As the weather has begun to thaw, the girls have gone back to playing outside. Darcy asked if she and Phoebe could invite Emily to play – the little girl next door. Sure. So off they ran. Megan stood watching from the back door, waiting for their return. Meg, it is just next door, you don’t have to worry.

Ivy, overhearing us, decided she wanted to go too. But soon Ivy was back and reported the neighbor said Emily wasn’t home. So I went next door to see if they knew where Phoebe and Darcy went. But our neighbor hadn’t see the girls. They must have meant Emmy’s house. 

So Megan walked down the street and up another street. But they hadn’t seen the girls either. Down another street a group of boys were playing football, but they had not seen our girls. The boys decided they would help search and ran all over the neighborhood.

A truck drove by for the second or third time and thoughts started to wander into my head. I stopped him, but he hadn’t seen our kids – just trying to get his daughter to take a nap. I asked another neighbor… Megan was asking neighbors on another street…

It was probably only 15 minutes later when one of the boys found Phoebe and Darcy bouncing on a trampoline. The two girls had been there the whole time, playing with a new friend. As we wandered aimlessly, they were playing.

Walking home, as the girls were getting an earful, I realized they were not the ones who were lost.

“The Penguin looked sad and the boy thought it must be lost.”

In Lost and Found, Oliver Jeffers writes about a penguin who shows up on a little boy’s doorstep. The boy assumes the penguin is lost and sets out to help him get home. He takes the penguin to the lost and found office. He asks other birds. Without getting any answers, he starts researching and discovers penguins are from the South Pole. So together they build a row boat and sail to Antarctica. There the little boy drops off the penguin.

Only when he begins to row home does the boy realize, it wasn’t the penguin who was lost. He was lost and in need of a friend. The penguin had found him.

“For this son of mine was dead and is alive again; he was lost and is found.” So they began to celebrate. (Luke 15:24)

As Christians we were once lost – once like the Prodigal Son. But in Christ we are found. And in being found, we rediscover our purpose. We are no longer aimless. Now, with Good News, we may join the celebration of God.

As the saved, it is easy to consider ourselves always found. But we still wander. We lose our way. We become aimless. Anytime we drift from our Father, we no longer hold the truth – because we never did hold the truth. We walked with the Truth. And when we walk away, even though we assume we are the found, we are like the lost.

I hope you understand — I am not writing about eternity, but about actions today. When we drift from our Savior, our actions become like those who are lost. Certainly we know how to keep a church light on our actions – claim their holiness. Yet when Christians or the church drift from God, our actions are those of the lost. Just like the lost, we lead people away from God.

We are in the midst of a difficult time in our country. Now more than ever we can not walk with old traditions or with our own thoughts. More than ever we must focus on walking with Christ – so that we may lead everyone to the celebration of God.

So he got up and went to his father.
But while he was still a long way off, his father saw him and was filled with compassion for him; he ran to his son, threw his arms around him and kissed him. (Luke 15:20)