TITLE: “The God Who Seeks You Out in Baptism”

Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. Amen. Our text for this morning is Jesus’ parables of the lost sheep and the lost coins.

This morning is a celebration of the grace and mercy of God shown to each one of you in your baptism. For when we talk about baptism and remember our baptism, it is the clearest Gospel you could ever imagine. In order to see this, Jesus preaches to us a couple parables that unlock the mystery of God’s love.

In our text from Luke 15, Jesus is accused of something that seems hard for us to understand. "This Man receives sinners and eats with them." So they said about Jesus. He ate with the lowliest and the weak, the prostitutes, the tax collectors, the lowest echelons of society in Jesus’ day. The Jews of his day could not understand what this great teacher of Israel was doing. Was He crazy? What would people think? Eating with the likes of these sinners. They wouldn’t be caught dead going anywhere near these people.

Now in a strange sort of way, they were right in their criticism, they just didn’t go far enough. Left to our own devices, sin consumes us and takes over. It defines us according to our fallen nature. These people Jesus sat and ate with did not deserve him. He is the king of kings and Lord of Lords, and they did not deserve His gracious presence at the meal. But of course, neither did the Jews. And neither do you. All of us by nature are sinful and fallen. We don’t deserve to even be in God’s presence, far less sit and eat a divine feast with him. Perhaps our new hymn put it best:

2. You were before your day of birth,

Before you saw the daylight,

Condemned and lost with all the earth,

A sinner damned in God’s sight.

For like your parents’ flesh and blood,

Turned inward from the highest good,

You constantly denied Him.

This is our nature state since the fall into sin. None of us deserve God’s grace and mercy. Not Isabella. Not Cody baptized a couple weeks ago. No, none of us deserve God’s love. And because of that, we are all condemned according to His righteous Law.

But God seeks you out. While you were still a sinner, Christ died for you, the ungodly. He seeks you out when it doesn’t even make sense. Think about our parable again. What kind of a crazy shepherd risks losing 99 sheep to go after the 1 that is lost? Cut your losses, man! Don’t risk losing everything for one lowly little sheep! There will be more sheep. Don’t risk it. And yet that is what the love of God does for you. He risks everything. He searches you out. His love is irrational. Crazy. Unthinkable.

Jesus then describes the joy of the sinner who repents like a woman who is going mad trying to find a quarter, the change she brought home from the grocery store. Perhaps you’ve been there. You know it’s in the house. It’s there. But you can’t find it. Every drawer is turned upside down. Every closet emptied. Your family is looking at you like you’ve finally gone over the edge. And when you find this quarter, you throw a block party that costs you hundreds of dollars. Everyone is thrilled to have a party, but I mean really, what’s the big deal about an old quarter. But you know. You had to have it. You had to find it no matter what. It wasn’t about the cost. It was about the fact that it was yours.

This is a pretty good picture of God’s work in Baptism. Baptism works forgiveness of sins, rescues from death and the devil, and brings eternal salvation to all who believe this, as the words and promises of God declare. In baptism God seeks you out, reaches down from heaven itself, and puts His very name onto you. You are signed with God’s holy cross. You are a Christian. Our hymn puts it this way:

6. This holy bath sets free from sin,

Bestowing God’s own beauty.

All those whom Satan bound within

Are freed from sin’s dread duty.

For He Who bears the highest crown—

What He inherits, He hands down

To us, the Father's children.

This great treasure which God gives you in baptism is the most important thing that ever happened to you in your entire life. It’s more important than your earthly birth, if that even seems possible. For in this holy bath God washes away your sins and recreates you in His image, holy and pure, beloved and perfect in every way.

This gift of forgiveness, life, and salvation defines you. In marriage it is the tradition that each spouse wears a ring to symbolize their lifelong love and devotion to their spouse. In baptism, God binds Himself to you with something far stronger than a wedding bond, for He binds you to Him with His own holy precious blood.

That is why in the face of trials, in the face of heartache and struggle, in the face of doubt within and temptations from the devil without, that your Baptism is the bedrock upon which can place your trust. For when you trust in your baptism, you are trusting in Christ Himself. Martin Luther put it this way:

But if we believed that God is speaking to us through parents, pastors, and ministers of the Word, we should feel our hearts inflamed by a wonderful joy. For we should glory as follows, saying: “I am baptized.” By whom? Was it not by a pastor? By no means, but by the Holy Spirit. I have been absolved by the Holy Spirit, by God Himself. Why, then, should I be afraid? Before whom should I be alarmed? Why should I be troubled about my sin? ^{^[1]}

This is why for Christians the world over, their baptism is what holds them to Christ and to everything which comes with Him: forgiveness, life, and salvation. So this day and always, cling to your baptism, for it is your life. In the face of everything that the devil, the world and our own sinful nature may throw at you, stand up with confidence and declare: I am baptized into Christ! I’m a child of paradise. In the name of Jesus. Amen.

And now may the peace of God, which passes all understanding, keep your hearts and minds in true faith unto life everlasting. Amen.

^{^[1]}Luther, M. (1999, c1970). Vol. 6: Luther's works, vol. 6 : Lectures on Genesis: Chapters 31-37 (J. J. Pelikan, H. C. Oswald & H. T. Lehmann, Ed.). Luther's Works (Ge 35:2). Saint Louis: Concordia Publishing House.