One evening as I changed into pajamas, I noticed I had only one earring in. I kneeled down and searched the bedroom floor but came up empty handed. Mentally retracing my steps, I had no clue where the earring might have fallen out.

It’d been a busy day. Since the weather was nice, I walked to school, spent a few hours working, and headed out front to meet other staff members for the drive-by parade. After an hour of waving at students and their families, I walked home, this time taking a different route.

They were my favorite everyday earrings—small, simple hoops in a brushed-gold color. I’d worn them at least weekly since sophomore year of high school when I bought them at The Limited.

No idea why I remember that.

As I recalled all the places I’d been that day, I made a mental note to check the school’s lost and found bin, but I’d pretty much given it up as a loss.

I hate losing things. It’s been a few years, but I still pine for the gloves I left in a Chicago taxi cab. Losing things makes me feel forgetful and foolish and—maybe this is the heart of the discomfort—not in control.

***

I’m lucky that I haven’t lost anything more important than gloves, umbrellas, to-do lists, a fleece hoodie. We’re living in a time of great loss—of jobs, security, and, most sadly, lives. One day last week, the front page of The New York Times was made up of thousands of tiny-print obituaries of people who had lost their lives to the virus, a moving tribute to loved ones lost.

And while loss of life is awful, how much worse is the taking of life? The loved ones of Mr. George Floyd must feel a ghastly sense of powerlessness. My heart aches to think of that moment of taking, captured on video, of something precious that can never be found, never returned. A senseless taking, a tragic loss.

***

In infinitely more trivial news, I found the earring. The next morning I walked past the school and there on the sidewalk, one tiny earring shone in the sunlight. I paused, amazed that it was there—scuffed and scratched but intact. I took it home, wiped it with alcohol, and reunited it with its mate.

This minor drama of jewelry lost and found reminded me of this: Jesus is the God of lost things. He described his job as having come “to seek and save the lost.” He told stories about a lost coin, a lost sheep, a lost son, all of which are eventually found and celebrated and cherished.

In times of crisis, I must admit it feels banal to sing, “His eye is on the sparrow . . .” when so many sparrows end up smashed against pavement. Yet I’m compelled, in the sense that I must force myself, to trust the God of lost things will make everything found.

Which sounds very vague: somehow . . . someday . . .

True, we believers in miracles don’t have the logistics figured out, but we can’t just forfeit. We are caught between the losing and the finding, but in the meantime—and these are very mean times—I want to counter the losing with finding and the taking with giving. That is, finding the humility to listen, giving the benefit of the doubt, seeking justice, giving love.

Maybe that’s the start of how lost things are found.

Love, Em