I understand the woman Jesus talked about in Luke 15: Jesus was telling a series of parables because, as Luke tells us, "All the tax collectors and sinners were coming near to listen to him. And the Pharisees and the scribes were grumbling and saying, 'This fellow welcomes sinners and eats with them!' "

And so Jesus says, "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? When she has found it, she calls together her friends and neighbors, saying, `Rejoice with me, for I have found the coin that I had lost.' Just so, I tell you, there is joy in the presence of the angels of God over one sinner who repents."

This story in Luke stands between two other stories that are much more familiar. The first is the story of the Good Shepherd who put his 99 sheep safe in the fold and then went out into the wilderness to search for the sheep that was lost. The story that follows our story is that of the Loving Father and the Prodigal Son. Both of the other stories are celebrated in art and song.

We are quite accustomed to thinking of God as the Good Shepherd or the Loving Father. We are less inclined and perhaps less comfortable thinking of God in Jesus' third story, the middle story, as the frugal, diligent homemaker. Yet homemaker is a wonderful image for God. After all, she made this big blue marble, the earth, our island home.

As African-American poet James Weldon Johnson says in his poem, "The Creation":

"Up from the bed of the river
God scooped the clay;
And by the bank of the river
He kneeled him down;
And there the Great God Almighty
Who lit the sun and fixed it in the sky,
Who flung the stars to the most far corner of the night,
Who rounded the earth in the middle of his hand;
This Great God,
Like a mammy bending over her baby,
Kneeled down in the dust
Toiling over a lump of clay
Till he shaped it in his own image...."

Since Genesis 1 tells us that God created us all, male and female, in the divine image, James Weldon Johnson might well have said:

"This Great God,
Like a mammy bending over her baby,
Kneeled down in the dust
Toiling over a lump of clay
Till she shaped it in her own image...."

Jesus speaks in Luke 15 of God as a homemaker, carefully saving her bag of coins, diligently searching for the one that is lost.

Now, like the scribes and Pharisees, some people in our society, even those who consider themselves the best of Christians, grumble and complain. They think that some people just deserve to be lost. They write off the poor or the unproductive. They reject inner-city young people who join gangs or suburban teens who become addicted to drugs. They say, "Send `em to prison and forget `em." They want to ignore people with AIDS and they wish gay people would just stay in their closets.

Some of us church people are quite cozy in the warmth of God's little money pouch. Frankly we just don't care whether God finds her other lost coin. Yet God lights the lamp, sweeps the floor, and searches for her coin. When she finds it, she calls her friends and neighbors, saying, "Rejoice with me."

Those of us outside the sheepfold, outside the homemaker's bag, say with Zion in the book of Isaiah, chapter 49: "God has forsaken me, The Lord has forgotten me." Yet God, through the prophet Isaiah reminds us, "Can a woman forget her nursing child, or show no compassion for the child of her womb? Even these may forget, yet I will not forget you. See, I have inscribed you on the palms of my hands."

Like the willful sheep and the prodigal son, even the lost coin has a mind of its own and choices to make. The sheep may hide from the shepherd in a thicket. The prodigal son could have stayed in the far country. The coin can roll far under the bed or hide behind the sofa or between the cracks in the stone floor. Yet God searches and sweeps. God calls our names and waits with open arms to welcome us.

And what does God say when we return? Does God say, "You stupid sheep?" Or, "You dirty little, good-for-nothing coin"? No, she simply rejoices that that which was lost is found. She calls all her friends and tells them her good fortune: the coin that was lost is found. Every penny counts!

As a child one of my favorite songs was:

"Jesus loves the little children,
all the children of the world.
Red and yellow, black and white,
all are precious in God's sight.
Jesus loves the little children
of the world."

As a historian, one of the people I most admire is Pandita Ramabai, a 19th century Indian woman. She was named for the goddess Rama, meaning "brightness," or "light."

"Pandita" was a title given her, meaning "learned one." Within her Hindu home, her parents taught her Sanskrit and encouraged her to study the holy books, something quite contrary to religious custom that usually barred women from such learning. As an adult, Pandita Ramabai found a pamphlet containing the Gospel of Luke. After much study and meditation, she became convinced that she wanted to be a Christian. She also became convinced that she must work to ease the oppression of women in her country.

She was inspired by the prayer of a young Hindu widow, crying, "O Father of the world,

has Thou not created us? Or has, perchance, some other god made us? Dost Thou care only for men? Hast Thou no thought for us women?"

Ramabai founded a home and a school for child widows. She rescued child prostitutes from the streets. During a famine, her resources were stretched to their limits, but she continued to take in girls and to quietly demonstrate her own faith by feeding, clothing, and educating them. Her Mukti Mission continues its work to this day.

Pandita Ramabai knew that, even though her society considered these young women disposable, they were precious in God's sight. They were lost coins worth searching for and treasuring.

If you are an active church member, know that God cherishes you.

If you are older and no longer able to be active, or if you are disabled and cannot get to church, God cares for you too.

