December 6/Second Tuesday of Advent
If a man has a hundred sheep and one of them goes astray, will he not leave the ninety-nine in the hills and go in search of the stray? ~ Matt 18.12
In The Shepherd’s Life, his account of sheep-farming in England’s Lake District, the author James Rebanks describes a spring morning when a lamb went missing. As the baby’s agitated mother runs back and forth along the fence, the shepherd searches everywhere – his own field, the nearby brooks, the neighboring properties — and finally spots the young animal, stuck between the trunks of an old thorn tree. “You can lose hours looking for a lamb,” he tells us. But he looks anyway, and his fellow shepherds look, and shepherds around the world look, too: it is what shepherds do when a lamb is lost. It is also, Matthew tells us, what God does. And perhaps that should bring us comfort. Because each of us, at some point in our lives, is that stray lamb. We may wander off from the flock unintentionally, distracted by the greener grass of a pleasure-oriented life. We may creep away furtively, not wanting our shepherd to see the selfish, greedy, or devious choices we make – or perhaps not wanting him to stop us from making them. We may bound off in anger, resentful at being treated unfairly, or chafing at the rules of the flock. We may or may not have a mother who runs up and down the fence in agitation, but we do have a loving shepherd who simply will not let us go. In the Preface of the Eucharistic prayer in the Roman Catholic Missal, we acknowledge that Christ humbled himself to be born and to dwell among us “out of compassion for the waywardness that is ours.” How fortunate we are to have a compassionate shepherd in Christ, who sees us for what we are and still searches tirelessly until he can enfold us in his loving, forgiving presence.
Lord God, Steadfast shepherd of your flock, Grant that, when I am lost and alone, I may trust in you to seek me and find me. Amen.
To hear the Choir of the King’s School (Canterbury, England) sing “The King of Love My Shepherd Is,” click here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pusiJTaP-vk
For today’s readings, click here: https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/120622.cfm
