lost
The Louisiana Purchase was the acquisition of the Louisiana territory, which was 828,000 square miles, by the United States from France in 1803. The purchase treaty was signed on April 30, 1803. There were a number of explorers who were anxious to explore the new territory…among them, Lieutenant Zebulon Pike. Pike’s explorations of the newly acquired Louisiana Territory of the United States began before the nation’s first western explorers, Lewis and Clark, had returned from their own expedition up the Missouri River. Pike was more of a professional military man than either Lewis or Clark, and he was a smart man who had taught himself Spanish, French, mathematics, and elementary science. When the governor of Louisiana Territory requested a military expedition to explore the headwaters of the Mississippi, General James Wilkinson picked Pike to lead it.
Although Pike’s first western expedition had little success, Wilkinson again picked him 
to lead a second mission in July 1806 to explore the headwaters of the Red and Arkansas Rivers. This route took Pike across present-day Kansas and into the high plains region that would later become the state of Colorado. As Pike approached the Colorado foothills of the Rocky Mountains during his second exploratory expedition, Lieutenant Zebulon Pike spots a distant mountain peak that looks “like a small blue cloud.” The mountain was later named Pike’s Peak in his honor, but Pike had vastly underestimated the mountain, and the distance to it. He told his men they should be able to walk to the peak, climb it, and return before dinner. Pike and his men struggled through snow and sub-zero temperatures before finally taking shelter in a cave for the night, without even having reached the base of the towering mountain. Pike later pronounced the peak impossible to scale. Little did he know what the future would bring for Pike’s Peak, especially tourism.
The remainder of Pike’s expedition was as bad as the first part. After attempting for several months to locate the Red River, Pike and his men became hopelessly lost. Were it not for a troop of Spanish soldiers who arrested Pike and his men, they would have most likely died. The soldiers escorted them to Santa Fe, thus providing Pike with an tour of that important region, courtesy of the Spanish military. After returning to the United States, Pike wrote an account of his expedition that won him some fame, but little money. In recognition of his bravery and leadership during the western expeditions, the army appointed him a brigadier general during the War of 1812. He was killed in an explosion during the April 1813 assault on Toronto.
Bob and I had always felt that our kids didn’t really need a phone in their room, and for the early years, they didn’t have one. But, when our girls reached the pre-teen years, we decided that since the phone was always for them, and having them talk, talk, talking in the living room made it really hard to watch television, maybe having a phone in their rooms wasn’t such a horrible idea after all. The constant chatter and loud laughter was hard to ignore…not to mention having the girls constantly telling everyone not to listen!!
So, along about the time they were 11 or 12, we decided that Christmas would bring a rather unexpected gift for our girls. We were going to get them phones for their rooms. Of course, there would not be a separate line, but there would be some peace and quiet in the living room. For the most part it brought peace to our home…sort of. There were times when one or the other of the girls took too long in their turn on the phone, and then we would have a few fights. Still, the moments of fighting were a small sacrifice compared to the hours of peace that fell in between. I will never forget the look on my girls’ faces that Christmas morning. They couldn’t believe that they could talk in their bedrooms and not have everyone listening to every word they said.
Much has changed since those days. Pretty much every child has their own cell phone these days…and their own phone number…and it is more important than many people would like to think. A cell phone can be a life line if their car breaks down, or they missed their bus, etc. I know of many parents who don’t think their child needs a cell phone, and that they are a distraction. In some ways, that is right…especially if they are using it during class, but a child walking home alone, who gets lost or is being followed…needs a phone…now!!
I am grateful that my girls have continued the tradition and that their children each have a cell phone. It’s nice to be able to get a hold of my grandchildren whenever I want to. Of course, today things are different. Phones are used in a completely different way…texting. And if you want to keep up, you have to be able to text. I personally like texting, because 
it allows you to go on doing what you were doing while you are waiting to hear back. And cameras on the phone can be fun and functional too.
Yes, much has changed since my girls’ first phones, but kids haven’t changed. They still get excited about that new phone, and just the fact that it is theirs. They still want the latest and the greatest technology. And what is cool today, will be old news tomorrow. As excited as my girls were with their new phones that Christmas morning so many years ago, today they would wonder if I had lost my mind, because I would be giving them an antique that would be viewed as worthless.
