Alex's personal musings - Lost Sheep

I was part of the team that began in the prayer room last night. During the day I was thinking about what verses I could highlight when giving out Bibles. One of the more obvious passages came to mind which I read out in the prayer room just after midnight:

“Then Jesus told them this story:

If any of you has a hundred sheep, and one of them gets lost, what will you do? Won’t you leave the ninety-nine in the field and go look for the lost sheep until you find it? And when you find it, you will be so glad that you will put it on your shoulder and carry it home. Then you will call in your friends and neighbours and say, “Let’s celebrate! I’ve found my lost sheep.”

Jesus said, “In the same way there is more happiness in heaven because of one sinner who turns to God than over ninety-nine good people who don’t need to.” Luke 15:3-7.

Following this we prayed that we would have the same spirit and have the determination and grit to find those who were lost, lonely, fatherless and in pain.

Just after 1am one of the long term team, Lucy and I paired up and walked down towards Ibiza Rocks bar (armed with brownies which we give to the bar workers). She noticed one young man, Carl (not his real name) who was part of a group of friends but looked a little wobbly. To be honest, I thought that he was OK and safe with his friends.

I am so glad that Lucy got involved.

He had obviously consumed more than alcohol (see how much of an expert I am now ;-)! and was struggling to focus. Lucy gave him some water while I had a chat with his friend about what 24/7 Ibiza is about.

After 10 minutes we decided that we would walk him back to his hotel with one of his friends to sleep it off. However, Carl started to deteriorate pretty quickly. He was finding it difficult to walk, he was overheating and his heartbeat was exceptionally fast.

Lucy decided that we should get him to the medical tent and we called for the 24/7 wheelchair. My now masterful driving skills came to the fore as I pushed Carl ¼ mile uphill whilst also trying to stop him from jumping out or trapping his feet underneath the chair (good prep for when Robert is older ;-)

I really felt for this guy who, through the teeth grinding, muscle spasms and outbursts, shared that he had lost his grandma that day. Perhaps Carl took the drugs not to party but to numb the pain.

The guys at the medical tent checked Carl’s vitals and we got stuck in by giving him water to drink, holding ice around his neck and also giggled at his reaction when he had cold water poured over him to reduce his temperature.

Lucy and I stayed with him for an hour while he slowly came down. At 3am I was swapped out with Jon so I could go back into the prayer room.

I was really surprised to see Carl still there and still struggling to come down when our team were sent home to rest at 4am.

As I write I don’t know what happened to Carl but I know that the long term team would have stayed with him for as long as it took and safety delivered him back to his hotel.

It would not surprise me if we had collectively spent over 20 hours with Carl.

Bearing in mind where this blog post started it was rewarding to finish the night realising that we had been used by God to find, care for and bring home a lost sheep.

Father, I pray that Carl is safe and that through his experience you will plant a seed of faith so that when his friends recount what happened his spirit would realise that You came to find him last night.

Today we are off to Ibiza Town to do some prayer walking and eating. Yum.