The shepherd came home

   Vacation Bible School, 1955.  I was 8 years old.  My great aunt, Lila Newton was the storyteller for the Primary Department and every day for two weeks she stood at a flannelgraph board, dressed as a shepherd and taught us about the Twenty-third Psalm.  I guess that is when my love for shepherds was born.  It was also at about that time that my love for words was developing and even then, although I didn't understand the word, I understood the concept of a simile. 
   Through the years I have appreciated Dorothy Thupp's words set to William Bradbury's music in the hymn, "Savior, Like a Shepherd Lead Us" and I am pretty sure it's because I remember the way Aunt Lila taught me "The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want..." (Psalm 23:1).
    Many years later as I  was looking for a Christmas 2008 gift for my daddy, my mother reminded me that he loved the 23rd Psalm and suggested a gift that would be an icon - something he could look at and find contentment.  We knew that daddy's health was waning.
   I found a statue of a shepherd, fashioned to look like Jesus - at least the way most artists have represented Him - with a staff, a sheep and one small lamb.
   At that time, daddy was still up and about right much, so the shepherd was placed in our living room on a table next to a recliner where he spent a lot of time.  Over time, the shepherd followed daddy to a bedside table and it was on that table when daddy died in September 2009.
   I have recalled that afternoon and remembered how special it was when the Rev. Kevin Pound personalized the 23rd Psalm with words like "we know that you are Earl's shepherd; that you have prepared a table for Earl...". etc.  I firmly believe that on that afternoon when my daddy died, he knew he was going to meet the Shepherd.
   The replica of the shepherd was placed on a shelf in my mothers' room and I'm sure it gave her some comfort.
   However, in September of 2013, my friend, John Gates, was diagnosed with Leukemia and I asked my mother if I could loan him daddy's shepherd.
   "Actually," my mother said, "that shepherd should be yours".
   John also loved the 23rd Psalm and he gratefully agreed to borrow it. I hoped it would bring him peace and contentment as he went through Chemotherapy.
   When I visited, I often saw the shepherd.
   I hoped there would be the time that he no longer needed it.  I hoped the Chemotherapy would be successful.  I hoped he would be coming home.
   He did.  For a while.  And then the time came that no amount of any medical treatment was going to help and in January he lost his valiant battle and I lost a dear friend.
   Last week as I visited with his wife, Diane, she handed me a bag.  It held the shepherd.
  And now, once more that shepherd is on a table in my living room.                                                
  Just waiting until someone else might need it.


http://www.hymnary.org/text/savior_like_a_shepherd_lead_us