God’s love is the only factor that matters, and it’s all-inclusive, all-loving, nonsensical, and the best news you could ever have.

Pr. Joseph G. Crippen
The Fourteenth Sunday after Pentecost, Lect. 24 C
Text: Luke 15 (adding the third parable to the reading)

Beloved in Christ, grace to you, and peace in the name of the Father, and of the + Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen

This time, Jesus told a story.

Sometimes when faced with opposition, Jesus might rebuke or lecture. But this time, criticized for “welcoming sinners and eating with them,” Jesus wanted to see if he could help these leaders open their imaginations. So they might see the truth about God’s love for them. So he said, “Let me tell you a story.”

The religious leaders can only see stereotypes here. All these people drawn to Jesus are “sinners,” not individuals with lives and stories. They’re broad-brushed as a dismissable group. Bad, to be avoided. We do the same with the Pharisees and scribes, seeing them as a stereotype – they’re all bad, they’re ignorant, let’s all boo whenever they come on stage.

But Jesus – God-with-us – doesn’t see stereotypes. He sees with the eyes of the Triune God, eyes that lovingly see each child of God. So he wants to tell you a story. Maybe two or three. So your imagination can expand, and maybe you can see as God sees, and find good news for you, too.

The first thing to notice is these stories are all about God.

These stories have nothing to do with repenting. Luke has added a little tag verse about sinners repenting after each of the first two parables. But those verses have absolutely nothing to do with Jesus’ actual stories. The sheep does nothing to help itself, it’s just found. The coin is inanimate, it literally can’t repent. And neither of the two lost sons repent, at least not that we hear from Jesus.

Sometimes Jesus does invite repentance. Just not today. Not in these stories. Today, Jesus just wants you to imagine how astonishing God’s love for you and for all really is.

Jesus says, can you imagine a God who sees all as precious and treasured?

A shepherd who loves his sheep so much he risks life and limb to find it. A woman who treasures her meager wealth and desperately searches until she finds what she lost. A father who loves his two sons no matter how they treat him or each other.

Jesus is brilliant here. He completely ignores the question of whether his companions are sinners, or even if the Pharisees are. Most Christians claim these stories say God loves you even if you’re a sinner.

Not Jesus’ way. Not God-with-us. Whether you’re a tax collector or a Pharisee, someone who’s a known screw-up or someone admired, someone with privilege or someone cast aside by your world, you are precious to God. Period. End of sentence. Not in spite of who you are or in spite of what you’ve done. Or only if you confess and do better.

Jesus tells these stories of precious things in order, so you understand this. A sheep that does nothing to help itself. A coin that can’t. Then a last story is about people like us, but they’re the same as the sheep and the coin. Even people are loved by God simply for being who they are, not for what they have and haven’t done.

And that’s really good news for you, treasured child of God.

But Jesus isn’t finished. He says, can you imagine a God whose love for everyone is non-negotiable?

Every shepherd in thousands of years of human history has expected some losses. Sheep get sick, get lost, wolves eat them. But Jesus’ shepherd isn’t satisfied with writing off losses. No. All one hundred must be found, all one hundred must be home. It’s not God’s will that a single little one be lost, Jesus has said.

And of course this woman needs all ten of her coins. Wealthy people can write off losses, but she needs to look until she finds her lost coin. Every one is precious to her, every one means life to her.

And this father doesn’t write off the younger son who despises him and leaves with his inheritance. He keeps looking, searching, watching, waiting. And he isn’t satisfied at the celebration party when he notices his older boy is not there. He leaves the party to search for his other lost son. This father loves his sons beyond everything and will not be satisfied unless both are at home.

Jesus says, can you imagine that even when you fear you’re worthless, or regret what you’ve done, or feel you’re not appreciated, or others diminish you, can you imagine God isn’t complete if you aren’t home? No one gets written off by God. Not tax collectors or Pharisees. Not you. God will only have one hundred out of one hundred.

And that’s really good news for you, who might sometimes feel you’re not in the count.

And Jesus says, wrap your mind around this: God’s love makes absolutely no sense.

It’s not rational. It’s foolish. Any shepherd listening to this story would laugh. None of them would leave ninety-nine alone to look for one. Ridiculous.

And this poor woman throws a party when she finds her coin? How many of her precious coins did that cost? Ridiculous.

And this deluded father, how foolish is he? He lets his younger son treat him as if he’s dead, and, splits his estate in two. He welcomes the boy back with no conditions, no required groveling, ignores the manipulation, and throws a huge party. He risks offending his cranky older son and breaking that relationship to get them to reconcile. This father so loves his sons nothing can get in his way. Ridiculous.

Can you imagine that? God’s love is so expansive, so strong, so deep, so risky, it makes no sense? God will risk everything to love everyone home, will go to a cross to prove it. Ridiculous.

And can you see why that’s good news for you?

These stories don’t really end.

We don’t know if the shepherd loses more sheep, or how the woman copes with poverty, or if the younger son is changed, or if the elder son ever reconciles with his brother.

But look at how these stories do end: celebration and joy that the sheep is found. Celebration and joy that the coin is found. And the last word of the last story is the utterly beautiful statement of a father’s love: you are always with me and everything I have is yours, but we also celebrate because your brother was dead and now he’s alive.

Imagine that, Jesus says to you. Imagine that God’s first word to you is a love that will always seek you out wherever you are, and God’s last word to you is joy and celebration that you are found. Can you imagine what your life could be like if you could trust God’s foolish, absolute, starry-eyed love is for you? Can you imagine how this world could be healed if everyone could imagine such love from God for them and for all?

