Some years back, “a pastor was traveling through a remote part of the State of Washington when he came across a flock of sheep crossing the road. He stopped his car to wait and soon the shepherd of the flock came by on horseback. The preacher jumped out of his car and approached the shepherd with a question: "You know," he said. "You're the first real, live shepherd I've ever met. Do you mind me asking what you think of when you hear the expressions 'The Lamb of God’ and ‘the Good Shepherd'?
The answer was more than he could have expected.
The old shepherd said, "You know, springtime is a tough time for sheep and shepherds. It's lambing time. It's a time of tragedy. When many ewes are giving birth, the shepherd must often deal with problems.
Sometimes a lamb dies at birth, sometimes a ewe, giving birth. And here is the scene: Over here is a mother sheep that has lost her baby. Over there is a lamb that has lost its mother.
But sheep are difficult animals. A sheep will not take a lamb that is not its own. And so, we have the situation of a mother full of the milk that will not nourish her baby because she has no baby to feed.
And we have a lamb, hungry for life-giving nourishment and no mother to feed it. In short order, the motherless baby lamb will starve to death. It is a scene of abundance and scarcity - all at once.
This is what the good shepherd has to do. To make things right, to bring something good out of this tragedy, the shepherd takes the lamb that has died and slits its throat. Then he washes the motherless lamb in the blood of the lamb that has died.
Only then will the mother accept and feed the motherless lamb as her own. That is what I know about 'The Lamb of God’ and ‘the Good Shepherd'," the old shepherd said.” (With thanks to Harlan Bemis, for sharing the story) Like that little motherless sheep, we are washed in the blood of the Lamb of God and we receive all that our loving Father in heaven has to offer to His children.
