an ideal, or a “nice thing to do”, but as a reality.

Another problem that developed along the way in the church was the idea that faith was about believing certain things, intellectually. We had to believe that certain things happened, or that certain thigns were true. If, for example, we could say the “Apostle’s Creed” without crossing our fingers and toes, then we were a true Christian. We lost the idea that faith was a verb. We forgot that faith and faithfulness were really the same thing.

Yet, Paul used the example of Abraham. Abraham did not just believe with his head or even his heart that God has called him, he believed it with his LIVING. It was more than a ‘good idea’, it was a way of life for him.

As I have already said, we must realize that the life of faith is not about one person winning the prize and the rest being either ‘losers’ or ‘also-rans’. Indeed, the Christian life has nothing to do with the normal ways of winning or losing, or accepted ideas of success or failure; the Christian life is about following in faithfulness and trust, despite the cost that may accompany it.

This sounds good until we all remember that the life of faith has no compartments, no quarantined or protected areas. Our call as a people of faith is meant to involve everything we do and seek to become. That is as true for our lives as Christian community: our outreach, our mission, our ministry; our personal lives, how we live out our moral and ethical principles; and our lives in the wider community.

As a people of faith we are called to constantly evaluate whether or not our goals in church, personal lives and work are in line with our faith. You see, there is no real separation between the two, we cannot separate parts of our lives in this way.

Another problem that developed in the history of God’s people was the idea that faith should shield us from the problems of the world. What the biblical faith teaches us is that, the Christian faith is a call to become involved in those problems of the world. As followers of Jesus we bring the love of Christ to those problems. The early church was heavily involved with the care of widows and orphans, the people in that society that had, as we say, fallen through the cracks.

The well-known preacher the Rev. Fred Craddock, is quoted as having said, “To be Christian is to cease saying, ‘Where the Messiah is, there is no misery’ and to begin to say, ‘Where there is misery, there is the Messiah’. The former makes no demands, the latter is an assignment.”

So we are called.

Not to right belief.

Not to success.

Not to wealth,

Not to gold Medals,

Not to being the last one left on the island,!

We are called to live our lives in faithfulness for the one who loved us, loves us, and will always love us has called us and promises to be with us always.

Amen.

Jeremiah 2: 4-13
Psalm 81: 1, 10-16
Hebrews 13: 1-8, 15-16
Luke 14: 1, 7-14

There are two very memorable scenes in the movie Titanic. Jack Dawson has saved the life of Rose DeWitt-Bukater and avoided revealing the fact that he had just saved Rose from jumping off the stern of the ship and committing suicide. Her aloof but relieved fiancé first tried to pay Jack off and then, reluctantly invited him to dine at his table.

Now, we all know that Jack Dawson was not someone with whom the rich and famous first class passengers on the Titanic would normally have chosen to dine. He WAS only travelling in third class, after all. Even though he was able to borrow a brand new tuxedo for the occasion, he knew; they all knew, that he is not truly welcome for he was not one of them and never could be.

Yet a few scenes later, Jack took Rose to where he was staying and where the people had created their own entertainment by holding a dance. The welcome she received there was boisterous, but sincere.

There are different laws and customs in every place that govern and guide hospitality, especially where food is involved. In some cultures a guest must eat everything on his or her plate in order to show appreciation. In at least some parts of India though, eating everything on one’s plate is a sign that the host has not served enough and is, in effect, a request for more. In some cultures people must eat quietly while in others they must smack their lips and praise the cook in a loud voice.

In some cultures the cook is expected to protest that the meal is not actually very good, but this is merely a sign that the guests are to praise the food and the cook! Many people dating someone from another culture find that meal time customs are the most important to know but the hardest to truly understand.

Usually, when a couple is invited for dinner there is an expectation of a return invitation at some point. The reciprocity of entertaining is an important part of maintaining friendships. In many cultures, but especially in class conscious societies, people who visit back and forth are from the same social and economic class.

Today’s gospel passage is set in the context of hospitality in a very class conscious culture. The verses that we did not read also add the issue of proper Sabbath observance, that was an issue at the same meal, but, as they say, ‘that’s another sermon.’.

