If you have your Bibles, I'd love for you to join me in Luke chapter 15. Began our study in Luke chapter 15 just a couple of weeks back. And I want you to understand where we arrive in this moment in scripture. Jesus was never confused as to why he was on earth. Jesus never wondered about the plan for His life. He was ever and always keenly aware of why He was here, of what He was doing, of where He was going, and of the will of His Father. It's declared so plainly to us, again in Luke 19, just four chapters ahead of where we are, Jesus, after reaching Zacchaeus with the gospel, says this, for the Son of Man is come to seek and to save that which was lost. Jesus himself just told us the purpose of his ministry. Jesus in that one verse just told us what He was all about. Jesus just revealed His heart. And now back here in Luke 15, He is knowingly on His way to Jerusalem. He's traveling to Jerusalem with the disciples and along the way He is alerting them to what will happen when they get there. Jesus knows that He will be received as a King. Jesus is fully aware that He will be arrested and unfairly tried. He's keenly aware of the reality that He's on His way to the cross. And so in these moments, He is urgent about the purpose of His being here, and that's where we find ourselves. Jesus Christ has come to seek and to save that which was lost. It's His own declaration. Just unpack the verse for a moment. For the Son of Man, Jesus says. That's His favorite name for Himself. Son of Man highlights the humanity of Jesus. It highlights the humiliation as He tells us in Philippians 2 of His life. His condescension. His sacrifice on our behalf, the Son of Man, Son of God, which He certainly is, amplifies His deity. But Jesus says, I'm here for this cause, for the Son of Man is come. This is the whole purpose of my arrival, my incarnation. is here to seek. That really is His purpose statement. I am come to seek out. I'm here for the purpose of pursuing. That word is an interesting word to study out. We're looking for, Jesus says. I'm watching for, Jesus is communicating. I'm striving for. I'm searching after. I'm here for the purpose of pursuing. What? So that I might save Those which are lost, to save. That's salvation. Now, some of you might be familiar with the term born again. Some might be salvation. Some might understand it in a different way. Save is what Jesus was here for. That which was lost, the having been lost one. That which is ruined. That which is devastated. That which is destroyed. Jesus knows why He's here. Never confused. Delivering His own mission statement is Jesus. The Son of Man is come. He is incarnate so that He might pursue after and save those which are lost. That's what Luke 15 is all about. It's an urgent message because certainly we live in a world where people are lost, where people are devastated, where people are damaged goods. Understand as a believer, this is not only a story about those who are without Christ, but as shepherd to us, his sheep, we, as the old hymn says, are prone to wander. prone to leave the God that we love, there has never been a day where one of us sheep have made it easy for our shepherd to shepherd us. That's what Jesus is teaching here in Luke chapter 15. He's on his way to Jerusalem where the height of humanity's hate against him will ultimately be poured out on the cross. But all along the way, Jesus is under attack. He constantly encounters His critics. There are those who are murmuring against Him, and complaining about His work. We can always learn something from Jesus, and even here in this moment in His ministry, we can learn how to deal with those withering attacks. Now remember, back in the beginning verses of Luke chapter 15, we read this, Then drew near unto Him all the publicans and sinners for to hear Him. All the publicans and sinners have gathered near to Jesus so that they can hear Him teach. And the Pharisees and the scribes murmured, saying, Unbelievable! Outrageous, preposterous, this man Jesus receiveth sinners and even eats with them. The Pharisees and the scribes were the obviously religious of the day. Venerated within society, they were the law keepers of Moses. If you were looking for anyone that was moral and upright in the crowd, you would settle on one of the Pharisees and they looked the part. The scribes were the lawyers who excelled in the law of Moses. They were not fun to be around. You did not want them at your party, nor as a co-worker, nor as a neighbor. They were constantly telling on you. And every time you were going to hell and God didn't like you for it. Sounds a little bit like a Baptist, right? Sorry. The Pharisees and the scribes are staying on the outskirts of everything that Jesus does, and at this moment in time, it is the hallmark of His earthly ministry that the publicans and sinners were around Him. It's kind of a hodgepodge term. It's a group that's thrown together. The publicans were hated individuals. They were traitorous. They were greedy. They were deceivers. They were liars. And they were near Jesus. Sinners doesn't really hit us like it would have hit them in this culture. Because even those of us that are church going people would agree that we're sinners. But this was an intentional turn. This was a term that was speaking to a group of people that really incorporated