I see this image of me as a little girl in my childhood home.  I am alone.  No one else is there.  And for whatever reason, I somehow have gotten ahold of matches.  Curious and intrigued I thought by lighting "just one" things would be okay.  I could manage.  I had seen my parents manage these flames time and time again.  But when I went to strike the match and I saw the fire in my hands, my fear got the best of me and I dropped the small burning flame on the floor.  

"It will be okay," I thought.  It is just one.  Just one small flame that will go out.  At that point my young, naive mind thinks it is best to leave the situation and go to another room.  To run to another place where the fear and regret about ever getting close to those matches is not there.  My house was safe.  It could take whatever consequences would come.  These walls were built to last; built to stand whatever forces may come against them.  They were, in my small mind, fire proof.

As I ran from room to room, the smoke and the flames only seemed to follow, growing ever greater with fury and intensity.  I looked out the window from my bedroom and all I could see was the entire house consumed with flames.  This was it.  How could I ever be forgiven?  No one was going to come to my rescue.  I had created this mess and I deserved to suffer whatever consequences were to come.  Convinced my bedroom was the safest place, I ran there.  I slammed the door and locked it behind me.  "The flames have to stop," I thought.  They will stop.  But the smoke just kept coming...and before long the door frame, and the entire front portion of my room was ablaze.  I could feel my body shutting down.  Each breath became heavier than the last.  My lungs were losing control.  My body was being wrecked by the heat.  As a final last attempt, I peered out my window from the corner I was hiding in.  Alas, I saw firefighters,  I saw a crowd of people but they weren't doing anything.  They were just watching.  Just standing by with their heads held low as they faced the defeat of the flames.  The firefighters had determined the flames were too much.  Too strong for any human to survive let alone carry another person out alive.

This was it.  I was done.  My eyes filled with tears and I began to pray with what small bit of consciousness I had left.  And then it went dark.

When I opened my eyes, I couldn't make sense of what was happening.  Someone was carrying me.  Someone was holding me.  The heat was becoming less and less.  And then it went dark.

My eyes opened again, I heard noises, sirens, and screaming.  I felt my body being laid upon the stretcher.  Everything hurt.  The pain was excruciating.  My body had been consumed by the burns.  But I was here.  I was somehow breathing.  Who had come to my rescue?  Everyone said it was a lost cause.  "Too risky," they said.  "There's no way she will make it." 

But someone came.  Who was it?  My mind was exhausted and I passed into another state of unconsciousness.

When I awoke, I was in the hospital.  Covered with pain so immense I could barely breath.  "Third and fourth degree burns"...those were the phrases I heard over and over.  "You're lucky to be alive...  We have no idea how you made it.  Recovery is going to be brutal.  Some parts of your body may not survive.  You will never look the same.  You will never walk the same.  From here on out, life is going to look drastically different."

Their words were hollow.  Empty and meaningless.  All I wanted to know was who carried me out?  Who was my rescuer?

I begged the doctors to let me speak to firefighters in charge that day.  Perhaps they would be able to point me to the one I owed my life to.  After much pleading, they allowed one visit.  My heart was so full and eager to hear what they would say, I found the pain lessened as my mind was distracted by what was to come.

And this was their response:

"We don't know his name...or who he was."  

"He came out of no where and disappeared as soon as he brought you to the medics."  

"Was he burned?"  I asked, my eyes filling with tears.  "Was he okay?"  "How did he ever survive coming to my rescue?"

"We don't know, he had to of been hurt...but no one has seen him since-we have checked with the medics, the hospital, the neighbors and community, and no one knows who or where he is...all we know is he never stopped.  Despite our screaming and yelling, when he saw the flames, he wouldn't stop running.  We knew he was a goner.  We knew there would be no way he could make it-yet alone bring you out alive.  But he would not listen..."

"And then we saw him walk out of those flames, carrying you...we could not believe what we were seeing.  He was barely standing, his skin was scorched, and he was struggling to breath.  But he never dropped you.  He never let go until he laid you on that stretcher...until he had made sure you were okay.  Until he made sure you had all the right people and all the right care to keep you breathing.  And then just like that he was gone."

When I think about grace...this is what I think of.  When I think about rescue, this is what I recall.

My life was ablaze.  No one should have come near me.  And yet...He came.  He came when everyone else said-she's done for.  She's nothing.  Just sit back and watch the burn.

But He said, "No.  She is my daughter.  The flames do not scare me.  The sin does not frighten me.  The odds mean nothing to me.  Whatever the cost, I must go to her.  I must rescue her.  She can't stand the heat any longer.  I will give her a new name.  I will give her a new life.  She will make it.  She is worth whatever flame, whatever injury, I may incur.  She is mine.  And I want her back."

This is radical grace.

God wants you back.  It isn't too late.  Let Him rescue you.  

Picture taken from: http://7-themes.com/7036664-flames.html