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You will seek me and find me when you
seek me with all your heart. Jeremiah 29:13

Lostology Law #16

A search becomes your consuming priority.

My childhood memories are checkered with images of intense searches for prodigal pets. Like most kids, we spanned the gamut of pet categories. Frankly, most were great disappointments.

Fish Category

Our goldfish tried to squeeze through the tiny passageway in his fishbowl castle--that ceramic decoration that was standard equipment in any fashionable fishbowl. Problem was, our castle passage was too snug for our fish. The fish got stuck and drowned . . . or whatever you call it when a fish can't breath and ends up floating upside down.

Rodent Category

Hamsters, gerbils--we had them all. The hamsters were the biggest disappointment. While in elementary school, I wanted to raise hamsters so I bought two. For some reason, the female grew twice the size of the male. Although small, the male was very affectionate and willing to help me produce baby hamsters. The female? Not interested. She was a fighter, not a lover. Family dysfunction continued. Then it happened. One morning I checked on my hamsters and was greeted by a gruesome scene. My lady hamster had apparently had all she could take of her persistent, amorous partner. So she killed him . . . and ate half of the remains.

Reptile Category

Our classic pet turtle prompted one of the memorable events on Ridgedale Street. He was an average, unassuming turtle. One of those small, half-dollar sized, moss-green turtles that lived in a kidney-shaped bowl with a plastic palm tree poking out of the center sunning island. We really liked that turtle and fed him flies, bugs, and grass. Most of all, we liked to play with him by putting him on the floor and watching him lumber off at turtle warp speed.

In the midst of playing with him on the floor one day, we got distracted. My mom walked up and asked, "Where's the turtle?" We were clueless. Other priorities had captured our attention. So my mom injected a strong dose of authority and upended our To-Do lists. "Find the turtle . . . now!" It was a mom ultimatum.

Her mandate launched The Raiders of the Lost Turtle. We recruited our friends and scurried throughout the house, searching frantically for the fugitive turtle. I remember climbing to the top of the shelves in my closet and inspecting the highest corners. Never mind that they were six feet from the floor. Passion overcomes logic during an intense search. You never know where the lost may be so you search everywhere. Yet, even with our persistent efforts which surely lasted a solid seven minutes, we discovered no turtle.

My mom was not pleased with that. Perhaps she was already imagining the putrid smell of rotting turtle wafting from a hard-to-reach place. In time, however, even she conceded defeat. That turtle was lost.

Days became a week. One week became two. Then one night, our family was watching the old black and white box-television that fit into a built-in slot in the wall. Suddenly, someone spotted him. Moving slowly but deliberately from the tiny crack at the side of the TV, like an escaped convict conceding defeat, our turtle returned to his cell. Apparently, he had vacationed among the dust balls and dead bugs behind the TV for two weeks. Not a great time for him, yet what were his alternatives? Life as our pet was not enviable, even for a turtle.

His return was a time of rejoicing for us. Our wayward turtle had been found. With celebration, we put him back in his kidney-shaped bowl where he lived about as well as a turtle could expect to live . . . at least at our house.

A Sudden Shift in Priorities

If a prodigal turtle can shift our priorities, a lost person can prompt even more change. Lostologists have observed that when someone is lost, new priorities emerge instantly for those who must mount the search. Lostology Law #16 states this truth: a search becomes your consuming priority. In reality, it can be no other way.

If you received a call saying someone you love was missing, your priorities would change in a flash:

• An important meeting? It would have to wait.
• A presentation prepared for months? Sorry, new priorities.
• A vacation to Hawaii? No way. Out of the question.

In such a crisis, everything in our priority system resets to zero. One priority demands total attention: find the one who is lost.

Model Priorities

Jesus' lifestyle communicated the priority He gave to searching for the lost. On the morning after an exhausting day of ministry, Jesus got up early to spend time alone in prayer. When the crowd began to clamor for Jesus to meet their needs, the disciples went looking for Him. They knew what Jesus should do, and they were prepared to tell Him. "Everyone is looking for you!" they said. Their implication? Forget this prayer business and get back into action with people. The crowd must be top priority.

As usual, Jesus was unimpressed with their plans for His life. His response was classic: "Let us go somewhere else--to the nearby villages--so I can preach there also. That is why I have come" (Mark 1:38).

The disciples did not know Jesus very well at this point. In time, they learned that searching for the lost or training others to share in the search was Jesus' top priority. He refused to let anything or anyone distract Him.

Jesus' stories about the lost sheep and the lost coin in Luke 15 illustrate a shift in priorities:

• Undoubtedly, the shepherd was looking forward to other tasks or to an evening of rest as he counted his flock. But as his tally entered the nineties, he sensed something was wrong. One sheep was missing. Instantly, his plans changed. Securing the ninety-nine, he headed out to search for the prodigal sheep. One missing sheep changed his plans and shifted his priorities.
• The woman with the lost coin would have had many other things to do. But when she noticed that one of her prized coins was missing, she placed everything else on hold. She focused on a new objective: finding the lost coin. She meticulously swept her house, looking in hidden nooks and obscure crannies. The plans she had set previously were forgotten. A lost valuable changed her focus and altered the way she spent her day.

