Advent – A Week of Sundays – What Sheep Do

Greetings Dear Reader,

Sheep have a fairly simple life.  They eat, they sleep, and they procreate.  They are more intelligent than most people think.  They do little to defend themselves when attacked.  They graze from dawn until dusk.  They are ruminants.  They gather in flocks and sub-flocks. 

 

So what does this have to do with me as a Christ follower?  How does the nature of sheep inform my view of Christ the Good Shepherd?  The first thing that I must address is that sheep accept their role as sheep.  They do not try to be lions.  They do not try to be goats.  They accept that they are sheep and to what they do.

This is not an easy thing for people.  We have a nature that wishes to be more than we are.  That is not always bad.  It is often good.  It is when I try to be more than a sheep in the presence of the shepherd that I have a problem. 

I am not going to launch into some puerile analogy here.  The similarities should be obvious.  What sheep do that I struggle with is follow.  It is easy for me to graze, ruminate, and flock.  I do a very poor job of following sometimes.  I feel safer when I follow.  I do better when I follow. 

The problem is that I decide I am something other than a sheep in that moment and do not follow.  When I do not follow I always lose my way.  I always find that I need to run to catch up.  Fear, pain, and failure always hunt me when I do not follow.  In an ever deepening complexity that is my world there is a simple doable thing.  I must do what sheep do.  I must follow.

Wishing you joy in the journey,

Aramis Thorn

Mat 13:52 So Jesus said to them, "That is why every writer who has become a disciple of Christ’s rule of the universe is like a home owner. He liberally hands out new and old things from his great treasure store."