As usual, Jesus’ every move is being watched. It seems that, as usual, those with whom Jesus is eating were more eager to find fault with him than they were to be truly welcoming hosts. Jesus turns out to be the rude party guest; but he takes what is really just common sense and looks at it with the eyes of faith.

In Jesus’ day meals were important social occasions. Nothing about a meal to which guests were invited was left to chance. People who were the community’s religious leaders were expected to be very careful about where they ate, with whom, what they ate and whether or not their hands were properly washed beforehand.

Jesus did not smile politely and toe the party line. He saw some serious flaws in the system of give and take that governed and especially restricted true hospitality and he knew that he had to say something.

Given its importance in his society, Jesus’ comments about their table fellowship struck at the very heart of his culture. He wasn’t just talking about food and who was invited to dinner, but about the very life of the community itself.

His first comments seem to be little more than common sense. The closest analogy I can think of is a wedding reception with assigned seats. There will be a head table with close family and friends being given what are considered choice seats and, usually, first dibbs on the buffet.

Essentially, Jesus is saying to them, “Unless you are closely related to the bride or groom, don’t assume that you are entitled to sit near the head table.” It is better to be surprised by finding you are closer to the front than you thought than further away, especially if you sit in a seat reserved for someone else! It seems like nothing more than common sense, but Jesus takes that simple life experience and relates it both directly and indirectly to the life of faith. He tells them that God does not honour those who seek honour but those who aretruly humble. It’s one of those passages which points to the ways of God as being opposite to the ways of human beings. While those with the best clothes, the most money and the most important jobs may be seen as the most important in this world, they are not in God’s kingdom!

Jesus goes beyond this to talk about the act of hospitality. Hospitality was very important in Jesus culture. There were no restaurants and people depended on relatives and strangers when they were travelling. But people tended to entertain those who could, one day, return the favour. Jesus’ words for them are very harsh. In a day and age with well off people throwing elaborate parties for one another, there were many who had no home, no food to share with others, or even for themselves. These may well be people who could not work because of an illness or disability. Jesus sticks it to the well off people invited to the house of this prominent Pharisee: “How many times do I have to say it, ‘invite those who can’t pay you back’. The life of faith is not about being paid back, it’s about sharing with others. He tells them that God rewards the generous and the welcoming.

The application to our own lives is fairly easy to see. We should be more interested in being welcoming than we are in keeping score of who owes whom a meal or an evening’s entertainment, though I must say that there is nothing wrong with taking turns among friends and colleagues as to who cooks and who had to cleans the house andall of those things involved with having dinner guests. It’s a criticism of setting limits on our outreach and caring based on ‘what’s in it for us’.

In the last half of the 20th century our society institutionalized much of our caring. We have welfare and various programs that make up the ‘social safety net’ and we usually hire people to do the work.

Yet, as time went on, for various reasons this net developed a great many holes and churches and services chubs will be expected to pick up more and more of the slack. When we have elderly people without public transportation or family nearby, there are many needs that must be met. The only payback we may receive other than a thank you is the hope that someone will do it for us when we are unable to do those things for ourselves. That’s not the way of the world, but it’s the way of the kingdom.

(One Congregation’s ending)

We live in places where, for the most part, we still know our neighbours and where neighbours help one another out. However, communities like these are known to be difficult places to truly become a part of if you aren’t born here. A former parishioner of mine was frustrated to find out that after 20 years of residency she was still regarded as a newcomer in her own community.

As church and wide community we need to show true hospitality to newcomers by being truly welcoming, and risking the chance that our community will be changed by their presence. A number of years ago a foreign student arrived in a large Canadian city and decided to go to church. He took a new friend and off they went to a large cathedral with a beautiful pipe organ and lots of stained glass and lots of empty pews. They seated themselves and reviewed the bulletin. By and by an usher in tails and white gloves arrived at the end of the pew with an elderly and very well dressed couple and told them that they would have to move because they were occupying this couple’s pew. There were dozens of empty pews in front of them and behind. They never returned to that church.

