Perception and Reality

The thoughts you have about God may be the most important thoughts you hold. Whether or not you call yourself a Christian, you have a mental image of who God is. But is it accurate? Because how you view God shapes everything…how you deal with guilt, how you respond to sin, how you believe God responds to you when you are at your worst.

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Jesus asked a question once: 'What do you think? If a man has a hundred sheep, and one of them has gone astray…' That’s the question we’re wrestling with today. What does the shepherd do, what does he feel, what does he think when one of his sheep goes astray?

Analogy at IT work

When I was in college I had an internship working in an IT department. This was a classic IT department, no one really talked with one another. We just sat in our cubicles and did our work. Our cubicles were laid out in large rows and after some time I learned that the man who worked on the other side of my cubicle was a loud talker on the phone.

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I learned so much about that guy because I heard every conversation and every phone call he ever made. I heard him talk to his co-workers. I heard him talk to his wife, And just simply by listening to this mans voice, his mannerisms I built an image of who I thought this guy was and what he looked like.

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Have you ever done that?

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His voice was kind of shrill. So I just imagined this guy was probably scrawny like myself and small.

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Until one day, in the break room, I hear that familiar voice of this man and I turn around to see what he looks like, and I see this tall, muscular, towering man. And my mind was blown. This is not the guy I pictured in my mind. This is not the image I built of what I thought he was going to be like. My perception and the reality were two very different things.‌

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Just as I built a wrong mental picture of who I thought that man was, so we often built a wrong mental image of who God is. We allow our experiences with other humans, our shame, the enemy to define the image of God to us, rather than the scriptures.

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Look at verse 12 with me. “What do you think?” Jesus is asking his disciples to consider, who is God to them and us, when we go astray? Let’s read it:

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What do you think? If someone has a hundred sheep, and one of them goes astray, won’t he leave the ninety-nine on the hillside and go and search for the stray? 13 And if he finds it, truly I tell you, he rejoices over that sheep more than over the ninety-nine that did not go astray. 14 In the same way, it is not the will of your Father in heaven that one of these little ones perish.

We will approach this text from two angles, who is God when we are tempted to go astray and then who is God when we actually go astray.

1- Who is God when we are tempted to go astray?

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“What do you think? IF a man has a hundred sheep, and one of them has gone astray…”

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From the story we know that this sheep was once part of the fold, part of the community. But for some reason or another, it wandered away. That word astray can mean to wander away from the faith on your own accord or to be tempted and led away by a deceiver.

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It is a picture of someone who has spent time with Jesus, but because of outward temptations or inward difficulties they begin to distance themselves from the community of faith and of fellowship with Jesus.

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I need you to understand this you guys…

We are all tempted to go astray

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Our tendency may be to say: “I’m not being tempted to cheat on my spouse, I’m not wrestling with deep sexual sin, I’m not facing a substance addiction dragging me away from God. Therefore… I am not tempted to go astray. I’m safe from this because I’ve been a Christian for 20 years.”

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That’s such a lie. One of the secondary truths from this parable of Jesus is that no matter how long you’ve been part of the fold, you are not immune to the temptations to go astray. It doesn’t matter if you are 7 or 77, if you are a human, you still have sinful flesh part of you. You still have the ability to wander. As the old hymn says:

Prone to wander, Lord I feel it

Prone to leave the God I love

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You sing that, do we believe it? That we are prone to go astray? Peter walked with Jesus intimately for years, and in a moment of weakness because he felt intimated by a little girl, said “I don’t know Jesus”.

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I’m not trying to scare you, but I want you to feel that you are not above, no matter how long you’ve been a follower of Jesus, going astray. The drift away always starts with a few small steps. Sometimes going astray is subtle.‌

Subtle ways of going astray

The sheep can be scared away quickly by a lion, or it can be lured away slowly by grazing on a patch of grass that leads away from the shepherd.