When a search is necessary, that search becomes the consuming priority. Everything in Jesus' life and teaching affirms this foundational truth of lostology.

Determining Church Priorities

All of us struggle with competing priorities. Multiple demands clamor for top spot on our To-Do lists. It happens when Christians work together to set the priorities for their churches.

Our church in Oregon was established as a "search and rescue" church. From the beginning, we understood that we existed to reach lost people for Christ. We communicated this priority to all who became members of the church. To be with us was to join the search team. Over time, however, some in our church began to question that focus.

One day, a key leader said to me in frustration, "Sometimes, I feel like we're a church for people who aren't here." As soon as she said it, I thought, "She's right. We started this church for people without Christ and without a church. Nothing has changed that mission." Her statement stimulated my thinking over the next months. That year, on our church's anniversary, I entitled my state-of-the-church sermon "The Church for People Who Aren't Here." That sermon became a defining moment for many in our ministry--especially for me.

As a church, we did not exist for ourselves. We came together as Christians to search for those who were not there yet. That was our mission, our reason for existence. Perhaps not all Christians are called to be part of a church focused on reaching the lost. Perhaps evangelism is not the driving priority in every church. For us, it was.

That priority was costly for us. Some Christians felt they could not get their spiritual needs met if we continued to focus on the lost. So they left. We did not blame them for leaving, but we hated to see them go because they were vital to our team. Still, we were unwilling to shift the priorities to which God had called us. The search was top of the list. For us, that was nonnegotiable.

Living with the Struggle

Essential elements for spiritual growth like personal time with God, Bible study, prayer, worship, ministry, and fellowship with believers all lay claim to our time. Since evangelism, by definition, focuses on people who are not in our midst, they cannot plead for the search to remain central. As a result, most churches move evangelism down the list. Most do so unintentionally. Yet the net result is the same: we do other things rather than searching for the lost.

The same thing happens in our personal lives. We never say, "Evangelism is unimportant." We simply raise the priority of other things, secular and spiritual, until there is no time left to share our faith.

Staying in Focus

Keeping an appropriate focus on reaching the lost is a constant challenge. Here are some practical steps that can help:

Keep a prayer list of lost people you know and pray for them. Ask God to give you an opportunity to do something that helps those people move a step closer to Jesus.

Carry a gospel tract with you. Simple booklets like The Bridge to Life, How to Have a Full and Meaningful Life, and The Four Spiritual Laws are excellent tools you can use when talking to others about Christ. Carrying a tract helps you be ready to share your faith when the opportunity arises. The tract itself will serve as a tangible reminder that you are actively seeking opportunities to talk with others about Christ.

Memorize a presentation of the gospel and review it regularly. The presentations in Continuing Witness Training and Evangelism Explosion are excellent.

Participate in the outreach program of your church. If your church does not have an ongoing outreach program, volunteer to contact people who visit your church so you can talk to them about their relationship with Christ. Committing yourself to participate in outreach on a regular basis ensures you will keep evangelism as a priority in your schedule.

Evangelism is so challenging and the need so compelling, we must intentionally rank it high on our list of spiritual priorities. Without a top priority, we will find ourselves passing through years of our lives without ever talking with anyone about Christ. As lostologists, we must commit ourselves to keeping evangelism a focus in our lives. The "people who aren't there" desperately need us.

The Lostology Lab

1. Recall a time when you lost something that caused you to change your plans so you could look for the item. Why did that lost item become top priority on your To-Do list?
2. How do you determine how you will spend your time each day? If you keep a To-Do list, what criteria do you use to place items as top priorities?
3. How do you adjust your To-Do list as you go through the day? What has to happen for you to alter your schedule based on new priorities?
4. Imagine one of your loved ones was missing. How would the disappearance change the way you spent your time? How long would the change in your schedule continue?
5. How do you deal with the pressure of competing priorities? When your choice is between two things that are both good and important, how do you decide what to do?
6. Read Mark 1 and focus especially on verse 38. What impact do you think Jesus' time alone in prayer had on His schedule decisions?
7. Have you found that spending time in Bible study and prayer helps you keep your priorities in order and enables You to make better decisions about how you spend your time? If so, name specific ways your personal devotional time with God helps you set priorities and live by them?
8. If someone analyzed your calendar and To-Do lists for the last four weeks, what would they say your priorities have been?
9. Do your priorities match the priorities you feel God wants you to have? If not, what changes will you need to make? Are you willing to make these changes?

Coming Next: Turned around Backward

Why is it so many Christians experience such poor results as they try to talk with others about Christ? The answer may be in how they approach the search. It is easy to start backward and end up tied in a knot. We will untie this knot in our next chapter.