Loss to Gain
Imagine that one day the authorities, based on a tip received by the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children and confirmed through DNA, informed you that you weren’t who you thought you were. The woman who claimed to be your mother wasn’t. She was a kidnapper who had posed as your parent for 18 years. Although she had treated you well, there was no biological relation, and she had never adopted you. Instead, your “mother” was a thief of the worst kind. She robbed a family of their precious child and now you, of the most critical relationship you had known up until that point.
That incident, you may remember from the news, is accurate and happened to an 18-year-old woman who grew up in Florida. As a result, Alexis Manigo discovered she was Kamiyah Mobley. It is a story of both extreme loss and gain (amid great pain) of family. She would never see the family she knew as hers through quite the same eyes. And a family her eyes had never consciously seen shared her blood. But despite the dastardly deed of the woman who raised her, she vowed always to love her. For Kamiyah, the kidnapper would always be her mother. At the same time, she acknowledged she had a new family to love.
I remember this story reminded me of the loss and the gain involved in the “family of God.” Christ came to earth to “seek and to save that which was lost” (Luke 19:10). He came to reach “the lost sheep of the house of Israel” (Matt. 15:24). Israel was His “birth family.” But as John writes, “He came to His own, and those who were His own did not receive Him” (John 1:11). The nation of Israel rejected her King. He had known and loved the family that would have to be set aside for another as He built His Church, His new family.
Through the behavior of this unfaithful original family, the loss would be gain for the new family. As a result, those “who formerly were far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ” (Eph. 2:13). But since we’re dealing with God, this is no ordinary story. It would result in a win-win for all involved. The original family would eventually—once again—embrace the rejected Son, the two families joined in unity. And He “made both groups into one and broke down the barrier of the dividing wall” (Eph. 2:14).
So, a dastardly deed resulted in an eternal family. The love of the One wronged allowed for a happy outcome. Though at one time He cursed the fig tree, a symbolic representation of Israel, for not bearing fruit (Matt. 21:19) and the Gospel focus turned to the Church, by the time Jesus comes again, Israel will recognize her Messiah. His Kingdom will include both. One family, Jew, and Gentile, together for eternity in heaven.
“For you have not received a spirit of slavery leading to fear again, but you have received a spirit of adoption as sons by which we cry out, “Abba! Father!” The Spirit Himself testifies with our spirit that we are children of God,” — Romans 8:15–16