Finding What You’ve Lost
Sep 25, 2022 2280
Finding what you’ve lost is one of the key themes of life. We’ve all lost things we value. We’re all somehow looking for them
I want to tell you a personal story. It happened in two parts, separated by more than 40 years of my life.
I’ve always had a lazy left eye. My left eye never focuses on anything. Everything is always fuzzy.
When I was a little kid, around seven years old, an eye doctor tried to strengthen my left eye by forcing it to work. To do that, for a year, I had to wear a patch over my good eye to force my left eye to work. I had to do that for a year.
Meanwhile, so that I could see anything at all out of my left eye, I had to wear glasses with some pretty strong lenses.
But one day I lost my glasses. I’ve never been very good at finding things, just ask my wife. And that was just as true when I was little.
I looked high and low in the unit where we lived but couldn’t find them anywhere. I was desperate.
I knelt down beside my bed and asked Jesus to show me where the glasses were. Don’t ask me how, but as soon as I stood up, I knew where my glasses were. I went outside our unit to the windowsill on the landing just outside our front door, and there they were!
I understood that Jesus would help me find what I had lost.
At seven years old, I understood that Jesus was there for me, and that he cared about the small things in life. I also understood that Jesus would help me find what I had lost. He was the Great Finder.
And then, over the next few decades that went by, I wondered, why did God choose to answer that prayer of mine in such a dramatic way, when other prayers later on didn’t seem to get answered.
So now we fast forward to a few years ago.
Now I was a grown man. Although other people didn’t see it, I had been deeply wounded by life, and I had lost my identity a long, long time ago.
One weekend, I happened to be at a board retreat for Good News Unlimited. We were up on a farm at Peachester, a beautiful spot on the Sunshine Coast in Australia.
We had a break during our programme, and after the break, I was due to present the next session.
I started to panic!
During the 45-minute break, we went on a reasonably long walk along a four-wheel drive track through the forest.
It had been raining so the ground was muddy and wet. I also remember that at some stage during the walk I had taken my jacket off and tied it around my waist.
When we got back to the room where we were meeting, I suddenly realised that I didn’t have my glasses on me, and I couldn’t find them anywhere. And they were very expensive.
I needed my glasses to do any reading whatsoever, and I needed them to present the next session. I started to panic, because I realise that I must have dropped them somewhere along the track.
But you know what this faith-filled group of directors did? They gathered around in a circle, and put their arms around me, and prayed that these glasses would be found.
Praying certainly hadn’t been on my mind while I was panicking.
Then they said, “Let’s go back to find those glasses of yours.” I thought to myself, “What’s the point? There are metres of track, and the glasses are of the thinnest possible rimless kind. It would be like trying to find a needle in a haystack.” I didn’t realistically think we had a chance of finding them.
But I also thought, “How kind and gracious these people are to break their programme in the hope of finding my glasses, when I had completely given up hope.” And being multifocal, they were quite expensive!
The Great Finder is still at work!
After praying, and despite my unvoiced reservations, we went to the ute. A couple climbed in the front, and three of us climbed on top of the tray to keeplookoutout, and we started slowly covering the track that we had walked before.
The further along the track we drove, the more I was sure my glasses wouldn’t be found. And if they were, what were the odds that we wouldn’t have run over them and crushed them anyway?
And then as we neared the end of the track and I was feeling quite vindicated in my hopelessness, someone alongside me in the tray of the ute shouted, “Stop!”
He got down, and there were my glasses, completely undamaged except for a tiny scratch.
I learnt that day that the Great Finder is still at work in my life. God sent me a powerful reminder that if he cares for the little things I’ve lost, he cares so much more for the big ones. And that’s true for your life as well.
If you trust in Jesus, everything you’ve ever lost will be found, and everything that’s ever died in your life will be resurrected. Never, ever give up your hope in him.
The Great Finder never ever loses anything. He’s still at work finding and restoring all that has been lost. He says of his children in John 10:28.
“I give them eternal life, and they will never perish; no one will snatch them out of my hand.”
Laura Burns
Oct 1, 2022
Thank you for sharing your testimony Dr. Eli, amen! I have lost things and prayed to God to find them, and then found them also. I once was lost, but Jesus found me about 20 years ago. John 10:28 is a beautiful scripture passage about how God will not lose us. Another favourite of mine is: John 6:37-40 New International Version 37 All those the Father gives me will come to me, and whoever comes to me I will never drive away. 38 For I have come down from heaven not to do my will but to do the will of him who sent me. 39 And this is the will of him who sent me, that I shall lose none of all those he has given me, but raise them up at the last day. 40 For my Father’s will is that everyone who looks to the Son and believes in him shall have eternal life, and I will raise them up at the last day.”
Peter Dodwell
Sep 25, 2022
A number of years ago, when was still possible for the untrained home mechanic, I was doing some car maintenance. When I had almost finished I realised that a vital nut was missing. There was no sign of it in the engine bay or on the ground. So wriggled on my back and feet first in the confined space under the engine. Still no sign of it, so offered a quick prayer for God's help. Then reached out to grab some bodywork because I needed some extra leverage to extricate myself. There, on a ledge behind the car's radiator I put a finger on the missing nut. I would have totally missed it if my hand hadn't been in exactly the right spot. This incident brought home to me that our Heavenly Father is just as interested in helping us in our minor problems as he is when we face major issues.
Alice Peters
Sep 25, 2022
Thank you for the reminder the God still cares. He always has and forever will. Thank you Jesus. Today I misplaced a much loved necklace and I had been at the mall and thought I had lost it there. My almost 5 year old grandson was with me and I told him , we needed to pray that God would remind me where I left it. As we prayed my husband told me it was left in the car. God answered my small prayer and my grandson’s saw it answered. Thank you Jesus.
Aniefiok Antia
Oct 3, 2022
God is still answering prayers, when we trust Him, nothing good will He withhold from us. I trust that all of my blessings, will be released to me and my family by the power of His might in Jesus Mighty Name. Amen.