PARABLES OF CHRIST
THE LOST SHEEP
CHILDREN’S SUNDAY
DR. JIM DIXON
MATTHEW 18:10-14
OCTOBER 18, 1998
Jesus was in the region of Galilee. He was in the town of Capernaum. He was with His disciples by the shore of the Sea of Tiberius. He took a child and He placed that child in the midst of the disciples. He used that child as an object lesson in teaching. He told the disciples that they needed to humble themselves and have the faith of a little child if they would enter the kingdom of heaven. He warned the disciples that they should not cause any little one who believes in Him to stumble into sin. He told the disciples how precious these little ones who believe in Him are.
Now, most Bible scholars believe that when Jesus speaks of “ton mikron,” when He speaks of “the little ones,” He is not simply referring to children but all those who are children of the faith, all of those who have childlike faith. When He speaks of God as a Shepherd and the little ones who believe in Him as God’s flock, He is referring to all who believe in Him, both young and old. This morning on this Children’s Sunday, as we focus on this little parable, I want us to focus primarily on children and God’s love for children. That is the message of this little parable, that God loves His people. God is like a shepherd, and He loves His flock.
In this parable we see that God loves His flock in five different ways. First of all, we see that God has an individual love for His flock. God has an individual love for His sheep. God loves each of us individually. He loves each of the children in our Sunday school individually. God has many sheep, but this parable tells us that He cares about each one. Now, in a sense, this is an incredible message.
Cosmologists, those who study the cosmos, tell us that this world we live on, this planet earth, is a relatively small planet in an average-sized solar system which is in the remote regions of an average-sized galaxy which is one of more than one hundred billion galaxies in the cosmos. It’s hard to believe that God cares about this planet. It’s hard to believe that God cares about what happens on this planet. The Bible tells us that God is the giver of life. He created life “ex nihilo,” “out of nothing.” The Bible tells us that God created us male and female in His divine image and likeness. The Bible tells us that we are the crown of His creation. The Bible tells us that He loves us. This little passage of scripture tells us that He loves us individually. God loves all the people of the world individually and God has a peculiar, special love for those who believe in Him. God loves His sheep. God loves His flock. God loves those who believe in Him with a special love, and God loves you with a special love.
This last Friday night, Barb and I went to see the movie, “Antz.” The movie was produced by Steven Spielberg’s company DreamWorks. In the opening scene of the movie (of course it’s an animated feature), this ant named Z is in psychotherapy. This ant is in a psychologist’s office and receiving therapy. Somewhat appropriately, the voice of the ant is the voice of Woody Allen. The ant is just complaining to the therapist. The ant is saying, “When you’re the middle child in a family of 5 million, you don’t get a whole lot of attention.” The ant was complaining about the whole concept of the colony and the whole corporate nature of the colony. The ant concluded his complaints by saying, “I guess it all boils down to this. I feel kind of insignificant.” The psychologist, the therapist, says, “Well, I sense that you’ve made a breakthrough because you ARE insignificant!”
Of course, that is certainly true of an ant colony. That is certainly true of an ant in an ant colony, but it is not true of a person in the body of Christ. It is not true of a person in the church of Christ. It is not true of a sheep in the flock of Christ because God loves us individually.
This last Friday night, we were celebrating Barbara’s birthday. It is actually Barb’s birthday today. We went out Friday night with Heather and Chris. We went downtown in Denver to a restaurant there. As we were driving home, I think maybe just in a moment of nostalgia, we were kind of thinking back. We were missing Drew a little bit because Drew’s away in college. He’s actually studying this semester over in England. Barb remembered a little story about Drew when Drew was just about two years old. Drew was sitting next to Barb on the sofa in our house. Barb whispered in Drew’s ear, “I love you.” Then she turned to Drew and said, “Whisper something soft and sweet in my ear.” You could just see the wheels turning and the gears grinding. Then Drew leans over and whispers in Barb’s ear, “Yogurt.” Of course, not able to think abstractly, he could only think concretely.
But we look back on so many memories with Drew and with Heather. Is it not true that you love your kids individually? You love your memories of your kids individually and they are precious to you. And Jesus wants us to understand that the Father is like that. He loves His people, and He loves us individually and we are precious to Him.
Now there is a second quality of God’s love that we see in this little parable and that is that it’s a seeking love. Not only is it an individual love but it is a seeking love. God’s love seeks us out when we are lost. He goes after those in His flock who have gone astray. It’s a seeking love.
