The Danger of Being Comfortably Lost - The Parable of the Lost Coin
You have never felt lost. That might be the problem.
Everyone loves the lost sheep. Nobody sees himself in the lost coin. A coin doesn’t wander. It doesn’t feel the dark. It lies on a clean floor in a familiar house, perfectly content — and perfectly lost.
Jesus didn’t tell this story to the runaways. He told it to the respectable men at the edge of the crowd, murmuring because He welcomed sinners to His table — the same men He had just told, at their own table, to invite the people who could never repay them. Now they were watching Him do it. And they called it scandal.
So He told them about a woman who lost one coin inside her own house. She did not shrug. She did not settle for the nine. She lit a lamp, swept every corner, and searched until she found it.
Likewise, I say unto you, there is joy in the presence of the angels of God over one sinner that repenteth. (Luke 15:10)
The coin did nothing to be lost. It did nothing to be found. And still Jesus calls the found one a sinner who repents.
This episode is about the decent man. The fair dealer. The golden-rule keeper. The churchgoer sure of his seat. The man with no God in the picture and no sense that anything is missing. The author was that man — a conscientious atheist for decades, who remembers searching for God and was not sure he could believe God had been searching for him.
Until the coin asked one question. Who lit the lamp?
Because when the light comes on, the first thing it shows is not the coin. It is the dust. The discomfort comes first. And nobody comfortable in his lostness ever goes looking.
If you have never felt lost, the coin is your story. Absence of distress is not evidence of safety. The coin never felt distress either.
And if you have started searching — someone was on their knees in that room before you ever knew it was dark.
Don’t take our word for it. Be like the Bereans: they received the word with all readiness of mind, and searched the scriptures daily, whether those things were so (Acts 17:11). Open Luke 15. Read it for yourself. Then ask who lit the lamp in your house.
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