Dear Family at Christ Community,

     This Sunday we will gather to learn from Jesus in Luke 15:1-10 of the ridiculous cost and foolish festivity of redemption. As part of our time together, we will be welcomed to the Lord’s Table to be nourished by the lavish grace of God in Christ. Who would bankrupt Heaven of its glory to salvage the passing dust of the earth? Who would send the Creator King to suffer the humiliation of a Suffering Servant for a group of hostile rebel enemies? This sounds like a terrible waste of resources that will only result in failure and loss. However, this can’t be true if the One who bankrupted and sent was sovereign and loving; it can’t be true if the One sent was none other than God Himself in the flesh. Praise be to God that He sovereignly sent Jesus, the exalted King of Heaven and crown jewel of Creation, to suffer as the Servant of all because of His eternal love for His people!  T.W. Manson reflects on this in The Sayings of Jesus: As Recorded in the Gospels to St. Matthew and St. Luke:

“In both parables (in Luke 15:1-10) the point is the same: the endless trouble that men will take to recover lost property, and their deep satisfaction when they succeed. The inference is that the publicans and sinners really belong to God, despite all appearances to the contrary, and that God Himself wants them back and will take trouble to win them back Himself….The characteristic feature of these two parables is not so much the joy over the repentant sinner as the Divine love that goes out to seek the sinner before he repents.”

     The bread and cup help us to remember the cost paid for our redemption in the death and resurrection of Jesus. The elements also nourish us to ridiculously spend and be spent as ambassadors of Christ’s redemption who have access to all the inexhaustible heavenly blessings. Please come to celebrate what God has accomplished by His grace and in anticipation of the eternal good that comes from a forgiven and repenting people!

In Christ,
Cameron