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I believe the devil’s most effective weapon against long standing Christians is not the explosive, life-altaring moment of weakness that blows your life up. He certainly uses that one, but it’s not his most effective weapons. Because when that happens you often are confronted and have to deal with it. Rather, it is the subtle, gradually growing distance between God and ourselves. It is so slow we don’t even notice it. To continue the analogy of Jesus, the sheep did not go astray in one step, but many small ones over a period of time.

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C.S. Lewis in a book called the screwtape letters, which is a fictional story about demons and their schemes to get followers of Jesus to stop following Him. There’s one chapter where this head demon is talking to a “junior demon” about how to really get a someone to fall away from Jesus and he is teaching the junior demon that you don’t always have to use big spectacular, explosive sins to do so, sometimes what is most effective is the slow, gradual, “small” sins like complacency, distraction, or mild self-indulgence:

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You will say that these are very small sins; and doubtless, like all young tempters, you are anxious to be able to report spectacular wickedness. But do remember, the only thing that matters is the extent to which you separate the man from [God]. It does not matter how small the sins are provided that their cumulative effect is to edge the man away from the Light and out into the Nothing. Murder is no better than [distraction] if [distraction] can do the trick. Indeed the safest road to Hell is the gradual one – the gentle slope, soft underfoot, without sudden turnings, without milestones, without signposts.³

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Some of us, our temptation to go astray is not the big moment of weakness where our life implodes over one decision, but rather the small drifting a few steps here because of this decision to flirt, a few steps here because of this attitude, a few steps here because of this unconfessed smaller sin. And a few steps here because of the numbing effect of entertainment addiction.

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Jesus is jolting us awake to our quiet drift.

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Are you aware of this danger in yourself? You can be a member of Ridgedale baptist church, come to sunday school, come to every service, serve in the choir, and the external signs point to you being close to Jesus. But in your heart, it has been a long time since you actually communed with God face to face. Where you sat in private prayer and poured out your heart to Him.

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Busyness in church can easily conceal a heart that has not communed with Jesus in a long time. (repeat) To where on the outside it all looks super spiritual, but your acctual intimacy with Christ is shallow.

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Be aware, the enemy has all kinds of tricks to tempt you astray, and they all aren’t pornography and murder. We all have the propensity to take steps away.

‌So we have a sufficient warning and awareness now, let’s return to our original point:

Who is God to us, when we are tempted to subtly or blatantly go astray?

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You have an image of how God responds to you in weakness, the question is, is it accurate?

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Is he annoyed with our ability to wander? Is he cold and distant, letting us figure it all out on our own? Does he only love us when we are not weak and tempted?

Look at verse 13-14: “And if he finds it, truly I tell you, he rejoices over that sheep more than over the ninety-nine that did not go astray. 14 In the same way, it is not the will of your Father in heaven that one of these little ones perish.”

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If God is crossed armed and cold towards me in my weakness, then I should probably hide my weakness from Him and from others. How you think about God has many implications for your life.‌

But, if God, when he looks at me in my weakness, when I’m in temptation, when the subtle attacks of the enemy and the sinful passion of my heart flare, and I’m tempted to take steps away, if God’s heart and disposition towards me is one of love, and active care, and compassion… then that frees me to actually handle my weakness not with covering it up, but with radical honesty towards God and towards others.

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Your father longs for good for you. And consider the author of Hebrews:

For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who has been tempted in every way as we are, yet without sin. 16 Therefore, let us approach the throne of grace with boldness, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in time of need.

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If Christ has faced temptations, and never relented, he understands what we face even more than we even do in temptations because we have not traveled as deep into the pull of temptation as He has because we give in.

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Application

If this vision of God has gripped your heart, If I feel secure in the love and grace of God that he cares about me in my weakness and wants better for me than sin and going astray,then I don’t have to pretend to be more than I am, than I can actually acknowledge my weakness to my brothers and sisters and ask for their help. That’s one of the implications of this text.

