Fourteenth Sunday after Pentecost, September 14, 2025, Proper 19: Jeremiah 4:11-12, 22-28; Psalm 14; 1 Timothy 1:12-17; Luke 15:1-10
For thus says the Lord: The whole land shall be a desolation; yet I will not make a full end. (Jer. 4:12)
So that’s where we are. The world is a mess, but we’re not at the end. Jeremiah, of course, is full of doom and gloom: my people are foolish, they are stupid children, they are skilled in doing evil. Not much hope there. But while the land is a desolation, the Lord did not make an end. As always, the Lord holds out hope that his people will clean up their act. This is the Lord’s history with his people: the good creation, the betrayal of one sort or another, misery and repentance, and then a new chance. With the Lord and his people, it is never a full end. There is always another chance. People can change.
This story is told again and again in the Hebrew scriptures. The teachings of Jesus and his followers pick up on this theme, and make it central.
The section of Paul’s letter to Timothy we read today is an example of how this works. In telling the story of his conversion, Paul recounts his previous life. He was formerly “a blasphemer, a persecutor, and a man of violence“. But he changed, and received mercy. Paul’s account of his gratitude for his second chance suggests its power: grace “overflowed from me with faith and love“. Jesus, he affirms, “came into the world to save sinners“.
In affirming the salvation of sinners as Jesus’ goal, Paul was picking up on the two parables in Luke 15. The Pharisees and scribes were upset that Jesus allowed tax collectors and sinners to be among his followers. In his parables, Jesus suggests an explanation for why he lets the sinners be near him. If you have 100 sheep, and know where 99 are, you worry about the lost sheep. The woman worries about the missing coin, not the ones she has. When you find the lost sheep, or the coin, you celebrate. The one matters, whether one of a hundred or one of ten.
The Pharisees and scribes are not lost: God knows where they are. The sinners are lost, and they are the ones who need to hear what Jesus has to say. There is “joy in the presence of the angels” for one sinner who repents. Just as Paul was able to change, do can and do other sinners.
Sometimes we are the Pharisees, worried about the wrong people getting too close to Jesus. Sometimes we are the sinners, desperate to hear the word. Insofar as we are lost, we can change. Jesus always holds the door open, just as the Lord did in Jeremiah when he did not make a full end. Grace is overflowing.
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