The Church offers for our reflection the parables of mercy—of the lost sheep, the lost coin and the lost son. Knowing to whom these three parables are directed is necessary to grasp the Gospel’s message and capture its purpose.
Today’s passage begins by saying: “Tax collectors and sinners were seeking Jesus eager to hear what he had to say. The Pharisees and the scribes frowned at this, muttering, ‘This man welcomes sinners and eats with them. So Jesus told them this parable …’” (vv. 1-3).
Jesus’ parable was not directed at the so-called sinners but the Pharisees and scribes, who considered themselves righteous. Strange but true: those called to conversion are not the sinners but the righteous!
The Jewish law prohibited them from “associating with the wicked or accepting invitations to dine with publicans and sinners. Jesus not only breached these regulations to go into the houses of such disreputable people to eat with them and even welcomed them in his house – he “received sinners”.
The three parables are the answer of Jesus to the doubts of the Pharisees and scribes to help them review their self-righteous attitudes. Jesus speaks of joy in all three parables, and a feast is organised.
But not everyone is happy to attend this banquet. There is a curious point for our deeper reflection on these parables. Of course, the sinners are the lost coins and the lost sheep. However, the sinners are all already around Jesus. Moreover, Jesus announces that there will be great rejoicing in heaven because the sinners have returned to the Lord and shared the banquet meal with him. However, the so-called righteous ones – the Pharisees and scribes – find this difficult to digest and stay outside the Lord’s banquet. They would probably stay out until they change their attitude.
Israel has always been a pastoral people, and the Bible often speaks of lambs, sheep, and goats and employs the pastoral language to describe the concern, tenderness, and care of God for his people. The famous Psalm 23 reads: “The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want” (Ps 23:1) or the moving scene of Israelites’ return from Babylon: “Like a shepherd, he tends his flock: he gathers the lambs in his arms. He carries them in his bosom, gently leading those that are with young” (Is 40:11). Seeing the large crowd that followed him, Jesus says in the Gospel of Mark—“he had compassion on them for they were like sheep without a shepherd” (Mk 6:34).
The shepherd’s behaviour is unrealistic: he forgets the ninety-nine sheep in the desert until he finds the lost one and runs from house to house, calling friends and neighbours to his feast of happiness.
Rabbis taught that the Lord rejoices in the resurrection of the righteous and the destruction of the wicked. Jesus reverses that teaching. God is pleased not with the destruction but with the return and resurrection of the wicked: “There will be more rejoicing in heaven over one repentant sinner…”
For your reflection:
The parables of mercy teach us that God is not a judge to be afraid of but a friend who always loves. God’s joy is when he can embrace and set free one who is plunged into an abyss of death.
Father Fernando
Armellini SCJ