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Do you speak honestly with Christian friends about yourself? Does anyone else know about the secrets of your heart? The pains, the sins, the doubts, the ways you feel tempted to go astray Big or subtle? If the other sheep in the fold know your weaknesses they will help you stay close and if they notice you taking steps away, they will lovingly help you.

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This gets harder the older you get because we often assume if you are 50 years or older and you are a Christian you shouldn’t really struggle with anything anymore. This text is supposed to relieve us of that pressure and allow us to be honest with one another. We will know we understand this text if our church is marked by honesty about our weakness.

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This text frees us to be vulnerable with others and with God because of His deep care for us in our weakness. We don’t have to pretend. If you confess the spark of sin you can save yourself from the forest fire of sin.

2- Who is God when we have already gone astray?

This question and this text get at the very core of our perceptions of God and His reality. How does God respond to me when I choose sin over Him and leave Him? You have an mental picture of how God responds to you in sin , the question is, is it accurate?

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So when you aren’t just facing temptation and weakness, but you’ve stepped into the temptation and it has drawn you so far from God… how does God feel about you?

‌Drowning in shame

I know some of you right now will tune out everything I am about to say, because you are convinced it does not apply to you. You think your sins are too dark, you’re in too deep, and maybe there’s just no hope for you.

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When we are real with ourselves that we’ve gone astray from God, often what suffocates us is not the guilt over what we have done. We know we are guilty, and maybe we even recognize God pardons our guilt.

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But what suffocates us… is our shame. Guilt says I have done bad. Shame says I am bad and worthless and always a screw up. Listen to this story again from Jesus, this text is not primarily revealing God’s heart towards those who feel guilt, but primarily this is revealing God’s heart to those who feel shame because he is speaking directly into our greatest fears that shame screams in us:

What do you think? If someone has a hundred sheep, and one of them goes astray, won’t he leave the ninety-nine on the hillside and go and search for the stray? 13 And if he finds it, truly I tell you, he rejoices over that sheep more than over the ninety-nine that did not go astray. 14 In the same way, it is not the will of your Father in heaven that one of these little ones perish.

To those who are astray, deep in sin,

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Shame says you are worthless because of what you have done, Jesus says you are worth finding so much so that He leaves the 99 to find you himself.

Shame says you are the exception to God’s grace, Jesus says grace eliminates exceptions. This text does not say the shepherd only goes to find sheep who go astray because of certain temptations, any sheep that goes astray, the shepherd goes after.

Shame says you have gone too far into the darkness to turn to the light now, Jesus says the greatest desire of my father is that you be close to Him in the light where you are safe and loved.

Shame says you deserve to be alone and abandoned, Jesus says he is pursuing after you to bring you into fellowship with himself.

Shame says you are only tolerated, not treasured, Jesus says he rejoices when you are found.

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Do you see? Shame speaks to your perceptions of God, it lies to you! The bible speaks to the reality. Let the reality of God’s heart deconstruct your perception of what He is like, because He is far more loving than we often think.

I’m trying to help us see that this story Jesus tells is a window into the heart of God towards us, not when we are at our best, but at our worst.

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Let me show you what this looks like in the real world

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I’m going to use an extreme example to highlight what we’ve been talking about and I use it not for shock factor but to help unlayer what Jesus is saying here which itself is quite provocative. It’s an example of how a lot of us would say… oh man you can’t come back from that. And God reaches into what we recoil from and saves.

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I was listening to an interview of a man who is now a pastor, but his early years of life were marked by darkness. As a late teenager he moved out to hollywood trying to make it as an actor, but after failure and years spent with nothing to show for, he was in a dark place. He had a low self-esteem. He felt like he wasted these years.

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And in this low place he was approached by an agent in the adult film industry, pornography industry to be an actor. And at first he said no. But one evening just sitting in how much of a failure he had been and how he wasn’t worth anything, maybe he could do this to get what he wanted, fame. Belonging.

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That’s often how sin whispers to us, to our deepest pains. This is why we need a gospel that speaks to our pains and fears as well.

