I want to share with you an excerpt from an article that really spoke to me. Jesus truly loves us more than we can imagine. Maybe you need to be reminded of that today, just as I do.
Above Rubies, Issue # 84: My Sheep, Mushies (by Kate Marchiniak)
Whenever I think back on this season of shepherding, a "Mushies" story is forever etched in my memory. It was a sunny day. I had gone into town to do the weekly errands, leaving the sheep contentedly grazing. As I hopped out of the car on my return, the sound of continual bleating filled the air. Something was up. It was Mushies. Her bleats were desperate.
I walked into the field. She immediately ran over, stood right in front of me, looked up at my face, and stamped her hoof, her bleats becoming more desperate by the minute. My heart sank. I knew instinctively what had happened- a coyote had taken her lamb. She was trying to say to me, "Where have you taken my baby? What have you done with her?"
To fully understand her anguish, Mushies was the only orphan that had not conceived for many lambing seasons. Usually, any infertile ewe is culled from the flock as production is important in a flock, but her special relationship with the shepherd saved her!
[...] As I looked down at my bleating Mushies, my heart went out to her. I tried to console her. Of course, I could not convey to her that it wasn't me that had taken her lamb. It was the enemy! It was living in a rugged land! She cried for days and wouldn't have anything to do with me for weeks.
I never loved her more. As her shepherd, my heart ached, and I wept over her loss. She never conceived again. Even as I type, I feel again the pain she went through!
Our Shepherd, Jesus, aches over our pain and weeks over the seasons of our loss, never loving us more. That can often sound trite in a season of pain, but, truly, there is no one who cares for us like Him. Who knows us like our Shepherd? [...]
Truth rings from the old hymn, "No one ever cared for me like Jesus. There's no other friend so kind as He. No one else could take the sin and darkness from me. O how much He cares for me!"
Aboverubies.org
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