How do we act towards fellow believers? Jesus challenges us to imitate our Father, in our costly commitment towards those the world dismisses.
Compassion
Matthew 18:5-14
5 “Whoever receives one such child in my name receives me, 6 but whoever causes one of these little ones who believe in me to sin, it would be better for him to have a great millstone fastened around his neck and to be drowned in the depth of the sea.
Temptations to Sin
7 “Woe to the world for temptations to sin! For it is necessary that temptations come, but woe to the one by whom the temptation comes! 8 And if your hand or your foot causes you to sin, cut it off and throw it away. It is better for you to enter life crippled or lame than with two hands or two feet to be thrown into the eternal fire. 9 And if your eye causes you to sin, tear it out and throw it away. It is better for you to enter life with one eye than with two eyes to be thrown into the hell of fire.
The Parable of the Lost Sheep
10 “See that you do not despise one of these little ones. For I tell you that in heaven their angels always see the face of my Father who is in heaven. 12 What do you think? If a man has a hundred sheep, and one of them has gone astray, does he not leave the ninety-nine on the mountains and go in search of the one that went astray? 13 And if he finds it, truly, I say to you, he rejoices over it more than over the ninety-nine that never went astray. 14 So it is not the will of my Father who is in heaven that one of these little ones should perish.
This transcript has been automatically generated
What is the worst that could happen? We sometimes ask that to each other. Sometimes the answer is, well, someone could say no, with the implication being that wouldn’t be so bad. What is the worst that could happen? When that question is asked, often the unsaid implication is it wouldn’t be as bad as death.
That could obviously be a pretty bad thing if it could happen at any point, but normally the question is asked because it won’t be that bad, will it? It’ll be something else. Could be the worst that could happen. Well, Jesus also wants us to ask this question, what is the worst that could happen? And Jesus wants us to think, well, there is something that could be worse than death.
Death is not the worst thing that could happen. So this is chapter 18. We’re going to see these words from Jesus in a moment. But again, I’m really keen that we have in mind the context where we are in Matthew’s Gospel. We saw it earlier, but let’s look at it again.
Let’s think again of the way Jesus is going. We’re following Jesus, what he is saying about the route that he is travelling. And we have these 3 repeated predictions of Jesus, but just to make the point, it’d be good to hear them. So who’d like to read the first one, 16:21? Thank you.
From that time on, Jesus began to show his disciples that he must go to Jerusalem and undergo great suffering. At the hands of the elders and chief priests and scribes, and be killed, and on the 3rd day be raised. Brilliant, thank you. The next one we heard this morning, but let’s hear it again. 17:22-23.
Sean. As they were gathering in Galilee, Jesus said to them, the Son of Man is about to be delivered into the hands of men, and they will kill him, and he will be raised on the 3rd day. And they were greatly distressed. Thank you. And let’s look on to 17 to 19, chapter 20.
Rachel. And so, and as Jesus was going up to Jerusalem, he took the 12 disciples aside, and on the way he said to them, see, we are going up to Jerusalem, and the Son of Man will be delivered over to the chief priests and scribes, and they will condemn him to death and deliver him over to the Gentiles, to be mocked and flogged and crucified, and he will be raised on the third day. Thank you. So along this route, and in Matthew’s Gospel, Matthew’s put them in along the way, so we are hearing about other things on the way, but Matthew keeps bringing us back to this to remind us this is the picture, the truth we have to keep in mind. This is the King, Jesus, but this is the way of the King.
This is the way he is going to be suffer and to die and to be crucified. So that’s the way of the King. But as we look at that, Matthew also wants us to know that is not only the way of the King but also the way of the King’s people. It’s for others too. So let’s just again just see briefly what Matthew Jesus shows us about this way of the King’s people as we look in some of these chapters in Matthew’s Gospel.
So Matthew 16. Who’d like to read 24 to 26?
Paul, thank you. 24 to 26. Then Jesus told his disciples, if anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me. For whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will find it. For what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world and forfeits his soul?
