The notion that Christianity is all about a soft-focus Jesus who
protects, feeds and shelters the fragile is one of the predominate
images we find every spring when Good Shepherd Sunday comes around –
just Google it and see.  It’s become an attractive picture for us to
see Jesus’ work in the world as nothing more than footprints in the
sand as He carries us when we cannot carry ourselves.  But we suspect
that any notion of a comfy, cushy Jesus without a cross to carry or a
burden to take means there’s something missing – something essential
missing.

After all, shepherds don’t raise sheep for fun - they raise sheep for
wool.  They lead them, feed them, and protect them because they expect
something from them.  When the sheep pass through the sheep gate it’s
not always to get a good night’s sleep.  Once a year, it’s about
getting sheared.  It’s about getting pinned down, shocked, scared, and
forced to give up their most valuable possession.  Then being
released, dazed and confused, to try to put their lives back together
again.  Sure the Shepherd knows every sheep by name and obsesses over
the humane treatment of His little ones, but the Shepherd’s love is
equally given to those who are not in His flock - those shivering in
the cold, quivering on the margins, in desperate need of the gifts his
flock might give.

Following the Shepherd, then, isn’t mainly about personal fulfillment;
its about universal sacrifice.  We are called to play a laboriously
vital role in God’s redemption, reconciliation, and provision for the
world.  How are we getting sheared today?  Can we see that it’s part
of following the Shepherd?  How are we being called to move beyond
Christianity as therapy – and into the depths of self-sacrifice that’s
essential for being counted as one of the sheep?

Reading
Branded Nation – James Twitchell
Bird by Bird – Anne Lamott
The Gospel of John – NT Wright