Two weeks ago on Sunday, Barb and I were in Branson, Missouri. I was preaching that Sunday morning to a group of people at a Fellowship of Christian Athletes gathering. They had an FCA board meeting and I am on the national board. Then we had a Tom Landry Weekend, so I was preaching that Sunday morning. I set the alarm for 6:00 AM in our hotel room. I wanted to make sure I got up in time to kind of review some things. The alarm went off at 6:00 and I was so tired, I just did not feel like getting up. I punched the little snooze button there and went back to sleep. I think that gave me about nine minutes and then it went off again. I hit the snooze button again and then I went back to sleep. The alarm went off again. I hit the snooze button again. Barb says to me, “You know, I’m having a hard time sleeping here.”
About 6:30, I got out of bed. I showered, shaved, and got ready. I got dressed. I looked over at the clock by the side of the bed and it said 7:30. It seemed strange to me that it was still so dark outside, so dark. Then I looked at my wristwatch and it said 4:30! I realized that the bedside clock was three hours off. Instead of getting up at 6:00 AM, it was 3:00 AM when the alarm went off.
Well, I was already dressed, and I did not feel like going back to bed. I just kind of wandered around. By the time it was time for the worship service to begin, I just felt so tired. I had to go to the restroom, and I went right into the women’s restroom. You are probably thinking, “How could he be so fogged out?” But whenever I go to these FCA national board meetings, it really is a tiring experience for me.
First of all, the board meetings begin at 7:00 AM in the morning. They have committee meetings which lead to a full board meeting and then an evening program which goes until 10:30. Then they start again the next morning at 7:00 AM. The agenda says you can have breakfast at your leisure, but I’ve never had a 6:00 AM breakfast that was at my leisure. Then the board meeting goes until Friday at 6:00 PM. Then you start the Tom Landry Weekend where people come from all over the country to hear about the Fellowship of Christian Athletes and that program runs all the way through Sunday afternoon when I spoke.
I have been on the board for five years and I go off the board next June. In these last five years, I have written curriculum for their camps, I have done devotionals for their board, and I have given messages at their Tom Landry Weekends. I do not get paid a penny, and yet I am so grateful to have had the privilege of being on that board. I am so grateful to have had a chance to serve, just a little bit, the ministry of the Fellowship of Christian Athletes and I will tell you why. The reason is that the Fellowship of Christian Athletes reflects the seeking love of God. The board, the staff, both national and regional, these are women and men who love Christ and love kids. They have a seeking love for kids. They want to reach kids who have never entered the flock of God and they want to reach those kids who have gone astray as well.
When I went on the board five years ago, FCA was ministering in 3,100 high schools in this nation. Today, FCA is ministering in over 7,000 high schools in America, and it’s all because of a passion and a love which seeks the lost. You see, I believe we have that kind of love here at Cherry Hills Community Church. We seek the lost for Christ’s sake. I believe the love of God is working here to seek those who are lost and to seek those who have gone astray. We have that love in our Sunday school, and we have that love throughout our ministries. It is a love that longs to see people in love with Christ and ministering and enjoying the family of God. This is the love of God, a love which seeks us out.
There is a third quality to the love of God as revealed in this little parable and that is this. It is a blessing love. It is an individual love. It is a seeking love. He seeks us out, and it is a blessing love. It is a love which longs to bless us. This is the love of the Father.
Of course, in the passage in Matthew 18, we’re told that Jesus took the child and placed the child in the midst of the disciples. We are told in Mark’s account that Jesus hugged that child. We are told in Matthew 19 that Jesus blessed the children. We are told that parents brought their children to Jesus in order that He might bless them. He laid His hands on them and blessed them. Indeed, Jesus wants to bless all of the people of God and Jesus wants to bless you as well as your children.
It is a sad thing when a person doesn’t receive the blessing of his or her parents. If you go back to the Book of Genesis and you read the 27th chapter, you read all about Jacob and Esau. You read about that tragic scene when Esau comes in from the fields seeking his father’s blessing—the blessing of the firstborn—and the blessing had already been stolen by his brother, Jacob. You see Esau begging his father to bless him. “Father, do you not have another blessing for me? Bless me too, oh my father. Bless me.” The Bible tells us that Esau wept. You cannot help but feel his pain as he is longing to receive a blessing from his father. Now, I do not want this morning to get into the complexity of the Jewish blessing of the firstborn but just to say that all children need to feel blessed by their parents.
I have counseled for 25 years. I have had people in my office who felt that they were not loved by their parents, people who felt that their parents never believed in them, and in that sense, never gave them the blessing. I think, in a sense, I felt my mother’s blessing from when I was very young. I knew she not only loved me, but I knew that my mom believed in me. With my father, it was a little different. I think my father’s blessing came later. I always knew my father loved me, but it was a little later in life that I sensed my father really believed in me and trusted me. That is very important for a child to receive the blessing of the parents. How many people in our society do not have that blessing? It is hard. And yet the good news in Christ is that the blessing is still available through Christ. The Father still wants to bless us. The Father loves us, and the Father believes in us.
