While leading a weekly devotion meeting today using the
latest weekly topic from The Wired Word that
was dealing with the lost flight 370 incident, in the questions at the end,
this multi-part question was raised:
What does the Bible mean when it speaks of
"the lost"? In what way, if any, does that term relate to people who
are missing? Some Christians use the term "lost" to describe people
who don't (to their knowledge) have a relationship with Christ. Is that a
useful or accurate term? If so, in what way is it possible to be
"lost" from God?
The question resonated with me because only a couple months
earlier I had preached a message on the parable of the Prodigal son that had
touched on this area of thought, so I quickly pulled out a few quotes on the
topic to share with the group. Here are those thoughts, which make a pretty
good stand-alone article:
