Thought for the Day – Sunday 3rd May
Today’s reading is John 10 v 1-10 – ‘The Good Shepherd’:
“Very truly, I tell you, anyone
who does not enter the sheepfold by the gate but climbs in by another way is a
thief and a bandit. The one who enters by the gate is the shepherd of the
sheep. The gatekeeper opens the gate for him, and the sheep hear his voice. He
calls his own sheep by name and leads them out. When he has brought out all his
own, he goes ahead of them, and the sheep follow him because they know his
voice. They will not follow a stranger, but they will run from him because they
do not know the voice of strangers.” Jesus used this figure of speech with
them, but they did not understand what he was saying to them.
So again Jesus said to them, “Very
truly, I tell you, I am the gate for the sheep. All who came before me are
thieves and bandits; but the sheep did not listen to them. I am the gate.
Whoever enters by me will be saved, and will come in and go out and find
pasture. The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy. I came that
they may have life, and have it abundantly.
I have to say I have missed being out and about this spring and seeing
the new lambs appearing in the fields – I can say with certainty there are not many
new lambs around the Newhouse Industrial Estate which has become my daily walk!
However, I do enjoy the programme ‘Countryfile’ on a Sunday and these last few
weeks I have seen lots of new lambs coming into the world, which in a way has
helped but it can never match the excitement of seeing new lambs frolicking
around a field!
I do remember telling you all at one time of a family trip to Grasmere in
the Lake District with the children to look for new lambs – Grasmere is always
a wonderful place to find them being such a compact village with lots of fields
around it and indeed in the heart of the village itself!
Anyway having had our fill of seeing the lambs gambolling around we
then took to the fells for a walk and there we met a hill shepherd who was checking
his sheep - counting them to make sure they were all there. However, being hill
sheep they were grazing the fells with many other shepherd’s sheep and so we
said to him we didn’t know how he could tell which sheep were his because all
the Lakeland hill sheep seemed to look the same to us. He just smiled back at
us and said, ‘Aye I suppose they do, but they wouldn’t if they were yours.’ The
children asked him, ‘So do you know them all?’ to which he replied, ‘Oh! Aye, I
know them alright and they know me.’
That answer caused a lot of debate in the car going home not only about
how the shepherd could know all of his huge flock of hill sheep, and all the
new lambs too, but even more debate arose about how the sheep could know him
and that they belonged to him and not to one of the other hill shepherds. We
had loads of ideas but never came to any real conclusion!
‘I know them alright and they
know me!’
I think this parable of the Good Shepherd does help us in trying to
understand what that hill shepherd said to us that day and what this Parable is
saying to us today.
Looking after sheep is not so easy – not in Bible times and not today
either – to be a Good Shepherd you have to know your sheep and know their
traits, you have to make sure your sheep have access to food and water, to
places of safety and protection from harm at night. Knowing your sheep means
the Good Shepherd can call to them and recognising his voice they will come to
him knowing they can trust him to care for them, to look after them, to nurture
and provide for them, to give them a full and abundant life.
Knowing these characteristics of a ‘Good Shepherd’ we can see from this
Parable that in our lives Jesus is our ‘Good Shepherd’ – he knows us by name,
he calls to us, and when we recognise his voice and go to him he will lead us
to nourishment, he will nurture us and care for us, he will protect us in his
sheepfold and be the gate to that sheepfold that we too might have a full life
– an abundant life.
However, it is worth remembering that a gate works two ways we can go
in and we can go out!
A sheep needs to be in the pen at night for protection but it also
needs to leave that pen in the morning and go out onto the hills to graze and
be fed.
So too with us.
We can hear Jesus call us, we can respond to his familiar voice and
come to him as his flock but we must not all stay together in that pen like
some exclusive group of people gathered around their ‘Good Shepherd’. We have
to leave the pen and go and interact with the world and those around us, we
need to be inclusive not exclusive, and in that interaction with the world we
will find nourishment, we will find sustenance for our soul. That nourishment
we gain by going out into our communities and interacting with them and with
the people who live in them will lead to a full and abundant life for us.
However, we need to remember that just as the sheep need to follow their ‘Good
Shepherd’s voice and leave the pen each day to get their nourishment so too do
we! We need to let our ‘Good Shepherd’ lead us from the pen each day to find
the nourishment which will make our lives full and bring us abundant life.
New lambs bring new life to a flock and we need to let Jesus lead us
out into the world that others might hear his voice, respond to his call, be
nourished and nurtured and cared for not by an exclusive group but by an
inclusive one and so bring new life to his flock!
Prayer
Loving Lord,
Give us a willing heart to listen for your voice,
Open our ears to your loving call,
Grant us strength and perseverance to follow where you would lead,
Be near us as we follow in obedience,
Enable us to feel secure in your loving care,
And give us grace to live our life fully in you.
In your name we pray. Amen.
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