Luke 19.10 For the Son of Man came to seek and save the lost.
Part way round my morning walk this morning I noticed there was something wrong with my earphones. I had been listening to John … read the new testament passage of the day to me when it stopped abruptly. I checked the earphones and realised the left earphone had dropped out without me noticing. I had lost it. I was annoyed. I had managed to use these earphones for a full year charging them up each night and looking after them with great care. I had been on some brambley parts on my walk and finding a little earphone amongst that would be next to impossible. So, I began the expectedly fruitless task of retracing my steps with my eyes glued to the path. After five paces, there in the middle of the path was my white earpiece. I was delighted. I popped it back into my ear turned on my iPhone and continued joyfully on my two-mile route around the woodland walk.
Jesus tells us his mission was to seek and save the lost. We don’t hear the message too often, that if you do not have Jesus in your life you are lost. It is also our mission to help people find Jesus. We cannot go around telling people that they are lost, but it is the call of every believer to help them find Jesus, so they are no longer lost. In Luke 15 Jesus tells three parables. The lost sheep the lost coin and the lost son.
Years ago, I took Di to see The Ballet Rambert in a packed Oxford Playhouse. One of the dances they performed was the Prodigal son. The dance finished with the son leaping into the Father’s arms, who then wrapped his cloak around him. At that dramatic point the dance stopped abruptly, the music stopped, and for a minute there was silence. I filled up with tears and as I listened all around the hall you could hear people crying. I don’t think it was the dancing so much, but the message of a son returning to his father, that touched emotions. A picture of what God the father wants to do for all his lost children.
I remember the joy of the first person I helped find Jesus. It was in the days when Billy Graham visited Wembley and all the services were relayed to massive halls across the UK. I invited my friend Jack to the one in Bristol where I lived and when it got to the appeal part at the end, Jack got up and walked forward as hundreds responded. I was so elated to see my friend finding Jesus.
Let us be those that keep the central message central and keep praying and be involved in helping lost people find Jesus. Jesus came to seek and save those who were lost, and we don’t need to be reluctant to be involved in the same mission.
