Day 19: Ewe and I

When sharing the parable of the ninety and nine sheep, the Savior asked "Doth he not leave the ninety and nine, and goeth into the mountains, and seeketh that which is gone astray?" (Matthew 18:12)

I had always likened the sheep in this story to the collective members of the church, and the one gone astray as those individuals who were wayward or struggling. But maybe the one hundred sheep can represent us as an individual, and the one gone astray as that portion within us that is wayward or struggling. Each of us has a part, big or small, readily visible or buried deep within that is a little different. Something about us that we don't like. Something we need to change; yet, the power to do so alludes us and so it remains, lost like the proverbial sheep out in the desert to wander. But it doesn't have to be so. The solution is in this same verse:

The Good Shepard doesn't focus on the ninety-nine percent of us that's right and well but the one percent that's wrong, that "grope[s] for the wall like the blind, and grope[s] as if we had no eye". (Isaiah 59:10) Not because he doesn't love that first part, but because "they that be whole need not a physician, but they that are sick". (Matthew 9:12) We are all sick. We are all walking dead men in need of living water.

Thankfully though, "he was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities: the chastisement of our peace was upon him; and with his stripes we are healed. All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned every one to his own way; and the Lord hath laid on him the iniquity of us all. He was oppressed, and he was afflicted, yet he opened not his mouth: he is brought as a lamb to the slaughter, and as a sheep before her shearers is dumb, so he openeth not his mouth" (Isaiah 53:5-7)

Interestingly, the Good Shepard 'goeth into the mountains' to rescue the one. We too, can "go up to the mountain of the Lord, to the house of the God of Jacob; and he will teach us of his ways, and we will walk in his paths" (Isaiah 2:2).

(Gotta love that Isaiah. Smart guy, I'm telling ya)

Some days I feel like 99% of me is wrong, and I'm only getting 1% right. I appreciate that the Savior blesses me for that 1% ninety-nine times over, and doesn't give up on the part of me that wanders.