Lost and found

Be reconciled.  Maybe you’ve also heard that theme from this section of Second Corinthians: “if anyone is in Christ, there is a new creation: everything old has passed away; look, new things have come into being!”  I’ve loved these words for their emphasis on newness and getting a fresh start.  But what is a fresh start for? 

There’s a repetition of the word reconciled: be reconciled, God sends Jesus to reconcile the world with God.  To reconcile is to put back together.  If you’re being made new, it’s not for your own entertainment or your own salvation; it’s for the reconciliation of all of creation, the healing of brokenness, the putting-back-together. 

Many years ago, this congregation, Gethsemane Lutheran Church, became a Reconciling in Christ congregation, a designation of the organization Reconciling Works that acknowledges congregations that specifically welcome LGBTQIA+ people, and in case you’re unsure what all those letters stand for, it’s lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer or questioning, intersex, and asexual or aromantic. 

The purpose of this specific welcome is for reconciling what has been broken.  Even if we think our particular congregation isn’t guilty of interpreting Scripture in such a way to equate sexuality with sin, even if we didn’t create or perpetuate the trauma, we still have a duty to speak the truth of God’s love and to speak against the interpretations of Scripture that harm people, beloved children who are created in God’s image. 

The Gospel lesson today comes from a section of Luke’s Gospel where Jesus tells parables of things and people that have been lost—today we read the longer section, the parable about a father and two sons, but there’s also the parable of the lost sheep and the lost coin.  To get a sense of the significance of these stories for people who identify as queer, today I’ll read from Emmy Kegler’s book, One Coin Found.  She’s an ELCA pastor who wrote this memoir, telling her story of coming to God through spiritual trauma and then healing. 

On her website, Kegler notes this: “Congregations that are actively affirming of LGBTQIA+ people are given permission to reprint and use my work.”  That means, hey, because of the welcome we extend, we get access to her work!  I’m reading from the prologue of “One Coin Found.”    

“…What I think, my fellow second sons, is that we were told the truth.  This story is for us.  We are the prodigal son.  …We have been unwanted, rejected, sent away with anger or with sadness at our rebellious streak.  We have seen both glory and starvation, both beauty and pig pens, and we are coming home footsore and heartbroken.  And before the words are out of our mouth, before our perfect speech is performed, God is cloaking our dirty shoulders in the best robe, slipping a ruby ring on our work-worn fingers, cleaning off the pig slobber to slip sandals on our feet, and declaring:  I am so sorry you had to go, and I am eternally glad to have you back again.  These stories, beloved, are for us too.”[1]

May we be reconciled to God in the love of Jesus, and may we be part of God’s reconciling work in all of creation. 

Amen. 

Pastor Cheryl

[1] One Coin Found, © 2025 Emmy Kegler emmykegler.com, page 8.