The sun picks up a glow on the pavement. I stoop down to pick up the cause of the glow that secured my attention ... a penny. "It is a bit battered," I think to myself. But then, so many of them I have picked up seem to have a nick here or there.

I chuckle to myself as I remember the question my son asked when he was younger. "Mom, why on earth would you bother to pick up a penny? Now, if it was a dollar bill that would be worth it, but a penny?" Of course, I seized that moment oh so long ago to tell him that there would be no dollar bill if there were no penny. That is where every dollar's worth begins. We cannot count without beginning with one.

I have picked them up all my life that spans some six decades now. A better reason than my explanation to my young son prompts my obsession with lost pennies. One day, a few years ago, God spoke to my heart as I was stooping to pick up a lost penny. He said, "Sharon, you pick up My pennies."

I smiled for I knew what He meant. It has been my life's calling to see the worth that is in a soul created by God. As a teacher, I could see the great potential in students others would have regarded as insignificant because they had nicks in their behavior or personality. When I looked further than the scarred surface, I often found precious things that were not visible at the surface level.

As a mother, I experienced times when one of my sons who had some physical and emotional developmental problems due to a wrong diagnosis at 20 months old was thought to have less potential. He often fell into the cracks of available programs because he did not meet the right criterion. He has taught me new depths about worth as God sees it versus how mankind sees it.

As a minister to women, I have been so privileged to participate with the Lord in showing those He points out to me what He thinks about them. It contrasts greatly with what they have either felt about themselves or had mirrored to them by treatment from others. Some of the women I have prayed with first thought their nicks and scars rendered them valueless. When the presence of a loving Heavenly Father shines on them, the glow of their worth emerges every time.

As a lost penny that God picked up many years ago through the loving hands of caring Christian mentors and friends, I have understood His value of me. It was the love He had placed in their hearts that stooped to pick me up, count me worthy, and patiently wait for me to see it, too. So, my obsession to pick up God's pennies goes on. I will remember every time I stoop to pick up a lost one on the ground.

Copyright © by Sharon L. Patterson Share