Joe Stowell - Son Lost But Didn’t Know he Was Lost

On our annual Christmas trek to the mall in Chicago with Grandpa and Grandma, we noticed that little three-and-a-half-year-old Matthew was gone. Terror immediately struck our hearts. We split up, each taking an assigned location. After frantically searching for him, I trudged back to our meeting point. My wife, Martie, had not found him, nor had my mother. And then my dad appeared, holding little Matthew by the hand. Interestingly enough, to Matthew there had been no problem. I asked my father where he had found him. “The candy counter,” he replied. Matthew didn’t look lost. He didn’t know he was lost. This is a candy-counter culture, where people who don’t look lost don’t know they’re lost. (Joe Stowell, Moody Monthly, Dec., 1989, p. 4).