Resource Detail

May 17, 2026

Rejoicing in Heaven

Luke 15:1-32

Key Verse: 15:7

1. Who are the three parties in this chapter (1-2)? What made Jesus tell the parables (3)?
2. Summarize the parable of lost sheep (4-6). What do you think the lost sheep stands for? What do you say about the shepherd’s searching? What was his reaction when finding the sheep? How does Jesus relate this to joy in heaven (7)?
3. Summarize the parable of lost coin (8-9). Why do you think the woman searched so hard to find the coin? What is the difference from the first parable? What do you think Jesus is emphasizing in the two stories?
4. Summarize the parable of the lost son (11-24). What is unique in this story compared to the first two parables? What part of this story touches your heart and why?
5. Why do you think Jesus added verse 25 through 32?
6. Why do you think Jesus spoke the three parables together? If you choose one word or phrase grabbing your attention from the parables, what is it?

May 17, 2026

Rejoicing in Heaven

Luke 15:1-32

Key Verse 15:7

I tell you that in the same way there will be more rejoicing in heaven over one sinner who repents that over ninety-nine righteous persons who do not need to repent

Today’s passage is about joy. Verse 1 through 3 give us the context of this chapter. Look at verse 1. Tax collectors and sinners were gathering around Jesus. As we know, tax collectors were considered the worst sinner in society. Nobody associated with them. But, according to verse 2, it seems that Jesus not only accepted them, but also very actively welcomed them. Jesus even ate with them. Eating with somebody means fellowship and friendship. There was another group. Pharisees and the teachers of the law muttered, “This man welcomes sinners and eats with them.”

We are very familiar with this kind of situation - Jesus’ welcoming sinners and Pharisees’ accusation. In Luke chapter 5, there is an example. When Jesus called Levi, a tax collector, as his disciple, Levi held a great banquet for Jesus. Many tax collectors came and ate with Jesus. At this, Pharisees complained, “Why do you eat and drink with tax collectors and sinners?” What did Jesus respond to them? “It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick. I have not come to call the righteous but sinners to repentance.” (Luke 5:31-32) This situation now repeats in Luke chapter 15. This time, instead of giving a short answer, Jesus spoke about very long, even three parables in a row. The theme is “Lost and Found.”

Part I. A lost one

In the three parables, we see three different lost ones. A sheep, a coin, and a son. In a sense, these show us three different types of lostness. First, a lost sheep. A man had a hundred sheep, and one of it was missing. Sheep are animals that entirely depend on their shepherd because sheep are defenseless. It doesn’t have any weapons. It doesn’t run fast. Sheep are prone to wandering by nature. But, it doesn’t have good sense of direction. So, once it is lost, it cannot find its way back by himself. And it becomes easy prey to wild animals. One time, Jesus saw a large crowds and he had compassion on them, “because they were harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd.” (Matthew 9:36)

There are people like lost sheep. They know they messed up their lives. Deep inside, they feel something has gone wrong. Somewhere along the way, they made foolish choices and wandered far from where they should be. Now they live under sorrow, regret, and despair. They want to change, but they do not know how to begin and where to turn. They feel utterly lost.

See Matthew, the tax collector. When he was sitting at the tax booth, Jesus saw his heart. His anguish, loneliness, emptiness, confusion, endless guilty feelings. For this kind of people, we do not need to preach on their sins. Because they are already burdened and crushed under their sins. How about the Samaritan woman? She had five husbands. Five broken marriages. Shattered life. Deep shame. She had to come out to draw water at noon to avoid people. My son has been serving in the Korean army for six months now. He’s feeling lonely, stressed, and even abandoned. He stopped attending worship service and started smoking again. He wanted to go back near to God but he’s feeling like just stuck. He longs for fellowship he enjoyed in our church, with Noah, David, Sam, and many missionaries and shepherds. What a great blessing it is that we belong to this beautiful community under the loving care of our Shepherd Jesus. Look around you, on your right and left. Your fellow sheep in Christ. Let us be thankful that God has kept us within His flock.

How does Jesus rescue a lost sheep? He sought them. He found them. To Matthew, Jesus said, “Follow me”. To the Samaritan woman, Jesus revealed himself, “I am He.” These encounters changed their lives forever.

Second, a lost coin. A woman had ten silver coins and lost one. She lights a lamp and sweeps the house to find it. Why does she search for the coin so hard? In those times, drachma or denarius were silver coins. One silver coin was typically a day wage, which is about two hundred dollars today. One silver coin is worth quite significant value. But, this coin is more than just money. In those days, bridegroom often gave ten silver coins to his bride as a wedding gift. Bride wears them as a necklace or headdress. It’s like a wedding ring in our days. It symbolizes love, covenant, and belonging. It’s not a coin, but the coin. It’s so valuable.

