Today we see Jesus in the company of tax collectors and sinners. They eagerly await His words. The scorn of the Pharisees and scribes is to cast doubt on the integrity of Jesus. In response, Jesus tells three parables with one common thread: God and His closeness to the lost. God does not write off the lost. God rejoices in the finding and the recovery of the lost.

The "lost" parables may resonate with you because you could be lost in the wilderness like the lost sheep. Or, you could be lost in the darkness of your own tightly secured, unlit world like the lost coin. Or, you could be lost and sold to the desires of the flesh like the prodigal son.

St. Paul exhorts the Philippians about his own "lost" condition. His was a tightly secured world of the Law. As far as the Law could make him perfect, he was entitled to be faultless. Yet he was "lost" in his world of self-righteousness. Because of Christ Jesus, Paul considers all the advantages that he had as worthless. The experience of St. Paul, to have been found by Christ Jesus, is a moment of supreme advantage and great rejoicing (Phil 3:8). It inspired Dan Schutte, the liturgical composer, in his song Only This I Want to pen this verse "All but this is loss, worthless refuse to me, but to gain the Lord is to gain all I need."