The Buddy System

My husband is looking all over the yard for a beach ball.
Not just any beach ball.
A beach ball that was here a few days ago but now it is gone.
Since it is large, blue ball with yellow swirls, he does not understand why he cannot find it.

Beach balls, soccer balls, and basketballs tend to get lost.
They lodge underneath the cars parked in the garage.
They roll down the hill and into the woods.
My husband found a lost soccer ball, but the whereabouts of the beach ball is a mystery.

Isn’t that always the way?
When you’re looking for something you never find it.
As soon as you stop looking, it suddenly turns up.
Car keys, sunglasses, and cell phones hide in the most obscure places.

Usually the place you last put them is the place you will find them.
Often our steps throughout the house look like a Family Circus cartoon.
My children always loved to trace the dotted line path that the cartoonist drew.
They would find it so funny to think that someone would traipse all over the house.

Except dotted line paths that go all over the place are not that far fetched.
We tend to traipse all over the place when we lose something.
We tend to do that when we are trying to retrace our steps.
We walk where we have walked before to find what we have lost.

I saw a cartoon that made me laugh.
It was a picture of socks all lined up before an open dryer.
A sign on the wall said, Field Trip Today.
The obvious leader of the sock group said, Okay everyone, remember the buddy system.

Socks get lost.
Not just lost like the ball my husband eventually found in the woods, but permanently lost.
Lost in the black hole that is the clothes dryer.
Lost in hosiery No Man’s Land.

How can socks that once were pairs, now be singles?
The buddy system was not in place as that load of laundry tumbled through the cycles.
Socks don’t just disappear.
It is a lament of anyone who does laundry; it is an unsolvable mystery.

Wouldn’t it be nice if socks lined up two by two and stayed two by two in the dryer?
Wouldn’t it be lovely if car keys stayed in pockets or purses and never got misplaced?
What if cell phones had a beeping device to warn you if you forgot them?
What if everything automatically went back where it belonged?

I thought of the scene from Mary Poppins when she and the children clean the nursery.
For every job that must be done there is an element of fun.
You find the fun and SNAP, the job’s a game.
One SNAP and everything lost is found, everything misplaced goes back where it belongs.

Imagine.
Lost beach balls roll back into the garage.
Lost socks jump out of the dryer and find their buddy.
Misplaced car keys, sunglasses, and cell phones are suddenly found.

After this the Lord appointed seventy-two others and sent them two by two ahead of Him to every town and place where He was about to go. He told them, “The harvest is plentiful, but the workers are few. Ask the Lord of the harvest, therefore, to send out workers into His harvest field! Go! I am sending you out like lambs among wolves…He who listens to you listens to Me; he who rejects you rejects Me; but he who rejects Me rejects Him who sent Me.”
(Luke 10:1-3,16)

Jesus set up a buddy system.
His disciples were sent out two by two.
No one was sent out alone.
Every matter must be established by the testimony of two or three witnesses.
(1 Corinthians 13:1)

Two by two for their protection.
Two by two to work in the harvest field.
Two by two to validate the Kingdom work that is being done.
Two by two to proclaim the testimony of what God has done.

The buddy system was used by Jesus Himself for the benefit of the Kingdom.
Jesus knew that going out alone is not fruitful.
Workers are needed, but workers tend to get weary.
When workers go out two by two, they help each other press on.

The cartoon I saw can be changed a bit.
A sign on the wall says, Harvest Workers Needed.
Pairs of disciples are lined up before the harvest field.
Okay everyone, remember the buddy system.

Go out two by two.
The harvest is plentiful but the workers are few.
A dotted line path traipses all over, going to every town and place.
Ask the Lord of the harvest for more workers; more disciples to go out two by two.

It can be frustrating when lost socks, keys, and sunglasses are not found.
Lost objects are not a matter of eternal significance.
Lost souls are.
When Jesus looks for lost souls, they are found.

Be a harvest worker.
The fields are ripe.
Remember the buddy system.
Go!