LOST! Suddenly Realizing the TRUTH of Our LOSTNESS!
“Let me drop you off here so you can check in, just in case the lines are long.”
Those were my words as I let my daughter off at the curb. She put on her hiker’s backpack and turned to me. Hugging me, she said, “Just in case you get lost.”
Laughing at her response, I replied, “That is always a possibility. So, have a good life,” I jokingly said, but still, there was a pit in my stomach because we were on a tight schedule; our time was brief before her plane taxied and flew south to Miami.
So, I drove away, searching for the nearest parking garage in an International airport FULL of construction. On & on I drove. Finally, I found a place to enter. Parking, I remembered my lack of remembering small details and pulled out my phone, snapping a couple of photos, you know, just in case.
Row P, Level 2.
“Jesus replied, “I assure you, no one can enter the Kingdom of God without being born of water and the Spirit.
Humans can reproduce only human life, but the Holy Spirit gives birth to spiritual life.
So don’t be surprised when I say, ‘You must be born again.’
The wind blows wherever it wants. Just as you can hear the wind but can’t tell where it comes from or where it is going, so you can’t explain how people are born of the Spirit.”
(John 3: 5-8 NLT)
To some, the message of the cross seems “too good to be true,” or “too simple,” or even “too foolish;” nevertheless, that does not nullify the work of Jesus Christ. The apostle Paul was led by the Holy Spirit to write these words to the new believers living in Corinth.
“For the word of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved, it is the power of God.”
(1 Corinthians 1: 18 NASB)
God is Pure Love!
God saw the sinfulness of mankind & stepped through the person of Jesus, God’s only Son, and entered the world as a man.
Flawless.
Sinless.
Perfect.
The image of God.
The God-man.
The Son of God, JESUS.
“Living Hope” by artist Phil Wickham tells the beautiful and most wonderful narrative of God’s salvation. Please see the words of the chorus as you hopefully listen & worship God today.
“Out of the silence, the roaring lion, declared the grave had no claim on me.
Jesus—Yours is the victory!
Hallelujah, praise the One who set me free
Hallelujah, death has lost its grip on me.
You have broken every chain, there’s salvation in Your name.
Jesus Christ, my living hope!
Jesus Christ, my living hope!
God, You are, my living hope!”
JESUS–YOURS Is the VICTORY!
Full Forgiveness can be mine. Newness of life is suddenly possible. Nonetheless, the world wonders—“What’s the catch?” “What must I buy to receive this gift from God?”
After hugging and hugging and hugging.
After tears and kisses goodbye.
After final waves as she worked through security, I knew it was time to drive back toward the hotel. So, I followed the path that ‘I thought’ was the way that I had come. ‘How can this be this difficult,’ I wondered. I JUST WALKED FROM THE CAR TO THE CHECK-IN GATE!’ my internal thoughts proclaimed.
BUT I was lost and I knew it!
- I knew the level and row where I had parked.
- I knew there had been an elevator ride.
- I knew I then walked through a construction zone.
- I knew that when I entered the building, I had gone left and then up an escalator.
- I even knew that I had taken two flights of stairs to reach the American Airlines check-in & security.
- Even though I knew all the details & Even though I only needed to walk back toward my Subaru in the REVERSE ORDER of the way I came . . .
I was LOST! Suddenly I realized the TRUTH of My LOSTNESS!
- Maybe it was the early hour. &
- Maybe it was the lack of sleep from the long drive after teaching a night class. &
- Maybe it was the tears I cried from the deep sadness I knew at her leaving. &
- Maybe it was my haste to reach her after I parked the vehicle. &
- Maybe it was my lack of really seeing, really knowing the way. &
- Maybe all the above that caused my walk back toward my vehicle to become so difficult.
- There are so many “maybes,” but this is the TRUTH, until I realized my LOSTNESS, until I sought direction—I remained lost.
Knowing God impacts us, every part of us. When we know God, then our prayers are influenced, our day becomes not our will but His will, we realize we are nothing apart from God, and our Father transforms our internal being, sanctifying us as He molds us into something beautiful.
From the Inside Out, the Holy Spirit of God removes and restores and renews us!
We suddenly stop running, stop searching, stop looking from here to there—And We Ask JESUS To Save Us!
When we start trusting Jesus, when we believe, when we accept the TRUTH & Receive—THEN WE ARE SAVED! God forgives our sins when we invite Jesus into our life, when we ask Him in, opening our hearts to receive “the only way to know God the Father.”
“Jesus replied, “I assure you, no one can enter the Kingdom of God without being born of water and the Spirit. . . .
the Holy Spirit gives birth to spiritual life. . . .
‘You must be born again.’
Just as you can hear the wind but can’t tell where it comes from or where it is going, so you can’t explain how people are born of the Spirit.”
(John 3: 5-8 NLT)
All people are at the moment of their human conception—born LOST!
All of humanity can suddenly realize the TRUTH of their LOSTNESS!
All mankind can be saved by Almighty God!
The great evangelist Dwight L. Moody explained God’s salvation like this—“To believe on the Lord Jesus Christ is simply to take Him at His word.”
May we sing:
“Out of the silence, the roaring lion, declared the grave had no claim on me.
Jesus—Yours is the victory!
Hallelujah, praise the One who set me free
Hallelujah, death has lost its grip on me.
You have broken every chain, there’s salvation in Your name.
Jesus Christ, my living hope!”
“Living Hope” by Phil Wickham