You can listen to this reflection here. Sunday's gospel reading is here.
Are sheep responsive to sound? I don't know, but Jesus – who must have known more about sheep-keeping than I do – says that sheep know the shepherd’s voice:“The one who enters by the gate is the shepherd of the sheep. The gatekeeper opens the gate for him, and the sheep hear his voice. He calls his own sheep by name and leads them out. When he has brought out all his own, he goes ahead of them, and the sheep follow him because they know his voice.”
This passage evokes for me Jesus’ encounter with Mary Magdalene in the garden on Easter morning. Deep in grief at finding the tomb empty, assuming the body of her beloved lord has been stolen, Mary has a conversation with someone she takes for a gardener. It is only when he says her name that she recognizes Jesus by his voice. “He calls his own sheep by name and leads them out.”
I can’t claim to know Jesus’ voice, but I have had enough prayer conversations with him that I believe I recognize his voice – by content and tone. When I get a response in prayer that is simple and profound and sometimes a little sharp, something I’m pretty sure I would never have thought of, I attribute it to Jesus. And if it bears good fruit, I feel that hunch confirmed.
One way to describe spiritual growth for Christ-followers is to become familiar with the Shepherd’s voice, so that we are led to green pastures and still waters, to fruitfulness and refreshment. Christ’s leading, which comes to us through the Holy Spirit, can also steer us away from ravines and precipices. As we learn to trust God’s guidance, we also become more hip to false shepherds who try to lead us away from the One who makes us whole.
How do you experience Jesus’ voice in your life?
Through scripture or prayer? In worship? Inner promptings? Other people offering interpretations?
If the very idea of “hearing” Jesus seems strange to you, consider a prayer like this: “Okay, Jesus, if you call your own sheep by name and lead them out, call me in a way I can understand.” And then see what happens over the next hours or days or weeks… check in periodically with that prayer and see if your relationship is changing at all. It’s not up to the sheep, it’s up to the shepherd… yet it helps if the sheep are open to possibilities.
Jesus had to watch a lot of people who drifted into his community be drawn away by fear-mongering leaders who warned people not to trust him. I imagine it pained him to watch people come close to the love he offered and then wander off.
But Jesus never forced anyone to follow him, and he doesn’t now. He only calls to us, with open arms. Do we hear with open ears?
© Kate Heichler, 2026. To receive Water Daily by email each morning, subscribe here. Here are the bible readings for next Sunday. Water Daily is also a podcast – subscribe to it here on Apple, Spotify or your favorite podcast platform.
Showing posts with label Good Shepherd. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Good Shepherd. Show all posts
4-20-26 - The Gate
You can listen to this reflection here. Sunday's gospel reading is here.
Someday maybe I'll understand the Easter season lectionary. After a few Sundays exploring the events of Easter Sunday, on Easter 4 we leave behind the resurrection of Christ and jump to one of the “I am the good shepherd” passages. “Good Shepherd” sounds comforting. But as we read these passages, we find they are anything but cuddly. Thieves, rustlers, predators and unreliable hired men abound.
It turns out that Jesus is talking – as usual – about the corrupt and oppressive religious leaders whom he feels misrepresent God and choke the spiritual life of their people: “Very truly, I tell you Pharisees, anyone who does not enter the sheepfold by the gate but climbs in by another way is a thief and a bandit. The one who enters by the gate is the shepherd of the sheep.”
Is it any wonder they wanted to kill Jesus? He compares them to thieves and bandits who would rob people of their assurance of God’s love and mercy. Of course, comparing the people to sheep is not the most flattering allusion either.
And it is easy to get tangled in the words as John presents them; isn't Jesus the shepherd? But later Jesus says, “Very truly, I tell you, I am the gate for the sheep. All who came before me are thieves and bandits; but the sheep did not listen to them. I am the gate. Whoever enters by me will be saved, and will come in and go out and find pasture.”
