St Philip & St James Church

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Acts 9: 36-end & John 10: 22-30 Sheep and Hens

God teaches us thing through animals

Animals behave towards us in ways that human beings don’t.  So we can learn something new.  We can learn new things about God’s love in the animals around us.

Which animals is God using to teach you?

I wonder whether God is teaching us something in all those animals that are dying out because they are losing their habitats.  I wonder whether he is trying to teach us we need to change the way we lead our lives, the way we treat each other, the way we treat the beautiful world God has given us, the way we treat the people who will be born after us.

Which animals do you think God using to teach me something?

Chickens!

Chickens all have very different personalities.  They all have very different ways of behaving.  Some of my chickens, for example, follow me around very closely.  They come walking into the house looking for me if I leave the door open.  Others are much more scared of me.

I have to know them really well.  Because I have to keep them safe from foxes at night time.  But I like to let them out during the day.  They are a lot happier then.  They can get all the food they want.  So I usually let them run around the garden during the day.

But then I have to get them home before it gets dark and before the foxes come.

With some that’s dead easy.  I walk to the garage get some chicken food and then walk to the chicken coop and already there are four hens that are right behind me.  I throw the food into the coop and they give a loud squawk and they all pile in.

 

 

 

But some are more wary.  They don’t necessarily go home just because I have put the food in. So I have to be a bit more patient.  And there is one hen in particular who often decides just when all the other hens are coming in for food and safety that she is going to spend some time in the thick bushes where I can’t possibly get her.

And so sometimes I have to close the coop up to keep the other hens safe and leave her outside the coop.  And that’s where I have to learn to be patient.  Because when the other hens start going upstairs to bed, she comes over to the coop and there is always one hen who doesn’t go to bed while she is still outside the coop.  And this hen who stays up gently talks to the hen who is still outside the coop.  And I let them talk to each other for a bit.  Is she frightened to come in?  But if she is she is also frightened to stay out on her own. And when they have been talking to each other for a bit I go outside.  I open up the coop and the hen that stayed outside comes in.  And then they both go up to bed with the others.

You see, I know my hens.  And my hens know me.  We have these little routines because we know each other.

And in the same way, Jesus is saying that he knows his people.  And his people know him.  Jesus talks about a shepherd and a sheep to explain this but he could have used hens to explain it just as well I think.

Jesus was saying this to people who didn’t know who he was.  They said, how can you prove you are the Son of God?  And Jesus said, look I don’t have to prove anything to you.  The people I have come for know who I am.  They have seen what I have done.  They know me and I know them like a shepherd knows his sheep and like sheep know their shepherd.

My hens know where they have to go to have food.  They know where they have to go to keep safe.  They know where they have to go to live.  And so do the sheep.  And so do the people of God.

 

 

 

Now when Jesus was explaining all this in Jerusalem, he said, ‘The works that I do in my father’s name testify to me.’   Which is the same as saying, ‘the things that I have done, prove who I am.’

And it was the same with the story of Tabitha and Peter in Joppa.  People came weeping when Tabitha died because she was such a lovely kind person.  And when people saw how Peter brought her back from the dead, they believed in Jesus because of what Peter had done.  The works of Tabitha and Peter proved who they were and people knew them and trusted them.

People in Alderley Edge will believe in Jesus if they see the works that we do in Jesus name.  If people come to our church and see how we are to them, how we help them, how we pray for them, how we look after them, how we love them, then they will know they have come to the right place.  They will just know it.  Like my hens know that their coop is the right place.

And some people will take their time.  Just like my hen who runs off to the bushes.  But in the end they will come, just like my hen who runs off to the bushes comes in the end.

If we keep calling them and loving them, they will come.

But we don’t love people just to make the church bigger although when we love people it will make the church bigger.

We love people because our lives are just a lot better when we love each other.  We love people because that’s who we are. 

Just like the hen that stays up and calls to the hen that is stuck outside the coop.  She stays up and calls her because that is who she is.

Because when evening comes, it’s a lot better if all the hens are tucked up in their coop together.  It’s just better for all of them, perched in a row, with their heads buried in their feathers, fast asleep, until morning time, or at least until the cockerel thinks it’s time to get up.

 

 

 

Page last updated: Thursday 22nd August 2019 1:37 PM
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