Mar. 8, 2013

Luke 15:8-9

Jesus said, “Or suppose a woman has ten silver coins and loses one. Doesn’t she light a lamp, sweep the house and search carefully until she finds it?  And when she finds it, she calls her friends and neighbors together and says, ‘Rejoice with me; I have found my lost coin.’”

Near the top of my pet peeve list: misplacing something.

Recently, Rick and I spent an overnight at my Mom’s house. I had taken along my laptop and used it multiple times. Once home, I realized that I had misplaced a flash drive. This is a little stick I put into a computer USB port to store information. Ridiculously convenient, I use them all the time. Now, the flash drive I use most regularly was missing.

After going through the things I had taken to Augusta, I did not panic but called my sister. It had to be in plain sight at my Mom’s house. She looked with no success. I suggested a few other places. Still no flash drive. I was getting by without it until I realized all the bookwork for our personal finances was on this flash drive. Recently, Rick asked how I was coming on pulling together the information for our taxes. I shared that I had a few more months of bookwork to complete before actually doing our taxes. What I didn’t share is that I could not find the only files with the information for the months I had completed.

How many times could I look through my bags and hope that little flash drive would appear? I contemplated driving the nearly six hours round trip to look for the flash drive myself. It would be less time than recreating the personal finance files, let alone the hundreds of other files.

I was in a meeting yesterday when my sister sent me a text message. She had found the flash drive! It was safety stuck into my Dad’s computer CPU tower. I had put it in there to print something! With the help of priority mail, I should have it today or tomorrow.

Writing about this in a blog is my way of calling some of my friends and saying, “Rejoice with me! I have found my lost flash drive!” The parable of the lost coin is sandwiched between two other parables Jesus told: the parable of the lost sheep and the parable of the lost son. Through three different vignettes, Jesus uses real life situations of losing a sheep, misplacing a coin or a child leaving the home to help us realize that no matter what we have done to distance ourselves from God, God yearns for us to come back. The excitement I felt for finding my lost flash drive is just a smidgen of the excitement God experiences when we pray for forgiveness, choose to worship regularly, allow ourselves to be God’s hands and feet. Any time we choose to do something that terribly pleases God, God wants to through a feast and celebrate!

Sometimes we get tired of being used by God. Other times, we think it is someone else’s “job.” Or we simply fill our lives with secular distractions. We forget God’s rejoicing when we make a godly choice. Too often I put energy into finding the most recent misplaced item in my life rather than putting energy into making myself reconnected with God. Lent is a time to focus on that recommitment and connection with God. I pray we are finding opportunities to do this during Lent.

Thanks for being patient with us, for seeking us even when we don’t want to be found. And you never bore of celebrating when we please you. May we find time this day to reconnect with you in a way that puts a smile on yours or someone else’s face. Amen.

Blessings –

Dianne