I still remember my mother’s face the day my younger brother went missing. It was 1968. We lived in a small city, about 180 kilometres from Seoul. I was seven years old, in first grade.

I was at school when the heavy classroom door slid open, shattering the quiet. To my great surprise, my mother appeared. I was embarrassed – she wasn’t dressed like the other mothers but wore the simple house clothes Korean women saved for home. She didn’t pause to greet my teacher. As soon as she saw me, she cried out in her familiar loud voice, “Nam Ok! Come out right now. Seong-Pil is gone!” Her voice trembled; her face glistened with sweat. We left the classroom and ran to the playground where Seong-Pil often played. No one had seen him.

Later that day, when I came home, my mother told me she had found my younger brother at the train station. I don’t remember exactly how she discovered him there, but I remember why he went: he wanted to catch a train to Seoul to see our father, who was working and living there at the time.

No one knew how such a small boy had walked so far. My father worked for the government and had just been transferred to Seoul, leaving the family behind. The following year, we moved to Seoul and were reunited; after that, my brother no longer felt any urge to run to a station. My mother was in her mid-30s then. How devastated she must have been, thinking she had lost her beloved youngest child. And when she finally brought him home, the relief was overwhelming. The lost boy was found, and our family rejoiced.

That memory gives me a glimpse into the parables Jesus tells in Luke 15: the lost sheep and the lost coin. At first, the actions of the shepherd and the woman seem baffling. Imagine hearing them for the first time. A shepherd with one hundred sheep notices one missing. To search for it, he leaves the ninety-nine in the wilderness with no protection. Irresponsible, perhaps. And when he finds the sheep, he calls his friends and neighbours and throws a party, likely spending more than the sheep was worth. Is this normal? Hardly.

Or think of the woman. She loses a silver coin. She lights a lamp, burns costly oil, sweeps the entire house, and searches until she finds it. And then she throws a party. From an economic point of view, this is absurd. Who would spend more celebrating than the coin was worth? By conventional wisdom, both the shepherd and the woman look foolish, wasteful, even reckless.
And yet, Jesus says, this is what the kingdom of God is like.

The parables of the lost sheep and the lost coin are often called “twin parables.” They share the same structure: diligent searching, the joy of finding, and celebration. And then they lead into the parable of the prodigal son, where again the climax is the rejoicing. Each story points to the same truth: God’s heart is restless until the lost are found, and heaven rejoices when even one is restored.

Matthew also records a version of the lost sheep, but with a different emphasis. In Matthew, Jesus speaks to his disciples, applying it to church leaders and their duty to care for “the little ones.” In Luke, however, the context is sharper. Jesus addresses Pharisees and scribes who resented that he welcomed tax collectors and sinners. For them, these parables are a rebuke. They reveal God’s radical hospitality, God’s refusal to abandon anyone, and God’s insistence that no one is disposable.

Shepherds themselves were despised in Jesus’ day. Although Israel’s Scripture spoke of God as shepherd, “The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want,” by the first century, shepherds became marginalized, associated with dishonesty and trespassing. So, to cast God as a shepherd was shocking. To cast God as a woman was even more shocking in a patriarchal culture. But Jesus chose these images deliberately. Both shepherd and woman become bearers of God’s action. Both show us a God who crosses boundaries, defies expectations, and does not rest until the lost are restored.

When I think of my mother’s face that day, I begin to understand. To lose a child is unbearable. Nothing matters until the child is found. That fierce, unrelenting love offers a glimpse into God’s heart. If my mother could drop everything, burst into my classroom, and search with desperation, how much more will God search for us when we wander? If our family could rejoice so fully when my brother was found, how much more will heaven rejoice over one sinner restored, one life healed, one lost soul embraced?

The world counts risk and reward, efficiency, and cost. But God’s kingdom uses different math. For God, one lost sheep is worth the risk, one lost coin the search, one lost child everything. What seems wasteful to conventional wisdom is, in God’s wisdom, love.

Love rejoices when the lost are found. That is why each parable ends in celebration. “Rejoice with me,” says the shepherd and the woman. God not only seeks us–God delights in us and throws a party when we are restored.

So what does this mean for us today? It means we, too, are called to seek and to rejoice. We cannot be content with ninety-nine while one is missing. We cannot hoard our oil while a coin is missing. We cannot draw lines between insiders and outsiders, us and them. In God’s eyes, all are beloved and worth the search.

It also means that when we feel lost or far from home, we can trust that God is looking for us. None of us is forgotten. None of us is beyond reach. The shepherd won’t stop; the woman won’t stop. This is who God is–this is love.

And when the lost are found, our response is joy, overflowing, shared with neighbours, mirroring heaven’s joy. So let us be people who seek, who find, and who rejoice. Let us live God’s radical love, crossing boundaries, risking ridicule, pouring ourselves out for the lost, and join heaven’s celebration. In doing so, we let God’s reign take root here in this community. God’s love never gives up; God’s grace never ends; and God’s joy is for all. Thanks be to God. Amen.