What’s the difference between a lost sheep and a lost coin? Lost coin is inanimate object. It doesn’t know it is lost. It is not aware of its own state. It doesn’t know whose it is, who it belongs to, what value it carries. It has no idea. In a sense, much of the world is like this lost coin. People do not realize they are spiritually lost. They do not know who they are, where they came from, or where they are going. They do not understand their true worth or how valuable they are in the eyes of God. When people tested Jesus about paying taxes to Caesar, Jesus said, “Show me a denarius. Whose image and inscription are on it? Then, give back to Caesar what Caesar’s, and to God what is God’s” (Luke 20:25) We, mankind, are like coins bearing the image and inscription of God. That is why we are so precious to Him. To people who are like lost coins, we should remind them who they are, how valuable they are, and to whom they belong.

Third, a lost son. In the last parable, Jesus directly talks about a man, a lost son. What is the difference compared to the previous two? He is a man. He has his own will. So, his lostness is intentional. He chose to leave. He left home deliberately. He loves the far country more than father’s house. He is not simply drifted away like a sheep. He is rebellious. For this kind of lost people, they cannot be found as the way a lost sheep is found. Because they do not want to be found. They prefer their lost condition. So, in the last parable, unlike the first two, we don’t see anyone actively go after the son. The lost and found happens a bit differently. The younger son had to lose all he had and hit the rock bottom of his life. And then, finally he came to his senses. In his misery, he remembered how good his father’s house was. He realized what he had abandoned. He recognized how deeply he wounded his father. He confessed in his heart. ‘Father, I have sinned against heaven and against you. I am no longer worthy to be called your son’

Interestingly, Jesus repeats the son’s confession twice, almost word for word in verse 21. Through this, Jesus is teaching us something about repentance. For a lost son to be found, he must go through repentance. The son honestly faces his misery. He recognizes how deeply he has sinned against God and against his father. He feels the full weight of his sin. He grieves and regrets. Yet this is only the first step. Many people stop here. They spend their whole lives in remorse and self-condemnation, endlessly regretting. But repentance must move on to verse 20. “So he got up and went to his father.” This is the clearest picture of repentance. He got up and went. The journey back is never easy. The farther he had wandered from home, the longer the journey back became. Leaving home must have been quick and exciting like driving a Lamborghini, but now he returns on foot, one slow step at a time. He might have wanted to give up in the middle. But he does not stop halfway. Because now he knows his father’s heart. By trusting his father’s love, he keeps going back. He doesn't need to clean himself up first. He just needs to go back. And he stands before his father and confesses his sins. This is how a lost son is found. Jesus showed us three kinds of lostness. Now Jesus shows us three seekers.

Part II. A shepherd, a woman, and a father

When a shepherd lost a sheep out of a hundred, he could be saying, “Oh, one is missing. It’s unfortunate, but it is inevitable for doing business. It’s only 1% loss. I’ll write it off.” I am a finance manager at a company. One of the jobs I’m doing is reserving some allowances for any potential loss whether it is inventory or accounts receivable, etc. So, once an unexpected loss occurs we offset the loss with the reserve, write off, and move on. But, the shepherd didn’t think that way. To the shepherd, the lost sheep is not merely one out of a hundred. He knows the sheep personally. He calls him by name. The one lost sheep was too precious to just forget about.

What about a woman? When she lost a coin, she also didn’t give up. She turns her house upside down and searches carefully. It is not merely one coin out of ten. The coin carries so deep love and relational value. It’s irreplaceable. To God, a lost sheep is not merely one percent, a lost coin is not merely one-tenth. God seeks each person as if that one person is everything.

I have a friend in California who runs a business. His father served many years as a missionary in Russia. But in his old age, his father was diagnosed with cancer and suffered a lot through a long painful illness before passing away. Watching his father suffer, he was filled with grief and bitterness toward God. He questioned ‘how could a living God allow this?’ People even whispered, ‘He must have had some hidden sin.’ Those words wounded him more. For years, he wept and wrestled with God. Then one day, in the middle of prayer, he heard God speaks. Just two words. “I know.” He said that in that moment, every question, every anger, every sorrow, every bitterness fell away. Since then, following Jesus, he has come to one deep conviction. He said, “I don’t know how, but somehow God seems to love me as if I were the only person in the world.” When we meditate on these parables, it truly seems so. God loves each person individually and completely with undivided heart.