even the harlots and the prostitutes. They were the grimy outside misfits. This was the group that was around Jesus and the Pharisees and scribes are amazed that he allows them near him. In fact, their nearness to Jesus, to the Pharisee and the scribe, was actually proof and evidence of the fact that there's no way He's from God, because if He was actually from God, He wouldn't be hanging out with them, He'd be hanging out with us, but look who He's around, and no, He's not from God. But it's interesting because they say he receives them and he eats with them. How preposterous, how outrageous. You can hear the condescension within this verse. You can grasp the cynicism, you can hear the hate. And make no mistake about it, they hate Jesus. They'll gather in just a short period of time in the Hall of Hewn Stones in Jerusalem and they will plot His arrest and murder. They hate Him. They want Him dead. As they're attacking Jesus, they're saying, He receives them. I don't know if you've ever been in a receiving line where you walk down the line and you shake hands and someone acknowledges that you are there and they receive your company. That's the simple word. What this word implies in the Greek is that Jesus was not just receiving them with a handshake, but that Jesus was actually embracing with both arms the publicans and the sinners. Jesus was placing His arm around them. He was reclining with them. He was eating in their presence. He allowed them close to Him. And to the cynical, condescending, self-righteous Pharisee and scribe, they were blown away by this reality. It was an outrage to them. Now Jesus, as the master teacher, I happen to believe, is going to stand to address the Pharisees and scribes. He's aware of their inner monologue. He knows the end game. He knows every one of them by name. He can see their glares. He can hear the sneering whispers. Jesus stands, and in Luke chapter 15, which is where we are in the Bible, he tells a trilogy of parables. Parables is a word we would use. It's a Bible word. It's a heavenly story that Jesus is going to lay an eternal principle next to. He's going to tell a story that we can understand, and it's analogous to something he wants to convey about eternity. Jesus is going to tell a trilogy of stories about lost things. He told, as we studied a couple of weeks ago, a story about a lost sheep. And now, looking directly at the Pharisees and scribes, he's gonna tell them another story. He's gonna tell them a story about a woman who has lost a coin and is gonna search for it. Jesus, in this story, is gonna teach us about how he feels about us. He's going to, within this story, reveal the heart of our Heavenly Father towards us. It's a simple story, just a few short verses, but it teaches us a whole lot. Listen now as Jesus addresses His detractors in verse eight. He's told the story of the lost sheep. He continues now and He says, either, what woman? having ten pieces of silver. If she lose one piece, doth not light a candle, and sweep the house, and seek diligently till she find it. And when she hath found it, she calleth her friends and her neighbors together, saying, Rejoice with me. For I have found the peace which I had lost. Likewise, I say unto you, there is joy in the presence of angels over one sinner that repenteth." Now when this whole scene concludes, what's going to be very evident is that the Pharisees and scribes don't care about what makes heaven happy. The Pharisees and scribes who would say of themselves that they were all about the business of God, it's actually going to be painfully clear that they're not at all about the business of God. But Jesus has just told us a little story about a woman who lost a coin. It doesn't seem like that big of a deal, but to this lady it is clearly a great concern. The setting of the story, from all that we can determine in the few words that Jesus shared, is one of simple village life. He's talking to common, everyday, ordinary people. Not to the Pharisees and the scribes who at the back have lined their pockets with blood guilt money at the temple, but to these publicans and sinners who are sitting around him, Jesus says, I'm gonna tell you a story about a lady who lost one silver coin. And everyone in that crowd would have understood, this is a really big deal. Now, one silver coin, as Jesus speaks of it in this story, is the equivalent to one day's wage. Maybe it's not an overwhelming amount of money, but to these poor people, this is a great concern. As I was studying, I found that Palestinian women oftentimes for their wedding would receive 10 silver coins and they would fashion them into a wedding headdress and then that would become a wedding gift to them. Perhaps that's exactly what this is. Not just something valuable, but something nostalgic for her. This one coin, however it comes to be, is lost. And the Bible begins to tell us about her search for it. And again, in revealing this about the search, we grasp something. She is poor and she lives in what we would probably call a hut. It's got a dirt floor covered in some reeds and in this cultural setting probably had just one window of 18 square inches and really didn't shed a lot of light. So she's in this place desperately looking for this coin. Jesus wants us to understand she only has one choice, and the one choice that