Lost and Found
Can you find the keys?
Lawsie, lawsie, we've lost some things recently. Fortunately, no grandchildren, but our credit card and I lost my husband's keys to two of the church campuses. The search for lost things can certainly make your mind weary and be a major distraction.
Sharing the stories with a friend, I told of how the credit card was actually offered to one of our pastors from another campus when he visited my husband's favorite ice cream shop and how I tore our car apart thinking I'd lost his church keys in my car. The friend topped off those tales!
When she was a teenager she came in the house and tossed her keys on the counter. For days she couldn't find the keys. Then one morning she was making toast and smelled plastic burning. When she tossed the key ring it had landed in the toaster!
The Parable of the Lost Sheep in Luke 15:4-7 came to me in my days of key searching. I knew they had to be somewhere close because they had been in my hands in the car. Likewise the shepherd knew the lost sheep was out there somewhere.
What man of you, having a hundred sheep, if he has lost one of them, does not leave the ninety-nine in the open country, and go after the one that is lost, until he finds it? And when he has found it, he lays it on his shoulders, rejoicing. And when he comes home, he calls together his friends and his neighbors, saying to them, ‘Rejoice with me, for I have found my sheep that was lost.’ Just so, I tell you, there will be more joy in heaven over one sinner who repents than over ninety-nine righteous persons who need no repentance.
Such a precious story reminding us of God's loving concern for EVERY lost person. He will seek the lost until he finds them.
I love how in the story we are told there is not only rejoicing by God, close family members, people who have been praying for this lost soul, but by all of Heaven! Just stop and think about the celebration that occurs.
When a person finishes chemo most cancer centers have a bell they ring. Try to anticipate what the announcement will be like in Heaven each time a person comes to faith in Christ. I'm going with a trumpet call, fireworks and angel choirs leading everyone in a chorus of hallelujah!
Here's a find Waldo type photo. Can you find our grandbaby.
The Songs
“I've Got Jesus” Ben Fuller
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8p6lgcuZemY
and
“Reckless Love” Cory Asbury