Jesus emphasizes God’s heart with the refrain. “He goes after until he finds, she searches until she finds.” Sometimes we see parents who are searching for a missing child. Some parents are still searching for their child who disappeared over thirty years ago, even fifty years ago. They continue posting signs and handing out flyers. A parent never forgets a lost child. That is the heart of God. Isiah 49:15, “Can a mother forget the baby at her breast and have no compassion on the child she has borne? Though she may forget, I will not forget you!”

This heart is revealed so well in the last parable. When the younger son left home, the father waited. He was determined to wait until his son returned. It could be months or years or decades. But the father never stopped waiting. His waiting is not passive, the father’s waiting is as every bit active and intense as the shepherd finds the sheep, as the woman searches for the coin. How can we know that? Look at verse 20b. “While he was still a long way off, his father saw him.” The father had been watching. He was watching yesterday, he is watching today, and he recognizes his son while the son is still a little spot on the horizon. Then comes one of the most beautiful moments in Scripture. The father runs. This father runs to his son. The father embraces him, kisses him, clothes him, honors him, and celebrates him.

Now we have arrived at the main theme of these parables. “Joy”. In all three parables, the moment of recovery overflows with joy. The shepherd rejoices. The woman rejoices. The friends and neighbors rejoice. The father rejoices, and all the house celebrates. It’s full of joy. Jesus says, this is what heaven looks like when one sinner repents. Look at verse 7. “I 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.” In Jesus’ time, the Pharisees had a saying, “There is joy in heaven when one sinner is purged.” Pharisees believed that heaven’s joy comes from cutting sinners off. But Jesus says the opposite. Heaven rejoices not when sinners are destroyed, but when sinners repent and return. Verse 10, “In the same way, I tell you, there is rejoicing in the presence of the angels of God over one sinner who repents.” Jesus returns again and again to this one central theme, “The joy of the Lord”.

How amazing is this? How can a sinner bring joy to God? I mean, not merely stop grieving God, but please God? Do you know that there is even a place in Scripture where God Himself is singing with joy? We sing praises to God. But one time in the Bible, it says God will be singing with joy. Zephaniah 3:17, “The LORD your God is with you, the Mighty Warrior who saves. He will take great delight in you; in his love he will no longer rebuke you but will rejoice over you with singing.” This is a vision of the day when sinners return through Jesus Christ, being forgiven, made righteous, and restored as God’s beloved children. I find it so amazing that we can become such a joy to God. C.S. Lewis expressed this as “The Weight of Glory”. The fact that we become the source of great joy to God is almost unbearable honor to us.

Personally, I have struggled for a long time with a deep sense of failure. Many sins I had committed kept coming back to me, saying, ‘You’re done. Just give up.’ Although I wanted to return to God, it seemed like my sins were holding me back. And I spent the last ten years in the US almost like ten lost years. I remember when I was called during the first service to introduce myself. I prayed I would not be just a spectator but become a coworker in serving God. But, for many years, I lived almost like a guest. I was not confident that God could truly be pleased with me. But, while meditating on today’s chapter, Jesus’ three parables struck my heart like one, two, three punches. “Rejoice with me.” “Rejoice with me.” “Let’s have a feast and celebrate.” God does not merely accept and forgive sinners, he genuinely rejoices. It reminded me of Nehemiah 8:10b, “Do not grieve, for the joy of the LORD is your strength.” The fact that God rejoices gives us strength. We can take heart because of God’s joy. We can find the courage to keep on repenting and keep on going forward because of God’s joy. I praise our God who finds us, waits for us, and joyfully restores us!

Part III. Pharisees

The third parable is not finished here. There is another son, the older brother. Apparently, the older brother represents the Pharisees. In fact, they appear in each parable. In the first parable, they are the ninety-nine righteous people who think they do not need to repent. In the second parable, they seem to appear as the coin that does not know it is lost. In the third parable, they are the older son who is angry when the prodigal bother is welcomed back.

Jesus could have simply rebuked the Pharisees and walked away. But surprisingly, Jesus lovingly invites them. Notice what the father does. He goes out to him, just as he ran to the younger son. He pleads with him gently. “My son, the father said, you are always with me, and everything I have is yours. But we had to celebrate and be glad, because this brother of yours was dead and is alive again; he was lost and is found.” The parable ends here, without telling us whether the elder son went in. That open ending is intentional. Jesus is leaving the door open for the Pharisees. He is inviting them. He wants them to become friends and neighbors and brothers who rejoice together.

Last night in Korea, World Mission Congress was held. The theme was “Who will go for us?” It connects with the parables today. We have seen what brings God the greatest joy. We have heard what God longs for. It is the lost coming home. We ourselves were once lost. We were found. We are the reason heaven rejoices. And now, we are also called to carry the heart of the father. I pray that all of us may join in the rejoicing of God! Amen.