The good shepherd lays down his life for the
sheep. John 10.11
We’ve
chosen a livestock focus for Harvest Festival because of where we are and who
we know. We live in Horsted Keynes and I know Howard of Shepherd Publishing,
also a farmer who’s into livestock.
That
verse from John 10.1 presses different buttons. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep presses a button
about God’s love for each one of if we think of ourselves as wilful lambs. It
connects with the 24-7 care of the livestock industry Howard’s part of. It’s also
no coincidence we’re promoting Shepherd
Publishing’s role in serving that industry. Lastly there’s the sting in the lamb’s
tail in saying shepherds die for their sheep since the livestock industry is
about sheep dying for their shepherds and indeed for all of us!
A few
more thoughts on Harvest Festival, lambs in particular.
They themselves have a
season - lambing season - and we’re all aware of that in the village,
particularly up at Cinder Hill. Anne and I also see lambs running joyfully in
the sledging field below the Rectory. They’re
an uplifting image of freedom that touches a spring inside of me, so it’s
(it’ll be) strange seeing them a bit fastened up in Church (later today).
Their excitement at life
is so evident as they go leaping and bounding around. They’re blissfully
unaware they’ll so soon have to lay down
their lives. This commercial aspect
isn’t evident to them as they engage in that joyful abandonment that refreshes
my spirit.
Their seeming
carelessness goes though as soon as their mothers lift themselves from the
ground and they dart underneath them for milk.
They are driven like all
animals, including myself, by the need for food. They themselves, and their
parents, wouldn’t have our care without the human need for food and indeed the
livestock industry.
As I watch the lambs in
the field I’m uplifted and made aware of how unlike a carefree lamb my life is
running. I’m regretful of past faults, mindful of a load of administration
pressing on me and ongoing concerns like filling St Giles on a Sunday (yes
we’ve now resorted to serving sausage sandwiches!) Unlike the lambs I’m aware of a weight of care that pulls my spirit
down. For them each moment stands
alone – no past regrets or future anxieties – indeed no real sense of past or
future accomplishment. They prosper without repentance, following the law of
nature, incapable of the disobedience that is mine.
The lambs’ capacity to
skip down the field shows a mastery over gravity that, while warming my heart,
challenges my sinful weight of self preoccupation. Yet, as a Christian, I know
Jesus The good shepherd who lays down his life for the sheep. The
gravitational pull of divine love draws us up
through Jesus countering the gravitational field that drags us down that we
call sin. The one gravitational field of the spirit draws us into God’s love
and the other field drags us down.
When the
astronauts trod on the moon they found themselves able to leap and jump with
ease because gravity on the moon is a sixth that on earth. If they’d been able
to visit Jupiter they’d have crawled on the surface so strong is the downward
gravity. You and I get pulled down
all the time. Our bodies, thankfully, get pulled down to stay on earth.
But our spirits – they get pulled down too and can feel very heavy.
Harvest
Festival’s a reminder to be thankful for the love that over and around us lies,
the love we come from, belong to and will return to. May such thanksgiving to
God this morning loosen all heaviness of heart and draw us up towards him. May
the thought of the lambs in the field, in joyful abandon, be our inspiration
and teacher!
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