The Lost Sheep

         How far will you go to find a lost animal of any kind?  I recall one rather cold, windy and snowy day when I went to work at the Hollett farm near our home in Indiana.  I was surprised to find Flora Hollett in the kitchen with a newborn calf wrapped in a blanket and feeding with a bottle.  It seems as if the mother didn't want to look after the calf or there was something wrong with her milk, so the task was up to Flora who stayed up all night with the calf.  There are times when one of your animals, be it the family pet or some other animal, gets lost and you spend a lot of time searching for it.  You may think that you can never find it, but you keep on looking and calling and waiting for it to come walking up to you.  Such is the case with our cat which walks off now and then to places unknown to us.  While we search for our cats and dogs and nurse little animals back to health, we can be thankful that the Lord Jesus Christ did the same for us.  Luke 15:6 says,"And when he cometh home, he calleth together his friends and neighbours, saying unto them, Rejoice with me; for I have found my sheep which was lost." 
        Christ reminded the people about God's searching for them when He told the story of the lost sheep.  In the above account, the owner rejoices when he finds that which was lost and in this case it is that wandering sheep that decided to take a wrong turn and ended up lost.  We should be able to associate with the lost sheep because we take a lot of wrong turns in our life and then need to be rescued.  In our case, we are the animal that is lost and the Bible often refers to our ways as those of a lamb.  We are defenseless, overloaded with extra weight, going where we shouldn't go and ending up so lost we can't even begin to find our say back.  Philip Keller reminds us of how sheep can be "cast down."  The extra wool, and being over weight, sometimes forces the sheep to lie down in a small gully in order to scratch its back.  The only problem is that it can't get back up without the help of the shepherd.  The blood soon leaves its legs and if not found soon, it will die.  He also said that once a sheep does it the first time, it will do it again.  It just doesn't learn.  Sound familiar?  Yes, we do the same thing in our own way.  The pleasures of sin seem to be good at the beginning and so we find ourselves often repeating the same thing over and over.  In each time, we cry out to God and the Great Shepherd comes and gets us back on our feet and heading in the right direction.    Praise God that He takes care of each and every wandering soul.