Some of you saw the movie “Stand and Deliver.” It was out a number of years ago. It tells the story of Jaime Escalante, a teacher in the barrio of East Los Angeles, an award-winning teacher. It is an incredible movie. The movie does not portray every episode from Jaime Escalante’s teaching. I read of another episode not in the movie, an episode where Jaime Escalante went to a PTA meeting. At the Parent Teacher Association meeting, a mom came up to him and said, “How is my son Johnny doing in your class?” Well, Jaime Escalante had two Johnnys in his class. One Johnny was a great student and just a delight to have in your class. The other Johnny was a horrible student, kind of a rebel, and a trouble causer and a real pain. Jaime Escalante just kind of assumed that this mother who was talking to him was the mother of the good student because she was at the PTA meeting. He somehow made that link. And so, he said to her, “Well, your Johnny is just a delight. He is just a great student, and it is a pleasure to have him in my class. He’s one of the best students I’ve ever had, and I’m just so pleased to have him in my class.”
The next morning, Jaime Escalante went to his class to teach. The other Johnny came up to him, the Johnny who was the rebel and the bad student. This Johnny said to him, “Mr. Escalante, my mother told me what you told her last night and I just want to thank you.” This Johnny began to cry. He said, “No one has ever wanted me in his class before. No one has ever believed in me like that before.” That Johnny went on to become one of the best students. His whole life turned around because, in this belated way, he got the blessing. Somebody believed in him, or he thought somebody did.
You see, the church of Christ kind of works like that, where we can hopefully bless each other with the love of God and with the love of Christ. Even if you did not get the blessing in your home, you can get the blessing around here because God’s love is a blessing love. He wants us to love each other, and He wants us to believe in each other. God believes in us. He loves us so much He died for us, and He believes in us so much He’s entrusted the gospel to us. He has entrusted ministry to us, and He longs to bless us.
Well, there is a fourth teaching in this little parable and that is that God’s love is a protective love. It is an individual love, a seeking love, a blessing love, and a protective love. In the passage, Jesus tells us that the angels of these little ones always behold the face of the Father in heaven. Jesus tells us, “Woe unto those who causes any of these little ones to stumble.” Jesus tells us, “The Father is not willing that any of these little ones should perish.” You see, God has a protective love.
I think most of you saw on the news last Wednesday night (or perhaps you read in the papers on Thursday morning) about the four teenagers in Greeley who died in a tragic automobile accident. That car was driven by a 16-year-old boy who, only hours earlier, had received his license. One of the children was the son of a local pastor and one of the children was the daughter of a local policeman. It seemed like all four of these kids were great kids and their lives were snuffed out instantly in that tragic automobile accident.
Now certainly, God has the power to protect us all. He has the power to preserve our lives physically on this earth until we all reach a hundred years of age. Certainly, God has the power to do that. But God is more concerned with protecting our souls than protecting our bodies. And so, when He looks at His flock and He looks at His sheep—whether they are children in Sunday school or moms and dads—He is most concerned with our soul and protecting our soul.
I was given a little paper this last week. It actually came to all the staff here at the church to remind us to use our Email correctly, to make sure that we looked in the address book so that we did not send our email messages to the wrong address. This example was given “Mr. Johnson, a businessman from Wisconsin went on a business trip south to Louisiana. He immediately sent an email back home to his wife, Jennifer Johnson, sending the email to jjohnson. Unfortunately, he forgot his wife’s exact email address and the message ended up going to a Mrs. Joan Johnson, jjohnson, of New Jersey, the wife of a preacher who had just passed away. The Preacher took one look at the email and promptly fainted. When she was finally revived by her daughter, she nervously pointed to the message, which read, “Arrived safely but it sure is hot down here!”
Certainly, for all of us it is tragic when we lose somebody we love. It is hard for any of us to lose somebody we love, and I think harder still to think that somebody we love might not be with us in heaven. Jesus wants us to understand, through the parable, that God the Father feels like that. He is not willing that any should perish. He has protective love over the souls of His people. Many come to believe in Him in Sunday school, and maybe go astray and He goes after them because of this protective love and this desire to not lose any that belong to Him. He has this kind of protective love. I think for us, as Christian parents, we take some comfort in that. I know I do. This is a crazy world to seek to raise children in.
In USA Today, at the beginning of this month, on October 1, their cover story was entitled “Struggling to Raise Good Kids in Toxic Times.” According to USA Today, innocence has evaporated in our open-door society. This article points out that, on the surface of things, it looks like a good time to be a kid. I mean, most of the childhood diseases that were so dangerous and so pandemic in generations past, diseases like polio, have totally been eradicated. Millions of middle-class kids have access to computers, and through those computers they have access to knowledge that scholars in prior generations would have loved to have had. And it looks like a good time to be a kid because companies vie to entertain them, from Nickelodeon to Disney. It even looks, in some ways, like a safe time to be a kid, since it’s a world of car seats, bike helmets, and baby monitors. And there are parenting classes.