Or what shall a man give in return for his soul? Thank you. So the invitation is clear. The King is walking on this way. He invites anyone to join him, but you must follow on that same way.
That’s the journey that he is offering to lie ahead. But of course, the question is, well, what is the destination? So for Jesus, we heard him say, and then rise again. It’s resurrection. What about then for the others who join him on the way.
If anyone’s still in chapter 16, let’s just get the next verse, 16:27. Christabel? For the Son of Man is going to come with his angels in the glory of his Father, and then he will repay each person according to what he has done. So that’s where it is heading. Let’s just see that for more verses.
We’ve just been looking at the parables on the Tuesday evening, and in Matthew 13 The conclusions to 2 of them are very similar, but who’d like to read these for us? Matthew 13:41-43.
Stacy. The Son of Man will send his angels, and they will gather out of his kingdom all causes of sin and all lawbreakers, and throw them into the fiery furnace. In that place there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth. Then the righteous will shine like the sun in the kingdom of their Father.
Thank you. And then 49 and 50, anyone in that chapter? Thank you.
So the teaching of Jesus is very consistent. Let’s just look at one more, chapter 7, Sermon on the Mount, verses 13 and 14, which speaks of the ways and their destinations. So chapters 7, 13, and 14. Duke.
Enter by the narrow gate. Pardon? Yeah, enter by the narrow gate. For the gate is wide and the way is easy that leads to destruction, and those who enter by it are many. For the gate is narrow and the way is hard that leads to life, those who find it are few.
So here is Jesus’ consistent teaching that, well, there are 2 ways, but there is a way, a narrow way, which as we read on then becomes clear it’s the way of the cross. It is the way the King has gone, what goes before his people. All are welcome to follow, but you must do just that, which is follow. And Jesus is very honest and clear. It’s sobering.
He tells us where the destination is. Like, of that way and of the alternative so that you can make the choice. So that’s the context. That’s what we’ve been hearing as we then come to chapter 18, as he speaks of the kingdom. That’s one theme.
Obviously, as we said, it’s one of the other themes. We’ve got this other theme wonderfully that we are in the family. God is our Father. That just teed up, didn’t it? Chapter 18, we saw that.
But the disciples still need to get their heads around this, what it means in practice. We saw earlier the idea of greatness. What does that look like? We are so privileged being a son or daughter of the Father, and yet in our sin we still think the world’s way. But Jesus says, turn, humble yourself, be like a child.
That is greatness in the kingdom. Well, that’s the first 4 verses, but now we’re going to learn more of what it means to be on the way. And the first is we are to receive children. The Evening Standard not long ago printed on its front page— it was simply a photo— a dead father, young daughter, head down. They had drowned trying to cross from Mexico to America.
I mean, it was a stomach-turning, distressing picture for them to print like that. But then we read what Jesus says, verse 5: Whoever receives one such child in my name receives me. But whoever causes one of these little ones who believe in me to sin, it would be better for him to have a great millstone fastened around his neck and to be drowned in the depth of the sea.
So, after the first few verses, we might have thought, well, what then does it look like to humble myself, to be like a child? And Jesus now goes on to say, well, if you’ve done that, one demonstration of that will be that you will receive other children. Or remember the language of this morning, other nobodies. We will welcome them, which of course the world won’t do, but Jesus says you will. Now, why will you do that?
Well, Jesus makes the connection with himself in verse 5. Receive one such child in my name, Jesus says, receives me is very much connected to our response to Jesus. Who would receive Jesus? Now remember which Jesus we are talking about here. We are talking about the Jesus who is on the way of the cross, who is going to be humiliated and suffer and die.
If it is the case that we have grasped that He nevertheless, or even precisely because of that, truly is the Son of God, well, surely then our whole thinking has been changed in how we see things. And so, if we accept a Jesus like that, well, we’ll be different people. And so, therefore, we will receive others like that, nobodies like that, and we’ll do it in Jesus’ name because we have put in our lot with Jesus. We are with him. We understand what it means to be with him.