My literal mind has trouble imagining Jesus as a gate; how can a person be a gate? Thankfully, Water Daily is a community, and after I posed that question a few years ago, a reader replied that not all sheepfolds in Jesus’ time had gates – often the shepherd would himself lie down in the opening to keep the sheep in and predators out. This really opens up Jesus’ perplexing words – and expands our sense of his role in our lives as we let him take up more space in us. What is he protecting us from – and for?
This image of Jesus as gate also makes me think of him as one who creates entry space for contact with God – a threshold we cross to gain access to the Holy One, the Creator of all. After all, we affirm that it is by Jesus’ holiness, not our own, that we have access to the Father. He’s our way in… and out.
Someday maybe I'll understand the Easter season lectionary. After a few Sundays exploring the events of Easter Sunday, on Easter 4 we leave behind the resurrection of Christ and jump to one of the “I am the good shepherd” passages. “Good Shepherd” sounds comforting. But as we read these passages, we find they are anything but cuddly. Thieves, rustlers, predators and unreliable hired men abound.
It turns out that Jesus is talking – as usual – about the corrupt and oppressive religious leaders whom he feels misrepresent God and choke the spiritual life of their people: “Very truly, I tell you Pharisees, anyone who does not enter the sheepfold by the gate but climbs in by another way is a thief and a bandit. The one who enters by the gate is the shepherd of the sheep.”
Is it any wonder they wanted to kill Jesus? He compares them to thieves and bandits who would rob people of their assurance of God’s love and mercy. Of course, comparing the people to sheep is not the most flattering allusion either.
And it is easy to get tangled in the words as John presents them; isn't Jesus the shepherd? But later Jesus says, “Very truly, I tell you, I am the gate for the sheep. All who came before me are thieves and bandits; but the sheep did not listen to them. I am the gate. Whoever enters by me will be saved, and will come in and go out and find pasture.”
My literal mind has trouble imagining Jesus as a gate; how can a person be a gate? Thankfully, Water Daily is a community, and after I posed that question a few years ago, a reader replied that not all sheepfolds in Jesus’ time had gates – often the shepherd would himself lie down in the opening to keep the sheep in and predators out. This really opens up Jesus’ perplexing words – and expands our sense of his role in our lives as we let him take up more space in us. What is he protecting us from – and for?
This image of Jesus as gate also makes me think of him as one who creates entry space for contact with God – a threshold we cross to gain access to the Holy One, the Creator of all. After all, we affirm that it is by Jesus’ holiness, not our own, that we have access to the Father. He’s our way in… and out.
- Does Jesus function that way in your spiritual life? Is he a threshold you can cross into the holy, a space-creator?
- Have you suffered from poor shepherds in the past, who made intimacy with God more difficult? Perhaps you can pray for them, and even forgive. That makes space too.
- Do you think you need Jesus in order to get closer to God? Do you want him in that between-space?
My prayer for today is, “Jesus – if you’re the gate, show me how I can get closer to the fullness of God by getting closer to you.”
© Kate Heichler, 2026. To receive Water Daily by email each morning, subscribe here. Here are the bible readings for next Sunday. Water Daily is also a podcast – subscribe to it here on Apple, Spotify or your favorite podcast platform.
© Kate Heichler, 2026. To receive Water Daily by email each morning, subscribe here. Here are the bible readings for next Sunday. Water Daily is also a podcast – subscribe to it here on Apple, Spotify or your favorite podcast platform.
5-9-25 - The Not-So-Gentle Shepherd
You can listen to this reflection here. Sunday's gospel reading is here.
Reading the Gospels, we can see Jesus in different lights – and come away with a picture very different from the one our culture presents. Popular art and hymnody often portray him as gentle and mild, serene, a peacemaker and solemn teacher. Maybe it’s all those pictures of him carrying a cuddly little lamb in his arms, and our desire for a world in which the meek inherit the earth. He did say they would, and he meant it in the long-term, but “meek” was not the way Jesus went about doing business.
