FOR a moment Lizzie held her purse all the tighter. Her mother had told her to carry the purse, to take care of the money; and, child though she was, she felt as if in some way she should prove herself unfaithful to her trust if she allowed the purse to pass into other hands.
The gipsy saw she was unwilling to give it up, so she said in a loud, cross voice, "Don't you know I have got a way of my own of making little girls do just what I tell them, and it's a way that perhaps you won't like; so just be quick and give me the purse.”
Poor Lizzie was quite frightened, and allowed the stranger to take the purse, which she put into her own large basket, and the two walked on for what seemed to Lizzie a very long way. At last she ventured to say, “Please will you take me home now? It is quite dark, and mother will be so vexed if we keep her waiting for tea.”
“Well, my dear, and so I am taking you right home now. But you like going to shops, don't you? Just run into this baker's and say Mrs. Green doesn't want any bread to-day.”
Lizzie was wanting very much to get home, so she obeyed, thinking if she made her guide angry she might say she would not take her. When she came out of the shop the gipsy was nowhere to be seen. She had run away, taking with her Lizzie's purse and basket. More frightened than ever, the child wandered on a little way till she came to a piece of open ground at the end of the houses. Then her strength and courage seemed to give way, and she began to cry. She was lost, and she knew it. But soon one little gleam of comfort seemed to come into her heart. It was the text, "Thou God seest me." Yes, God could see her, lost, lonely and afraid as she was. I do not know the words in which the child spoke to the holy, all-seeing God. Lizzie never could remember what she said, but I am sure she prayed from her very heart, and always believed that her cry for help was heard and answered by God.
A lady passed, and, after going a little way, turned back, saying kindly, "Why don't you run home, little girl? It is going to be a wet night, and, besides, mother will be thinking you are lost.”
“I am lost," the child replied between great sobs, "and I've lost all my money. All my mother's money, I mean, and she will be so vexed, and I don't know which way to go.”
“Tell me who you are and where you live," said the lady.
Lizzie's name and address were soon given, and the stranger, who Lizzie felt sure would be a real friend, said— “Why, you have wandered a long way from your home; it will take us nearly half-an-hour to get there. But I can't go home and leave a little lost lone lamb like you out—such a wild night, too." Half-an-hour later Lizzie was safe at home, and though at first her mother, who thought her little daughter had been careless and disobedient, was angry and threatened to punish her, her new friend would not go away till she had received a promise that she should be forgiven; and so it was not long before Lizzie, who was very tired and almost worn out with her wanderings, was asleep in her own little bed.
Are you not glad that the lost child was found and taken safely to her father's house? But let me ask you, dear young friends, has anything just a little like the story you have been reading ever happened to you? Have you ever tasted what a sad thing it is to be lost? If you have I know how glad you were to hear of One who came from heaven to be a Savior, "To seek and to save that which was lost." I can say "I know" because I have gone through it all myself. The bitterness of knowing that I was lost. The joy of knowing that I had been sought and found by the Lord Jesus, the Good Shepherd, who gave His life for the sheep.
Another time I hope to tell you of the way in which the gracious One, who had taken care of poor lost Lizzie, made Himself known to her soul as her own precious Savior. But just now I must leave you with the question—Are you lost or found? Or in other words—Do you know the Lord Jesus as the One who has sought and saved you?