There have been a great many studies done about what makes a welcoming church, and surprisingly it is sometimes very simple things. In addition to being welcomed by regular church members and invited to sign the guest-book, and invited to return, it has been suggested by one study that (and you might not like this one!!!!!!!!) regular members need to sit in the front pews and leave the back ones for newcomers who may be a little late, who may come with squirming children, and who may very well feel self-conscious when forced to walk to the front in a church full of strangers.

We have a beautiful church with plenty of history and many of you have been here all your lives and your parents before you. Yet the call of the gospel is not to look inward but outward to the world around us. Jesus is continually reminding the people who would follow him that he came to seek and save the lost, heal the sick and give sight to the blind. (Just as the people before us have always had to do) we as a people of faith need to look around us, inside and outside these doors and we need to look for ways of proclaiming the gospel in word and action appropriate to this time and place. The Pharisees whom Jesus encountered were often using what the prophet Jeremiah referred to as ‘cracked cisterns’, vessels that outlived their usefulness.

As we go forward to engage the world we need to take a look at the values of the world, and the values that the gospel proclaims and then decide where we will go and what we will do and how we will do it, in the name of Jesus of Nazareth.

And as we go, let us remember that it is a loving, caring and generous God who both calls us to follow Jesus of Nazareth and gives us what we need to be able to follow with faithfulness and love.

Thanks be to God. Amen

(the ending for the ‘annual memorial service’ in another congregation)

We have gathered here today to have our annual memorial service, to remember those who have gone before us and to make special donations to support the work of our cemetery committee in keeping our history alive. Yet we don’t do it for its own sake, but so that the history and our memories of the contributions of our ancestors may give us insight and hope and strength into what we should be doing as God’s people in 2004. We are challenged by their hard work, their dedication to church, family and community and their ability to deal with the crises and hardships that came their way. We can learn from their lives and their example as we seek to respond of the difficulties and challenges of this time and place. We may not think we have much in common with those who lived a hundred or more years ago, but we have the call and promises of God who has promised to never leave us or forsake us, just as he promised this to the ancestors in the faith we remember today.

We celebrate a grand heritage and we share with those who have gone before us a grand promise, as we follow the call of Jesus to be his people in the world.

Let us remember that we are not alone as we go forward to follow and serve.

Amen.

Jeremiah 18: 1-11
Psalm 139: 1-6, 13-18
Philemon 1-21
Luke 14: 25-33

What Discipleship Costs

If you are in New York City and ask for directions to the famed “Carnegie Hall” you could very well become the unwitting victim of a standard New York joke, “To get to Carnegie Hall you have to Practice, Practice, Practice”. The performing arts is something which demands a great cost from the players in terms of time and commitment to the task itself. How many piano teachers have thrown up their hands at a young student and told the parents, “If your child isn’t going to practice, I’m wasting my time and you are wasting your money!”

We live in an area where minor hockey is very important. In addition to the usual number of pratices and games, any of you with a child in AA or AAA hockey knows about the extra commitment involved; about driving long distances in the dead of winter, starting out long before the crack of dawn to watch your kind practice or play in a cold rink and eat greasy fast food for a whole weekend and get home with not much time to get ready for school on Monday only to do it the next weekend by travelling to some other tournament in some other place. Soccer wasn’t yet over before my niece and nephews started their hockey clinics. One of them at least, dreams of the NHL.

The Olympics have just finished. At each medal presentation ceremony, as we looked at the faces of the Olympians, both those who stood on the podium and those who did not, we could see the glimmer of the years of hours and hours of training and practice and sacrifice.

We come to today’s gospel reading with plenty of experience in relation to the cost of certain kinds of endeavours and a sense of the cost of success. We teach children that things cost money, that effort preceeds success and that what is valuable is worth working for. Yet there are other aspects of this passage which challenge the values by which much of our society is organized. The same was true in Jesus’ day. Many of Jesus’ teachings took the way people assumed things were supposed to work, and turned that idea on its head.

