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1 Now the tax collectors and sinners were all gathering around to hear Jesus. 2 But the Pharisees and the teachers of the law muttered, “This man welcomes sinners and eats with them.” ~ Luke 15:1-2
When the lost are found, heaven rejoices! God celebrates when a sinner acknowledges his need and cries out to God for salvation. The heart of God the Father is the heart of a shepherd who is willing to go through hell to find his lost sheep.
The Pharisees lacked the practical understanding that for all of mankind Satan had removed the manhole cover. In doing so, Satan tricked us into an act of rebellion against God in the Garden which became a seemingly never ending horror story. Helplessly mankind has tumbled, aware of our failure and unable to gain control. We crashed to the bottom and helplessly stared into a dark future without God.
When the Lord Jesus showed up on the scene, those who had figured out this quandary, well, we cried out to Him for help. And, God hears all cries from the broken for help.
The religious leaders of Israel found no joy in even availing themselves to the lost, let alone seeing them converted to the truth. These religious leaders lacked a spiritual sense of direction because they lacked a proper understanding of mankind's separation from God. They were the worst kind of shepherds. And, in contrast to them, the Lord Jesus came demonstrating the priority of heaven in saving the lost.
In Luke 15 here, we have three parables. This is the pinnacle of the teaching of the Lord Jesus. And, these are invitations to salvation. And, these stories about salvation, about being lost, being found, and being restored is celebrated by God.
In Luke 15:1-2 we read, "Now the tax collectors and sinners were all gathering around to hear Jesus. 2 But the Pharisees and the teachers of the law muttered, “This man welcomes sinners and eats with them."
These two verses set up the whole chapter. If, we do not understand the context of the chapter, we will conclude the wrong message the Lord Jesus is trying to teach here.
The religious leaders despised tax collectors and sinners. In Luke 5 Matthew invited the Lord Jesus to his house. And, there was a great crowd of tax collectors there. The religious leaders asked, 'Why do you eat and drink with the tax collectors and sinners?'"
The religious leaders only had contempt for the tax collectors whom the religious leaders thought to be the worst of all sinners. This is why they missed the Lord Jesus as the Messiah for He prized anyone broken enough to cry out to Him for help. Despite the fact the religious leaders hadn't acted on their sinfulness quite like the greedy tax collectors, they were just as separated from God. And they did not have "ears to hear."
There was something about the Lord Jesus that didn't push obvious sinners away from Him. He was compassionate. One passage says of Him, "He had compassion upon them, because they were weary and scattered, like sheep having no shepherd."
You see, the Lord Jesus saw people differently than the way we see people. We often see people as an inconvenience. The Lord Jesus saw them as an opportunity, not an inconvenience.
It is significant that Jesus attracted sinners while the Pharisees repelled them. Lost sinners came to the Lord Jesus, not because He catered to them or compromised His message, but because He cared for them. He understood their needs and tried to help them, while the Pharisees criticized them and kept their distance. The Pharisees had a knowledge of the Old Testament law and a desire for personal purity, yet they had no love for lost souls.
Three words summarize the message of this chapter: lost, found, and rejoice. The Lord Jesus spoke these parables to address the accusations of the religious leaders. To them, it was bad enough that Jesus welcomed these outcasts and taught them, but He went so far as to eat a meal with them! They did not yet understand that the Son of Man had “come to seek and to save that which was lost.”
Luke 15 makes it clear that there is one message of salvation: God welcomes and forgives repentant sinners. But these parables also reveal that there are two aspects to this salvation. There is God’s part: the shepherd seeks the lost sheep. But there is also our part in salvation, the prodigal son willingly repented and returned home. To emphasize but one aspect is to give a false view of salvation, for both the sovereignty of God and the responsibility of man must be taught.
The Lord Jesus is happiest when the lost are found. He rejoices because he knows what awaits those who are found. In Heaven, we will at long last, have a heart just like His. We will be separated by all that weighs us down. We will be rescued from the dungeon. And, Satan's manhole cover? Well, let's just say the Lord Jesus remedied that problem by going there for us. And, He won that battle.
