Lost

December 8, 2018

I AM – Devotional Style Short Stories “The Hunters”

Winter has set in and the mountains are clothed with their winter coats. The birds are resting comfortably in their nests and the animals are hunkered down in their dens for warmth. Deer roam the meadows in search for food with their winter coats thick. A slight wind blows across the mountains leaving an even deeper chill.

Three hunters are bundled in their warm hunting clothes and slowly maneuver the deep snow. Their rifles are loaded and hopes are high for bagging at least one buck. They’ve seen the deer tracks and are following in silence when they spot a large buck. His thirteen point rack tells them he’s ripe for the kill. They aim their rifles but suddenly a doe and two small fawns appear out from behind a clump of trees. The family of deer is beautiful, even to the hunters.

“We can’t shoot that buck.” One of the hunters whispers and lowers his gun.

“It is a beautiful sight.” Another interjects, lowering his gun.

They kneel in awe for several minutes watching the deer family graze.

A fourth Man steps up beside them and slowly kneels in the snow. He says nothing while gazing at the deer.

“Where did you come from?” One surprised hunter asks.

“Heaven.” The Man whispers.

A quiet chuckle is heard from the hunter.

All is quiet as the hunters and the Man watch the deer graze.

Suddenly a shot rings out across the snowy land and the deer jump and with lightning speed dart into the cover of the trees.

The hunters jump to their feet searching the woods for whoever shot.

The Man stands calmly as the hunters search. The solitude of the mountains has been breached.

The Man asks, breaking the silence, “Had that shot not been fired would you have killed the deer?”

“That’s what we’re out here for!” One of the hunters sarcastically answers.

“Were you not enthralled by their grace and touched by the beauty of the family?”

“We weren’t going to kill the doe and fawn.” Another of the hunters replies.

“Ah, but when the father is removed the entire family suffers, much like a shepherd with his flock of sheep,” The Man states.

The third hunter turns and looks intently at the Man. He weighs his words carefully before speaking and then quietly states, “You’re not really a hunter are you?”

“I am the I Am and yes, I hunt for my lost sheep when they have gone astray.”

The hunter suddenly falls to his knees at the feet of the Man, as the other two stand gaping in amazement.

***

Luke 15:3,4 -“So He spoke this parable to them, saying, “What man of you, having a hundred sheep, if he loses one of them, does not leave the ninety-nine in the wilderness, and go after the one which is lost until he finds it?”

***

Jesus is the Shepherd and we are His flock. When one becomes lost in the wiles of the world He will send His Holy Spirit to search out all who are lost. The Holy Spirit is the One who woo’s us toward accepting Christ as our Lord and Savior and without Him we would remain lost. There are those who will try to run and hide and use any excuse to not enter the family of God. Christ never gives up and it is our choice as to whether we will allow Him to pick us up out of the depravity of our worldly ways and unite us with Him.

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October 1, 2017

Unrest Within

There’s a stirring in my soul. A heaviness I don’t fathom. Are the heavens in disarray or am I delusional? I can’t put my finger on the depth, but it feels deep. Lord, what is happening within me? The gloom seems overwhelming. The tears tiptoe at the edge yet will not fall.

My heart hurts, not with pain but with something I don’t recognize. A sadness for all that are lost, those who don’t know you and the depth of their loss is not just for now but forever more. How can they refuse to see? How can mankind live in a world so filled with hate and evil? You are King of kings and Lord of lords yet the earth seems to be vibrating with hatred and strife.

Is that what I feel, the earth being tilted off its axis? The deep groaning of a lost world? I don’t know how to change that. I cannot hold the world in my hands and sooth it back into righteousness. I am only one and yet you are great, you are Holy and Almighty. Can you not fix it?

The depth of the groan, Lord, is more than I can bear. It is the growl of the evil that prevails in our land. The groan of the saints as they seek your face and yet seem to go unheard for the evil out-shouts them.

Help O’ God for we are your children crying out from the depths of your love. Help us to see you in the midst of all the mud. Help us to focus on the One who knows all and will bring redemption to all who ask.