Jesus can imagine it. Listen to him. He’ll tell you a story. Maybe you’ll see for yourself.  

In the name of Jesus.  Amen

You are a precious human being, made of dirt and God’s breath, and God, who knows what it is to live as you, invites you to see and love all others made like you.

Pr. Joseph G. Crippen
The Twelfth Sunday after Pentecost, Lect. 22 C
Texts: Luke 14:1, 7-14; Hebrews 13:1-8, 15-16

Beloved in Christ, grace to you, and peace in the name of the Father, and of the + Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen

God loves playing in the dirt.

That’s what our ancient Hebrew forebears tell. After their first creation account of an eternal, almighty God speaking creation into existence, they tell a completely different creation story. In the second account, they tell of a God who gets down to earth on divine hands and knees, plays around in the mud, and makes humans.

Then, this hands-on God breathes life into them. Even what the Hebrews called humans in the story tell this wonder: the man isn’t referred by name, only as “earth,” or “dirt,” in Hebrew “adam.” Adam. The woman isn’t referred by name, only as “life,” or “breath,” in Hebrew “chavah.” Eve.

These ancient Hebrews give us the gift of understanding each human being as a precious, miraculous merger of dirt and breath, earth and God’s Spirit.

Hold that for a moment as we listen to Jesus today.

Because Jesus asks you and me, who hear this story of an awkward dinner party, to be humble.

In the Greek of the New Testament, as well as in the Aramaic Jesus spoke, and the Hebrew of the Jewish people, the words for “humble” and “humility” meant to “bring down.” You could use it to describe leveling a hill, or, as we know well from Isaiah, a mountain being laid low.

But “bring down” gets us into all sorts of trouble. It leads to proud, privileged people telling oppressed people to be humble, literally putting them down, and covering that sin with the assumed virtue of divine command. We still see that today, especially from people who do the same job I do. But it also leads people who are struggling, who do not have privilege and status, to put themselves down, trying to be obedient. Neither is what Jesus means.

It’s the Romans who help us. Latin speakers used a different image for this concept than “bringing down.” “Humus” in Latin means earth, ground. And the Latin words you and I still use for this idea come from that word for earth: humble. Humility. Literally: grounded.

To be humble is to be down to earth, Latin says. And if you join that to what the Hebrews believed was the heart of humanity, earth filled with divine breath, you see an astonishing wonder in Jesus’ teaching today.

Actually, Jesus is his teaching.

The Word of God from before all time, God’s Sophia, Wisdom, creating with the Creator and the Spirit at the beginning, became human. A being of dirt and breath, just like you and me. The ancient Hebrews thought God liked playing in the dirt. But the first to trust in Jesus as God’s Messiah believed God actually became dirt.

To be down to earth, humble, the divine, all-powerful, eternal God became one of us. Lived in and experienced being made of the same minerals and water and breath that make us who we are.

Because – and this is most important – God loves these beings of dirt and breath. Loves you. Loves me. And God needed to see us as we are, from our view. To learn about us from inside our skin.

That means today’s writer to a different group of Hebrews is giving the wrong incentive.

This preacher says “do not neglect to show hospitality to strangers, for by doing that, some have entertained angels without knowing it.” But Jesus, God-with-us, sharing our dirt and our breath, says, “do not neglect to show hospitality to strangers, for by doing that, you will entertain a human being. No more, no less. But a beloved person made of dirt and breath, like you.

The preacher of Hebrews isn’t wrong. We might entertain angels among us. And Christ taught us to look for his face in every person we meet. That’s a blessing we don’t want to forget.

But today Jesus says, how about seeing everyone else as dirt and breath, just like you, when you look in their eyes? Whether you see one of our smallest, Annika, baptized with her brother James today, or the two revered saints among us whose centenary-plus birthdays we rejoice in today, from youngest to oldest we’re all dust, dirt filled with God’s breath. And that is precious and holy to God.

All the things we seem to notice and categorize most, color and gender and size and age and culture and language and customs, all these are just God’s frosting on the cake, God’s delight in diversity. They are to be treasured and valued and enjoyed. But at the core, Jesus says, remember that you are dust and to dust you shall return. And so are all you meet. So love them, because they are you.

And if Christ can change how our eyes see, so many things will be healed.

All our categories – rich, poor, friends, enemies, stranger, neighbor, race, gender, creed – make objects out of beloved people. If you’re jockeying for good seats at the party or for the front of the line, you’re seeing objects, not people. If you support oppressive structures and value some people more than others because of how they present themselves, you’re seeing objects, not people. If you live in privilege and expect you deserve things, and are offended if you don’t get them, you’re seeing objects, not people.

But Jesus says true life is found when you look into the eyes of every human being you see, and see another human being. Not a category or a type or an object. A beloved child of God. And as more and more see with these eyes, all oppression and violence and hatred and all that ails our world will fall apart.

So, if you want to be humble as Jesus asks you, just remember your Latin.

Remember that to be humble is to be down to earth. To be who you are. Rejoice that you are a precious, miraculous merger of dirt and breath and you are not the only one.

Open your eyes, and see all these others God has made and rejoice. Find and live in that mutual love for and with all people that the preacher to the Hebrews urges, and then see what God will change inside you and in this world.

In the name of Jesus.  Amen