“[Jesus said,] ‘Or what woman having ten silver coins, if she loses one of them, does not light a lamp, sweep the house, and search carefully until she finds it?'”

What is the value of a single coin?
Not much today, when we make money
with printing upon paper, or with
electronic imagination.

What is the value of a single coin?
It might be little even in those ancient days,
unless, of course, it was a tenth
of everything she owned.

What is the value of a single coin?
It might be food to take me through the day,
or into a coming week,
or possibly next year.

What is the value of a single coin?
Enough to set me searching high and low,
to bear the cost of burning oil in the lamp,
to celebrate the sudden silver gleam amidst the dark.

What is the value of a single coin?
A better question might be this:
What is the value of a single human soul?
Enough, said Jesus, for the heavens to rejoice.

A poem/prayer based on Luke 15:1-10, the Revised Common Lectionary Gospel Reading for Year C, Proper 19 (24).

The image is Parable of the Lost Drachma by Domenico Fetti (1618) – Web Gallery of Art:   Image  Info about artwork, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=15453383.