Lost

by Scott Phillips

Have you ever been lost?   The other day we were coming back from vacation and I was driving down unfamiliar roads and my sense of direction was all out of whack.  We were traveling north and it felt like we were traveling at an eastward trend.   The fortunate thing is somehow I knew my sense of direction was wrong so I stopped and verified which way I should go.  Even after asking for direction, my sense of direction was flipped and over the next hour I made a few minor wrong turns that in the end caused me to be off course.

Do you remember those times that it seems like your direction understanding flips and you can almost feel your internal compass flip when you see familiar territory and you think… “Hey this is north….” And all of a sudden you realize where you are and which way you are going.  I have had this happen a few times over my life and it is an amazing experience when you realize where you are, when you thought you were lost.

Lost

No sense of direction.

No familiar landmarks.

Don’t know how to get home, because you don’t know where you are.

A map serves little help, if you do not know the starting point.  You can look at a map and see where you think you are and where you want to go, but until you know where you are, you will not be able to get where you are going.

So, where are you?   Really.

I know the frustration of holding the map in my hands and trying to retrace where I know I have been to locate where I am.

It is so important to understand where you are, so that you can make right decisions on what you do next.

To lose something.  It is one thing to lose money, if you have other money or it is a small amount, but when it is all you got, the fervency of the search is multiplied.

It is one thing to lose your keys if you have multiple sets, but when you are down to your last set, your running late and it seems a little mouse or the children must have thrown them down the drainage pipe.

Combine these feelings.

Lost

Don’t know really where you are.

Don’t have any way to get out of where you are.

Don’t have any means to get to where you need to go.

Lost, Broke and Stranded.

This would be a state of extreme discouragement.   When everything that you depended has changed.

This is the feeling that the young man felt that day he woke up and wiped sleep from his eyes and found himself laying outside by the curb.  He looked around and wondered, “How did I get here?”  His belly rumbles and he struggles up to his feet feeling the effect of his last nights drinking.  He feels sick and hungry at the same time.  He reaches into his pocket only to find what he knew would greet him, nothing.  For the first time in his life, he is without a home, without a friend, away from family, with no place to stay and no food to eat.   He leans over the trough and washes his face and begins to search for a job.  He has lost the sparkle in his eye and the crease in his clothing and there is an odor that he can’t seem to get away from.  After going to a few places he thought hew would find friends, he continues in his search for his next meal.

As he reaches the end of town he sees a sign, “Help wanted.”  He smelt the place before he actually saw it, a pig farm.  But his hunger over powers his nose and he makes his way down the path and approaches a cruel looking man.  In a few moments the pay is agreed and he is sent out to feed the stinking swine.  His world is spinning.  His mind is reeling.  His heart is breaking.  His tears are falling.  His soul is in conflict.   His stomach is rumbling.  Before he can eat, he has to work all day feeding the pigs.  He looks carefully at the slop that he is giving the pigs and after a few hours he toys with the idea of eating what he is giving.

At this moment, a splash of cold reality hits him.  And he thinks to himself, “Those that work for my dad have a place to sleep and plenty to eat, what am I doing?”

The journey to this moment of clarity has been hard.  The events to these thoughts of sanity have been devastating.  But here he is.  He finally realizes where he is.   The first step to finding your way home, is realizing where you are.

At this moment, he puts the bucket down and turns his back on the pigs, walks past the cruel looking man, and begins a journey all the way to fathers house.

He passes the bars and thinks, “I don’t ever want to drink again.”

He passes the drug dealer and wonders, “I can’t believe I was ever here.”

He passes the old friends sitting outside and soldiers on past as they snicker and jeer him.  “What ya doing John?” 

He passes every landmark of his downward path.  He walks away from the old life.  He walks away from his old friends.  He walks away from his old self.  And with an understanding of his Father, he knows down deep everything is going to be all right.

After a long journey and the sun setting on the horizon, he rounds the corner and passes the familiar old oak tree with the swing still intact and as he tops the hill he can see the old home place.  He sees a familiar figure rise from the porch and peer in his direction.  At that moment, across the distance his father spies the familiar jaunt of his step and leaps off the porch, sweeps through the gate and runs like a boy.  The prodigal realizes this is my Daddy.  He drops his little duffle bag and runs crying, weeping and smiling.  He sees in his fathers’ eyes all that he had hoped for to be true. 

He falls into his fathers’ arms and weeping, crying and repenting and he can hear his old father say, “It’s alright son.   It is going to be all right.  Lets get these old rags off of you.  Lets get you cleaned up.  I am so glad to have you back home.”

Found.

Everything that never made sense before, now as it were the internal compass flips and the young man understands now like he never understood before what and who his Father is.

No greater revelation for you and I to experience than to understand the great love and mercy the Father has toward his children.

Everything I have ever needed or wanted, I found it.  I discovered it.  I enjoy it.  Everything I have ever needed, I found it,

In Him, By Him, Through Him,

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