Lost and found - Jenny's story

You know, you can be lost without realising it. It’s only when you are found – and that’s wonderful – that you understand you were lost before. I was like that. As a young wife with a good husband and two lovely children, I tried the best I could, but never felt I reached the standard I set for myself or my family. I wasn’t unhappy, and, as I regularly attended church considered myself a Christian.

At some point, a friend and I started meeting to study the bible. After about a year my family was given the opportunity to join a house party in Cromer, Norfolk, with my mother’s church. It was a good family holiday. Cromer, as a seaside resort was having ‘Billy Bones’ week, and there were loads of wholesome activities for the whole family to be involved in – treasure hunts, sandcastle competitions, games on the beach – you know the sort of thing. Good though sand, sea and sun were, it was not any of these that made me realise I was lost.

On the holiday, there were other young mothers like myself. Being in their company, seeing the way they were willing to go the extra mile, made me realise I was not the person I wanted to be. I remember a mother with little children of her own, looking after the fractious baby of a tired Mum so that she could have an afternoon rest.

I remember too, the warmth of the friendship within the group of parents and children, in which we were included. For all my attempts to do the right thing, to be the best I could, I simply did not have in me what these people had and I wanted what they had.

Actually, it wasn’t what they had but Who! Each one of them was a believer in the Lord Jesus Christ, whose hearts and lives had been changed by a personal relationship with Him. This was not a distant God but the Son of God, who became a man and dwelt here on earth so that we could see what God the Father was like. Not only that, He died a brutal death to pay the penalty for my sin so that I could live with Him forever, and for that ‘forever’ to start now for whoever accepted Him.

I heard the Word of God, the Truth. ‘For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son that as we believe on Him we would not perish but have everlasting life.’

I put my name into that verse. God loves me! I was lost but Jesus found me! Thank You Jesus