So, we will receive others. Now, that attitude will be evident, I think, for believers in how you interact with everyone in general, but of course Jesus’ focus here is one particular group. He speaks in verse 6 of the little ones who believe in me. So this fits with what we saw earlier. The Christians are the little ones because they believe in Jesus.
They associate with him, they are like him, so the world thinks they are little nobodies. The world is happy to sideline them, ignore them, look down on them, maybe worse. So then the question is, well, clearly verse 6, what we— how we respond to them is very important. What did it mean to cause one of these little ones to sin? Jesus himself says, don’t do that.
What does it mean to cause them to sin? Now, we might come at this and say immediately, oh, well, that must be for me to do a particularly open and obvious sin, that might be a difficulty for them. Or I might encourage them to do something that is so obviously sinful, maybe even, you know, the kind of sins the world thinks of as sins, those obvious things. And that would be true if we were to do that, that would be to cause them to sin and cause great difficulty. But we can get sharper than that because the phrase to sin here, maybe in your Bible it’s got a footnote, like mine does, which says that actually the Greek specifically here says to stumble.
Whoever causes one of these little ones who believes in me to stumble, it would be better for him to have a great millstone fastened around his neck and to be drowned in the depth of the sea. So the picture is the little one is going in a certain direction, travelling, moving, and if you were to cause him or her to stumble, Well, that would be very serious indeed. And of course, the point is a little one who believes in Jesus is following Jesus on the same way as Jesus. So, to stumble means to stop them going on that way, no longer for them to go the way of the cross. To almost confirm that this is how we’re to read it, look back now to chapter 16.
16. This again, we heard it this morning. This is after Jesus has told Peter that they must suffer like him, and Jesus must suffer. Uh, 16:22-23. Who wants to read that? Anyone?
Thank you, Audrey. And Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him, saying, far be it from you, Lord, Lord, this shall never happen to you. But he turned and said to Peter, get behind me, Satan, you are a hindrance to me, for you are not setting your mind on the things of God but on the things of man. So Peter, almost unbelievably, after saying Jesus is King, says to Jesus, don’t go the way of the cross, far be from you, Lord. But Jesus, of course, says, get behind me, Satan, but then, you are a hindrance to me.
And again, it’s a bit annoying, you’ve got to look in the footnote, but it literally means stumbling block to me, a very similar word to what Jesus then uses in chapter 18. And of course, what does it mean that Peter is a stumbling block? Well, Jesus has just said he’s going to go the way of the cross. Peter is, if you like, trying to knock him off the way of the cross, says, don’t do that. And Jesus says, therefore Peter is being a stumbling block.
And then we turn to chapter 18, and as we’ve heard, we are told not to cause one to stumble like that. If we did that, well, the consequences are serious. So, we therefore need to think, what would it mean for us to cause someone to stumble on the way of the cross? So, it could be the big obvious sins that might immediately come to mind, but how is it, do you think, we would— if there’s a fellow Christian that that we knew, that we had contact with, they saw us, and they were seeking to follow Jesus on the way of the cross, to go the way of being a nobody, how would we have to live, or how might we live, that would be a stumbling block to them? And in some ways, you might say, you wouldn’t necessarily need to be especially sinful in the world’s eyes.
It would be simply for us not to live as if the way of the cross was the way to follow Jesus. In other words, it might be that we lived very worldly, normal lives. We lived for the same sort of things. We didn’t do anything particularly bad in the world’s eyes, but we just, well, lived like the world, did normal things, but with no sense that life now is about being a nobody and is about following Jesus on the way of the cross. Because if we lived like that, we would be telling others, well, just live the normal life, that’s fine.
Whereas clearly anyone living for Christ knows, I can’t do that anymore because I must take up my cross and follow.
So, just the way we use our time, the way we use our money, the way we work, the way we do all those things. I mean, are we standing out from the world or are we giving the impression pretty much you can be a follower of Christ and live just like everybody else. That would be a stumbling block, wouldn’t it? How many times have you and I faced the challenge of living for Christ, but then we see a Christian just living like the rest of the world and you think, well, they can do that, why can’t I do that? Which means then to step off the way of the cross.