This ought to be a good time to be a kid, but, according to USA Today, most parents know something is wrong. They know that the culture has become toxic. They know that sex and violence are graphically portrayed in television and in the movies. Pornography is more readily available than ever before. Even the government has had to step in. The government has made television and movie people rate the content of their programs. The government has forced television manufacturers to put v-chips in the sets so parents can block inappropriate programming. But most parents in this country know it’s not working. It’s not working, and most parents feel like they just can’t protect their kids from a culture that’s gone toxic.
According to USA Today’s CNN Gallup poll, nine out of ten parents in this nation believe that it’s harder to raise children today than it was 20 years before. Most parents in America feel that no matter how hard they try, it’s very possible that their kids will go astray because the culture is so toxic. And yet, as Christians, we have this comfort that God has a protective love for us and for our children. I know for Barb and me, that just means the world. We started praying when our kids were born. You feel so helpless, and you make many mistakes—at least I know we did. But you pray for the mercy and the grace of God. Isn’t that how you feel as parents? And it is so great to know that we have a God whose love is protective of His people and protective of their souls.
Finally, as we conclude this service, this little parable tells us that God’s love is a rejoicing love. It’s a rejoicing love. It’s an individual love, a seeking love, a blessing love, a protective love, and it’s a rejoicing love. Jesus tells us that when one sheep from the flock of God has gone astray and comes back, there is joy in heaven. We have a rejoicing Father.
I mentioned earlier that today is Barbara’s birthday, and I’m mindful of one of Barb’s birthdays many years ago when Heather and Drew were very young. I told this story to some of you years ago. Barb and I decided to go to the Hyatt Regency Denver Tech Center for dinner to celebrate Barb’s birthday. We took Heather and Drew with us. We had dinner there. The Hyatt Regency had just opened. After dinner we were walking around, taking a look at this new hotel. There is an elevator there, a glass elevator. Drew looked at the elevator and he wanted to get on the elevator. That was an exciting thing to him and so I said, “Sure.” Heather was there and I asked Heather if she wanted to get on the elevator. At that point in time, Heather was a little bit afraid of elevators, I think particularly glass elevators where you could look out, so Heather did not want to get on the elevator.
I began to encourage Heather to get on the elevator. She really didn’t want to get on the elevator. Then I began to be a little more forceful. I kind of commanded Heather to get on the elevator. Barb said, “Jim, you know…” Barb told me to lighten up, which I should have done. I mean, after all, it was Barb’s birthday. I should have done whatever Barb wanted. For some reason, though, I really pressed, and Heather began to cry. Barb said, “See, I told you so!” Not only was it Barb’s birthday, but the very next day, Barbara and I were leaving for China, and we were going to be gone from the kids for two weeks. What a dumb time for me to try to teach Heather to ride on elevators!
Well, Heather started crying and Barb and I started fighting. We went out of the hotel, out into the Hyatt Regency parking lot. The argument between Barb and I continued. The kids got in the back seat. Barb and I started to argue some more. It got a little more intense. We started driving out and I said, “You know, I’m walking home.” I stopped the car, and I got out of the car and just began to walk. I was foolish enough to feel pretty good about it. I was just kind of walking along there until it dawned on me that I was miles from our house.
Fortunately, Barb had not gone anywhere. She was just driving along the road right next to me, just kind of keeping pace with me as I walked. Heather and Drew had rolled down the windows and they were saying, “Daddy, get back in the car. Please, Daddy.” I felt like… I mean, people were going by and looking… I really felt like a fool (which, of course I was). Finally, after the kids had really been pleading with me, I got back in the car. When I got back in the car, it was amazing how happy Drew and Heather were. I am not sure Barb felt exactly like that, but it is amazing how happy Drew and Heather were. They were so happy I was back in the car. Dad was back in the nest. The prodigal father had returned and there was joy in the back seat.
Isn’t it like that in a family? Sometimes in a family you just want to keep it all together. Children want the parents and parents want the children. You do not want to see your kids go astray, and the kids don’t want to see their parents go astray. You want to keep the whole deal together.
Jesus is telling us in this little parable that that’s how God the Father feels. He wants to keep His family together. That is why He has that protective love. That is why He seeks when we go astray. He wants to keep it all together. He wants to keep us all together. When one of us goes astray and we come back, there is joy in heaven. Celebration. Rejoicing. And so, Jesus wants us to understand, as we look at this little parable, the love that God has for us and the love that God has for our children. He wants us to understand that that love is an individual love. It is a seeking love. It is a blessing love and it’s a protecting love and a rejoicing love. Let us look to the Lord with a word of prayer.