Jesus says in verses 12-14:
What do you think? If any man has a hundred sheep, and one of them has gone astray, does he not leave the ninety-nine on the mountains and go and search for the one that is straying? If it turns out that he finds it, truly I say to you, he rejoices over it more than over the ninety-nine which have not gone astray. So it is not the will of your Father who is in heaven that one of these little ones perish.
There is a doctrine related to our salvation known to many as “Once Saved, Always Saved.” It is the idea that once you are saved by grace through faith in Jesus Christ you cannot lose your salvation. It is known more in theological circles as the “perseverance of the saints.” However, this passage indicates what I believe to be a greater truth, that this doctrine should actually be called the “preservation of the saints.”
Sheep don’t keep themselves within the flock. They stray. I know my own self, my own tendencies, to forsake the grace that has been bestowed to me my the Lord Jesus. This truth was beautifully captured in the eighteenth century hymn “Come, Thou Fount of Every Blessing”:
O to grace how great a debtor
Daily I’m constrained to be!
Let Thy goodness, like a fetter,
Bind my wandering heart to Thee.
Prone to wander, Lord, I feel it,
Prone to leave the God I love;
Here’s my heart, O take and seal it,
Seal it for Thy courts above.
We are all prone to wander, but it is the Lord who binds us to Himself through the gracious and precious blood of Christ. The Good Shepherd is the One who goes after even the one out of a hundred who are straying away. God will not allow any of those whom He is saving to be lost.
What a comfort! What cause for hope! That no matter how bad we might think it is, if we are ever truly in Christ we are always truly in Christ and He will never allow one of His own to be lost. Praise God through Whom all blessings flow!
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