Wandered

Something stirs in you. Sometimes it is a smell or the taste of the grass you are grazing on or a memory of something but it touches something in you and an old desire is reawakened. You want to ignore it, after all, shouldn’t you be satisfied with the pasture the Good Shepherd has brought you to? Something though, has stirred and feels nearly overwhelming.

You follow your nose down a path, grazing here and there. Looking back you still see the other 99 in the flock. You belong there and your heart is tugged with that realization. Turning back, a step or two is made towards the flock but the poison of rationalization steps in to turn you the other way. “It’s just a short way off the pasture” or “I can handle this, just a taste of this old thing that I am hungry for will make me never want it again” or even more deadly, “I’ll be back before the Shepherd misses me.” And with a trot in your step, your mind is made up and you leave the pasture behind.

Head down with your nose filled with the smell and memories of times past and the anticipation of what is to come you buy into the lie thinking you feel alive. The chase is on, the pursuit of that “it” you think you’ve missed. “What fun” is the thought that shoves aside the inner, deeper voice of caution that says, “Turn back, you still have a choice”.

You arrive to where you’ve been headed. It doesn’t matter what it is, it’s a greedy morsel and you willingly partake of the fruit that will soon eat you up. It all floods back, the moments of pleasure, feeling alive, maybe feeling wanted in a way you’ve been hungering for, a hunger that little by little ate the satisfaction you once knew in the gaze of love from the Good Shepherd’s eyes.

No sooner have you partaken of the old delight than it turns on you and shouts, “What have you done?” You poke your head up wanting desperately to escape the thorny clutches of the vine you’ve been feasting off of. You tug against the capturing arms and feel the pinch of thorns work through your wool

You push against the thorns, side to side, forward and backward but with a sickening realization you know you are stuck. “Why did I do this again”! If I could just get out, I will never come this way again” Heaviness creeps into your heart and you want to cry but you know you’ve done this to yourself and you deserve to be stuck, back in the thorns you once lived in. You want to go back to the pasture, want to see the Good Shepherd again but you are ashamed. Even if you get yourself out, you don’t know if you can face Him.

Then you think, “If I get myself out of this myself maybe He will love me more. Maybe I will finally learn the lesson and never come this way again”. These thoughts energize you again and more futile attempts are made to extricate yourself from your predicament. The end result though, you have dug yourself in even deeper, more thorns have lodged into your wool.

You hear someone coming, you hear His voice; it’s the Good Shepherd. He’s come looking for you. You hear his voice and you want to cry, “Here I am, here I am”, but the shame of what you’ve done silences your cries. You hope, just a little, that He won’t find you. You indulge yourself into a little fantasy. You aren’t really stuck, you’ve been playing a little game. You will just jump out and with a little chuckle shout out, “Here I am. I’ve just been playing a little game”! It’s no good, though, your stuck and you know He will know better. He knows what you’ve done.

“Oh, there you are” you hear His voice say with delight. “Look at you, you’ve wandered off and gotten stuck in these old thorns” is spoken without an ounce of condemnation. You expect that, it might even “feel” better to hear anger or accusation; the delight and love hurts a bit. You wish you weren’t stuck and you wish you could prove yourself worthy of His delight by getting yourself out of the thorns but all you can do is sit there, accept his thorn-scratched hands as they slowly work you out of the bush. You are humbled by His tender love and determination to find you. Humbled as only you can be if you give up the fight and simply accept His tender love.

At the same time you want to hide from Him and you want to bury yourself in His arms. He tenderly holds you so you opt to let yourself be nuzzled, loved. “Oh my, look at all these thorns. When we get back to the pasture you will have to sit still and let me get them out of your wool. Some of them have burrowed in deep. They must hurt”. You are stunned at His compassion; after all, you did this to yourself.

After no small amount of time, the thorns have been removed but you still ache inside with the heaviness of wandering off. You want to vow to never do this again but there is something about trying to claim the future that keeps you from doing this. You simply know you need to learn to accept His mercy in searching, His grace in taking you out of the thorn bush, His love in setting you down once again in the pasture He’s lead his flock to.