Several years ago, after a move to a new community, I started doing business at a different bank. After establishing my accounts, I began using the ‘drive-through’ facility, which was faster and closer to my house. I soon began to dread my trips through this drive-through because I felt like the woman working there was cold, rude, and unprofessional. I continued to feel this way for over a year until, one day, I decided to give this woman another chance. I started to be more friendly to her, asking her about h...
Several years ago, after a move to a new community, I started doing business at a different bank. After establishing my accounts, I began using the ‘drive-through’ facility, which was faster and closer to my house. I soon began to dread my trips through this drive-through because I felt like the woman working there was cold, rude, and unprofessional. I continued to feel this way for over a year until, one day, I decided to give this woman another chance. I started to be more friendly to her, asking her about her family and getting to know her. Amazingly, she responded with a smile, and we soon became friends! Over the next several years, we often talked about her family and other concerns. Eventually, when her aging mother died, she asked me to perform the funeral for her! She and I were good friends for many years. She wasn’t cold, rude, or anything like that – the problem was that, in my haste to do my business, I hadn’t given her a chance. Over time I found that she was clever, intelligent, and warm-hearted. I just had to get to know her!
Many of us are that way in our approach toward God. We have a few pre-conceived ideas of how He thinks and feels without giving him a chance to become a part of our lives!
In one of his sermons in the gospel of John, chapter 10, Jesus, who claimed that He was God ‘in the flesh,’ referred to himself as “The Good Shepherd.” The farmers in the crowd understood what he meant: a good shepherd cared for his sheep, would get to know them and even care for them, and, if the situation demanded, he would fight to protect those in his herd! This is exactly how Jesus wanted his hearers to begin to think of God.
Let’s take Jesus’ comments about ‘The Good Shepherd’ to heart. Instead of viewing God as a cold and distant deity, let us consider God a loving father who cares for his children. Instead of an angry god who wants to punish and destroy those who have failed, let us remind ourselves that God’s primary motivations are to love and give us help and grace in this life.
God loves us and wants to have a living, daily relationship with us all! He wants to get involved in our lives, help, bless, and give us hope. May we all follow Him! God in the flesh, Jesus, is “The Good Shepherd.”
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