In fact, the image of Jesus as a gentle shepherd shows ignorance about what went into shepherding in his day. It was a dirty, dangerous, fierce and sometimes nasty business. Shepherds were hired to tend valuable livestock; if they lost a sheep to a predator or a poacher or a ravine, they were responsible for the cost. It was not a field that attracted the finest of men. I wonder if Jesus' taking on the label “shepherd” itself raised some eyebrows.
The Jesus we find in the Gospels is strong; fierce on behalf of the broken and marginalized; merciless with the self-righteous; challenging to the wealthy and powerful; harsh with his followers; often sarcastic and occasionally rude. He is frequently seen arguing with the religious leaders, whom he mocked to their faces and in his parables. He spoke with authority and did not hold back, even when threatened with death. He was “in your face” to the max – especially when it came to his claims about his relationship with God, as he does again in this week's Gospel reading: “What my Father has given me is greater than all else, and no one can snatch it out of the Father’s hand. The Father and I are one.”
More clearly than we see in other passages, Jesus defines his “flock” and his mission as a gift from his Father, and with all humility elevates himself above all others. I say “with all humility” because humility means having an accurate, “right-sized” view of yourself, and Jesus was, after all, God. But he didn’t look like God to the religious leaders around him, so they often took great offense at such claims. After hearing him say, “The Father and I are one,” we’re told, “The Jews took up stones again to stone him.”
How we see Jesus matters, because it shapes how we reveal him to the world. Our churches often reflect the cultural view of Jesus – solemn and contented, comforting and complacent, slow to challenge the structures of society or provoke our members to action. No wonder we’re in decline. Too often the Jesus we project is someone to have tea with, not one to join in reclaiming, restoring and renewing all of creation.
Let’s become reacquainted with the Jesus of the Gospels, even if it means reading them back-to-back several times over. Let’s look at our congregations and see how well we reflect the Jesus that multitudes found so compelling they left everything to follow him, whom thousands testified rose from the dead, bearing that conviction to a martyr’s grave.
And let’s look at ourselves, how we walk with Jesus among the people we know, how well we reflect the Jesus of the Gospels. That’s a guy people want to know better. Let’s make him known.
© Kate Heichler, 2025. To receive Water Daily by email each morning, subscribe here. Here are the bible readings for next Sunday. Water Daily is also a podcast – subscribe to it here on Apple, Spotify or your favorite podcast platform.
Reading the Gospels, we can see Jesus in different lights – and come away with a picture very different from the one our culture presents. Popular art and hymnody often portray him as gentle and mild, serene, a peacemaker and solemn teacher. Maybe it’s all those pictures of him carrying a cuddly little lamb in his arms, and our desire for a world in which the meek inherit the earth. He did say they would, and he meant it in the long-term, but “meek” was not the way Jesus went about doing business.
In fact, the image of Jesus as a gentle shepherd shows ignorance about what went into shepherding in his day. It was a dirty, dangerous, fierce and sometimes nasty business. Shepherds were hired to tend valuable livestock; if they lost a sheep to a predator or a poacher or a ravine, they were responsible for the cost. It was not a field that attracted the finest of men. I wonder if Jesus' taking on the label “shepherd” itself raised some eyebrows.
The Jesus we find in the Gospels is strong; fierce on behalf of the broken and marginalized; merciless with the self-righteous; challenging to the wealthy and powerful; harsh with his followers; often sarcastic and occasionally rude. He is frequently seen arguing with the religious leaders, whom he mocked to their faces and in his parables. He spoke with authority and did not hold back, even when threatened with death. He was “in your face” to the max – especially when it came to his claims about his relationship with God, as he does again in this week's Gospel reading: “What my Father has given me is greater than all else, and no one can snatch it out of the Father’s hand. The Father and I are one.”
More clearly than we see in other passages, Jesus defines his “flock” and his mission as a gift from his Father, and with all humility elevates himself above all others. I say “with all humility” because humility means having an accurate, “right-sized” view of yourself, and Jesus was, after all, God. But he didn’t look like God to the religious leaders around him, so they often took great offense at such claims. After hearing him say, “The Father and I are one,” we’re told, “The Jews took up stones again to stone him.”
