Lost

Or my life...not the show.

I think I thought I was lost. For the past year and a half, that is.

And now I am thinking I was not ever lost, and I am thinking that this was just part of the trip. I told you a month ago about the man I gave a couple dollars to because he was out in the cold on a dreary November day. I think about him and I wonder where he is and if he is warm and if he has food to eat.

Now you might think that I am now thinking that man is the definition of lost. But I do not think so. In fact, I don't think any one of us is lost at all.

(And by the way, haven't I been doing much thinking lately?)

It's just life, after all. But when people said that to me before, I would think what in the world do you mean, it's just life. I probably take life too seriously, and that is why I got confused. How can you say it's just life when people are suffering or hungry or homeless and cold and alone? How can you say it when people are losing jobs or can't even get jobs or have illnesses and die? What do you mean...it's just life? Because it seems unto me that this is serious stuff.

I suppose it is, but still, it's just life.

Whatever I am here and whatever problems I have now are small. I imagine the great big universe...or wait, I just go outside at night and look up at the stars and think about how many beautiful lights I see up there in the sky. I cannot number them. And one day I will not be here anymore, and some other poor schmuck will have her turn, and she will look up at the sky, and she will think that her problems are so big, and I will be there, watching her somehow. Then I will whisper to her on the wind that no, her problems are not so big. In the grand scheme of life and everything that will come later, when her body is no longer bound to the earth, then she will see life for the small thing that it is.

I know this. My life as I know it here will come to an end. I believe with all my heart that my spirit will go somewhere else, and I will have a new, clearer understanding of what my life was about. I won't be worried anymore about whatever it is I worried about...marriage, children, friends, church, jobs, houses, cars, clothes, food, weight, height, eye color, race, politics, the economy, and Coca-cola. You know, the serious stuff. I think then that I will be filled with love and light. I hope that I will see myself as God sees me - completely free and unfettered from any worldly trappings or labels or cravings.

Mostly I hope I will know that I was not lost, ever. I hope I will see the beautiful things that filled my life, like friends and family and love. I hope I will see a period of pain and doubt as a small little blip on the radar that gave me insight and compassion for other people. The truth is, none of us is lost to God. That is why I know I'm not lost.

It's Christmas, a time to celebrate Jesus Christ. And Jesus Christ left the ninety and nine to search for the one. To Him, I am always present. To the Father, I am never anywhere that He does not know. The same is true for all of us, and while I cannot comprehend how that is possible, I know it is how the God of heaven and earth works. He never loses sight of us.