Luke 15:1-20

1Tax collectors and other notorious sinners often came to listen to Jesus teach.

2This made the Pharisees and teachers of religious law complain that he was associating with such sinful people—even eating with them!

3So Jesus told them this story:

4“If a man has a hundred sheep and one of them gets lost, what will he do? Won’t he leave the ninety-nine others in the wilderness and go to search for the one that is lost until he finds it?

5And when he has found it, he will joyfully carry it home on his shoulders.

6When he arrives, he will call together his friends and neighbors, saying, ‘Rejoice with me because I have found my lost sheep.’

7In the same way, there is more joy in heaven over one lost sinner who repents and returns to God than over ninety-nine others who are righteous and haven’t strayed away!

8“Or suppose a woman has ten silver coins and loses one. Won’t she light a lamp and sweep the entire house and search carefully until she finds it?

9And when she finds it, she will call in her friends and neighbors and say, ‘Rejoice with me because I have found my lost coin.’

10In the same way, there is joy in the presence of God’s angels when even one sinner repents.”

11To illustrate the point further, Jesus told them this story: “A man had two sons.

12The younger son told his father, ‘I want my share of your estate now before you die.’ So his father agreed to divide his wealth between his sons.

13“A few days later this younger son packed all his belongings and moved to a distant land, and there he wasted all his money in wild living.

14About the time his money ran out, a great famine swept over the land, and he began to starve.

15He persuaded a local farmer to hire him, and the man sent him into his fields to feed the pigs.

16The young man became so hungry that even the pods he was feeding the pigs looked good to him. But no one gave him anything.

17“When he finally came to his senses, he said to himself, ‘At home even the hired servants have food enough to spare, and here I am dying of hunger!

18I will go home to my father and say, “Father, I have sinned against both heaven and you,

19and I am no longer worthy of being called your son. Please take me on as a hired servant.”’

20“So he returned home to his father. And while he was still a long way off, his father saw him coming. Filled with love and compassion, he ran to his son, embraced him, and kissed him.