Introduction to the Celebration
Each of us can stand here because the Lord has sought us out
and forgiven us. We call Jesus is ‘our saviour’, but we could just as easily
call him ‘our pardon’ or ‘our reconciliation’ or ‘the One who reveals the
Father’s love to us’. Now we gather to join with Jesus in offering thanks to
the Father for his love, and to grow in our awareness of how we are sought out
and welcomed home by the Christ.
Gospel Notes
The three parables are part of the basic memory of
Christians about the content of the good news, so much so that we could go so
far as to say that if someone did not have these stories in his/her store of
memory, then they would be deprived of some of the keys to how Christians view
God. So it is important that people hear these together as Luke preached them,
but also hear their subtle differences: the first two stories are addressed to
the cause of the welcome the Jesus offered sinners: