“How think ye? if a man have an hundred sheep, and one of them be gone astray, doth he not leave the ninety and nine, and goeth into the mountains, and seeketh that which is gone astray?”
Matthew 18:12 (KJV)
Beloved, if you have ever felt like the one who wandered off, the one who did not fit, the one everyone else seemed to have given up on, this verse is for you.
Who Jesus was talking to
Matthew 18 opens with the disciples asking, “Who is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven?” Jesus answers by calling a little child and setting him in the middle of them. He warns them not to despise “one of these little ones” (verse 10). The parable of the lost sheep comes straight after.
So the story is about how God sees the small, the weak and the easily overlooked. The disciples were thinking about status. Jesus was thinking about the one at the back of the crowd.
Luke tells the same parable in a different setting (Luke 15:4–7). There, the Pharisees were complaining, “This man receiveth sinners, and eateth with them.” Jesus told the story to show them that God goes after people they had written off.
The shepherd goes to the mountains
Notice what the shepherd does. He does not wait at the gate hoping the sheep finds its own way back. He “goeth into the mountains.” He goes where it is hard and dangerous, because that is where the lost one is.
This is the heart of God throughout Scripture. In Ezekiel 34:16 He says, “I will seek that which was lost, and bring again that which was driven away, and will bind up that which was broken.”
More joy over the one
“And if so be that he find it, verily I say unto you, he rejoiceth more of that sheep, than of the ninety and nine which went not astray” (verse 13).
This does not mean the ninety-nine do not matter. It means that the return of the one who was lost brings a particular kind of joy. Then Jesus makes the point plain: “Even so it is not the will of your Father which is in heaven, that one of these little ones should perish” (verse 14).
You were always worth going after.
If you are the one
- Read Matthew 18:10–14 and Luke 15 in one sitting. Let the three “lost” stories in Luke 15 (sheep, coin, son) sink in together.
- Notice that the sheep does not have to find its own way home. It only has to be found.
- If you have drifted from God or from church, tell one person this week. Let yourself be found.
- If someone you love has wandered, pray for them by name every day this week, believing that the Shepherd is already on the mountain.
A prayer
Good Shepherd, thank You that You do not wait for me to find my own way back. Thank You for coming into the hard places to look for me. Where I have wandered, carry me home. And for the ones I love who are still out on the mountains, keep looking until You find them. Amen.
Wear the verse
Our For The 1. collection was made with this verse in mind: the acid-wash hoodie with a bold back print and a hidden sleeve message, and the zip-up version.
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