Proper 19: September 12, 2004

Currents in Theology and Mission, August, 2004 by Sarah K. Bunge

In the words of Cool & the Gang, "Cele-brate good times, Come on!" Or maybe you prefer the timeless mantra of Prince--"Party like it's 1999." Join in the party. Be big enough and secure enough to get over yourself so you don't miss the party. Celebrate with others God's merciful acts. If we think this parable is tough to hear, imagine if we read the version of this parable from the Gospel of Thomas: "The kingdom is like a shepherd who had a hundred sheep. One of them, the largest, went astray. The shepherd left the 99 and searched for that one until he found it. After he had labored he said to the sheep, "I love you more than the 99" (107). God's preferential option for the lost is not as overt in Luke as it is in Thomas. Luke's version never looked so docile.

When held all together, there's an obvious tension in these texts. They illustrate the classic Lutheran tension: both/and. We are both precious and prideful; gifted and guilty; saint and sinner; follower and fumbler; valuable and vicious; disciple and dope; loved and lost. Perhaps that is the tension God felt in our first lesson, faced with being both just and merciful.

God bringing disaster on people would have been justice, but God showed mercy. Justice for Saul would have been death, but God showed mercy. Justice would be equally distributed attention to each of the flock, but God shows mercy to the lost. Justice for us is something we do not even dare imagine. As Lutherans, we are make-no-mistake-about-it clear that only by the grace of God can we bask in God's loving presence. Thank God, God is merciful rather than just, or we would all be lost ... to sin, to doubt, to the devil, to death. Ultimately, God is merciful. God's purpose was revealed to us in Jesus who showed, lived, taught, personified, and died God's mercy. Jesus clarified God's intention of mercy to humanity. And Jesus allowed us entry into that mercy, love, and covenant.

Today will be Rally Day for many congregations--a day of new beginnings, restarting programs, reinvigorated children, reenergized congregations, and the refreshing Good News caught and taught through Christian Education. These texts speak clearly to the hungry who come for worship and education. The parables give clear, unmistakable Good News. The radical, merciful love of God is for each of us in Jesus the Christ. Teach it! Share it! Learn it! Live it!

The No Child Left Behind Act is our current administration's attempt to bureaucratize and institutionalize Jesus' parable. More important than test scores or teacher performance, there is a God whose love reaches all. God's mercy has already made sure that none of God's children will ever be left behind, none will be lost, none is forsaken; each one is precious. This initiative, originally articulated by Jesus (not the Bush administration), can be more accurately and boldly lived out by our Sunday schools, sharing God's love with one another and living together in God's gracious mercy.

God is merciful. God remembers promises and holds to covenants even when we fail, forget, or fall short. God is merciful. The Good Shepherd cares for us, actively searches for us, finds us, holds us, waits with us, and celebrates! God's love is greater than wrath, larger than disasters, more profound than suffering, transcendent of our selfishness and pride, our hypocrisy and tendency to judge. God is love. God's grace and mercy is for us. We are precious--each one of us, whether newborn or new to the church, still lost, or never left the flock--we are precious in God's sight! SKB