14 Pentecost/Year C
September 15, 2019
Jeremiah 4:11-12, 22-28; Psalm 14;1 Timothy 1:12-17; Luke 15:1-10
I came across a very old gospel hymn this past week in the hymnbook we use at the Pioneers’ home for the Wednesday morning communion service. I’ve been spending some extra time there the past couple of months due to a couple of their regular pianists being out on medical leave. They usually play every week for the Wednesday morning service, and the gospel music time afterwards, and on Thursday nights.
When I was looking through the hymnbook to choose the 2 hymns to sing this past week at the Wed service, the title of a hymn, The Ninety and the Nine caught my eye. When I returned to my church office, I looked up the hymn to check out the lyrics and music, and I listened to a few recordings of it. And as music almost always does for me, it brought home the message of today’s gospel for me, reminding me, yet again, of God’s never-ending and relentless, outpouring of love, compassion, and mercy for me, and for all of his beloved people.
I was reminded while reading the lyrics of this old, old hymn, written in 1868 and put to music in 1874, that no matter how many times I have messed up, sinned, and wandered far away from trusting in the love and mercy of God, God never gives up on me. He never gives up on us. He will do whatever it takes to find any of his flock who have wandered off from the Shepherd’s care and find themselves lost for a time… He will keep looking and searching for those who are lost, and when he finds them, he will bring them back home, rejoicing, “I have found my sheep!”
Sometimes, we, ourselves may not even know we are lost…it’s often easier to point out others who appear to be lost, and label someone else as a sinner…but we are not so ready to admit to ourselves, our own sin, our own shortcomings, our own failure to fully trust and believe that God calls us beloved.
When we repent, we free ourselves to be loved by God, and we free ourselves to go out into the world to seek those who are lost, or feeling alone, …those who God sends us out to love, and welcome them home….our family, our friends, our neighbors, our enemies, and strangers….
God will not give up on any of us: He will keep looking and searching for those who are lost, and when he finds them, he will bring them back home, rejoicing, “I have found my sheep!”
This is good news, indeed! Good News that has been proclaimed for over 2000 years in the scriptures, and in the lives of those who believe in the life and death and resurrection of Jesus Christ… In Jesus, we have a Shepherd who has shown us what it means to be relentless in love, compassion and mercy…In Jesus, we have a Shepherd, who has given us hope and strength to follow him, in seeking out ways to love and care for one another…never giving up hope, never giving up on someone else’s worthiness, never giving up, on listening for their voice, never giving up on the dream of God’s beloved community….where all will know the love and power of God’s love, to bring healing and hope in all of our lives again, uniting us and reconciling us to one another…as a community, a family…where all are loved and welcomed home, where we will all rejoice together, in the presence of the angels of God, in this life, and in the life, yet to come.
By our Baptism, as followers of the Way of Christ, The Way of Love, we are being called to be part of the search party now…
"How many of you, having a hundred sheep and losing one of them, will leave the ninety-nine in the wilderness and go after the one that is lost until he finds it?
In God’s kingdom, in God’s family…every person is loved and valued and of worth. Never give up, in remembering that about yourself….and never give up, in searching for his beloved and bring them home.
God will not give up on any of us: He will keep looking and searching for those who are lost, and when he finds them, he will bring them back home, rejoicing, “I have found my sheep!”
Hymn: The Ninety and Nine (words by Elizabeth C Clephane, 1868; Music by Ira D Sankey, 1874)
1 There were ninety and nine that safely lay in the shelter of the fold,
but one was out on the hills away, far off from the gates of gold —
away on the mountains wild and bare,
away from the tender Shepherd's care, away from the tender Shepherd's care.
2 "Lord, thou hast here thy ninety and nine; are they not enough for thee?"
But the Shepherd made answer: "This of mine has wandered away from me,
and although the road be rough and steep,
I go to the desert to find my sheep, I go to the desert to find my sheep."
3 But none of the ransomed ever knew how deep were the waters crossed;
nor how dark was the night that the Lord passed thro' ere he found his sheep that was lost.
Out in the desert he heard its cry —
sick and helpless, and ready to die, sick and helpless, and ready to die.
4 "Lord, whence are those blood-drops all the way that mark out the mountain's track?" "They were shed for one who had gone astray ere the Shepherd could bring him back."
"Lord, whence are thy hands so rent and torn?"
"They're pierced tonight by many a thorn, they're pierced tonight by many a thorn."
5 But all thro' the mountains, thunder-riv'n, and up from the rocky steep,
there arose a glad cry to the gate of heav'n, "Rejoice! I have found my sheep!"
And the angels echoed around the throne,
"Rejoice, for the Lord brings back his own! Rejoice, for the Lord brings back his own!"
Rev Julie Platson
St Peter’s by the Sea Episcopal Church
Sitka, Alaska