How we see Jesus matters, because it shapes how we reveal him to the world. Our churches often reflect the cultural view of Jesus – solemn and contented, comforting and complacent, slow to challenge the structures of society or provoke our members to action. No wonder we’re in decline. Too often the Jesus we project is someone to have tea with, not one to join in reclaiming, restoring and renewing all of creation.
Let’s become reacquainted with the Jesus of the Gospels, even if it means reading them back-to-back several times over. Let’s look at our congregations and see how well we reflect the Jesus that multitudes found so compelling they left everything to follow him, whom thousands testified rose from the dead, bearing that conviction to a martyr’s grave.
And let’s look at ourselves, how we walk with Jesus among the people we know, how well we reflect the Jesus of the Gospels. That’s a guy people want to know better. Let’s make him known.
© Kate Heichler, 2025. To receive Water Daily by email each morning, subscribe here. Here are the bible readings for next Sunday. Water Daily is also a podcast – subscribe to it here on Apple, Spotify or your favorite podcast platform.
5-8-25 - Held Fast
You can listen to this reflection here. Sunday's gospel reading is here.
Do you ever want to feel you belong to someone, someone who desires the best for you and will hold your heart, and not let anyone take you away? That is the basis of many a good marriage – and maybe some stalker scenarios. We want to be held tight and to have our freedom, often at the same time.
This is one of the promises Jesus gives those who follow him as Lord. We have the freedom to walk away, but he will not let anyone take us from him: "My sheep hear my voice. I know them, and they follow me. I give them eternal life, and they will never perish. No one will snatch them out of my hand."
I reflect on this promise when I think of people who seem to have been snatched away from Jesus by greed or mental illness or addiction or trauma, people who claim to have no use for the gift of life he promises. I have to believe that if they have once considered themselves as belonging to Jesus, even if it was only as children, they are still his, no matter what happens later.
And I wonder, if I were more conscious about being tethered to Jesus, would I feel more grace in daily life? Would I go easier on myself? Would I be easier on other people? What does it mean to feel held fast and fully alive, all at once?
As I write that question, an image fills my head, the famous one from the movie itanic, Kate Winslet at the bow of the ship, her arms outstretched, face into the wind, exhilarated by freedom, as Leonardo DiCaprio holds her safe. Schmaltzy, yes, but perhaps not a bad way to understand the gift of being held so we can be adventurous and free.
I know God wants us to know his love. And I know God wants us to be free. And I know God wants us to be fully alive – in this world, and in the life that comes next, which flows in unbroken continuity from this one.
We already live the eternal life Jesus has won for us; we get to explore it here and now, becoming ready for Life Without Any Ends. And we can be free to ride the winds of the Spirit knowing Jesus holds us fast. And no one can snatch us out of his hand.
© Kate Heichler, 2025. To receive Water Daily by email each morning, subscribe here. Here are the bible readings for next Sunday. Water Daily is also a podcast – subscribe to it here on Apple, Spotify or your favorite podcast platform.
Do you ever want to feel you belong to someone, someone who desires the best for you and will hold your heart, and not let anyone take you away? That is the basis of many a good marriage – and maybe some stalker scenarios. We want to be held tight and to have our freedom, often at the same time.
This is one of the promises Jesus gives those who follow him as Lord. We have the freedom to walk away, but he will not let anyone take us from him: "My sheep hear my voice. I know them, and they follow me. I give them eternal life, and they will never perish. No one will snatch them out of my hand."
I reflect on this promise when I think of people who seem to have been snatched away from Jesus by greed or mental illness or addiction or trauma, people who claim to have no use for the gift of life he promises. I have to believe that if they have once considered themselves as belonging to Jesus, even if it was only as children, they are still his, no matter what happens later.
