I wonder what it feels like to be totally lost. As I was thinking about what I was going to say this morning, I was trying to remember a time when I have been lost, and I couldn’t. Of course there have been times when I’ve had difficulty finding the way to the place that I was meant to be going, and there have been times when I’ve not been sure exactly where the bit of ground I’m stood on is on the map that I’m looking at. But I don’t recall a time when I’ve ever felt that I didn’t have a single clue how to get home.
I think that is how I would know that I was properly lost. If I had no idea how I was going to get home, then I would be lost.
Maybe you have been in that position; you have known what it feels like to be entirely lost. If not, perhaps that idea might help you to begin to imagine what it would be like to be lost. How would you feel if somebody took you from here in a blacked out car and dropped you in the middle of a wood, in the middle of the night, in a country where you didn’t speak the language, with no money. If you wandered around that wood until you couldn’t walk another step, and you’re just curled up in a ball, at the end of your resources, knowing for certain that you are never going to see your home again. You are truly lost. Despair, fear, deep sorrow.
What then if you see a light swaying through the trees. Are you imaging it? You think you hear a voice calling your name. Your throat is so dry you can’t call out. You feel warm arms cradling you, gentle hands lifting you. You smell the familiar scent of home on the clothes of your finder. The taste of reviving drink is sweet on your tongue. What then? You have been truly found. Hope, faith, vaulting joy. And not just joy for you, but joy for the one who has found you. Joy for those who have missed you, those who have been praying for your finding. Joy and rejoicing and a party.
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