So, don’t do that. We could even maybe be even more specific on what it would be to cause another Christian to stumble. Well, let’s say someone in our circles really was living for Christ. They were willing to accept they were nobodies. They were following in Christ’s way.
But what did we do? Maybe we just distanced ourselves from them. Maybe we agreed with our colleagues that really is a bit extreme, isn’t it? Maybe we even highlighted their idiosyncrasies or the difficult things about them. Whatever it was, we didn’t identify with them.
Not that we agree with everything they do, but rather to say, I’m with them. That is the route I’m living. That is my way too, following the Lord Jesus. That is, they are a little one. They are believing in Jesus and it’s costing them.
Well, I must receive them and help them to see that is the way to live for Christ and certainly not be a stumbling block for them. I mustn’t cause others to stumble. So, Jesus goes on in verse 7, woe to the world for temptations to sin or to stumble! For it is necessary that temptations come, but woe to the one by whom the temptations come! So, Jesus is saying the world is a very dangerous place.
He’s not talking about the crime in London or the possible terrorism, or even the natural disasters that might take place. Remember, sin is to stumble. So, the big danger of the world, according to Jesus, is the way of salvation is the way of the cross, and the world will do whatever it can to get you off that way of the cross. It might just say, take it easy, come on over, come and enjoy the good things of life. It might be overt persecution, But as we saw in, well, you can see in the parables, it might just be the cares of the world, the deceitfulness of wealth, all those things in the world that look so normal, everyone does it.
Well, woe to those through whom temptations to stumble come. Jesus is saying you need to rethink what normal looks like, by whose standards, by the world’s or for a follower of the Lord Jesus.
On the way, don’t stumble yourself. It was 2003, Aron Ralston hiking through the national park in Utah. You might have seen the film, might have read the book. He slipped, he fell down a canyon, survived the fall, but a boulder fell after him and pinned his arm, his right arm, against the wall. He was down there for days.
He screamed, no one heard him. He tried everything he could to work his arm free from that boulder where it was pinned. He had some rations of food and water, but it only lasted a few days and they ran out. Search parties were called, but he was down a crevice, down a little canyon. There’s no way he was ever going to be found.
So it was obvious the only hope he had for salvation, if you like, for rescue, was to amputate his own arm. He did have a penknife. He knew he could do it. Obviously, he resisted for long, but then it came to the point where he realised if he didn’t do it, he would die. I mean, what an agonising situation, but he did it and he lived.
Well, look at verse 8. If your hand or your foot causes you to sin, cut it off and throw it away. It is better for you to enter life crippled or lame than with 2 hands 2 feet to be thrown into the eternal fire. And if your eye causes you to sin, tear it out and throw it away. It is better for you to enter life with one eye than with 2 eyes to be thrown into the hell of fire.
Now, this language is obviously very challenging. Jesus has used language like it already. You might remember in the Sermon on the Mount, very similar. And there, if you like, the focus was the sins. Well, it’s lust in particular he’s talking about there, the one we might consider the more obvious sins.
If we struggle in that area, be ruthless, throw the computer out of the window, whatever it takes, don’t do that. But notice now here, he’s using the same language, but the context is, have that same attitude when you think of how you are influencing, for good or ill, other believers. That really matters. That is serious.
So what a challenge. Causing a fellow Christian, if you’re not thinking about it, to stumble is easy to do in all sorts of ways, in the ways we’ve been thinking about. But Jesus says, be radical, do what is costly. Now, say it again, there are reasons why you can see Jesus doesn’t mean to take this language literally. But the symbol is meant to point to an attitude all the more ruthless and serious.
