Who Needs God

A Quick Look: Luke 15: 1-7

Really Read It: Luke 15: 1-32, Romans 8: 23-26

Memorize: Romans 8:25 For God presented Jesus as the sacrifice for sin. People are made right with God when they believe that Jesus sacrificed his life, shedding his blood. This sacrifice shows that God was being fair when he held back and did not punish those who sinned in times past,

At Camp Kids Rule the kids do whatever they want for the whole week. And there are some great things to do. Huge fast water slides. Huge fast monster trucks. Batting cages. Basketball jam fest. Music. Movies. Arcades. And since kids rule at Camp Kids Rule, the kids get to do whatever they want to do all day every day. Nobody tells them when to go to bed or when to wake up. Nobody makes the kids eat breakfast, lunch, or dinner. Nobody forces these kids to do anything, so the kids so just anything.

The cook at Camp Kids Rule makes great food for the 100 kids in her care. The food is always ready in the Dining Hall, but the kids just don’t come to eat. Day after day she waits but the kids don’t come to get food. Finally she hears a faint voice, “I need to eat. Could I please have some food.” The cook rushes out and finds that one kid who needs food to live. She calls her friends and tells that great story over and over. She is happier about that one kids who needs to eat that the 99 who don’t need any food.

Before Luke wrote down the story of the Lost Sheep, he told us the reason for the story. Jesus told the story to religious people to show why he talked to sinners. The religious guys believed that they did everything that God wanted them to do. They thought they had it all right. And one of the things that they did was keep away from guys who didn’t keep all of the rules that they did. They thought Jesus should stay away from those bad people too, so Jesus said,

"Suppose one of you has a hundred sheep and loses one of them. Does he not leave the ninety-nine in the open country and go after the lost sheep until he finds it? ⁵And when he finds it, he joyfully puts it on his shoulders ⁶and goes home. Then he calls his friends and neighbors together and says, 'Rejoice with me; I have found my lost sheep.' ⁷I tell you that in the same way there will be more rejoicing in heaven over one sinner who repents than over ninety-nine righteous persons who do not need to repent.” Luke 15: 4 – 7 NIV

Jesus kept going and told about a woman who lost a coin and a man with two sons. The one about the sons is the longest and, I think, the best so you should read it again after you finish reading this.

The guys that heard Jesus tell the story of the Lost Sheep thought that they were not lost. They saw themselves as the good sheep who stayed with the shepherd. And they saw the sinners, the bad people that Jesus was talking to as the one sheep who got lost. They got those parts right but they missed what Jesus was really saying to them. Another time Jesus answered the same question even more clearly.

“Why does he eat with such scum?”

When Jesus heard this, he told them, “Healthy people don’t need a doctor—sick people do. I have come to call not those who think they are righteous, but those who know they are sinners.” Mark 2:16b – 17 NLT

Now pick 100 people. They could be people from your church, from 100 different churches, from the street of your town, from the street of the town where Jesus told the story. It doesn’t matter. Just pick 100 for this tough question. How many of those people have sinned? How many of those people need God?

The answer is 100. Romans 8:23 says that everyone has sinned. Now think about the guys that Jesus told that story to. They heard about those 99 good sheep and they thought that was them. Their weak brains and their hard hearts missed the easy riddle that Jesus told. Jesus called them “righteous persons who do not need to repent.”

Repent means to turn to God. It is bigger than saying sorry. Repent is to turn away from sin and turn to God, to run toward God. Everyone needs to run to God every day. Every person needs God every day. The ones who think they have God already, they already do it all right are farther away than the sinners who know they need God.

Remember the 100 kids at Camp Kids Rule. How many of those kids needed to eat? All 100. How many of those kids knew they needed to eat? Just one.

How many kids in the world need God? How many think they already have enough of Him? How many kids need to repent? How many don’t know it? How many are far from God? How many think they are close?

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Nathan is amazed to see God move in power every week at his church. You can see what is happening: http://www.worldrevivalchurch.com

You can find more of Nathan’s writing on lulu and helium.