There is a principle in business that works well when studying the Bible; that principle is “Location, Location, Location.” A good location with favourable traffic patterns is an important factor in the success or failure of a business. In reading the Bible as we do in worship, only in small bits, it is easy to forget that the location in the whole story is very important to the author’s message. We need to keep asking such questions as: “What did Jesus just finish talking about?” and “Who is Jesus talking to now?” In the passage we read last week Jesus told the rich people listening to him to include the downtrodden and the outcaste, the poor and the blind and the lame in their lives and to look to their needs as well. In the verses immediately prior to this passage Jesus uses a parable about a banquet to talk about God’s kingdom. Those who had been involved has sent excuses so the invitation was sent to other people; the poor, the blind, the lame, the social outcast. There is a song I learned as a kid at church camp that goes, “I cannot come to the banquet don’t trouble me now ......” I’ll spare you all and not sing it! That passage speaks of the necessity of responding to God’s free and unmerited grace; God’s love and welcome is completely apart from economic class or social status.

Yet it’s easy to take that for granted. It is easy to assume God’s grace; to assume that we can fit God in when we have the time and, as it were, to attend the banquet whenever we feel like it and to be absent whenever we’d rather do something else. The rich man’s friends in the parable found out that they could not continue to so that. But it would be easy for his new guests (the deaf, the blind and the lame) to become just as complacent.

Jesus’ words are a wake up call to those who have followed; not to become presumptuous or complacent. They are not just the new ‘in’ crowd; the new ‘favoured children’. The message is that their lives had to reflect this welcome, not just in certain aspects but in all.

In fact, in the 26th verse, Jesus uses a little ‘hyperbole’ or obvious exaggeration to make his point. To hate mother and father is a harsh command indeed. Someone has said that this passage turns around the traditional saying, “blood is thicker than water” and it now says, “Water is thicker than blood”. The Christian community, the family of those baptized is to be a priority for us. Our commitments to care are not to be limited to those who are blood relatives.

To carry a cross, in the literal sense, was a part of the execution process in Jesus’ day. To carry a cross, in the metaphorical sense, is to take up the difficulties of commitment as a choice and to bear them as Christ bore his cross to Calvary. It’s not something someone can do for us; we have to do it ourselves.

Some people can’t bear to have their kids do their own school projects because they will look like, well they look like they were made by a kid! Of course, the teacher knows the difference! God knows if we are trying to let others carry our cross and will not shoulder our own. We must be clear here: a cross is not a burden that has come to us such as illness or tragedy. That is another matter; another issue. A cross, in this context, is a symbol of the call to Christian discipleship that is extended to each one of us.

This passage is not saying that family is not important. By the use of an obvious exaggeration, a hyperbole, it is challenging the assumption that our duty stops at our family. In this day and age more working people need to reaffirm commitment to family because other things such as career advancement and financial success have taken over. Family is important.

I was watching an episode of Twice in A Lifetime as I was trying to fix my sewing machine the other night and the primary character in this episode had to realize that his dedication to his work, his lack of compassion for others and his harshness toward his son were major destructive factors in his life and in the lives of others. In this, as in each, each episode of this show people are taken back in time, to a place before a specific tragedy and given the opportunity to live their lives again. The message of this episode was that family and children are more important than work a and criticizing a child for not being as skilled as an adult is no way to develop confidence and that compassion for others is very important and had a positive ripple effect on more than just his own family.

The world would tell us that we look out fort #1. When we have a family that definition of #1 expands to include them, but little else beyond that.

There are a great many commercials today that speak of how much you can get for so little. Starting at just the price of a coffee a day can get you some life insurance and your family needs you to have life insurance so that your family will be secure if you die. Of course, the key words are ‘starting at...’. I’m sure that if you investigated it, the amount the average family would need would cost much more! But you can get something for the price of a coffee a day! There are charities that do that too: “pennies a day” will save the life of a child, or an acre of rainforest or whatever the thing is that they are trying to promote.

While its perfectly true that a child in a developing country can be helped for very little compared to what our own children need and want for life in Canada, the Jesus we meet in this passage would not leave it at that.

He’s not going to get those people he’s talking to, to sign on the dotted line and then spring the real truth on them.