To get into discussion about does he mean it literally, I think, is often a smokescreen to avoid what it means here, because there will be costly ways, decisions I will make, changes that will happen, because I no longer will be willing to allow myself to be a stumbling block, a difficulty to others. I will realise staying on the way of the cross is what I must do, and I must help others to do the same. Well, the strength of Jesus’ language, it is shocking, isn’t it? The question is, do we believe him? Do we believe he thinks it matters this much?
The stakes are high. He says it, not me. But he does say, if you keep going the world’s way, and the world’s way is without a concern concern for fellow believers, it is to head for destruction. So instead, turn, be like a child, go Jesus’ way, and help others to do the same.
So act radically, act decisively to keep yourself and others on the way. And then next, on this way of the cross, on the journey, imitate the Father’s compassion. Right, verse 10. If you’d like to just remind us what it says there, chapter 18, verse 10. Heads are all down, I think, except for Jonathan’s.
Well done. See that you do not despise one of these little ones, for I tell you that in heaven their angels always see the face of my Father. Thank you. So, first of all, do not despise one of these little ones. Don’t hate Christians.
Which I don’t, of course. Jesus, what are you talking about? I don’t despise Christians. You don’t need to tell me to say that. Well, except Jesus does say that to his disciples.
So what does Jesus mean? Well, we read on and then we have this verse about guardian angels. Now, some people are very keen on this verse. They like it a lot, although often it’s fair to say what people mean by guardian angel in no way is backed up and even contradicts what the rest of the Scriptures teach. This is the only place in the Bible where a phrase like that, their angels in heaven, directly appears.
So, the Bible often doesn’t answer the questions that we might ask about it, except of course we are meant to think, what does Jesus mean by it? And ponder it. And when that happens, what do we do? Well, obviously, as we’ve done this weekend already, is context, think, well, does anything else around help us understand what this means? What does the Bible say?
Maybe you’ll start in Matthew, but also think more widely. And to that end, I’m going to give us 2 options. I’ll leave it to you to decide which it is and to have more of a think about it. But either way, you get to the same conclusion, which is why I’m quite happy to do that. But the first one, turn to Matthew 22, verse 30.
So, remember, Jesus was asked this tricky question, what if, you know, 7 marriages, a man dies and the woman has 7 husbands, what happens in the resurrection? But anyway, as Jesus answers, chapter 22, verse 30, who’d like to read that?
Duke again here. For in the resurrection they neither marry nor are given in marriage, but are like angels in Thank you. So, in the resurrection, there’ll be some sense in which we are like angels in heaven. Maybe that gives you lots of other questions, don’t worry about those now. But the point is, Jesus is reminding in chapter 18, it could well be that Jesus is reminding his hearers that someone on the way of the cross who, remember, will look like a nobody, look like a nothing, so weak, well, that person will one day be an angel in heaven, in the presence of God, looking at his face.
Remember, that is— well, you could say it likewise from Matthew— a son of the Father, someone of such significance and value. So of course you are not to despise them, however they might look in worldly ways. So that’s one way of reading it. The other one comes from these— well, putting these next 3 verses together, or let’s have a look at some of those. Psalm 91, which is a great psalm, But have a look at what it says in verse 11, Psalm 92.
Sian, I think. For he will command his angels concerning you to guard you in all your ways. So look at that, speaking to people on earth the language of angels guarding you. Angels, plural again, guarding you in your ways. Now that verse is quoted in the New Testament.
You might be familiar with where it is. Um, but then in Matthew, because we’re in Matthew, Matthew 4:11, Noemi. Then the devil left him, and behold, angels came and were ministering to him. Okay, so here we are, Jesus at the end of the temptations in the wilderness. We are told angels came and ministered to him and served him.
Angels plural. So again, angels come to help one of God’s people. And I put the Hebrews verse in just for the sake of all of you studying Hebrews to see— you can see how it fits in. Hebrews 1, verse 14. Uh, Stacy.
