You Are Worth Finding

Read Luke 15:1-10. What do you do when you lose something valuable? You search for it. You keep searching for it, until you find it! I recently helped a colleague search his computer for a lost dissertation that disappeared when his computer crashed. It represented a huge amount of work - it was valuable! I was determined to keep searching for it until it was found.

Jesus’ story of the lost sheep shows us that we’re lost only because we’re worth finding. The lost sheep mattered to the shepherd so much that he left the ninety-nine other sheep to find it. At face value that makes no sense: surely, it is better to let one lost sheep go and protect the ninety-nine? But the lost sheep was so valuable it was worth finding.

We matter so much to God that he has set out from the sheep fold to search for and rescue us. God came to earth as a human being - a baby - so that one day he could rescue us by dying on a wooden cross for all the wrong we have done.

God gave up his divine privileges, his glory, and his honour to set out from heaven to rescue us. He did so for one simple reason: because he loves us and believes we are worth finding. We may not fully understand why a shepherd would leave ninety-nine sheep to find one lost sheep. We may not fully understand why God loves us. But we don’t have to understand. We just have to accept it. 

THINK IT OVER

Think about the following:

•          Who do you know who most needs to hear that God loves and values them? How could you reach out to that person today?