Lost

As I wheeled my shopping trolley towards the supermarket checkout, I noticed a neatly dressed man standing nearby, looking confused.

‘I’m new here,’ he told me. ‘Can you tell me how I get out?’

A little confused myself as to why he could not see where to go, I guided him through another checkout. But as I finally left the supermarket myself, I saw this same gentleman standing outside, still confused. This time, I went up and asked if he was okay.

‘I’m lost,’ he told me. ‘I came on the bus but stopped to look at something and the others went on without me. I’m from the Christadelphian village. Do you know where our bus is?’

I did not but suggested we try the two main exits. At the first, there was no sign of his bus so we headed for the other at the far end of the centre. As we walked, he told me his name was Michael and that he was 84. I felt so sorry for him as, by this time, he looked so agitated and tired. We made it to the second exit – but again, no bus.

We then headed to the information counter but it was unmanned. So, I asked for help in a nearby chemist and someone pointed to a security guard hurrying by. I yelled out to him and discovered the bus pulled in at a tradesman’s entrance at the edge of the food court, so off we went again.

We had almost reached this entrance when my new friend’s face suddenly lit up.

‘There they are!’ he exclaimed with great relief and headed straight for a group of older people seated nearby. He hurriedly plonked down next to them and began to wipe sweat from his forehead.

‘That was a terrible experience,’ he said, gasping for breath. ‘Thank you very much for helping me!’

I turned to explain what had happened to the young carer in charge of the group but, to my shock, she did not seem too fazed at all – or even too inclined to care for Michael.

‘I think he needs a glass of water at least,’ I told her in my most disapproving tone, before wheeling my trolley away. But when I arrived home, I found I was still fuming. Surely they could have cared better for this poor gentleman? If I had not noticed him standing there so distressed, someone else would soon hopefully have helped him, but how long would that have taken?

Later, when I told my husband the story, I began thinking how graphically it depicted our own lost state when we do not know Jesus Christ. We may set off happily enough in life, following along with our friends and trying all sorts of different ways and experiences. But at some stage, like Michael, we may end up well and truly confused, alarmed and even hopeless. We may ask here and there for help but find none. Yet, Jesus is constantly reaching out to us, longing to set our feet on the right path again.

May we each respond with sincere love and gratitude as we are found by him and welcomed home!

‘I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.’ John 14:6

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An important question

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I had finished my shopping and was heading towards the shortest checkout queue when I noticed a man doing the same thing.

‘Ladies before gentlemen!’ he said with a smile.

As I thanked him and forged ahead, I bumped my trolley against the counter.

‘Oops—looks like I need to see where I’m going!’ I laughed.

‘Oh,’ he replied, ‘I’ve been trying to work that out for the past seventy years!’

My mind whirred as I stacked my groceries on that counter, but before I could say anything, he spoke again.

‘Do you know where you’re going?’

For a few moments, that question seemed to hang in the air between us. It was as if time stood still—and almost as if God was smiling at me and saying, ‘Well, Jo—what are you going to say?’

So I said the first thing that came to mind.

‘Actually, I do know where I’m going!’

‘Oh, where’s that?’ he responded.

‘Well, I belong to God—I know Jesus and I believe I’m going to heaven!’

He looked slightly taken aback, but then launched into a little poem I recognised yet now sadly cannot remember. When he had finished, I decided that, if he could quote something to me, I could perhaps quote something back.

‘Oh, I love 1 John 3:1—How great is the love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God! And that is what we are! It’s amazing we can be children of God, don’t you think?’

At that point, it was as if he dredged up a Bible verse of his own from somewhere deep in the recesses of his brain—perhaps from childhood? I could not catch it all, but nodded and smiled.

‘What’s your name?’ he demanded then.

‘I’m Jo-Anne … what’s yours?’

‘I’m Tony,’ he told me, in his lovely European accent.

‘Good to chat, Tony!’I replied, suddenly realising the girl at the checkout was smiling at me—and that the shopper she had just served was looking at me somewhat strangely!

Later, I thought of all the things I could have said instead—but at least the man hadn’t seemed too put off. In fact, I wondered if something had stirred in him as we chatted—perhaps something God had spoken into his heart long ago? And maybe our conversation would cause him to reflect a little more on his own question. I hoped so anyway.

I wondered, however, if what I had said may have come across as just that little bit too presumptuous. Even as I said what I did, I remember thinking, ‘This could sound so proud and arrogant!’ But Jesus himself tells us:

For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life. John 3:16

And in 1 John 5:11-12, we read:

And this is the testimony: God has given us eternal life, and this life is in his Son. He who has the Son has life …

I wonder how you would have answered this man’s question. Perhaps your response would have been much wiser and more sensitive than mine. Whatever the case, I hope you do know where you’re going—because that’s the main thing, isn’t it?

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