Here’s from another mosaic from Ravenna just south of Venice, filled with early churches with their characteristic decorations, and they all have sheep, lots of contented sheep. 

The sheep represent the believers, people. Our churchy language still reflects this.  

A congregation may be called a flock.  This flock has a pastor, another word for shepherd, and they have a pastorate. 

Likewise, bishops carry a fancy staff, a crook, a shepherd’s crook. 

So, we are the sheep. Now if you think about a flock of sheep, which I am sure that you often do. You realize that most of the sheep are ewes. You only need one ram for a flock. 

But the ewes have lambs every year, and half of them are males. So, what happens to all these little fellows? They are the meat source. 

The females are kept for they are valuable for their wool, their milk and their ability to reproduce. 

And the males? Well, shepherds eat lamb chops. Sorry guys. 

So just don’t take the sheep imagery to its logical conclusion. It is only an image, and it has its limits. 

Here is that shepherd going after his lost sheep. I think he could have used a sheepdog. 

I expect that you have heard this parable for years.  

I remember as a child taking it in and then always wondering how any responsible shepherd could just leave all those sheep to fend for themselves to go after one.  

Also, I wondered how he could reasonably count a hundred sheep one by one and then realize that one was missing. I took it all too literally, 

Here’s another version, and the author, Nettleton, thought about this and put the sheep in a paddock. 

For much of the time, a crowd of people hung around Jesus, listening to everything he had to say.  

The crowd was full of disreputable characters whose lifestyles were offensive to the more respectable members of society.  

The devoutly religious Pharisees and the experts in religious law got their noses out of joint over this and began denouncing Jesus 

“He keeps company with people whose behaviour is beyond the pale,” they said, “and he doesn’t even draw the line at eating with them.” 

Jesus responded to their objections by telling a story. He said, “If you had care of a hundred sheep and one of them got lost, what would you do?  

Like anyone else, you would leave the other ninety-nine grazing in the paddock and go off looking for the lost one until you found it.  

And when you found it, you would be so relieved that you would hoist it up on your shoulders and dance home with a spring in your step.  

Not only that, but you would also call all your friends and neighbours around for party, saying, ‘The beers on me, for I have found my sheep that was lost.’” 

Jesus said, “Let me assure you that it is just like that in heaven.  

One screwed-up person getting back on the right track causes far more celebration than ninety-nine respectable people who never left it.” 

When I was small my parents didn’t go to church much.  

But we kids had to go to Sunday School. I started in the Presbyterian Sunday School because my friends went there. 

The church had a couple of good parties with movies, Laurel and Hardy, each year. Prizes for good work were real books, not Bible stories.  

And we memorized the Westminster Catechism”. It starts with: The chief end of man is to glorify God and to  enjoy him forever. 

 No one questioned that God was a “him”, but they did explain that even us little girls were included in that word “man”. 

Then there was a great tragedy in our family, and my mother arranged an Anglican funeral.  

The next week we were taken out of the Presbyterian church and enrolled in the Anglican Sunday School. 

They did not have parties with or without movies. There were no prizes, only a star beside your name on a poster board, and there was a different catechism. 

Further before Sunday School we had to go to church, and there every week we intoned the prayer of confession: 

Almighty and most merciful Father we have erred and strayed from Thy ways like lost sheep, we have followed too much the devices and desires of our own hearts, we have offended against Thy holy laws. We have left undone those things which we ought to have done. And we have done those things which we ought to have done. And there is no health in us. 

I had to pray this particularly fervently because on my way to church I often succumbed to temptation and spent the nickel I had been given for the Sunday School collection at Harry’s Candy and Tobacco store, on candy. 

I am going to have to intone that old prayer again this evening as I have been asked to give the meditation at the evening service, evensong, in the Little Dutch Church. 

If you ever wondered what happens inside that little church, come at 5:00 this evening. 

Of course, there have been times when we have erred and strayed. Of course we follow our hearts, what else have we got. 

The point is not that we are miserable sinners. To repent means to make an adjustment, turn around, and accept that God is seeking you. 

But we are also not those smug sheep in the paddock. We are all lost sheep in that God draws us into living in God’s holiness. 

The point is that the Divine Essence is always searching us out and attempting to draw us in ever closer to share in God’s holiness. 

“God became man so man might become God.” 

That was Saint Athanasius, a long, long, time ago. Born in 296, who lived in Alexandria, and was obviously not woke. 

What he is saying is that humanity has the potential to participate in the divine nature through Christ. 

Here’s the theology: Through the incarnation in which God takes on human form, humanity is offered a path to divine communion and transformation. 

The phrase "God became man so that man might become God" emphasizes humanity's potential for each person to become united with God and share in God’s divine life. 

 

This gift of grace allows each of us to become transformed and renewed. 

 

This divine grace searches us out and draws us into its essence. 

 

“I once was lost but now am found.” 

 

This early teaching was that through Christ believers can attain a state of divine likeness without losing their unique identity.  

 

The shepherd searches for their sheep.  Divine Love seeks each of us.  

 

The invitation is about the transformative power of faith in Christ. It invites us to engage in a relationship with God that leads to spiritual growth and renewal. 

 

By participating in the life of Christ through prayer, action and community, we are called to embody the love and grace of God in our daily lives. 

 

We are never safe in the paddock. 

 

We are always being searched for, to be transformed into holiness. 

The old Methodists had a name for it. They called it “sanctification”.