First Sunday In Advent

1. Shearing time is always met with great anticipation by Australian farmers. All the year’s work comes down to those few long days. The shearers spend hours relieving sheep after sheep of a year’s growth of wool. Appearing plump on the way to the shed, some sheep are so heavy with wool they quickly tire and drop to their bellies if the dogs chase them for the briefest moments. In the chutes they wait their turn. There are usually thousands of sheep, so speed is crucial. Pulled into position for the first shave, sheep sitting upright against the shearer’s legs, the wool on the stomach is removed. The animal rotates slowly while long strokes remove the wool from stomach to side, to back, and down the other side. A few odd swipes on the legs and top of the head, and the fleece is gathered in a heap and quickly tossed skyward, flat onto a rack to be plucked and preened and graded for quality. The sheep, which minutes before appeared to be so substantial, hobbles off, dazed and bleating, patches of wool remaining, and full of bloodied scrapes, bright red against bright white underwool. Ready for next year’s growth. Only the shearing reveals how scrawny and helpless these little animals are. Relieved of the wool, they bound off. Those sheep are an awful sight when the shearing is done! They are scrawny, motley, bleating, and bleeding. It’s really quite hard to believe that they are the same animal before and after! Why are they shorn? Well, it’s a harvest, a livelihood for the shepherd, to be sure. But we might also note that if those little animals aren’t shorn, the wool will continue to grow. Weighted down with more than a year’s growth, sheep are susceptible to disease. They can’t move well; the fleece is filled with dirt and burrs, and infection is a danger. The sheep are extremely vulnerable in this state. The shearing is quite painful, but necessary. And the shepherd wants that sheep back on the range, growing a nice valuable coat for the next season! Good thing the shepherd is overseeing the shearing!

2. When you are facing the shears in life, know that the Shepherd is the one in control. And though God’s purposes be hidden (like they were in Christ dying on a cross), he is working his will in your life for your good. And what good is that? He’s allowing, causing, bringing afflictions to drive you to hold all the more tightly to “his rod and staff” (his precious Word--Luther); and as his dear blessed sheep, find in his precious Word of the Gospel “quiet waters” in your Baptism, “restoration of your souls” in his forgiving Word of absolution; a “table prepared in the presence of my enemies”--sin, death, and devil--in his blessed Sacrament of the Altar. “Surely goodness and mercy shall follow you all the days of your life, and you shall dwell in the house of the Lord forever!” Amen! (Matthew Harrison)