God Always Takes the Initiative
The Son of man is come to seek and to save the lost. Luke 19:10.
Lost!
Here is a Technicolor word, especially to anyone who has ever actually been lost.
Have you ever been lost? I remember once as a teenager I got lost while hiking in the redwood forests of northern California. At first I remained fairly calm. I knew that if I tried hard enough and long enough I would find my way out. But the further I went, the more lost I became, as I no longer saw anything that even looked familiar. It was then that panic set in.
Lost is not a good feeling. But it is an impressive one. A person who is lost has only one goal and hope--to become unlost.
When reading the Bible, we need to pay close attention to the meaning of "lost." The word does not mean damned or doomed. Rather it indicates being in the wrong place. People are lost when they have wandered away from God, when they have rebelled against His will and struck out on their own path in life.
Some lost people are totally oblivious to the fact, as were the Pharisees of Jesus' day and the "holy" types of all generations. They managed to get lost in the church. But other types know that they are spiritually lost and desire to be rescued. Such are the Zacchaeuses of the world.
One of the most important truths ever uttered by Jesus is that He came to seek and save that which is lost. And He doesn't care if you are lost in the church or in a house of prostitution. He has a mission.
That mission we see reflected in Scripture from one end to the other. No sooner do we find Adam and Eve sinning than we find God searching them out in the garden. So it was with the lost coin and the lost sheep of Luke 15. Salvation is never a matter of us approaching God. It is always Him coming after us. God so loved the world that He sent His one and only Son into the world to search out that which had been lost. His love and grace is always proactive. He does not wait for us to make a move. Instead, He seeks us out.
Thank You, Father, for the dynamics and richness of Your grace. Thank You for searching me out. And now, please help me to keep hold of Your hand.
The Son of man is come to seek and to save the lost. Luke 19:10.
Lost!
Here is a Technicolor word, especially to anyone who has ever actually been lost.
Have you ever been lost? I remember once as a teenager I got lost while hiking in the redwood forests of northern California. At first I remained fairly calm. I knew that if I tried hard enough and long enough I would find my way out. But the further I went, the more lost I became, as I no longer saw anything that even looked familiar. It was then that panic set in.
Lost is not a good feeling. But it is an impressive one. A person who is lost has only one goal and hope--to become unlost.
When reading the Bible, we need to pay close attention to the meaning of "lost." The word does not mean damned or doomed. Rather it indicates being in the wrong place. People are lost when they have wandered away from God, when they have rebelled against His will and struck out on their own path in life.
Some lost people are totally oblivious to the fact, as were the Pharisees of Jesus' day and the "holy" types of all generations. They managed to get lost in the church. But other types know that they are spiritually lost and desire to be rescued. Such are the Zacchaeuses of the world.
One of the most important truths ever uttered by Jesus is that He came to seek and save that which is lost. And He doesn't care if you are lost in the church or in a house of prostitution. He has a mission.
That mission we see reflected in Scripture from one end to the other. No sooner do we find Adam and Eve sinning than we find God searching them out in the garden. So it was with the lost coin and the lost sheep of Luke 15. Salvation is never a matter of us approaching God. It is always Him coming after us. God so loved the world that He sent His one and only Son into the world to search out that which had been lost. His love and grace is always proactive. He does not wait for us to make a move. Instead, He seeks us out.
Thank You, Father, for the dynamics and richness of Your grace. Thank You for searching me out. And now, please help me to keep hold of Your hand.
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