ONE day, some years ago, a family of children of different ages and sizes, accompanied by their nurse, might have been seen walking near the outskirts of a large seaside town. The roads and turnings were all strange to them, for they were that very day moving to a new house, and they had already walked a long distance. They were passing a pretty park, and the sight of trees, blooming flowers, and shady seats, made one of the children, a little girl of about six years of age, wish to run in and see for herself what the pretty place was like.
“No, no,” said the nurse, “we must not stay now, but I daresay you will often be able to come here and play, for I don’t think that we have much farther to go. Come along, dear.”
But the little girl did not choose to wait for her pleasure, or to mind what was said to her just then; so first looking and longing, and then lingering behind, she began to reason with herself.
“What harm can there be in just running in for a minute? O, I must just see what it looks like inside. I’m sure I can easily catch up to them again.” and in she ran. Of course, when she was once within the enclosure, one thing after another caught her eye; here were lovely flowers, which must be smelled and peeped at more closely, and so the time slipped by, till the child suddenly remembered where she was, and ran out of the entrance, feeling rather frightened.
When on the road again, she felt still more frightened, for no nurse, brothers or sisters, could she see anywhere! And what was worse, so many roads went this way and that way, that she could not possibly tell which one they had taken. So she stood there the very picture of misery, crying bitterly. She felt herself to be lost.
Dear little readers, this child’s condition at that time is exactly like yours now, if you are still unsaved. You, too, are lost, though you may not know it nor feel it. You need someone to save you, as did the little girl who was lost on the roadside, and that is just what God, in His love, sent His dear Son Jesus Christ to do.
You have read—have you not? —what He had to go through thus to seek and save us. He had to leave His lovely home where He was very rich, and come here and be very poor, and be despised, and finally die a dreadful death to put away our sins. So that now any one—any child—who just clings to Him, and says, Lord Jesus I am a poor lost child, and I cannot find my way to heaven, He will make them know that He is the way.
He will take you up like a shepherd takes a poor little lost lamb in his arms and carries it to a safe place. The safe place where Jesus carries us is the lovely home from which He had come, and to which He has gone back.
But suddenly there was a shout of delight: “O, there’s my sister,” was heard, and an elder sister of the lost child, who had been searching for her, came up. Sometime had elapsed before the little girl had been missed, and great had been the sorrow of the nurse and the trouble of the mother. How happy they were when the lost child was brought by her elder sister to the new home; how the kind mother clasped her little one with thankfulness to her bosom, even while speaking to her of her fault, which had caused them alarm, and some sorrow to herself.
It was that first look at the forbidden pleasure; then the desire, and then the act of disobedience, which led to her being lost.
Are you among the lost ones, who do not even know that they are lost? Or are you lost, and, knowing it, are you miserable on that account? If so, the Good Shepherd is seeking and inviting you.
The Lord grant that you may be among the happy number of the saved ones, who are being led safely along to their new and eternal home, where will be endless joy and praise.
ML 11/09/1924