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Parable of the straying sheep:
v. 12. How think ye? If a man have an hundred sheep, and one of them be gone astray, doth he not leave the ninety and nine, and goeth into the mountains, and seeketh that which is gone astray?
v. 13. And if so be that he find it, verily, I say unto you, he rejoiceth more of that sheep than of the ninety and nine which went not astray.
v. 14. Even so it is not the will of your Father which is in heaven that one of these little ones should perish.
A most effective comparison! The picture is that of a mountain meadow, where the shepherd has taken his flock to give them the full benefit of the rich grass. But now it happens that one goes astray, leaving the richness of the meadow for an occasional hummock of bunch grass, exchanging the safety of the shepherd's protecting care for the uncertainty of the gullies and canyons, with the danger of rock-slides and bloodthirsty animals. For the shepherd that one sheep then becomes an object of concern. Leaving the other sheep behind him, he climbs up into the pathless mountains, and searches for the stray. And if he has the good fortune to see his toil rewarded, his joy over that one sheep will be greater than that over the others that have not felt the temptation to leave the meadow in search of adventures. Most solemnly Jesus emphasizes, most solemnly He states the conclusion: In the same manner it is not the object of the heavenly Father's will that even a single one of the lowly and humble disciples be lost, especially not on account of an offense given by a brother in the faith. The Father in heaven has only one will, the will to save; only one desire He has, to save by grace. The idea of a predestination to damnation is as ridiculous as it is blasphemous.