Why is it that when someone finds a lost item they say, “It was in the last place I looked”? Of course it was in the last place you looked, because, if you keep looking for something after you’ve found it, you’re a little off your game, wouldn’t you say?

I think what they really mean is that it was in the last place they thought of looking, in an unexpected place. Now that makes more sense.

How much time is wasted looking for lost things? How much anxiety is created? Wouldn’t it be great if you could call in a pro, someone with a gift and a passion that could find all the lost things quickly, someone that could restore calm and order to your universe by finding that lost item?

I bring this up because I have identified my super power. It’s finding lost things.

If you’ve lost an item I can usually tell you where it is, even if its in the most unexpected place. Sounds pretty ordinary, I admit, but I assure you it can be impressive. It works by combining visual memory and deductive reasoning. If I have seen it recently even if it belongs to someone else and I don’t even know what it is, I can usually find it.

And it’s not limited to my own surroundings. I can help people find things in places I’ve never been. I admit I’m a little less effective if I haven’t been there to see the environment. It becomes all deductive at that point, but I can still do it.

My biggest difficulty is getting people to acknowledge that it is a genuine superpower. Oh, its not that they’re ungrateful, it’s just that they are unimpressed. It’s a little vexing. I mean it impresses me, and its my superpower. Why aren’t they impressed?

Here’s an example. Marilyn drives a car with one set of keys. If we lose that set, we’re not driving that thing anywhere. One day she needed to go shopping. She couldn’t find the keys. She looked almost everywhere for them including some very unlikely spots. When she told me I said in my mind, “Lord we need those keys where can they be?” Then I saw an image of her wearing her dad’s old jacket. I went to where it was hanging in the garage and checked the pockets, there were the keys!

I asked her if she was impressed. She said. “Oh, yeah now I remember, it was cold and I put that on to go take the recycling to a neighbors house.” It was like I had just revealed the secret to a magic trick. When I asked her again she said yes, but I wasn’t convinced.

I thought that I had been pretty good, I mean how could I have even guessed those keys were in that jacket? I guess she was just glad to have them back.

Recently I went out to California. While I was out there I visited my niece in Santa Monica. We had a great day and at the conclusion of the day we decided to go to a local restaurant. She had some cash in her pocketbook but she was missing her wallet. I could tell she was a little concerned, a little anxious. She said it was fine, she had cash and we could go ahead to the restaurant. But I thought to myself, we need to find this thing or it might spoil all the fun we had. I didn’t want the day to end that way.

So I said in my head, “Lord we need to find this wallet so this day can end really well.” Then I remembered she had emptied out some things from her fanny pack before we went for a hike up in Topanga Canyon earlier. I suggested we go look in her car.

So we went to the parking deck and she looked a little on the passenger side and then climbed in the drivers side, she opened the glove compartment but didn’t see the wallet. However I caught a glimpse of a zipper just before she closed the glove box back up. So I asked her to open it back up and she fished around and found it. I could tell she was happy and relieved, so I said, “Are you impressed?” And she beamed up at me and said “Yes I am. ” She came around the car and gave me a hug.

Later that night, back at the hotel, I was packing to leave LA early the next morning. I couldn’t find one of my lens caps for my camera. So I thought I might have lost it. I thought to myself, “Oh well, its a pain, but I can just buy a new one.”

Frustrated, I said in my head, “Lord, I wish I could find that lens cap.” As soon as I said it, I remembered I had put it in the iPod compartment in my back pack. I went over to the back pack and found it right where I had stowed it.

Then I heard a familiar voice in my head ask, “Are you impressed?”

I had to laugh. Yes I have a superpower. It’s finding lost things. It’s a gift. I had just gotten a gentle reminder that every good and perfect gift comes from our God, who knows where all the lost things are.

Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, and cometh down from the Father of lights, with whom is no variableness, neither shadow of turning James 1:17