she has is not to say, this doesn't really matter. He wants us to grasp this moment. This coin is of great concern to her, no matter how you view the coin. No matter what value you place upon the coin, to her it is of great value. It was a great concern, and this great concern brought about a real diligent search. Now this silver coin was certainly lost, but it wasn't forgotten. And Jesus, again, gives us just enough in the story to grasp the urgency of the moment. He says that this woman, when she recognizes that she has lost this silver coin, she lights a candle, she grabs a broom, she sweeps the house, and she searches diligently until she finds it. There is an urgent sense of care to her search. Why? Because it's precious. It's lost. It needs to be recovered. She's gonna do whatever it takes. I hate losing stuff. It really doesn't happen often, unless my wife is involved. We were together yesterday and we got back to the house. And on occasion, not all occasion, but on this particular occasion, the loan key which would allow us to access our home was in my wife's custody. When we left the house, she put that key into her purse. Now, my wife's purse is small, but when you open it, it's like the wardrobe of Narnia. You can actually get in there and walk around. She can store things. She can survive on what is in her purse. When we pulled back into the house, I got out of the car and I started to walk in and I recognized, you have the key. When I said, you have the key, I saw what washed over her face was a sense of panic, no, you have the key, oh no, not this time, not my fault, you have the key, you stuck it in her purse, round two of the panic in my purse. You know what this entails? Oh, I do. I know we're about to spend 10 or 11 minutes of argumentation when I have to preach tomorrow, and this is not my fault. Rarely is. Don't ask her. Don't follow up. It's just rarely my fault. I stood patiently waiting as the search was underway. I then noted that she got out of the car and set her purse down and started looking in the back seat, and I thought, this isn't good. She went around and opened the back of the car and was looking and she says, are you sure? I'm sure you have the key. I know you have the key. Now, I had to come down from my precipice and join in the search. not knowing where I was looking, who are scrambling around because you know what? We like to be in our home. We like to have access. If you go to the center console and open it, now I listen, my wife is exquisite. She's perfect. She's beautiful. She is completely put together, but never check the center console of her car. Never open it, whiskey bottles, cigarette butts, everything. You could go down in there, it's the same. Never check the center console of her car. Finally, she finds the key and we make it into our home. And of course, we're at peace with each other because we're great Christians and our marriage is veteran and mature. No judgment zone there. There was a sense of urgency which arrested both of us because we were looking for something. And Jesus is teaching us not just a story about a lady with a coin. He wants us to understand something because he's already told us the reason that I left heaven and I'm here is to diligently search after lost things so that I might save them. And so as Jesus is telling this pompous group of condescending self-righteous guys in the back about a poor lady who lost a coin, He's actually talking about this group of impoverished publicans and sinners in front of Him. And he is basically saying, I know that to you in the back, you see one silver coin and you couldn't care less. But I want you to know that my heavenly Father cares so much about these dusty, grimy little coins that I'm here for them. And I'm diligently searching after every one of them. I love how one wrote. He said, this is God. in His grace, stooping down to find you and me in the dirty places of the earth, bending down and sifting through the dust and debris in order to lift the treasure of His redeemed from the garbage into which it has fallen. Nobody likes to think of themselves as a grimy, dusty, largely invaluable little coin. The other reality is this, we all kind of have the propensity to imagine that if we're ever gonna go to God, we have to really clean ourselves up first. We have to check every box so that God deems us as okay. And again, in this story, grasp, this search is depicting, Jesus sweeping His light all over, scraping the broom, sifting through the dust, looking for that grimy little coin so that He can clean it up. Yet again, one said this, He finds you. He makes you acceptable. He finds you in the dirt of the earth, in the dustbin of sin, covered with the grime of guilt. You don't clean yourself up before coming to Him. You come to Him and He will clean you up. I love this. In fact, he wrote, for the rest of your life he'll be cleaning you up and dusting you off until that day when his work is completed with your glorified, perfected heart, soul, and mind. When? When you enter into the presence of the one who searched for you. On that day, he concludes, you'll finally see your shepherd who searched for you and took you from the realm of being lost into the realm of being found. He pursues until he finds. That's what he's telling us in the story. The candle is lit going into