Luke 15:1-16

¹Now all the tax collectors and sinners were coming close to him to hear him.

²The Pharisees and the scribes murmured, saying, “This man welcomes sinners, and eats with them.”

³He told them this parable:

⁴“Which of you men, if you had one hundred sheep and lost one of them, wouldn’t leave the ninety-nine in the wilderness and go after the one that was lost, until he found it?

⁵When he has found it, he carries it on his shoulders, rejoicing.

⁶When he comes home, he calls together his friends and his neighbours, saying to them, ‘Rejoice with me, for I have found my sheep which was lost!’

⁷I tell you that even so there will be more joy in heaven over one sinner who repents, than over ninety-nine righteous people who need no repentance.

⁸“Or what woman, if she had ten drachma coins, if she lost one drachma coin, wouldn’t light a lamp, sweep the house, and seek diligently until she found it?

⁹When she has found it, she calls together her friends and neighbours, saying, ‘Rejoice with me, for I have found the drachma which I had lost!’

¹⁰Even so, I tell you, there is joy in the presence of the angels of God over one sinner repenting.”

¹¹He said, “A certain man had two sons.

¹²The younger of them said to his father, ‘Father, give me my share of your property.’ So he divided his livelihood between them.

¹³Not many days after, the younger son gathered all of this together and travelled into a far country. There he wasted his property with riotous living.

¹⁴When he had spent all of it, there arose a severe famine in that country, and he began to be in need.

¹⁵He went and joined himself to one of the citizens of that country, and he sent him into his fields to feed pigs.

¹⁶He wanted to fill his belly with the pods that the pigs ate, but no one gave him any.