it sparks rays of light in dozens of directions. Will you bear with me if I stay on the sheep/shepherd analogy for awhile? It's one that truly ministers to my heart. I hope it does yours too.
Let's start with a silly question: Have you ever seen sheep performing in the circus? Jumping through hoops? Balancing on a ball? Or even riding in a clown car?
Have you ever seen sheep doing tricks on television?
Why?
Very simple. Sheep are not trainable animals. They never learn from their mistakes. They do the same dumb things over and over and over again. And again. And again.
Trainable animals are those that learn from their mistakes. They respond to punishment. They remember pain. Sheep don't remember anything.
Shepherds know that sheep are not trainable. They know that sheep will repeat their mistakes - even the mistakes that have caused them pain or gotten them punished. That's part of the reason that shepherds commit themselves to full-time supervision of their sheep.
With all of our God given gifts and talents, we human beings have a hard time thinking we truly need full-time supervision by God or anyone else - right? We reason that, unlike sheep, we *do* learn from our mistakes . . . especially the ones that get us punished . . . especially the ones that cause us pain - right?
Well - WRONG - on both counts!!
I remember using an ugly word when I was a little girl and getting my mouth washed out with soap. YUCK!! Spit - Sputter. NASTY!!! I hated it. It was AWFUL punishment. Did it mean I never again uttered a naughty word? Not on your life! I failed to learn from that mistake and at one time in my life had developed a potty mouth that would make most sailors blush!
I pitched a leapin' screamin' full-fledged hissie fit when I was about seven years old because I didn't want my parents to go off and leave me with my dad's mother. They could still hear me screaming when they got to the corner and my daddy turned the car around, came back, and blistered my butt so bad it hurt to sit for days afterward. It was one of the few times in my life my daddy ever spanked me - he usually left that task to mother - GRIN) I was MORTIFIED!!! Do you think that means I never again pitched a fit in an attempt to get my own way?? Sorry, charlie!!! Ask my husband. LOL
Let's just get honest here, shall we? Those are childhood incidents. A lot of children don't learn too quickly. But, what about as an adult? Surely by the time we are adults, if something causes us pain or punishment we quickly learn not to do it, don't we? Sadly, NO!! We don't seem to learn from our mistakes much better as adults than we did as children. How many of us have opened mouth, inserted foot and paid painful consequences as a result of something we have said? How many of us have sworn "I will never speak without thinking again"? And, how many of us have breached that oath with the next breath?
I've commiserated with enough other women to know that the numbers of us who struggle with our weight could form an endless parade. We recognize that we have allowed unhealthy eating master us. We determine that we are going to change. We will no longer hide in the house because we are too inhibited by our over-weight out-of-shape selves to want to be among others. Talk about an issue that brings personal pain! Nobody has to punish us for this one. We punish ourselves! So, what do we do? We go on a diet. We work hard to establish healthy eating habits. We add exercise to our daily schedules. We lose weight. We look good. We feel good. Then, we get tired of making the time to exercise. We begin to revert to our old eating habits. And before we know what has happened, we're right back to where we started. It's a cycle many of us have repeated more times than we care to count!
Ahhhh. But we are HIS SHEEP. That means our Shepherd gives us full-time supervision. He has placed within us His Holy Spirit who will convict us of sin and of righteousness (John 16:8). When we, like sheep, fail to learn from our mistakes and do the same dumb things over and over and over again, and again, and again - The Holy Spirit will whisper His sweet word of conviction. With the conviction, He offers us forgiveness.
If we confess our sins,
He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins,
and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.
1 John 1:9
We may find it difficult to control our tongue. We may say things we should not say. We may eat things we should not eat. We may resist supervision - but we NEED it. We may go astray and want our own way just like sheep do. And we may fail to learn from our mistakes.
But.
We are HIS SHEEP and our Shepherd will patiently watch over us. He stands ever ready to give us the guidance we need. He forgives us our sins. He continues the "process" of perfecting our lives. We may not learn what we need to learn today. We may forget today's pain and repeat the same mistake tomorrow. But we can take heart in this: We are HIS SHEEP and
He who has begun a good work in [us]
WILL be faithful to complete it!!
Philippians 1:6
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