So again, there’s that idea that chapter 1 of Hebrews has got a lot to do with angels, and there one thing in the argument has said that angels are ministering spirits sent out to serve those who are to inherit salvation, which is of course what they do for Jesus. Jesus is going to be saved through his trials, and the Lord sends angels, plural, to serve them. And here again in Hebrews, likewise for us, there are angels who are serving us as those who will be saved. Fits again in Matthew, remember that language, the end of the age, the angels will come and gather in, yes, some to judge, but they’ll also come to gather in those who are to be saved. So, angels have a part to play in our salvation.
Which gets us to the same place as that other way of reading the phrase in Matthew 18, namely, we, God’s people, matter very much. God has assigned his angels to be ministers of our salvation. Again, we don’t overread it and go into the details where we’re not told, but what we are told is for our good, to say God’s spiritual realm is with us, is on our side, and is providing what what we need. And so therefore, Jesus says, chapter 18, verse 10, see that you do not despise one of these little ones, for I tell you that in heaven their angels always see the face of my Father who is in heaven. Again, another way of saying these are very valuable and precious people to God, presumably by contrast to how the world treats them.
But again, we might say, but I don’t despise them, Jesus. Why are you saying this? I’ve got nothing against them, I don’t harm them. But maybe as we reflect on it, maybe we remember that we are to be humble. How would a humble person listen to these words of Jesus?
Well, presumably we begin to realise not despising doesn’t just mean, do I do nothing to hurt them? Or rather, what more positively am I doing to help them? I would maybe be more quick to ask myself, well, if the Lord, if Jesus, the angels are going to value His people so much, what am I doing to help them? If that member of my small group is struggling as a Christian, what am I thinking? Not just, well, whatever, but how can I serve them and help them?
Or maybe there is a Christian in the office because they’re a Christian, because they’re making a stand, is having a really tough time. Oh well, they’re not in my department, or I’m too junior to help. Or how can I serve them? How can I help them? Or children at St Helen’s having to hear the world’s lies rammed down their throats at school all the time.
Well, what can I do to help them? Okay, I’m not in school, but is there anything I might be able to do to help them to stay, even at that age, on the way of the cross. Jesus is challenging you and me, how high up my agenda is serving other Christians in these ways, helping them to keep going, to encourage them? And the answer to motivate them is to pray for them, to be with them, to show we are on their side. You know, did it cross my mind this week, or more generally, the things I am saying and doing, how am I choosing to do them to help others to follow on the way of the cross?
And this understanding that despising means— well, not despising means being proactive— is then confirmed in verses 12 and 13. So, we’re chapter 18, 12 and 13. Who’d like to remind us of those verses? MC, are you— 18:12 and 13. What do you think? If a man has 100 sheep and one of them has gone astray, does he not leave the 99 99 on the mountains and go in search of the one that went astray.
And if he finds it, truly I say to you, he rejoices over it more than over the 99 that never went astray. Brilliant. This is familiar teaching. I’m sure you recognise it, although it’s probably fair to say that most of us find it much more familiar from Luke’s Gospel. It’s in Luke chapter 15.
Do you remember there’s a lost coin, a lost sheep, a lost son. But now the thing to do is to think hard, what is the difference between the same account from Jesus, which has lots of similarities about the one going astray and the shepherd going after them, but what is the difference? Can anyone tell me or have a think? What is the difference between when Jesus tells this similar account in Luke 15:3-7, and here?
MC is smiling, which means he might have an idea.
Go on, MC, tell us what you think. I wonder if one of them is currently a Christian and is brought back into the fold, and the other was never and then becomes a Christian. Yeah, so I think that’s the— just Luke 15 is the lost, which more obviously is speaking of those who are not yet in the fold, the unbelievers. So, you should go out with this effort in your evangelistic efforts in seeking to reach the lost. You know, you’re building up to Luke 19:10, even the Son of Man did not come— well, not that one— the Son of Man came to seek and to save the lost.
So, the lost people, that’s that section there in Luke. Whereas here, Jesus uses the same language, and says we are to have the same attitude towards straying believers, struggling Christians. We are to give ourselves like this. And why do that? Verse 14. Who’d like to read verse 14, chapter 18?
