A Woman and her Money--a perfect picture of God

Sermon manuscript for Green Lake Church for Sabbath, August 1, 2015

So Thursday morning about 7:30, I'm sitting on a dock across the street at Green Lake. I'm there for prayer and meditation. The sky was blue. The temperature was in the upper sixties. The lake was still except for ripples raised by the white shells of the rowers. It was glorious, tranquil, charming. Contemplation was easy.

At the opposite end of the dock a couple of boys were setting up to fish. The older looked like he was maybe eleven or twelve. The younger eight or nine. It took a while, but finally they managed to get a hook in the water. A few minutes later, I heard the older brother say, “You watch the pole. I need to run home and get something.”

I returned to my contemplation. Five or ten minutes later a woman came onto the dock. She was dressed in running clothes, had a German wire-haired pointer on a leash. She greeted the boy.

“Hi Ean, where's Nate?”

“He went to get something.”

“Did he go home?” she asked incredulously.

Something about the interaction piqued my interest. Who was this woman? It seemed obvious she and the boys had not started their day together. They had not yet seen each other. Still, her interaction with the boy was warm and comfortable.

Here's how the conversation went:

“How long has Nate been gone?” She asked.

“I don't know.”

“He left you here all by yourself?”

“Yes.”

“When is he coming back?”

“I don't know.”

“I see your bike. Where's your helmet?”

“I forgot it.”

“What? You rode here without your helmet?”

“Yes.”

“Did you have breakfast?”

“Yes.”

“What did you have?”

“Cereal.”

“How long are you going to be here?”

“I don't know.”

“You're sure Nate is coming back?”

“He said he was.”

“You're okay here by yourself?”

“Yes.”

“You warm enough?”

“Yes.”

“Tell Nate to call me, okay?”

“Okay.”

She started to walk away. “Oh, by the way, good morning.”

Ean gave her a little wave.

I laughed. She had to be Mom.

I'm guessing the boys' parents are divorced. The boys spent the night at Dad's house. Maybe they're spending the week or the summer at Dad's house. The conversation gave no hint that the boys were headed back into Mom's world later that day. Still, Mom did what moms do. She interrogated Ean in the interest of making sure her boy was okay.

Where's your helmet? Are you warm enough? Are you okay here by yourself? Did you have breakfast? All those questions were mom-speak for I love you. I care about you. You are precious to me. That last bit, “Oh, by the way, good morning.” came from some book she had read. You're supposed to say good morning. So she said it. But the questions—they came straight from her heart.

Maybe she wasn't mom. Maybe she was Aunt Julie. In the world I grew up in the difference between Aunt and Mom was slight. Aunt Velma and Aunt Louise were as likely to interrogate me about my well-being as Mom was.

If Mom didn't see you eating, when she does see you, even if it's on the dock at Green Lake, she's going to ask, did you have breakfast? When she sees your bike lying there and no helmet, she's going to ask, where's your helmet? That's what moms do? At least most of them. Certain behaviors go with the territory. They are automatic.

It's the same in the story we heard in our Gospel reading today. Jesus began telling a story about a woman. She had ten coins. She lost one. What is going to happen next?

Maybe we need a little background to understand the story. The coins were not dimes or quarters. Each coin was worth a day's pay. How much do you make in a day? At $15 an hour, that's $120. Now, if you make a hundred or two hundred dollars an hour, that's not much. But for the person making $15 an hour, $120 dollars is a lot of money.

In the culture of first century Palestine, most peasants did not handle cash. They grew their own food, made their own clothes and bartered for what they couldn't make or grow. So, ten drachmas, ten silver coins was a significant amount of money. Losing one of those coins was a huge loss. This was disaster.

How did she lose it? When did she lose it? How long has it been missing?

Panic!

Let's call her Maria. Her husband was poor. Her dad had been poor. Her relatives were poor. The neighbors were poor. There are no closets in Maria's house. Maria had nothing to put in a closet. Her only clothes were on her back. Her only pot was on the stove. The entire family slept in a pile in the one room that comprised her house. We would probably call it a hut.

Maria had one treasure, these ten coins. Maybe they had been her wedding dowry. Maybe they were her life's savings? Whatever, they were irreplaceable. She can't just go work an extra day and replace it.

She was startled when she noticed it was missing. She immediately began searching, confident she would find it. She looked beside the stove. She looked under the bed. She looked outside next the log where she sat when she shelled peas yesterday. Panic began to build.

She managed to calm herself. Then started over.

She hauled the bed outside. And the cook pot. She carried out the stack of kindling she had beside the stove. She lit a lamp and then began sweeping, carefully studying the floor as she went. Finally she found it. She fixed the gold coin back to the necklace she wore. Hauled the bed back inside. Set the cook pot back on the stove. Replaced the kindling beside the stove.

Then she ran next door to tell Elizabeth and across the street to tell Naomi. Within minutes the yard was full of women chattering, recounting their own stories of losing and finding, of urgent searching. Of finding. They were happy together.

In the same way, Jesus said, there is joy in heaven over one sinner who turns toward righteousness, one rascal who begins to ask how his actions affect others, self-absorbed parent who begins paying close attention to her children, one self-important clergy or science professor who begins to regard persons as more valuable than ideas.

When a person repents God is delighted.

Jesus makes this same point three times in three stories in Luke 15. The common titles of the stories are “The Lost Sheep,” “The Lost Coin” and “The Lost Son.” But stories really about the Shepherd, The Woman and the Father. In this story of the Lost Coin, Jesus is telling us if you want to understand God, study this woman. We don't need the story to know that sometimes coins get lost. The story is not about the coin, but about the woman's search for the coin, her finding the coin, her happiness at finding the coin. Jesus point is that God is like that woman.

At the core of our faith is this conviction: human character matters to God. When a person turns toward goodness, the ripple of happiness created by that turning runs to the very heart of the universe. The happiness of God in response to a person's turning toward the light is as certain, as assured as the happiness of a woman who has found her lost treasure.

This is the essential core of the theology of Jesus. Jesus makes this point repeatedly. Shepherds respond to lost sheep by searching and finding them. Women respond to lost coins by searching for them anid finding them. Neighbors respond to emergencies by helping their neighbors. Dads take delight in providing good gifts for their children. Doctors do not scold their patients for getting sick. Auto mechanics do not act outraged when I bring them my car—AGAIN!

In worship we celebrate this conviction. God delights in our turning toward goodness. This truth is more important than outrage at the latest ideas of our political opponents. This truth is more important than balancing the scales of justice.

God delights in restoration and correction, not vengeance and punishment. We are invited to contemplate God's character and to cooperate with God in delighting goodness, especially the fragile, tentative goodness of someone who is just turning toward the light after having spent time in darkness.