Loving the Lost
(Sermon Recap)
The more valuable something is, the more we will search to find it and get it back. There is nothing more valuable to us than our children. They are priceless. We would never stop looking for them if they should become lost. Well, God feels the same way about us! God loves His children no matter how lost they are. This is why the parable of the prodigal son in Luke chapter 15 is not only one of the most cherished chapters in the Bible, but also one of the most popular pieces of literature known to man. It is hard to find someone who has never heard the story.
The parable (an earthly story with a heavenly meaning), comes out of an encounter Jesus has with the Pharisees and Scribes (religious elite). These so called “religious leaders” were complaining that Jesus was receiving and eating with tax collectors and sinners. It's sad to see that while the sinners were drawing near to Jesus, the saints were pulling away from Him.
Our spiritual journey is one of ebb and flow. Like the tide going in and out, so is our consciousness of Christ. Sometimes we are drawing near to Him and sometimes pulling back. We are constantly in motion spiritually, and because of this tug-of-war, we find ourselves needing to “COMEBACK” to the Lord over and over again.
Religious people often try to separate people into two groups; “Us” and “Them." We do this because we don’t want to associate with what we perceive as “lesser” than us or our standard and because we want to think of ourselves as “better” than others. But the truth is that there is no “Us and Them.” There is only “US." We can all act like a sinner one moment and a saint the next. We draw near to God and then pull away from Him. It is inadvertent and not intentional. In other words we all get lost, spiritually, at times and need to COMEBACK to the place where Jesus is our first love and where we are walking in His Spirit.
Because of this spiritual ebb and flow in everyone's lives, we should be more tolerant of others as we see them struggle with their own spiritual tug-of-war. Since we are just like them, we should be non-judgmental. In fact, we should actually seek to help people when they are down. Help them when they are away. Help them when they are lost. I thank God that Jesus came to seek and to save the lost (Luke 19:10) and that he loves the lost, because I get lost on occasion too. Sometimes I get really lost. So, who am I to judge others when they are lost? Are they not a reflection of the same sin nature that lies within me?
We will all find ourselves lost at different points in our spiritual journey. It can be a maze of trials, tests, and temptations in this world that can leave you far from where you intended to be. So what can you do to COMEBACK to that sweet place of intimacy with Jesus? To COMEBACK to that place of power and strength? To COMEBACK into the peace and joy of the Lord? Here is a fourfold process that we can take to right our
wrongs, right the ship, and get right with God once again when we have drifted away from Him.
- 1. Recognition- Recognize your sin for what it is. The first step in the process is confessing your sin and admitting it. You can’t fix what you can’t acknowledge. And the person we need to confess to first and foremost, other than yourself, is God.
- 2. Repentance- This means much more than saying sorry. It speaks of an action; turning from your sin and turning toward God. This turning point is key. It is one thing to recognize the problem. It is another to begin to do something about it.
- 3. Restitution- We may have hurt others or taken from others in the process of our sin. Restitution is making our wrongs right and doing what we can to undo what we have done. If there is something you can do to make it right, do it. If not, allow yourself to be forgiven and move forward.
- 4. Restoration- Once we have taken the first three steps, the beauty is that we can be restored in our relationship with God and others. This is the heart of God: to restore unto us the joy of our salvation (Psalm 51:12). To not only get us back to where we were before, but beyond!