Sermon Tone Analysis

Last week we began a new series called Created for Significance.

I want to begin this week by telling you once again that you are significant in God’s Kingdom.

You have a place in His kingdom.

You have an important role to play.

Today, I want to ask each of you a question.

What’s really important to God? What truly matters to God?

When I was a kid, I use to get in the mail the Highlights kids magazine.

I absolutely loved this magazine.

My favorite part of this magazine was at the very back of the magazine and it was called Hidden Pictures.

It was a picture and in it was several different items that really didn’t belong in the picture but they were drawn into the picture to make it look like they belonged.

They would list those items and then you would search the picture and try to find those items.

I would skip everything else in that magazine and go to that first.

That was my favorite part.

When Mailey was little we got her that magazine for a while as well and I would help her try to find the hidden pictures.

Today, our scripture is about hidden things.

If you have your bibles, go with me to Luke 15.

We are going to look at two of the three stories here and then next week we will look at the third in more detail.

The first two stories are about a lost sheep and a lost coin.

The third story is the most famous.

It is about a lost son.

Let’s begin reading at verse 1.

It is in these stories that Jesus points out the two types of people that God is searching for.

Each of us in this room falls into one of these two categories.

Those two types of people are the fully committed and the lost.

1.

The Fully Committed

Let me begin with the first type of people, the fully committed.

In order to explain this to you, we need to go back to a time in the Old Testament.

There was a well-intentioned king of Israel named Asa.

He came under attack from the neighbor to his north.

Asa was a seasoned king who had been at war several times before, and in those previous battles, Asa’s strategy was to do the best he could to array his troops tactically, and then pray that God would fight for them.

And God always did.

As a result, Asa never lost a battle.

I want to say something right here.

If you ever finding yourself about to go into a spiritual battle, don’t go at it alone.

You will have a much better outcome if God goes with you.

One time, Asa was attacked by a vastly superior force from Ethiopia.

In customary fashion, he arrayed his troops and then prayed.

Here is what it says in 2 Chronicles 14:9-11

This was Asa’s prayer.

Look at what God did.

Verse 14.

That is what it was like for Asa for most of the first years of his reign, but as time went on things would change and several years later when King Asa is older and more established, He is being attacked by a king in the north.

This time though King Asa is reluctant to go into battle.

Now Asa has more to lose than he used to when he was just a young king starting out.

So now, in his conservative days, instead of going to battle, he takes money from his treasury and pays the king of Syria to attack his rival from his eastern flank.

That way Asa risks nothing.

He lets somebody else do his fighting for him.

Something we go to remember, God is always watching.

God was watching Asa closely.

God knows all about the hostile king of Asa’s northern border.

And he is so disappointed when Asa takes the comfortable way out that he sends a prophet to Asa, who name is Hanani.

Go to 2 Chronicles 16:7-9

Do you see what happened here?

God knew the predicament Asa was in.

It was a chance for Asa to do good and express faith.

To be fully committed and prove it.

God needs fully committed people who won’t flake out when it gets hard or there is a lot a stake.

God wants to know how committed you are.

In our stories in Luke 15, you have 3 very committed people.

You have the shepherd that would not leave his lost sheep behind.

You have the woman that lost her coin and searched the house diligently to find and you have the father that would go out and look over the horizon to see if his son was returning.

They were fully committed.

They did not give up on the task at hand.

Are you committed?

Paul was an example of being fully committed.

Once he committed his life to Christ he was fully committed.

Look at what he says in Philippians 1:20-24

You can look at a Christian in two different ways: those who marvel and those who are marveled at.

Greatness comes to the Christian when they become committed to the cause of Christ.

Think about an athlete for a moment.

They become great when they make a total commitment to their sport.

They fully understand the need to do what is best for their bodies.

Their commitments become a matter of life and death.

The committed athlete enjoys a challenge but is always pressing for even greater challenges.

Greatness comes to an athlete who is willing to sacrifice everything.

It is easy to settle for a marginal life.

Most people do.

But God has a better plan for His people: greatness—the kind that comes only through a life of commitment!

Why do we have people here to take care of your children?

So, that we can bring up another generation of believers.

Why do we have people here committed to teaching you God’s Word?

So, that we can give you the answer to any problems that this world will try to throw at you.

God needs fully committed believers to fulfill the calling that God has placed upon your life.

Fully Committed believers matter to God.

Don’t be fully committed only when it benefits you like King Asa.

Be fully committed like Paul.

The second Group of people that matters to God are those that he describes as the lost.

2. The Lost

It is for the lost people that God needs the fully committed.

In our text Jesus tells the stories of three lost items: a sheep, a coin, and a wayward son.

The people He is telling this to is a group of tax collectors, sinners, Pharisees and teachers of the law.

Jesus probably made it a point to reach out to the tax collectors and sinners because those were the lost people that Jesus wanted to reach.

The Pharisees were probably looking on from a distance because to associate with tax collectors and sinners would mean that they were unclean.

And Jesus begins to tell them these stories.

The first one was about a shepherd that lost one sheep.

He had a flock of 100 sheep and one goes missing.

It was not uncommon for sheep to wonder from the flock.

A shepherd would go in search for that one lost.

During Jesus times many rabbis of that time believed that God received the sinner who came to Him the right way.

But in this parable, Jesus teaches that God actively seeks out the lost.