There is more joy in heaven over one sinner that repents than over the ninety and nine just souls.
Why is that one may be tempted to ask. The ‘right’, traditional answer is so obvious that it doesn’t need investigating further, but supposing we want an answer that doesn’t come out of an authority that is bent on control? Take as a starting point that God is happy and wants us to join in, or take as a starting point that it is the misfits who move evolution along or again, take as a starting point Jung’s oft quoted saying that one person who comes to consciousness is of the value of a thousand who don’t. Any one of those viewpoints may lead us to ask, what is repentance? At root it is turning around, seeing things from the other side, if you like, recognizing our errors and doing things differently. So, the one sinner turns around and sees things differently. What does she see? She sees that the way she has been judging herself for not conforming to the ways she has been taught, for not being good in the ways everyone expects, as everyone else tries (or pretends) to be, she sees this judgement is wrong. She turns around and looks at it from the other side and discovers that, rather than having her joy diminished by guilt, by a sense of getting it wrong, she can rejoice wholeheartedly in the joy of living, knowing that she is, was, and always will be “acceptable in the beloved”.
After being ‘properly’ prayed to by all those sheep who never step out of line, wander off, enjoy the wonders of creation, both silly and glorious or try not to do anything that would displease Jesus, can you wonder at God and the angels rejoicing in the delight of someone who gets the point of it all? Who strives to understands what the Incarnation is all about?
