2 Lost but 1 Found!

Early on this morning I realised that my plastic card wallet was not in my trouser pocket where it was supposed to be. I checked the other places in the house where it might have been. There was no sign of it. It was missing.

I was also trying to solve another mystery. How was it that I had not received a voicemail on my mobile yesterday evening? I was to give someone a lift to the Bible Study at the church, but I didn't get the message.

I was pretty sure that the wallet would be somewhere safe, so I didn't call the banks, etc. and cancel the cards. But I needed to locate the wallet to be sure. I checked the jacket and trousers I had been wearing on Sunday morning, and it wasn't in my gardening jeans either. I would have to check the two homes I had been in on Monday, and the church too.

Out at the church I spent the late morning and lunchtime helping to print the quarterly magazine. Our printer had gone faulty and we were kindly offered the use of the printer at Broxburn RC Church. It was a job that needed done, but all the time I was pondering my two mysteries. The wallet hadn't been at the church, neither in the sanctuary nor in the Session room where we had met for the Bible Study.

I got my wife to send me a trial voicemail on my mobile. It worked OK. I had received a phone call from that person before. So they had the right number. The person confirmed that they had definitely left a message. There was no clue to what had happened.

Back in Winchburgh I returned to the two houses I had been in on Monday. We had a thorough search but there was no sign of my wallet. By now I was beginning to get alarmed. Maybe I would have to call the banks after all. It doesn't take very long for a disreputable person to use up a plastic card. Although I still couldn't figure how I could have lost the wallet outside.

As I drove home I had another think about what I had been doing on Sunday and Monday. It occurred to me that I had worn another pair of jeans after I finished in the garden on Sunday. I hadn't checked them earlier in the day. Perhaps I didn't take it out of the pocket at the end of the day. They must be there.

When I got home, I nipped up to the bedroom, and sure enough, there was the wallet, just where I had left it, in my jean's pocket. Well, that was a relief!

The wallet had been lost but now it was found. I was pleased. It reminded me of a famous song, about being lost and then found. Of course, it's Amazing Grace, 'I once was lost but now am found', penned by John Newton back in the 18th century.

I thought about how we are all lost, not knowing where we are, until God finds us, and we understand that we are in his family, secure, safe, and not lost.

Jesus told many stories about people and things that were lost and then found, a sheep, a coin, treasure. Are you searching? What have you lost? God knows the answer to what you're looking for.

And the Voicemail? It's still a mystery!