That key is to find Christ in his parables first.
In the past I didn't do that. I would immediately find myself in each parable so I could understand how the parable applied to me.
But I have learned to wait to apply a parable to myself until after I have found the Savior in the parable. I find Christ first. Then I find myself in relation to Him and try to learn the parable's lessons from that point of view.
Take, for example, one of my favorite parables, the Parable of the Lost Sheep in Luke 15:4-6:
"What man of you, having an hundred sheep, if he lose one of them, doth not leave the ninety and nine in the wilderness, and go after that which is lost, until he find it?
"And when he hath found it, he layeth it on his shoulders, rejoicing.
"And when he cometh home, he calleth together his friends and neighbours, saying unto them, Rejoice with me; for I have found my sheep which was lost."
President Dieter F. Uchtdorf spoke about this parable in his April 2016 General Conference talk titled, "He Will Place You on His Shoulders and He Will Carry You Home."
President Uchtdorf commented:
"Over the centuries, this parable has traditionally been interpreted as a call to action for us to bring back the lost sheep and to reach out to those who are lost. While this is certainly appropriate and good, I wonder if there is more to it.
"Is it possible that Jesus’s purpose, first and foremost, was to teach about the work of the Good Shepherd?
"Is it possible that He was testifying of God’s love for His wayward children?
"Is it possible that the Savior’s message was that God is fully aware of those who are lost—and that He will find them, that He will reach out to them, and that He will rescue them?"
(For the complete talk, click here.)
As President Uchtdorf points out, this parable has traditionally been interpreted as a moral call to action for us to be like the shepherd in the story by seeking after those who are lost and bringing them back. This is all well and good.
But President Uchtdorf points us toward a deeper, more personal meaning.
What would happen if we looked to find the Savior in the parable first and then considered how the parable applies to us?
When I look for Christ in this parable, I immediately recognize Him as the Good Shepherd in the story.
If Christ is the Good Shepherd, who am I in the story? Clearly, I am the one lost sheep.
What do I learn from this relationship?
The Savior, as the Good Shepherd, leaves everyone and everything to look for me, His lost sheep, until he finds me. He never gives up. When He has found me, He lays me on His shoulders, rejoicing, and carries me home. Then He calls together all who will come to rejoice with Him, "for I have found my sheep which was lost."
From this I begin to understand how much the Savior truly loves me and values me personally and to what lengths He has gone, and will go, to rescue me and carry me home.
Then . . .
I look again, and I ask who else I might be in the story. Is there more for me to learn about my relationship with the Savior by placing myself somewhere else in the story?
What about the ninety-nine other sheep?
To understand more about how I can relate to the ninety-nine sheep, it helps to look at the context in which this parable was given.
Luke described what was happening just before Christ told the Parable of the Lost Sheep. He wrote that "all the publicans and sinners" drew near unto Christ "to hear him," and "the Pharisees and scribes murmured, saying, This man receiveth sinners, and eateth with them" (Luke 15:1-2).
President Uchtdorf described the situation in this way:
"During the Savior’s ministry, the religious leaders of His day disapproved of Jesus spending time with people they had labeled 'sinners.'
"Perhaps to them it looked like He was tolerating or even condoning sinful behavior. Perhaps they believed that the best way to help sinners repent was by condemning, ridiculing, and shaming them.
"When the Savior perceived what the Pharisees and scribes were thinking, He told [the Parable of the Lost Sheep]."
I ask myself, who was Jesus speaking to?
He was associating and eating with people the Pharisees considered to be sinners, who had come to hear Him. Surely His message of rejoicing over the lost sheep was for them.
But His story was prompted by the Pharisees' murmuring that "[t]his man receiveth sinners, and eateth with them" and seems to have been directed particularly to them.
When thinking about this, it may help to learn a little more about the Pharisees of that day. The LDS Bible Dictionary defines Pharisees as follows:
"A religious party among the Jews. The name denotes separatists. They prided themselves on their strict observance of the law and on the care with which they avoided contact with things gentile. . . . The tendency of their teaching was to reduce religion to the observance of a multiplicity of ceremonial rules and to encourage self-sufficiency and spiritual pride."
With such attitudes, the Pharisees would surely have identified with the "ninety and nine" sheep in the story that were not lost.
Seen in that context, Jesus's story was an invitation for the Pharisees to recognize the love with which He, the Good Shepherd, went to find and rescue His sheep that were lost, and was an invitation to them, as His "friends and neighbours," to rejoice with Him over each lost soul found and brought home.
But I think Jesus was presenting the Pharisees with an even greater invitation, if they would only open their eyes to see and their ears to hear.
After Jesus finished reciting the parable, He said, "I say unto you, that likewise joy shall be in heaven over one sinner that repenteth, more than over ninety and nine just persons, which need no repentance" (Luke 15:7).
Just persons which need no repentance? Surely that is how the Pharisees must have seen themselves. They were the ninety-nine sheep in the story that weren't lost. They strictly followed the Law of Moses and needed no repentance.
I have to stop here and ask myself, how have I been like the Pharisees? How do I identify with the ninety-nine sheep in the parable? Have I seen myself as righteous and others as sinners? Do I see myself as better than others? Do I think in terms of us and them? Where am I being hypocritical? Do I not see my ongoing need for repentance? Do I not see that we are all in this together? Do I not see or acknowledge my own need for the Savior?
I think the pridefulness of such a point of view could have become evident to the Pharisees if they had humbled themselves and pondered on Jesus's use of sheep in this parable. The Pharisees had been schooled in the teachings of Isaiah, the Old Testament prophet, who wrote:
"All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned every one to his own way; and the Lord [our Heavenly Father] hath laid on him [the Savior] the iniquity of us all" (Isaiah 53:6; emphasis added).
I believe Jesus used sheep in this parable for a reason. From Isaiah's words, it becomes obvious that all of the sheep in the parable—even the "ninety and nine"—were lost without the Good Shepherd. When Jesus spoke of ninety and nine just persons which need no repentance, he must have been speaking "tongue in cheek."
Indeed, the Pharisees had great need to repent of their pridefulness, their unrighteous judgment and their hypocrisy. (See Matthew 23.)
We are His sheep. We have all gone astray and have turned, every one of us, to our own way. One hundred percent of us.
But, in a wonderful way, each of us is the "one" lost sheep for which the Good Shepherd leaves everything behind to rescue and carry home! Through His atonement, the Savior finds and rescues each one of us, individually, when we but let Him.
These lessons were apparently so important that Jesus, after relating the Parable of the Lost Sheep, went on to share two other related parables: The Parable of the Lost Coin and the Parable of the Lost Son (also known as the Parable of the Prodigal Son; see also Elder Jeffrey R. Holland's April 2002 General Conference talk titled The Other Prodigal.)
Christ's invitation to the Pharisees was the same invitation He extends to every one of God's children. It is an invitation to come and feast with Him at the table of the Lord.
When we do so, it then becomes our blessing and opportunity to serve as His "under shepherds" by helping to bring others unto Him so they, too, can partake at the Lord's table.
It is not our job to be the Good Shepherd. We are not the One who rescues. Our job is simply to come unto Christ and invite and help others to come with us. The Good Shepherd does all that is needed to find each one of us, place us on His shoulders and carry us safely home.
I am grateful for what I am learning about, and from, finding the Savior first. Christ is my Polar Star. By finding Him first, I am able to find my way—for He is the Way (John 14:6; Alma 38:9).