the darkened little corners of this impoverished hut. The broom is reaching under the meager furnishings and scraping around the reeds and the dust, sifting through handfuls of it until that one dusty little coin is found. Do you comprehend that Jesus isn't just telling us a story about a coin that was lost, he's talking about us, and he is saying each and every one of you, regardless of where you were born, no matter which far-flung area of time or far-flung area on the earth, he cares so much about you that he's sweeping his light from side to side, scraping his room and the dust and the reeds to find one coin. Let that wash over you for a second. Jesus, even now, by your mere presence here in this room, indicates one more sweep of the light, one more time to hear the gospel, one more time to be confronted with the truth. He's reaching out, he's sweeping again, he's moving the light, he's looking for you. And then Jesus tells us something for the second time in his trilogy of stories, which heightens the importance for us. It's something that Jesus wants us to understand. He wants us to understand that whenever one thing is lost or misplaced, it is of great concern to him. That he will undertake a diligent search and that it brings about a grand celebration. I grew up in church and I often was led to imagine that when I felt that weight of sin, when I knew I had something to confess, when I grasped that at the moment I was pretty dust covered and grimy, I would imagine that God was waiting for me to come home so that he could really punch my lights out. that God was standing there with a clenched fist, waiting to smash me down for what I had done wrong. But I'm listening in Luke 15, as Jesus is surrounded by publicans and sinners that he has embraced, and he's talking to the self-righteous in the back, and he is saying to them, I know every one of you back there would judge these people as useless, You would judge them as void of any hope and as waste, as refuse. But I'm saying to you, I'm looking for them. And when I find them and they come back to me, they won't find a clenched fist ready to punch their lights out. What they will find is grace, mercy, forgiveness, love, acceptance, and in fact, will celebrate when they get here. You ever have that one person in your life, that one coworker who thinks they are God's gift to the workplace? Or God's gift to the school? Or God's gift to the office? Or God's gift to the church? Anyone ever, don't raise your hand. If you don't know that person, you might be that person. The Pharisees, imagine, they're God's gift We're what heaven is all about. If heaven ever throws a party, heaven parties for the Pharisees because look at us. We know how to wear our robes all the way to our feet. We know how to fast. We know how to tithe. And we know how to keep rules. And Jesus is saying something so plain, we don't celebrate you. but we rather celebrate this ragtag group of misfits that you look down on. May I say to you, does Jesus, when one of these sinners repents, heaven celebrates, listen to what he says in verse nine, and when she hath found it, keeping us in the story, this woman has found the coin. It means so much to her that she calls her friends and her neighbors together and says, rejoice with me, for I have found that one little piece which I had lost. Likewise, Jesus said. Now, just like that, Jesus says. Just exactly like that woman who gets her neighbors and friends together and says she found it. And you know that moment of excitement, right? This woman was probably on the borderline of embarrassing behavior. She found the coin. She was bouncing around her little hut. Her neighbors could hear her through the mud brick walls. They could hear her out into the courtyard. She steps into the door and she holds it up, because she had shared this concern with everybody. Come here, I found that one lost coin. Rejoice with me. Now, I can imagine Jesus in this moment, and it is opinion, but He's a master teacher. I imagine the setting as it is, and I think in this moment, Jesus points His fingers at the standers in the back, and He says, likewise, I say to you, I say to you that just like that woman celebrates finding that coin, all of heaven erupts in a celebration. It happens in the presence of the angels of God. It happens just like that when one sinner repents. Sometimes we denigrate small things. But Jesus just said this, heaven celebrates one sinner. Which means if you are saved, there was an actual historical moment where all of heaven celebrated your salvation. Celebrated finding you which had previously been lost. I love one commentator who said this, Jesus tells us this twice in verse seven and verse 10, to meet our unbelief. Because it is hard to believe, come on man. Heaven's got a lot going on. There's a lot of harping. There's a lot of angel wings fluttering. I can't imagine all of heaven stops when one sinner repents and Jesus says, let me say it again. because I wanna meet your unbelief. I want you to raise your expectations. I want you to get a peek behind the curtain. I want you to know what happens in heaven. There is genuine rejoicing in the presence of the angels of God when one sinner repents. Get it, heaven celebrates one sinner. Do you recognize that in the book of Revelation we're told at the end of days we'll