The Jesus we meet in this passage demands everything and he says it up front. He compares it to a man who undertakes a building project. If you are building a house you need a plan and an estimate. It’s no good to get a roof and windows and doors and wiring and to discover that you have run our of money! His friends will laugh at him Jesus says. Jesus also uses an image from the political world of defending one self against invasion. So Jesus is laying his cards on the table, saying that the life of discipleship is the most important enterprise there is.

However, something else needs to be said here. We tend to equate discipleship with church life and commitment to church life. That’s not what Jesus is talking about. While our commitment to the Christian community is very important it is only a part of discipleship. Jesus’ call was to have our discipleship order and inform our entire lives. Of course we have to work and to raise our families and participate in the wider community. Of course we need to plan for the future and save for anticipated needs, but all of that should be done in the context of our commitment to God in Jesus of Nazareth.

Yet, it’s not all about us. If WE have to make the plans and consider the cost of following before we join up and sign on, we can be assured that God has done so, that God believes the enterprise will be successful, that it is not a waste of time and effort and resources. When we are following God’s plan of a kingdom of faith, love, peace and justice, what other plan is as worthy? This insight concludes the passage commentary in Texts for Preaching by Cousar, Gaventa, McCain and Newsome, by Westminster john Knox Press, 1084 pp.505-506

So we have a call to give everything and to commit all but we have an assurance that it is not a feeble plan; it is something worthy of our very best.

As we begin again to look at our lives and our work on this labour day weekend let us keep these things in mind and let us go from here in all that we do as God’s people.

Amen.

Jeremiah 4:11-12, 22-28
Psalm 14
1 Timothy 1: 12-17
Luke 15: 1-10

In the mid 1920's a young man immigrated to one of Canada’s largest cities. He was walking along the sidewalk after work one day and saw a 5 cent piece. Then he saw a 10 cent piece. Then there was another ten cent piece and then another five and five more and then ten and then twenty-five. As he picked up the money he realized that it was more than spare change that had fallen out of someone’s pocket and he took it to the police station. When he arrived he encountered a very distraught little boy who had been on the way to the landlord’s pay his grandmother’s rent and had lost it all! The line of coins the young immigrant had found, was indeed this elderly woman’s rent money. This true story was told to me by the man’s daughter.

Unless you are super organized, or very lucky, you have no doubt had the experience of having lost something. Of course the important piece of paper, the widget or the item of clothing did not get lost by itself, it only seems that way. When this happens to me, and I cannot find the item immediately, I first go through the mental exercise, “Where did I see it last?” Then I panic and search everywhere. When that fails I usually just try to walk away from the search and “let it turn up!”, unless of course it is garbage day and I have to make sure it has not found its way into the garbage.

When we were quite young my middle brother became lost on the midway at the exhibition. If you have ever been to “Old Home Week”, you know something of the crowds and the confusion. I don’t remember much about the day except that we were in Kennedy Colosseum when an RCMP officer brought my crying and very upset brother back to our very relieved parents.

When it comes to lost children though, they don’t always realize that they are lost. One day a friend of mine was shopping at the mall and suddenly realized that her young son was missing. Before she had time to panic, she heard the announcement: There is a little boy here who claims his mother is lost. If anyone finds her please return her to the customer service desk! When his mother arrived she found a cross little boy genuinely upset at his mother for having wandered off.

In today’s gospel lesson Jesus is again speaking to Pharisees and religious leaders. Reacting to their criticism of his choice of friends, Jesus is trying to broaden their views of God’s will and God’s ways. He does this by comparing his ministry and the ways of God to the way in which a shepherd seeks out sheep or a woman seeks a valuable coin. Later on he compares God’s love to that of a father welcoming home a lost and wasteful son.

Our culture is so different it is hard for us to realize how shocking it was for a religious leader to associate with those the gospels refer to as ‘tax collectors and sinners’. Tax collectors had, in a sense sold themselves to the enemy. They often cheated their neighbours as they lined their pockets while collecting taxes for the hated Romans. The name ‘sinners’ could refer to any number of people whose professions of personal lives did not pass muster with the religious leaders of the day. Worse yet, Jesus ate with them. To sit at table with someone is to accept that person in a symbolic but very real way.

