We would do well to hear God speaking to us through the text today. Perhaps its placement immediately following the story of the shepherd seeking the lost sheep is a necessary corrective. There is always a temptation to idealize ministry in terms of rescue outside the fold. We leap over the sheep we know so well to focus our mission on the lost in the far countries of this world. Living so extensively could be interpreted as escape today.
Mission is on our door step.
We need to live intensively. An integrity is demanded at home. Mission is from the inside out. How easy for us to forget that ministry of reproof, rebuke, admonition and exhortation has been given to the church. A ministry of exhortation can only be given and received in a community of faith grounded in the love and forgiveness of Jesus Christ.