Luke 15: 1-10

The toll takers and other wrong-doers were drawing near so they could listen to Jesus; and the Pharisees and scribes were grumbling, saying, "This guy welcomes wrongdoers and even eats with them." In light of that attitude, Jesus told this parable: "Which of you, having 100 sheep and losing one of them, does not leave the 99 out grazing and go after the one that is lost, and keeps at it until it is found. When he does find it, he picks it up, lays it on his shoulder in great relief. And when he comes home, he asks his friends and neighbors to come over and celebrate with him: 'I have found the sheep that was lost.' In the same way, I tell you that there will be more joy in heaven over one wrongdoer who gets himself turned around than over 99 people who do not need turning around. Or, putting it another way, what woman having 10 silver coins, if she loses one of them, does not light a lamp, sweep the house and look for it carefully until she finds it? When she finds it, she asks her friends and neighbors over to celebrate her good luck. She says, 'I have found the coin I lost.' In the same way, I am telling you, there is joy in the presence of the heavenly hosts over one wrongdoer who sees the light and gets himself turned around." (Translated and paraphrased by Harry T. Cook.)

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Loss whether by one's misplacing of a thing or by its wandering off of its own volition can be at the least frustrating and at the worst devastating, depending on the value of the lost thing. Loss of a loved one by death or by that living death known as dementia or Alzheimer's disease is a loss that is final and irrevocable. We mourn such a loss and then try in some stable way to put it in perspective and move on.
 
Loss of material things or wealth is another matter. The shepherd is depicted in the parable as having lost one percent of the wealth of which in real first century CE life he would surely have been a steward. The woman lost 10 percent of hers. The shepherd would have been accountable to the owner of the sheep and, in the minds of those who may first have heard the parable, would be facing instant unemployment and who knows what other punitive action against him. The 10 coins it was said the woman possessed would have been thought of as the extent of her funds.
 
The core of this Lucan passage is locatable in Matthew 18: 12-14, and therefore probably in Q as well as in Thomas 107. However, the Thomas version has quite a different feel to it as the shepherd is depicted as saying to the one lost/found sheep, "I care for you more than the other 99." The lost coin part of the parable is exclusively found in Luke as is what follows it: the parable of the second or prodigal son.
 
The concept of sheep and shepherd was probably easier for a first century CE peasant audience to grasp. Sheep are pretty hapless creatures and can get separated easily enough from a flock, even one tended by the best of shepherds. The kind of terrain upon which sheep would graze in Palestine tends to be craggy with many a blind spot for the human being in charge. In fact, 100 sheep (in this text surely a round number given for effect) would present a tough job for the best of shepherds.
 
Yet they do keep track of things. Try to hear the shepherd counting them as they enter the fold towards the close of the day. Try to see the shepherd's face fall when he gets to 99 and has to stop counting.  Does he own the sheep? Or is he a hireling, as John would say (10:12ff)? Either way, if he is true to his vocation, he secures the 99 and sets out as the evening shadows lengthen, back to higher ground where many a danger and hazard await. "If" he finds it (Matthew) or "when" (Luke, Thomas), there is cause for rejoicing because the shepherd doesn't get fired or because the flock's owner retains one percent of his capital.
 
The coins depicted were probably drachmas each worth about what a Roman denarius was worth: approximately a day's wages. So depending on the standard of living at the time the parable was confected and assuming the woman was on her own and therefore relatively powerless, her lost drachma or denarius was about one day's sustenance. At that rate, she would sooner rather than later come to the place where the widow of Zarephath found herself when Elijah showed up in 1st Kings 17: close to death by starvation.
 
The sense of the parable, better understood by sheep than coin, is that the deity conceived of by late first century CE Jesus Jews was thought to have a disposition toward human beings similar to that of the faithful shepherd. One among 100 or one among 10 was valued as much as all 100 or all 10. A dumb sheep cannot ultimately be blamed for its lostness, much less an inanimate coin, though both are valued for different reasons.
 
What of the toll collectors and wrongdoers with whom Jesus is accused of fraternizing? The shortcomings of the "wrongdoers" (or sinners) are difficult to catalogue. But we have a pretty good idea about the toll collectors. They were the ones employed by Rome in Judea and Herod Antipas in the Galilee to demand and receive custom and passage levies. They became known as extortionists because some of them sometimes demanded more than the actual levy and pocketed the difference. That would have made them an object of public scorn and hatred.
 
The wrongdoers or sinners were those "who had made mistakes" or "missed the mark" -- not the miserable, wicked and hopelessly depraved wretches of many a fundamentalist preacher's sermon. Why were they depicted as being attracted to Jesus? Maybe because the depicters themselves were thus attracted as they perceived in the ethical wisdom that was Jesus' legacy a culture of acceptance even of the otherwise marginalized -- an acceptance not dependent upon religious ideology or purity codes but on personal intention and amended behavior. They each were worth saving every bit as much as the lone sheep and the lost coin.
 
The passage starts with toll collectors and wrongdoers who end up in a rather inelegant way being compared to sheep and coins. Lost is lost, however one got sidetracked, marooned, off the path or misplaced. It may have been the indulgent trip off the right road. It may have been at first an innocent flirtation with the forbidden. It may have been a deliberate headlong plunge into the pit. But even while in one of those sets of conditions, there is a beacon sweeping the landscape, letting the lost know the way to come home.
 
In the end, it is human beings who have to do that for one another. The parable sets forth and models the ethic of outreach and unconditional love and forgiveness. It is finally the only way human beings can live together without killing each other.