My heart cries out – ASK! but it falls on deaf ears. ASK! and we’re shot down like clay birds on a shooting range.  O’ God open the ears of the deaf. Open the eyes of the blind for our days are short and many are lost. Help us O’ Lord, for we can not reach them all.

~~~~~

Am I alone with this?

 

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June 22, 2014

A Wasted life – or was it?

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“Blessed are those who mourn, For they shall be comforted.” Matt.5:4

Looking at this scripture we often think of a widow or a widower mourning the loss of their loved one. But in this life we mourn many things. What do you mourn?

When that question was asked of me I couldn’t think of anything in particular. Yes, I had mourned the loss of my husband, I had mourned the loss of a childhood through abuse, I’ve mourned the loss of pets, and of friends. But when I asked the Lord, “Is there anything I’m mourning?” I was surprised and confused about His reply.

“You mourn a wasted life.” was His reply. What?

All day I have thought about that answer and have taken peeks back at my life from birth to adulthood. I went to school; elementary through college. I’ve been a “soda jerk,” a sales clerk at J.C. Penny’s and various clothing stores, I worked my way through college by working in a Psychiatric Hospital helping the mentally ill. I had a career flying the friendly skies.  So how can all of that and all of those years have been wasted?

Forty-nine years. Yes, for forty-nine years I was doing my own thing. But was I really? The years of schooling was preparing me for the world. The after-school jobs was teaching me the financial aspects of being a responsible adult. The Psych. Hospital was teaching me so many things I can’t begin to express them here. It was an experience like no other and that knowledge has been used in many different situations in my life along with, of course, paying my college tuition fees. The flight attendant career took me to places I would never have been able to go and meeting people I never would have met. In particular Christians! I didn’t realize there were so many flying around those friendly skies! They had their “prey” trapped in a cylindrical tube high up in the sky and continually tried to convert me.

Oh yes. Sue was not a Christian. Sue was doing her own thing. Sue didn’t think she needed God. Not the God that allowed all the bad stuff in her life. Not the God that sat on the sidelines and didn’t give a flip about what she did. Sue, who chewed up Christians and spit them out like sour milk. No, Sue didn’t need this so-called loving God.

How wrong Sue was!

My husband and I had retired and was enjoying the good life but suddenly my world was turned upside down and inside out. My comfortable world with my cherished husband, was left empty. My husband died, my home felt empty and I was alone with the silence within its walls. Family was gone because I told “the secret.” I crawled into the cave of grief. That dark place where no light will enter because the shutters of the heart is closed.

Then Christ stepped in.

I hear it all the time, “Forget the past!” Well I don’t want to forget the past! When I look at my past and the experiences I have had it humbles me to the point of tears because it is my past that the Lord brought me through. It is all those experiences of growing up in a dysfunctional, abusive home that the Lord has used to help other victims of abuse. It is those flight attendants that prayed fervently for this lost soul to find Christ and all the seeds they planted at 37,000 feet in the air.

It is a husband who showed me unconditional love. and yes, it is all those sin filled experiences that the Lord has shown His great mercy through. It is the fowl language that spewed from these lips, the indiscretions, the drunken parties, dirty jokes uproariously laughed about, the “I’ll burn that Bible if you don’t get it out of my face!” It is the forgiveness of all my sins; past, present, and future.

I don’t want to forget the past! If I forget the past then maybe I will shrug off the great things that Christ has done in my life; in me, through me, and for me. He transformed a lost soul to a victor. He has taken me out of the pit of hell and given me life.

So why did He say, “You mourn a wasted life?” Because I look at those first forty-nine years and see my feet on the edge of a fire filled abyss and wonder how I ever lived without Him. I look at those forty- nine years and regret that I didn’t know Him, I didn’t worship Him, I didn’t serve Him. I look at those forty-nine years and mourn the lost time I could have had with Him.

“Blessed are those who mourn for they shall be comforted.” His comfort comes in that when I look back I can see His hand all along the way. I can see His mercy and grace hard at work as I did my own thing. I can see His shed blood on the cross and hear Him tell me over and over how much He loves me.

His comfort is in knowing I will not be spending eternity in a fire filled hell with Satan laughing at me for all my poor choices. His comfort comes in knowing that I have a Savior that cares so much for me that even though I was lost He never gave up on me. His comfort comes in knowing He used every opportunity to bring me step by step to Him. That’s the kind of comfort He gives to those of us that were lost and now are found.

~~~~~

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Blessings to you.