The Inefficient Shepherd Luke 15:1-10 September 12, 2004, Year C, Pentecost 15, Proper 19 The Rev. William V. Livingston, Rector Church of the Resurrection, Starkville, Mississippi During the 10 years we lived in McComb, I served a couple of rotations on the Mediator-Redeemer Vestry. At some point in each Vestry meeting, Aston, a local bank president, in an exasperated tone would comment, "This church sure doesn't operate as a business." Any who have served on a parish vestry have heard such comments, understand what he meant, or have made them ourselves. Serving as the executive director of the local mental health center, who had attended innumerable management seminars, read all the current management books and had taught time management seminars, I considered Aston's comments to be right on target. Aston and I developed a close personal friendship, however, over time I have come to understand why the Church cannot operate as a business. Luke's narrative today helps us to understand why not: because we worship a God who operates in the most un-business like manner. To those criticizing him for eating with tax collectors and sinners Jesus responds by asking the question, "Which one of you, having a hundred sheep and losing one of them, does not leave the ninety-nine in the wilderness and go after the one that is lost until he finds it?" By the way he asks the question, one would assume well of course everyone would. Maybe an ancient shepherd would leave the ninety-nine to search for the one, but history suggests the opposite, even among the faithful. Surely no good businessperson would do so. A good businessperson would do a cost-benefit analysis to determine if looking for that one lamb would be profitable. But, you see, Jesus' parable is not about how to be a successful shepherd, but is once again a comparison of God's kingdom and the earthly kingdom, is once again a shattering of our mistaken understandings of how the kingdom of God operates. The earthly kingdoms in which we live crunch the numbers to determine which will cost more: correcting a flaw in an automobile that can result in deadly accidents or paying the occasional lawsuit that arises from such a death. In God's kingdom, the shepherd leaves the ninety-nine and does not return until he has found the lost sheep. The earthly kingdoms in which we live consider employees expendable and abolish jobs and cut salaries to save money while CEO salaries now exceed 300 times the average salaries of their employees. In God's kingdom, the Messiah stoops down and washes the feet of the disciples. In the earthly kingdoms in which we live politicians yield to lobbyists for assault weapons while daily gunfire is the number one cause of death for our youth in major cities, yield to tobacco lobbyist despite tobacco's link to almost every major disease, yield to pharmaceutical lobbyists while the elderly and the poor are left to choose between taking a life-saving medication or having food on the table. In God's kingdom, Jesus confronted the hypocrisy of the powerful and threw over the tables of the money changers in the Temple. In the earthly kingdoms in which we live, our elected officials have $10,000 a plate banquets and allow in only the select few. In God's kingdom, Jesus shared meals with tax collectors and prostitutes and touched lepers. In the earthly kingdom in which we live, life is a cruel affair, and we see little concern for the lost, the weak or those deemed expendable. Therefore, we invent gods, rather than wander alone. We reject reality and complexity in order to maintain the simplicity of childlike certainty. That leaves us in the sad and brittle place where many religious people find themselves: clinging to old comforts and resenting any challenge to them. We envision God as operating on our terms and are unable to accept scriptural references that tell us that God's kingdom is nothing like ours. "And when he has found it, he lays it on his shoulders and rejoices. And when he comes home, he calls together his friends and neighbors, saying to them, 'Rejoice with me, for I have found my sheep that was lost.'" What would it be like to share in God's rejoicing? I doubt that we know, for it seems nearly impossible for us to get out of our own way. But I think we can safely assume that God's joy isn't the same as our triumphant shouts of victory, or our smug pursuit of an institution that fits our preferences. I think we can assume our arguments and barriers have nothing to do with God's rejoicing, and that our solemn assemblies do as little for God today as ever. I don't doubt that God experiences pure joy. For lives are saved, sinners repent, children smile, people die in peace, wars end, food is shared, and in a chorus we can only imagine, souls cry out, "Abba! Father!" I do doubt that we have tasted that pure joy. We remain too busy trying to package it. However, if we quit trying to make churches operate like businesses, if we quit assuming God's kingdom operates the way we have created our earthly kingdoms, there is reason for great celebration. The good news in this passage of scripture is that God actively seeks us out when we have wandered away or are lost, or absent. It is almost as if God is incomplete when one of us is missing. In God's eyes everyone has value! Each one us! God will never stop reaching out for us! Regardless of what we have done or ever might do. When we lose something and can't find it, we generally replace it with something new. Maybe that is why we have been called the throw-away society. But in God's case: God transforms, but doesn't substitute with something new. God doesn't stop looking or searching for that which is lost. God doesn't throw us away. God doesn't write us off. There is reason to celebrate that God, the untiring Pursuer, will never give up the hunt, until we turn and accept being scooped up in an embrace of Holy Love and are placed on the shoulders of a caring shepherd. There is nothing we can do to keep God's extravagant loving care from any of us: Not our incompetence, our negligence, our rebellion, our misuse of talent and resources, nor even our selfishness and sinfulness. There is nothing we can do to detour God from loving us. Like the shepherd leaving the ninety-nine behind and the woman diligently searching the house for her lost coin, so God will not give up on any of us. From breathing life into us via our creation, from taking on our flesh to reach out to us and allowing us to nail him to a tree, to offering us the Holy Spirit which without ceasing calls us into the arms of the shepherd who climbs over the crevices and under the brush looking for us, there is no limit as to how far God will go to search out that which is lost and invite us back into relationship. When each of us wake tomorrow morning, we will have a choice of two kingdoms. In one we will reject all those we think unworthy. In the other we will understand in God's eyes all are worthy. In one, we will have to stop seeing the world as it is to avoid seeing the suffering our choice of kingdom brings about. In the other all we have to do is wake up with a hunger for God that trusts that God is somewhere in that wilderness looking for us. May we accept God's love and forgiveness and share it with others. May we keep seeking out those who are still lost. May we see value and worth in others. All others, as God sees it in each of us. When we do so, there is rejoicing in heaven!