Shepherds were certainly not among the elite of Palestine and, in fact, were often looked down upon. This shepherd was likely working together with friends andneighbours to look after a herd comprised of all of their animals. To lose one sheep was for that owner a big loss.

Jesus also uses the illustration of a woman looking for a coin. It is likely that the value of this coin represented a day’s living expenses for a peasant family, and if it was all she had, the loss would have been substantial indeed. Like the little boy on the streets of Montreal, the loss would have been devastating. It is little wonder that here was great rejoicing when the sheep and the coin were found.

Sometimes the thing we have lost does not seem to be worth the bother. My moter is certain that there is a place somewhere on our farm that harbours a large number of hammers, screwdrivers, wrenches, flashlights and even a chain saw or two. Sometimes missing people aren’t even looked for, especially street people in big cities. Like the Pharisees of Jesus day, many people say, “Why bother. They shouldn’t ahve gotten lost anyway!”

There was no thought of grace here; everyone knows right from wrong and it is up to them to follow it! The argument goes like this: if misfortune has befallen someone, it is their fault, and we, the righteous have no duty to welcome them back in.

Yet, what Jesus is trying to tell them, is that in seeking and finding, they discover the essence of God’s love and that they discover that they too have been lost.

An internet colleague Mark McCalla, of the PRCl-L preaching list was in a 24 hour WalMart earlier this week at about 4am. He was not in a good mood, due mostly to all the rain dumped on his town by hurricane Frances. He arrived at the same time as a dirty, shirtless, tattooed man, who was smoking a cigarette. WalMart usually has a no-smoking and shirts required policy but there was no friendly greeter at 4:00am to tell him that! However the preacher gave him a condescending look and rolled his eyes as he met him in one of the grocery aisles. Minutes later, wouldn’t you know it, the men were at the same cash together; there was only one open! The man asked him: “Whatcha buying this morning preacher?”

“Tortillas” replied the preacher, wondering where he had met this man before!

“Bleach, for my flooded basement” said the man. “Have a good day, preacher!”

“You too”, said the preacher, fully aware that he had just felt the shepherd’s crook snag him around the neck and haul him back into the fold, kicking and screaming.

We can be lost in more ways than one. We can be lost when we know exactly where we are. We can have lost our purpose in life. We can have lost our zest for life. We can have lost our reason for living. We can have lost our own sense of being found, our own sense of having received Go’s grace. The kingdom is not a “reward” for virtue or good behaviour, but it is God’s community of forgiven people who have been accepted into a community of love and pure grace.

The Pharisees hearing Jesus would have been quite shocked. The tax collectors and sinners would have been silently, at least, cheering. They would have had a great need for acceptance, a great need to be welcomed back. But it is all too easy to forget that once welcomed back. Once in the fold, it is all too easy to become complacent of one’s place and critical of God’s welcome to others.

We need to realize that we all too easily fall into that camp. None of us whoudl be considered Pharisees, yet ‘good church people’ sometimes think or behave in Pharisee like ways.

When we resent the work of food banks and soup kitchens and clothing banks and inner city missions, we have in the back of our minds the idea that they don’t deserve this welcome, and that we should be doing other things. That is part of our calling as a church; we’re not here to build and maintain real estate, but to use the real estate as a place to strengthen and inform our ministry to and with God’s people. Like the shepherd and the housewife, we are to expend our very life force to seek out and bring back the lost, and not only that, but also to truly rejoice when they are found.

The good and religious people would have thought that Jesus was nuts. They would have thought that he was dangerous, because the people who followed after him might actually take him seriously. They might actually think that this was what God wanted.

The Christian faith is more than the Bible giving us a road map of life and then being told, “Good luck and god speed.” We are called to be part of a community which seeks out those who have become lost and who each know, deep down that they too are also numbered among the once lost and now found. We are both seekers and those sought.

Join me, says Jesus, be part of the search. Rejoice when the lost are found just as we rejoiced when you came home. Amen