by Ms. Roshini Nunes
The Lord is my shepherd –we may have sung this hymn so many times and as you may know this is from a very famous psalm, Psalm 23 where King David sang this psalm to the Lord – he called the Lord his shepherd….actually it is an image that God himself had projected of himself. For the Israelites and the Jews alike shepherding was a very common profession – Abraham was a shepherd – he had many sheep, even when Moses encountered the Lord in the burning bush, he was taking care of his father-in-law – Jethros sheep. So it was easy for them to connect to this image – and God used exactly this image to express his love and care for his people. A shepherd is someone who would basically take care of his sheep, who would provide for his sheep, since sheep meant a source of income – wool, flesh, milk – so the more sheep you had the better your prosperity and your economy – so it was but natural for shepherd to care for their sheep – after all they had something to receive from the sheep. But when it comes to the Lord I wonder how good economically we are to the Lord – or at all for that matter– in fact we cannot give our flesh to the Lord – the Lord himself gave us his flesh, when his Son died for us. And yet the Lord shepherds us, yet he loves us and yet he wants to do so much for us.
Is 40:11 - He tends his flock like a shepherd: He gathers the lambs in his arms and carries them close to his heart; he gently leads those that have young.
This is from the OT.. in the NT also, Jesus called himself the Good Shepherd. In Jn Chapter 10, Jesus said I am the good shepherd and I know my sheep by their name – not just a flock of sheep or a herd of people, but each one personally.
Also in the Gospel of Luke – Lk 15 – he talks about the shepherd who leaves 99 and goes in search of one - that one which had strayed, who has lost the way and who in a way is so dumb that it can’t find its way back. Yet he goes in search of the lost.
Green pastures and water – food – spiritual and material…how God provides for our every need.
The one who shepherds also rules – so God has to rule over our lives. He shepherds even the birds of the air for whom he provides abundance of grass and water.
The soul is constantly renewed by the WoG and the Sacraments – Holy Eucharist
Man does not live on bread alone, but on every word that comes from the mouth of God.
An attitude that we have to have
- to want nothing and to seek the Lord totally
- to feed the other sheep / lambs as Jesus does to us knowing that he is truly our Good Shepherd.