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But this man went and he got involved in the adult industry and actually became a pretty prolific actor. He came from a christian family, his mom was so disappointed, so he just isolated himself. And after 6 years, he said he was even more empty than he ever was. It wasn’t the guilt of what he was doing that was driving him into deep darkness, it was the shame. He was disgusting, sinful, a failure, and now he thought his family hated him and God hated him and he was in so deep there was no option but to continue down the path he was on or kill himself.

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“He said, ‘I took so many showers, but none of them could clean me. Because the filth wasn’t on my skin — it was inside me.’”

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It culminated in this day where he thought he should just end it all. He said he had believed so many lies from shame that he just believe them and he wanted to die. And he said I just needed someone to give me permission, to validate everything I thought was true about myself that I was a failure and a screw up. So he took his latest check from a adult film he had done, and he was going to cash it in person. And he hoped the cashier would see what the check was from and say something like “how sick are you?” and that would be what he needed to push him over the edge then he come go back home and take the pills.

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So he walked into the bank and handed the cashier the check, she looked down at it and looked up at him. Then she cashed it and didn’t say anything other than have a nice day.

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And he said I just started sobbing.

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And that cashier got up, came around the desk, and put her arm on his shoulder and said: “Joshua are you ok? Can I help you?” He said that was the first time in 6 years someone had used his real name.

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He said he went home and he called his mom for the first time in a long time, and said he was so sorry and he was so lost. and he prepared for her to tell him all the lies he had been believing about himself. That he was worthless, stupid, too far gone, out of the family.

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He said, as a good southern mama, she cussed me out for not calling her for years. And then she spoke directly against all the lies I had believe. She said, son I love you. Son you are not too far gone, it is not too late. Son I just want you to come home.

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He said that he believes the holy spirit came and met him in that bank and then in the phone call with his mom.

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This guy had gone so far astray, some of it was his fault, some of it wasn’t. He was in what we don’t even want to mention, and God found Him. Did God ever give up on this man? Was there ever a time God said… you know what that’s just too much, too far?

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In your deepest sin and shame, what is the heart of God? Compassion. He looks you in the eye, he calls you by name, and speaks directly against all of the lies shame have spoken. Does God approve of our sin? No. Does He call us to surrender, repentance, and obedience? Yes!

But the main point of this text is that Jesus does not give up on you when you go astray. And this cuts against how we often think about God, assuming his love for us is strongest when we are at our best and that his love is weakest when we are at our worst. But this is not how Christ operates. We see this most clearly in the cross:

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(Romans 5) You see, at just the right time, when we were still powerless, Christ died for the ungodly. 7 Very rarely will anyone die for a righteous person, though for a good person someone might possibly dare to die. 8 But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.

9 Since we have now been justified by his blood, how much more shall we be saved from God’s wrath through him!

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Friends, that’s the heart of our God.

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That young man walked into a bank to get confirmation that he was beyond hope. Instead, God met him through that cashier and through the conversation with his mom. God met this man with grace and compassion and forgiveness. God did not excuse his sin — but neither did He reduce him to it. He was more than what he had done. He was loved.

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So I ask you again, what do you think? When you are tempted to go astray or when you do go astray, who is God to you? Your perception may say, “he’s done with me, ” But the reality from Jesus is this: He is actively pursuing you even in your sin, He will find you, he will clean you, and he will bring you home to himself. And does he do this begrudgingly?

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“when he finds it, truly i tell you, he rejoices.” Rejoicing. This is scandalous grace, our God is worthy of our worship.

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Maybe you are astray today from God, and you want to come home. All it takes on your part is surrender, to finally stop running and turn to Him. His arms are open, if you would like rest.

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After prayer:

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Be honest with someone. You have a space in your bulletin to write down, might I encourage you, if you do not have someone in your life that you are honest about the inside of your heart with, think about who that should be, and write their name down, and then text or call or schedule today to meet with them and talk. Maybe just said he, i’d like to talk about the sermon.

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and tell them you are avalible.