Once in a while, you find yourself in a situation that requires you to be someone’s hero. That is the situation my son-in-law, Kevin and my daughter, Corrie found themselves in yesterday evening. Coming home from work, at about 5:15 pm, Kevin saw a little girl walking up and down their street, crying and obviously freezing. The temperature was about was about 20 degrees at that time. As Kevin got out of his pickup, the little girl let out a scream of frustration, fear, and cold. Kevin turned around to see what was going on, but was concerned that the little girl would not come to him. He went in the house and got Corrie, telling her that he thought the little girl might be lost or hurt.
When Corrie stepped outside, the little girl turned and started to walk away…obviously afraid. Then, after taking about 4 steps, and knowing that she was in a lot of trouble, and could die without help, she turned back around and started toward Corrie. Corrie asked her if she was lost, and she said that she was. Then, she hugged Corrie with such deep gratitude that it almost brought tears to Corrie’s eyes. Corrie said, “Oh my gosh, you are so cold!!” She shivered and said, “C-c-c-cold!” Corrie asked her if she knew her address or phone number. The answers were no to both questions. She is in Kindergarten.
Corrie asked to look in her backpack to see if there might be any information in it. She found a hat, mittens, a small notebook, and a juice box. The little girl’s coat was on but unzipped. She told her to come into her house so she could get warm and they would find her parents. She asked her how she got to where they found her. She said she rode a bus and some kids usually walked her home, but they weren’t on the bus yesterday. She thought she could make it home alone, but got lost. She had walked about 4 blocks from the bus stop, but who knew how long she had wandered around during the hour and fifteen minutes before they found her.
The little girl knew the bus number, so Corrie called the bus garage, and said, “I don’t know if you can help me or not, but I have a little girl at my house who got lost walking home from the bus stop.” The person answering the phone immediately said, “Is her name…?” Corrie asked the little girl and confirmed that she indeed had the right little girl. They told Corrie that her parents don’t speak English, and they had been calling the bus garage, frantically trying to find their little girl…their only child. They were certain their worst nightmare had happened to their little girl. The bus garage dispatched a bus to pick up the little girl, now warm from being in Corrie and Kevin’s house, wrapped in a blanket, and snuggled up with the family cat.
What do you do after an evening like that. Your adrenaline has been pumping like crazy. You have found yourself on the helping end of a parent’s worst nightmare. You were the hero. You saved the day, and more importantly the little girl. You got her safely back home to her terrified parents. What does a hero do after something like that…well, if you are Corrie and Kevin, you don’t shout it from the rooftops. You wouldn’t have even told your mom if she hadn’t called at the moment you were on the phone to the bus garage. No, if you are Corrie and Kevin…you simply go to Walmart to buy groceries.
A couple of months ago, I lost a pin that I really liked. It had 2 Calla Lillies on it and it was delicate and beautiful. I searched high and low for it, at work, in my car, and at home. I couldn’t find it anywhere. Being a Christian, I believe that the devil has no right to steal things from me. I believe that God takes care of me and my things. His word promises me that I have power over the devil, and since the devil came to steal, kill, and destroy, what was happening to me was wrong. I prayed over my pin, telling God that He knew where it was and asked Him to reveal it to me.
During the next couple of months, I thought about my pin often, but it still had not been returned to me. I had not had to stand this long for a lost item before, and I wondered what to do about that. I know faith works, and I didn’t want to pull back my faith, and yet, I had no pin. I just kept putting it out of my mind.
Yesterday as I was getting some things out of my car after work, my attention was caught by something at the back edge of the driver’s side seat. There, staring me in the face, was my pin. I was ecstatic!! I wanted to jump up and down. I knew God would never let me down, so if the pin had never been returned, I would have to face the fact that I had failed in my faith stand. I really hadn’t much thought about the pin, and certainly not enough to be pressured to pull back my faith with some silly remark about how I guessed it wasn’t going to be returned. I had simply put it out of my mind for the most part. But, God is faithful. And words are alive. The words spoken in faith two months ago, were not forgotten by God, He didn’t put it out of his mind by saying it was too hard. No, God and I are in covenant, and He never takes that lightly. I, His child, had spoken in faith, and managed for two months not to pull back my faith, so God in His never-changing, perfect sense of responsibility and obligation to perform His word, did His part and brought it to pass.
My pin returned, I went about the rest of my day with a lighter heart and an ever growing understanding of how true to His word my God is. Thank you Father, for your faithfulness to me. I know that my God loves me and cares about every area of my life, from the biggest to the smallest detail. How awesome is that? I can roll the care of anything in my life over onto God, and He is faithful to supply every need, and even cares about my desires. Every little thing in my life is important to God, because He loves me and we are in covenant together. God always keeps up His end of the bargin.