sing out worthy is the lamb that was slain. And when one sinner repents, it is a reminder of the worth of the shed blood of Jesus Christ. That when that one sinner repents, it is as though heaven shouts again, worthy is the lamb that was slain. Jesus, your death was worth it. One more has come to saving grace. One more understands. Recognize that Jesus searches like that. Look, not just on the corporate level. He's looking for you. He knows your name. He knows your background. He grasps your genetic structure. He knows your story. He knows your secrets. He knows your strengths. He knows your weaknesses. I don't mean he's looking for one race. I don't mean he's looking for one ethnicity. I don't mean he's looking for one political ideology. I mean he's looking for individuals that are lost. He's looking for you. It's a beautiful truth that Jesus is telling us in this story. that literally in heaven there is rejoicing at the salvation of one. If I were to simply conclude this simple message, I would say just a couple of things. To the lost sinner, I would say repent. To the lost sinner, I would say come to an end of your efforts to save yourself. In faith, turn to the finished work of Jesus Christ. I would say to you, recognize that you are a sinner. You're in that group of misfits. You're damaged goods. Not irreparably, because Jesus, through salvation, can make us new creatures and acknowledge you are a sinner. And to be honest with you, and if you were honest, you probably have already sinned today. How many of you have already done it? You've already sinned today, recognize it, yep. Just a few, some of you are perfect, good for you. I only sin in the 945 service because they're so pompous. You guys are the cool crowd. It's that group. I don't sin in 11, but I've already done it today. Maybe it was this week. Maybe it was a month ago. Maybe it was a year ago. You've sinned. Now, here's the reality. Whether you have sinned by choice or not in your mind, the scriptural fact is you're a sinner by conception. And your father, Adam, has made sure that sin has passed on to you, and the sentence for sinning, which is death, is yours. You're a sinner. And if you can come to grips with that truth, you recognize that God loves you so much, man, that He's sweeping a candle over. He's scraping into the dark, far-flung corners. He's sifting through handfuls of dirt to find you. You are of great concern to Him. So great a concern that He has undertaken a diligent search, which has taken coming to earth and the flesh to seek you out. so that he might save you which was lost, and if you can recognize that God loves you in spite of your sin, which must be paid for, but Jesus paid for it on the cross, you can by faith be saved. I say to the believer who recognizes that they aren't what they once were, who acknowledges, man, be quite truthful, I've gotten a little dusty, I've gotten a little grimy, But I know that God. If you go back to God and you're dusty and grimy, he's just gonna punch your lights out and he's gonna make sure you feel dirty and rotten and he's gonna make sure you know how useless and hopeless you are. And Jesus says, no, actually, actually, he's gonna hold you up and wipe the dust off and celebrate that you came back. And really the whole story of the prodigal son is about the loving father. I say to you believers who have wandered just a little or stumbled a little bit, come home. And then I say to the believers yet again, share the mission of Jesus, share the heart of Jesus. We're in a broken world, are we not? I think the political season heightens division. Sometimes when that division is heightened, it breeds within us a little bit of disdain. And instead of compassion, and instead of a newfound fervency to tell people that God loves them, we really kind of silence ourselves because we imagine what difference will it make. Just look at this world. Who cares? Who would want to hear the truth? And I say to you again, listen to Jesus. Look at who he's talking to. The people that were around him were ideologically different than him. The people that he put his arms around looked vastly different than the Pharisees in the back. People that Jesus embraced, reclined with, and ate with, laughed with, and shared the truth with, did not love him because he accommodated their wrongness, but they were drawn to him because he was compassionate for them and could change them. I say to you, share in the mission of Jesus. Do what makes heaven happy. and tell people the truth that they can be found. It's a beautiful reality what we learn in Scripture. Indulge heaven and be saved. Indulge heaven and tell somebody the truth about Jesus. Would you just for a moment bow your heads with me? Thanks for listening this week to the Graceway Baptist Church podcast. For more information about our church and our ministries, head on over to our website at gracewaycharlotte.org. We are a church located in South Charlotte. We are growing and our ministries are doing big things for Christ. If you're looking for a way to get plugged into what we're doing, email us at info at gracewaycharlotte.org. Also, stay in the loop with everything happening by following us on Facebook and Instagram. Our handle is GracewayCharlotte. Thanks again for listening to the Graceway Charlotte podcast. We'll see you next week.