
I had an awesome revelation yesterday. It’s honestly an amazing experience to hear God speak to you through his word. Especially when something’s been on your mind. Lately, I’ve been thinking about how do we help those who seem to have lost touch with their faith or struggle with sins that pull them away. It’s like a tug of war game with souls if knowing if you should pull or when should you pull. Will pulling helping them or is it more likely to push them away? My heart yearns for those people in my life and I pray for them. And as a person who always wants to continuously improve the way we do things around the parish, I look at these situations and want to see how we can avoid them. Personally, I think that’s what we can learn from the parable of the lost sheep.
Yesterday, Fr. Manuel Souza celebrated mass for Life Teen’s Empower training. With Life Teen’s year theme “Heart of God”, Fr. Manny choose the readings of the Feast of the Sacred Heart of Jesus. The gospel for that feast day is the parable of the lost sheep. In my mind, I seem to reflect on this parable focusing on the shepherd and how he leaves all the ninety nine just for one lost sheep. I think we find comfort and joy knowing we have a good and loving shepherd who seemingly recklessly abandons the ninety nine just to save one.
Looking at the parable, I want to suggest we can learn from the actions of the shepherd towards the ninety nine. The shepherd leaves the ninety nine not solely because he is worried about the one lost sheep. Not because he is reckless in his love for the one over the ninety nine. It’s just for that one, it is the one who truly is in the most danger, vulnerable and can easily be attacked by the wolf. When the shepherd leaves the ninety nine, he knows that it is far less likely that they will face any harm for they have the protection in numbers. When predators hunt, they try to isolate one animal away for the rest of the flock. That’s why the flock stays together.
Maybe you have thought about this or maybe this has been explained to you. But here is what I see time and time again in the church. We have people who are apart of a ministry or group that wander off. Either leaving the ministry or creating an isolation for themselves within the group. Closing themselves off from others. You see, the ninety nine sheep is the body of Christ and the one is lost or wandering. The wolf, predator or danger to the one sheep is Satan. And I’ve seen time and time again where Satan attacks the one lost sheep. Fills them with thoughts that are lies. In so, deceiving them from finding their way back to the shepherd.
Brothers and sisters, don’t be the one sheep. There’s plenty of reasons to step away from ministry and that’s okay. But there’s a thought that I can go to mass and disconnect from the body. Maybe we don’t realize that is what we are doing. But those two actions are contradictory. We cannot be the one sheep and be safe. It’s removes our builtin protection of accountability to the moral life, the prayer life, and communion life that challenges us to enter into a deeper relationship with Christ. I’m not saying you are the lost sheep but don’t be the one sheep that thinks they can be alone and apart of the flock. Find people in the church to be in contact with. Reach out to them and be open to having real conversations about what is going on in your heart and in your spiritual life. Know that God loves you and calls you to be a part of his family. Know that he trusts you to the other ninety nine to keep you safe.
