Have you seen my son?

Jesus is found by His mother, Mary

The gospel on Sunday was about Jesus missing and his parents in a rush to find him again.  I don’t know if you have ever lost a child temporarily or not, but I have and the overwhelming fear and panic that you experience is like nothing else.  The longer they are beyond your reach, the more terror stricken you become.  It is only holding them in your arms again that can calm your fear. 

I have experienced this with my son, who is now 44, on three different occasions and each time the thought crossed my mind that I might never see my child again.  You would think I must be a bad mother or that I had a very disobedient child, but I like to think neither was the case, as I believe Mary and Joseph were also attentive loving parents.  The fact is, with kids strange things just happen.  Our son was first lost in a store while in the care of my mother, who agreed to keep an eye on him while I went alone to the toy department to buy his Christmas gifts and hide them in the trunk of the car without him seeing them. 

The two of them were browsing the greeting card racks together and when Mother walked around the end of an aisle in the store she assumed he was by her side.  When he looked up, however, she was not in his sight, so he went directly to a cashier and said, “I can’t find my grandmother.”  He was four at the time and had been told NEVER EVER EVER leave the store without me.  The store made an announcement on the PA system for Chad’s grandmother to please come to check stand #4 to meet her grandson.  Hearing the announcement, I knew there was a problem and I dropped the toys in the aisle and made a bee line to the check stand.   I was there before my mother and there was Chad, happy as you please, waiting to be rescued.  My mother arrived shortly in tears saying, “I’m sorry, I’m so sorry.  One minute he was there, the next minute he was gone.”