Lost and Found

I went to bed and it was 1999. I woke up and I was 28, and I’d already lived a life, full of adventures, and stories, agony and depression, love and loneliness. I would never ask where the time went; I know damn well. It went into bottles and fights; it went in one ear and out the other; it went into one special girl; it went into family and new friends; it went into a short-lived teaching career (soon to be reborn); it went into the Middle East. It went into church, and it went right back out. Time now sits by my side on a threshold and it holds my hand.

Have you ever been lost? Not like, “I can’t find this address” lost, but like, “Where the fuck am I?! Will I ever get out of this place?!” lost. I’ve been lost like that. Sometimes being lost is fun, but that’s only when you don’t realize you’re actually lost. Alone in the darkness there is no light.

I was lost in the mountains once. With trees and hills on all sides of me, and a washed out trail ahead, the day drew dusk, and soon the dusk drew dark. The forest can be a frightening place at night, but morning came, and with it new light and direction. So it often is.

Another time, in the pink arid hills of Palestine I could not find my way. Me, my black pack, and maps turned to mush by my water jug spilling. A small boy on a small road led me to a path, charred and littered with debris and rubble. He pointed down that path, and I walked that path. Found, was at the end of that path, but it lay past angry militants and armed Israeli soldiers. I nearly lost my life on that dirt road…but alas, I survived, and I was found again.

The unknown. Have you encountered it? The world is full of it…and so are we. We come across a stranger, or maybe a dark alley. We see a bit of ugly, some violence, some evil and treachery, and we retreat back to our home, to the places we know, to our safety. But what happens when we come upon the unknown in ourselves? What happens when we find things in ourselves more terrifying and unexpected, more weak and frail, than we’d ever imagined? Lost in ourselves and lost in the world we stumble blindly, shuffling our feet slowly, feeling out for familiar things.

If you’re lost, and you might be, take faith, you’re not alone, you just can’t see all that surrounds you. Take it slow--running blind is dangerous. Doubt will fill your mind, doubt and fear, but remember this…you are still you, you are still loved. Find your touch-points, one by one; eventually they’ll carry you back to that place where the miraculous is possible, and there you’ll be--stronger, wiser, and more confident. There and then you’ll see again, and you’ll be found, and there is nothing better than being found.

2 weeks ago I got an iPhone for work. It has GPS on it. The world is mapped and plotted, and we carry it in our pocket, but pockets have holes and batteries run out. Everything is going to be fine.