Friday, May 27, 2005
Jennifer and Kourtney were three-year-old twins, and they were excited about pre-school! In fact they were so excited, they got up in the middle of the night in their Omaha, Nebraska home and they walked out of the house to make the six-block walk to school. All this while their parents were sound asleep. You say, "Isn't that cute?" No. Snow was everywhere that night, and the temperature was nine degrees below zero, and the girls were reported missing at 4:05 A.M. after family members awoke to find a light on and the front door open. Two police officers started driving the route to school, hoping to find the girls before it was too late. At one point, their squad car was actually stopped by the ice on a steep hill. They were stopped right in front of an alley, which they decided to investigate. And there they found first little footprints, then three tan boots, no bigger than the palm of the officer's hand, and finally they found barefoot Kourtney, wearing an open coat kneeling beside her sister Jennifer, who was face down in the snow, wearing socks but no coat. Even though Jennifer was near death when they found her, both girls miraculously survived. If someone had not come looking for them, they would have died.
I'm Ron Hutchcraft and I want to have A Word With You today about "Lost and Found."
Two little girls were lost and dying. They wouldn't have made it back home themselves. Their only hope was for someone to look for them and find them. It's always that way for someone who is lost; including you and me.
"Lost" is actually a word in the Bible that's used to describe our spiritual condition. It's because, as the Bible says, "each of us has wandered away from God like sheep" ( Isaiah 53:6). We were created to have our life revolve around our Creator. But we've all decided to have it revolve around ourselves instead. And this wandering has taken us away from the home we were made for - a personal love relationship with the One who made us. We're lost, we're away, and ultimately we're dying. If you're honest with yourself right now, maybe the word "lost" pretty much describes how you're feeling.
Our word for today from the Word of God is good news - Luke 19:10. Speaking of Jesus, it says, "The Son of Man came to seek and to save that which was lost." Jesus is God come looking for you - a lost child that He loves very much. Notice, He did exactly what those police officers did for those lost little girls - seeking, and then saving. Those girls had nothing to do with their own rescue. Their only hope was a rescuer coming for them and saving them. That's just like you and me. This simple fact that you cannot find God, God has to find you, is pretty radical. It means that all our religious efforts to get to God, all our self-improvement, will not get us home to a God whose standard is perfection. A lost child doesn't find himself, he or she gets found by their rescuer. All our spirituality, our attempts to complete ourselves by finding God through spiritual searching and exercises, will still leave us lost.
According to the Bible, we are that little girl, hopelessly lost, face down in the snow, about to die spiritually. And Jesus is that policeman coming to where we are to rescue us. But this rescue involves eternal death - the price tag for our sin. This rescue cost the Rescuer His life, as Jesus died on that cross, absorbing all the punishment; all the hell that you and I deserve for our sin.
And the Rescuer comes to where you are to bring you home from your lostness. Your move is putting yourself totally in the hands of Jesus, the only One who paid the price to bring you back. You're finally home when you tell Jesus you're putting your total trust in Him to be your personal Rescuer from your sin. If you're ready to do that, let me send you my booklet about how to begin with Him called Yours For Life.
You will never find your Creator - you're lost. But He's found you, at the cost of His life. Now let Him bring you home before it's too late.