If you are a gay man or a lesbian who has given up on Christianity because your church has rejected you, know that God does love you and there are churches who will welcome you.

If you are busy and haven't had much time to even think about God, know that God has been sweeping the room, looking for you.

If you feel like you have screwed up your life so badly that God has washed her hands of you, do not despair. God is searching for you. God's forgiveness and mercy are there for you.

If you are sick and feel like your life is coming to its end, know that God is reaching down to pick you up and to hold you safely in her hand.

As the Apostle Paul assured us in Romans, Chapter 8: "I am convinced that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord" (Rom. 8:38).

Nothing can separate you from the love of God.

David Hardin: There is a lot of confusion about the role of women in the church. We are hearing about it a lot. It wanders all around us and there is a lot of frustration and anger in looking at it. As a founder of the Evangelical Women's Caucus, you are clearly in this arena. Why did you start the Caucus? What was that all about?

Nancy Hardesty: Actually the Caucus -- we call it a caucus because it came out of Evangelicals for Social Action -- was one of the emphases within that organization, and then we started meeting on our own. Next summer we will be celebrating our twentieth anniversary.

Hardin: There has always been this ambiguity between the church being Bible oriented, Bible based and socially oriented and social programs involved. Many people claim you can certainly have both.

Hardesty: Certainly you can. That has been one of the emphases of this group -- to be both biblical and to look at women's roles from a biblical perspective, but also to seek justice, not only for women, but on the broad issues, because feminism is not simply something that is focused on women. When we began, we were much more narrowly focused simply on women's issues, but we found that all social justice issues really are intertwined.

Hardin: Yes. Then we have got the men's movements, too. The things that Robert Bly and Robert Moore and all have started, which are designed to make people feel comfortable with who they are and what their gender is. You call your newsletter, "Daughters of Sarah." Why did you pick the name Sarah?

Hardesty: It's funny you should ask me because I came up with that one night when we were kind of brainstorming. There is a New Testament verse, I believe in Peter, that talks about Sarah calling Abraham, "Lord." It sounds like she was pretty submissive. We really thought of it more in terms of the pride that many Jewish men have always felt in being sons of Abraham, and so we thought of ourselves as women in the Judeo-Christian tradition as daughters of Sarah.

Hardin: All right. How are we changing the position of women in the church today? How is it changing, for better or for worse?

Hardesty: You spoke originally about some of the frustrations and I think it is part of a long period of change that we have been in. As a historian, particularly of nineteenth century America, I looked at the way that the family has changed over the last 150 to 200 years. The women's movement, the men's movement, are a part of this on-going historical change. It is very difficult to go through a period of change and readjustment and we are redefining what it means to be a man, what it means to be a woman.

Hardin: Well, plus the roles of the father and the mother are being intertwined more. The men are doing a little more child care maybe and the women are doing more outside occupational stuff. As I understand it, about half the seminarians today, at least a very high percentage, are women. Does this mean that half of tomorrow's pastors will be women?

Hardesty: I hope so.

Hardin: Do you think that is going to happen?

Hardesty: I hope that we come out with some kind of equality in the church. Certainly, this is the thrust of much of my writing. I think that as men and women we are called to follow God in many of the same ways. There have always been women who felt called to ministry. It is really just in our own day that women have been freed to go into the seminary and to go into the pastorate, but it is still very difficult for women in the pastorate. I find many women pastors very discouraged.

Hardin: Why are they discouraged?

Hardesty: Well, certainly for both men and women pastoring is a difficult profession. It's a very challenging profession.

Hardin: I know the classic role of the pastor's wife is sort of getting beaten up, too. Women are no longer saying that they are going to hang around as a free employee.

Hardesty: One of the things that is happening in those denominations where pastors move frequently is that they have not adjusted how they deal with pastors and new understandings of family with both parents more involved, with women working outside the home. The church as an institution has not come to grips with those realities for pastors' families.

Hardin: Your Daughters Shall Prophesy is the title of one of your books. Who are, in your opinion, some of the great women of faith who have been mentors or inspirations to you?

Hardesty: Whenever I come back to Chicago, I always think of Frances Willard who lived in the 19th century. History books often call her the founder of the Women's Christian Temperance Union, and she really wasn't. She was a long-time president of the Women's Christian Temperance Union in Evanston, Illinois.

Hardin: And she hung out at Northwestern.

Hardesty: Right. She was the first dean of women at Northwestern, demoted from college president when her little women's college was incorporated into Northwestern University. She combined a real evangelical fervor for the Good News of the gospel with an immense social vision, a very integrated social vision, which inspires me.

Hardin: We just have a few second left. One of the problems that we decry in the world is religious violence, people beating each other up in a variety of ways because of religious differences. Do you think this will be affected by the growing role of women in the church? And if so, how?

Hardesty: I hope so. So many people think of women as more nurturing, more peace loving. While I know that certainly women are also capable of violence, as we begin to work together as men and women, I think perhaps there will be less violence. I certainly hope so.

Hardin: I kind of agree with that. I think we are making progress. Let me thank you very much.