Both of this morning's readings are expressions of what in the church we call grace. Grace is a central theme of the Christian faith. God's grace is God's love that comes to us not because of what we have done or not done, not because of who we are or are not, but because of what God is like. God's nature is to love, love unconditionally and inclusively.
The First Timothy reading is the Apostle Paul's autobiographical statement that God's grace came into his life even though he had participated in the persecution of Christians. He writes that Jesus Christ "came into the world to save sinners," to reach out to people struggling with what I call brokenness.
The reading from Luke's Gospel illustrates that point. In the preceding chapter Luke depicts Jesus in the home of a Pharisee, a religious leader of the Jews. Jesus was the dinner guest of the Pharisee. Nothing wrong with that—dinner with the bishop or the moderator of the General Assembly. But then Luke tells us "the undesirables" were getting close to Jesus to hear what he had to say. We know who they are-street people, illegal immigrants, people who are different, etc. And the leaders of the religious community were not amused. Luke says they complained that "This fellow Jesus welcomes sinners and eats with them."
Ordinarily I am happy with the New Revised Standard Version of the Bible published in 1989. Fresh translations make helpful changes to older translations as knowledge of the original languages expands and English usage changes. Sometimes we fall back on the familiar, as we did last Tuesday at the noon service in the sanctuary and the session (governing body of a Presbyterian church) meeting in the evening. It was 9/11, and the Twenty-third Psalm still feels most comforting to people in the King James Version of the Bible.
The New Revised Standard Version of the Bible makes an interesting change in the second verse of the reading from Luke's Gospel that we're thinking about. It says, "...all the tax collectors and sinners were coming near to listen to [Jesus]. And the Pharisees and the scribes were grumbling and saying, 'This fellow welcomes sinners and eats with them.'" They were grumbling. The slightly older version of 1946 says they were murmuring. Grumbling is more blunt. But murmuring may well be more appropriate and evocative.
Any man or woman who has been a pastor for more than ten years knows about the murmuring that goes on in every congregation. Some congregations participate in pitched battles; other congregations do a lot of gossiping; but all congregations murmur. In the Old Testament book of Exodus, which describes the deliverance of the Israelites from slavery in Egypt, there is an incident in which the people complain to Moses in the desert that they were better off in slavery because they at least had enough to eat. The word for what the Israelites did is murmur.
In Jesus' time the religious leaders murmured about how this new teacher and healer carried out his ministry. He seemed to enjoy the company of people who were outside the circle of respectability—well outside, in fact. And so the ministers, elders and deacons murmured, and eventually their murmurs grew to shouts of "Crucify him."
The entire fifteenth chapter of Luke's Gospel is a response to the murmuring or grumbling of the scribes and Pharisees: three wonderful stories about finding what has been lost. This morning we have the first two of the three. The third and longest is dealt with separately—the story of the lost brothers, or the Parable of the Prodigal Son, which was the lectionary text back in March. This morning's stories are about a lost sheep and a lost coin. In both stories there is active searching. A shepherd leaves his flock to find the one lost sheep, and a woman sweeps her house until she finds the small coin she has lost.
At the heart of both stories is what I talk about in most of my sermons—our gospel, our good news about God's unconditional love. God loves the world in an inclusive way. God affirms the goodness of human life and desires fullness of life for all people. The stories of the lost sheep and the lost coin emphasize the active nature of God's unconditional love. These are not stories about the human search for God. They are about God's active search for humankind.
When I hear the story of the lost coin, I think back to 1993 when I had a ten-week sabbatical in Annecy, a town on a lake in the French Alps. I was on a limited budget, allowing myself about a hundred French francs per day for food and entertainment. It was the equivalent of eighteen or nineteen dollars. On one of my last days in Annecy I went to the local supermarket for a few items and also to get a couple of cartons for packing up the books I had shipped over for my time in France.
When I got back to my apartment, I realized I was missing a fifty franc note I was sure I had had in the supermarket. It was half of my daily allotment. I raced back to the supermarket, trying to remember everything I had done. In the store I remembered putting the fifty franc note in my shirt pocket before leaning over some empty cartons in a storage room to see if any were adequate for my packing purposes. I went into the storage room, pushed aside some cartons, and there on the floor was my fifty franc note. I remember my feeling, my elation. I found what I had lost: something of great value to me at the time.
Jesus said that God searches for all of us, for all people, the way I searched for that fifty franc note. And God feels elation when we allow ourselves to be found. I believe that's what "being saved" really means—coming to a clear awareness of who we are in relation to God, other people, and the world. It means feeling good about ourselves in a healthy way because we know we are valued by the loving reality at the center of existence.
When we are "saved" in that sense, we don't have to be resentful that God's goodness reaches out to people we may not like or feel good about. We don't have to murmur when our prayers aren't answered the way we want them to be and other people's prayers are. God still loves us and cares about us, no matter what.
The religious leaders murmured when Jesus extended God's love in ways they didn't understand or like. They must have resented God's graciousness toward people they didn't approve of. They are like the man who was told by an angel he could ask for and receive three gifts from God as long as his neighbor received the same gifts in double measure. He asked for a hundred head of cattle, received them, and was overjoyed until he realized his neighbor had received two hundred head of cattle. He then asked for a hundred additional acres of land, received them, and was thrilled until he learned that his neighbor and rival had received two hundred additional acres of land. For his third request, he asked to be made blind in one eye. And God wept. [Story adapted from The New Interpreter's Bible, Vol. IX, page 298, Abingdon Press, Nashville, 1995]
The capacity for murmuring is part of who we are. And so is the capacity for rejoicing, rejoicing that God is loving to all and merciful to all.
Personally I've murmured, and I've rejoiced. Rejoicing is better.