Something Lost

   There are many memories of time spent with my dad, but one that stands out to me is the day he took me to Emerald Pointe water park in Greensboro when I was 16 or 17 years old.  It was Labor Day weekend and the last weekend Emerald Pointe would be open until the next summer.  Dad and I were hanging out in the wave pool waiting on the next big wave to come through.  When the wave hit, we were tossed about… in and out of water like a rag doll.  My dad popped up and said “Ginger, my wedding band is gone!”  We knew that finding his ring in the very crowded wave pool would be about near impossible.  Before we could begin looking for it, a girl rose up out of the water and shouted “Did anyone lose their wedding band?”  And just like that, what was lost was found.
   A couple years after that, I went to the beach for spring break my senior year of college.  Two months earlier I had ordered and financed my college class ring.  I couldn’t afford to pay for it upfront, so I had financed it for 6 months and wore it on this trip to the beach.  We had spent the day riding jet skis and I had just gotten off the Jet Ski in Merrill’s Inlet.  I pulled my ring off to rinse the sand out from under it.  Somehow in just a split second, I had dropped my class ring and it was gone.  The ring I still had to pay on for four more months just vanished.  We searched the water, but was never able to find my ring.  And just like that, what was lost this time, remained lost.
   Two stories, two related people, two rings, and two different outcomes.  What do you want us to learn from this God?  Open our hearts and minds to receive the exact thing you want us to learn and understand.  My blogging buddies are here today for just that!
   There’s another story about being lost that we find in the bible.  Jesus’ parents thought they had lost him one time.  Every year Jesus’ family would travel to Jerusalem for the Passover festival.  When Jesus was 12 years old, they went to the festival as usual and on the way back home, they realized Jesus was not with them.  They frantically looked for him among their family and friends that were traveling with them, but when they couldn’t find him, they returned to Jerusalem to see if he was still there.  Sure enough, three days later, they discovered him in the temple.  He was sitting with the religious teachers listening to them and asking them questions.  Everyone in the temple was amazed by Jesus’ understanding.  Mary, his mother, didn’t know what to think so she asked him why he did this to them.  Didn’t he know they were worried?  Jesus simply told her “Why did you need to search for me?  Didn’t you know that I must be about my Father’s business?”  The bible says Mary didn’t understand what Jesus meant, but that she stored all these things in her heart.
   Twenty-one years later, Mary thought she had lost Jesus again.  This time she was certain of it because she was there when the Roman soldiers hung him on the cross and then when they pierced his side.  She watched in agony as her son was brutally beaten and murdered.  She was there when Jesus called out in a loud voice “Eloi, Eloi, lama sabachthani?”  “My God, My God, why have You abandoned me?”  She was there when Jesus was laid in the tomb.  More things to ponder in her heart.  Gone.  Lost.  No more. 
   But we know the rest of the story.  We know what happened three days later.  We know Jesus was raised from the dead and appeared again to his disciples and his family.  He wasn’t gone.  He wasn’t lost.  He was fulfilling scripture. 
   Luke 24:25-27 Jesus starts walking to the village of Emmaus with two of his followers that don’t realize it’s Jesus and says “You foolish people!  You find it so hard to believe all that the prophets wrote in the scriptures.  Wasn’t it clearly predicted that the Messiah would have to suffer all these things before entering his glory?”  Then Jesus took them through the writings of Moses and all the prophets, explaining from all the scriptures the things concerning himself.
   Jesus was not lost in either of these two scenarios.  He was right where he was supposed to be.  The first time being about his heavenly Father’s business learning in the temple.  The second time being about his heavenly Father’s business by taking on the weight of all the sins of the world, unwilling that any of us should perish in our sins.  Jesus became the ultimate sacrifice, covering us with the blood of reconciliation forever.  He did this so that none of us would ever experience being lost and separated from God.  Jesus paid the price for our sins.  He is our good shepherd.  We are his sheep.  He will go to any length to find even one lost sheep.  I lost my ring and still had to keep making monthly payments on it even though it was gone forever.  Jesus made that one crucial payment in full, so we could experience the richness of God’s glory and never have to make another payment on our own.  He sacrificed so that if we just confess Jesus as our Lord and Savior and invite him in our hearts, we are saved forever.  Never to be lost again. 
   If you’ve ever lost something precious to you; a sentimental item, a person, a commodity, a relationship; then you know the pain this loss causes.  You feel like you’re being punished, you’re miserable; you so desperately want this thing back.  You’d go to any length to be with it again; never separated from it again; you just want another chance.  Jesus knows this feeling too.  He was more than willing to go through misery, punishment, rejection and death to make sure we never had to be separated from Him.  He did what He was put here to do; to find the lost.  I’m so thankful He made the ultimate sacrifice to find me.  Now will you let Him find you?

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