I think my greatest fear for most of my adult life has been the possibility of losing a child — losing to death, kidnapping or for any other reason. Even temporary loss scares me.
One Sunday morning after church the family loaded up in my SUV. I did the quick over-the-shoulder kid count and … “Where’s Devon?” No answer.
“Guys, where’s Devon?”
A chorus of I dunnos came back at me.
“Is he laying down in the back seat?”
“Uh-huh.” “Yes, sir.”
So off we went.
When we pulled up at the house, out hopped all the kids. Save one.
“Is Devon asleep in the back?” I asked.
No. Devon was not there.
I panicked. “You guys said he was lying down in the back seat!”
“I thought he was.” “I didn’t know.”
So, I hopped back in the truck and took off down the highway. Cell phones were not all that common then and my 10-year-old son certainly didn’t have one. If he was left at the church and tried the landline phones, he might not have even known what my cell number was.
I pictured my child, alone in a huge building or — even worse — wandering around outside, racked with anxiety and fear and in terrible danger. I was pretty sure we were the last vehicle in the lot when we left. No one else was there for him to turn to. He didn’t know some of our friends lived next door to the church on practically every side.
He was alone.
Lost.
As I turned the corner two blocks from the church and gunned it up the hill I looked around for any sign of my son. Then I saw him. Thank God!
He was sitting on the front steps of the church, leaning against one of the tall white columns, head hung low and my heart broke more.
I coasted to a stop in front of him, and he got up and walked to the truck, then climbed in.
“Are you OK? Where were you? I’m so sorry we left you,” and all sorts of similar things came pouring out of my mouth.
He explained he needed to go to the bathroom and had told one of his siblings, who obviously had not been listening. He’d gone downstairs and when I made rounds to turn off lights and lock doors, I hadn’t realized someone was in the bathroom.
His brother and sisters also didn’t bother to check the back seat when I asked if Devon was lying down. It was not unusual for him to do so, and to be the only one back there.
Through teary eyes he looked at me and asked, “Why did you leave me?”
I apologized and apologized. I held him close and told him how much I loved him.
I kept him close the rest of the day, too. And I think he chose to not be alone the rest of the day, either.
He’d been smart. He didn’t panic when he realized our SUV was gone. He said he’d walked around the church building to see if we’d moved the vehicle for some reason, or if I’d pulled over in front of the church office building and gone inside. When he didn’t find us, he sat on the front steps, thinking we’d either be back shortly, or someone he knew would pass by and check on him.
I was proud of him and told him so. But it didn’t take away the disappointment, hurt or fear of being left behind.
Not once in my life have I ever sought for God and discovered he was not already there. Not once have I cried out to him and he wasn’t close enough to hear, to answer, to pick me up in safety and reassurance.
Even when I have, like Jonah, run in the opposite direction from what God wanted me to do, when I came to my senses, I always found God was right there. Not far away from me, but right there with me.
“Where can I go that I can hide from you?” King David asked God. “Nowhere” is a good summation of his reply.
I don’t have to fear that God will leave me, that he will abandon me or forget me.
The Lord is an amazing God, the perfect Father.
There’s no fear in that whatsoever.