Daniel? So it is not the will of my Father who is in heaven that one of these little ones should perish. Isn’t that amazing? Isn’t that stunning? The 1%, the statistically insignificant, the difficult individuals presumably.
You know, that one sheep that’s going astray, it’s probably the annoying sheep anyway, the one that’s not very cute or cuddly, the one that’s such a hassle. Who cares? I’ve got 99. I can stay with this. We’ll build a lovely whatever you build with 99 sheep together.
We’ll have a great time. I’ll care for them. I’ll look after them. I’ll work really hard for them not to care for that one. But we have here a wonderful glimpse of the compassionate heart of God.
Just, if you like, think of that Christian you find very difficult. Maybe they are straying. Maybe they deserve it. Maybe they are choosing. Maybe they’re being stupid.
They’re going away. Maybe you’ve tried before. Maybe it’d be so much effort. Maybe it’d be hard work. Well, Jesus is saying, think of that, and that is the will of the Father, that that one should not perish but be saved.
And therefore, the point is the Father does not want that one who looks like they are wandering astray to stumble definitively. They need to be brought back. To come on the way of the cross, to rejoin the rest of the sheep. And it’s the Father’s passion that that is happening, because notice we’ve had this very strong language in this passage— the millstone around the neck, the depth of the sea, the eternal fire— but it’s the Father’s will that none should perish. God wants people to be rescued from that.
End. And He uses us, His people, to bring them back and to help them to do that. And so therefore, do not despise them. That is, don’t do nothing. Rather, be like this shepherd.
Don’t think there’s collateral damage. Don’t think there’s the one that there’s nothing you can do about anyway. Think, how can I even help them, support them, chase after them, keep them on the way of the cross. Again, notice the world thinks this is a totally futile effort. I mean, who cares about Christians in the first place?
And who cares about going after the difficult, straying individual Christian? Which again shows us how different the world is to our God. Wonderfully, our God cares. And so, He has given us, therefore, this work to do. Now, it’s obvious that what we’ve heard this morning is so challenging.
We all hear this knowing that we have failed, that we haven’t done this. And I’m sure we begin to realise that actually, if you’re going to talk about one difficult, obstinate sheep that despite however long as a Christian just hasn’t got the message, well, that’s me. I’ve realised I’ve been going astray again. And it’s serious, it matters. But the point, of course, of this passage really ultimately is to then drive us back to look ahead on that way, to see the one who has travelled the way before us, and to see again the only one that never strayed, that never fell off the path, but kept going right to the end.
And of course, Jesus says these things about judgement in this passage, knowing that is why He is on the way heading for Jerusalem. As He says in chapter 20, that’s where He says, the Son of Man did not come to be served but to serve, to give His life as a ransom for many. That is, He knows the judgement that is deserved by all believers and He has willingly, gladly gone that way to bear it for us. So, if we are convicted, then look first ahead to him to realise he’s walked that way. He has done that for us.
Realise again that because of what he has done, we have that wonderful future destination, life with him. And that is what motivates us to strive now, to listen here, and to keep going ourselves on the way of the cross. And as we go the way, it’s not just head down, push on myself. As I go the way of the cross, I will look around, see who’s here, see who I can help to go along the way. As I do, I will act radically, decisively, for my sake, for others’ sake, thinking I must be like my Father who has such compassion for little ones.
I’ll lead us in a prayer.
Father, we do praise you again for that one who went before us, our great Lord Jesus, the Great Shepherd of the sheep. Thank you that he was willing to be like a child, enduring the hatred and opposition and humiliation of the world, to go the way of the cross for the sake of others like us. Thank you that he is truly great. Thank you for that atoning death which does ransomed us. Thank you that we are freed from this future of which these verses speak.
Thank you for the life that is ours in him. But now, as his people, as we continue on the way, would you strengthen us? Would you equip us to keep going? Would you give us compassion like yours for others around us? Help us to serve, and especially this morning as we’ve been thinking about other believers, and in particular those who might be straying.
And we ask it for Jesus’ sake. Amen.
