Or what woman, having ten silver coins, if she loses one coin, does not light a lamp and sweep the house and seek diligently until she finds it? And when she has found it, she calls together her friends and neighbors, saying, ‘Rejoice with me, for I have found the coin that I had lost.’ Just so I tell you, there is joy before the angels of God over one sinner who repents. (Luke 15:8-10, ESV)
I found it. Three words that flush relief over a golfer’s cortisol when a lost ball is found. The current Rules of Golf have a tight three-minute rule for looking for a lost ball. If the clock strikes one hundred eighty seconds, the golfer must take a stroke and distance penalty and return to where the last golf shot was played. In layman’s terms – add two strokes to your score. There is no way out of incurring the penalty.
Two of Jesus’ parables were about rejoicing when something precious had been lost and then found again. One contrasts the joy when a lost sheep is found (Luke 15:4-7) with rejoicing in heaven (God) when one sinner repents. Jesus then seamlessly slides into the parable of a lost coin.
A silver coin, a drachma, was equivalent to an entire day’s wage of work in the first century. Most homes in the Sea of Galilee region were built with a dark volcanic rock called basalt. Light was scarce in these homes, and a lost coin of such worth would have been extremely hard to see and find in the crevices of the rock. And to really get his audience agitated, Jesus made a woman the hero of the story when she finds the coin in such challenging surroundings.
In the parable of the lost sheep, a sheep is lost because it wandered off. The lost coin was lost inside a house. In other words, Jesus suggests we get lost by wandering away, or we can be lost right where we are. Sometimes our beliefs and choices leave us lost, and at times we feel lost because of harm perpetrated against us (outside and inside the Church).
Either way, there is good news. In her book The Lord is My Courage, author K.J. Ramsey describes God’s love this way, “God leaves behind the ninety-nine pretty and perfect-seeming parts of you to find and restore the one part of you that feels too broken and lost. There is no part of you that the Good Shepherd will not seek and follow to extend goodness and love.”
There is no part of our brokenness (be it anger, anxiety, trauma, depression, bitterness, shame) that is too much for God. There is no crack or crevice that is too dark or dirty. God’s Hesed love (lovingkindness) searches until we are found. “God is too kind to leave you behind,” says Ramsey. And if you’re too weak when he finds you, God will put you on his shoulders and carry you home, rejoicing the whole way.
God’s love is fierce…how do you need to be found today?
Prayer: Lord, help me be honest about where I am feeling lost. Please come find me.