And I wonder, if I were more conscious about being tethered to Jesus, would I feel more grace in daily life? Would I go easier on myself? Would I be easier on other people? What does it mean to feel held fast and fully alive, all at once?
As I write that question, an image fills my head, the famous one from the movie itanic, Kate Winslet at the bow of the ship, her arms outstretched, face into the wind, exhilarated by freedom, as Leonardo DiCaprio holds her safe. Schmaltzy, yes, but perhaps not a bad way to understand the gift of being held so we can be adventurous and free.
I know God wants us to know his love. And I know God wants us to be free. And I know God wants us to be fully alive – in this world, and in the life that comes next, which flows in unbroken continuity from this one.
We already live the eternal life Jesus has won for us; we get to explore it here and now, becoming ready for Life Without Any Ends. And we can be free to ride the winds of the Spirit knowing Jesus holds us fast. And no one can snatch us out of his hand.
© Kate Heichler, 2025. To receive Water Daily by email each morning, subscribe here. Here are the bible readings for next Sunday. Water Daily is also a podcast – subscribe to it here on Apple, Spotify or your favorite podcast platform.
5-5-25 - A Winter's Tale
You can listen to this reflection here. Sunday's gospel reading is here.
Alas, we have to leave the morning beach and its breakfast cookout and head to Jerusalem in the dead of winter. Why? Because the Lectionary says so. The fourth Sunday in Easter always has as the appointed Gospel reading one of Jesus’ Good Shepherd discourses. One might think these comforting stories, but they have a rather dark and dangerous cast, showing Jesus at his most contentious. (If you want a more cuddly good shepherd story, read Jesus’ parable about the shepherd who leaves the 99 sheep to go find the one who’s lost. That’s very comforting – unless, perhaps, you happen to be among the 99 left behind…)
Why can’t we just stay with resurrection appearances for the whole seven weeks of Eastertide, or at least the 50 days that mark Jesus’ resurrection sojourn in this world? More time to wrap our minds around resurrection life might help us be more God-centered in this life. Or maybe not – just as we proclaim life in the midst of death, it remains true that, this side of glory, we must contend with death the midst of life. So back we go, back to before Jesus’ arrest and passion, death and glorious resurrection, to Jerusalem in winter: At that time the festival of the Dedication took place in Jerusalem. It was winter, and Jesus was walking in the temple, in the portico of Solomon.
What is the Feast of Dedication, you ask? I had to look it up – it is the eight-day remembrance of the Maccabean revolt that regained the temple from the defiling Seleucid rulers. Part of that festival recalls the miracle of the small quantity of unprofaned oil found in the temple that somehow lit the lamps for eight days until they could bless more. This is the festival we now know as Hanukkah. So that’s the “when” in this week’s story – a festival of light, a festival recalling the victory of God’s people over evil. Hmmm....
The “where” has significance as well – we are in Solomon’s Portico, “a many-pillared, three-aisled portico that ran the length of the eastern boundary of the court of Gentiles.” Perhaps I am making too much of this proximity to the area of the Temple where Gentiles were permitted – but we will see in this encounter Jesus setting a clear distinction between his followers, those who “know my voice,” and those who do not. In the end, this definition will lead to the Good News being proclaimed not only to Jews but to Gentiles as well. This is the sacred geography in which Jesus proclaims his message of eternal life for all who believe in him.
This message has life for us as well, even if we have to leave our stories of happy discovery of the Risen Christ for a time. We now see all stories – those we find in the Bible, and those we experience in our own lives – from the vantage point of Jesus’ resurrection.
Where are you being challenged to find new life in what seems like a sad story? Because Jesus rose, we can find new life in any story, especially our own. As we watch spring unfurl from winter’s firm grip, maybe this winter’s tale will renew our faith in new life.
© Kate Heichler, 2025. To receive Water Daily by email each morning, subscribe here. Here are the bible readings for next Sunday. Water Daily is also a podcast – subscribe to it here on Apple, Spotify or your favorite podcast platform.
Alas, we have to leave the morning beach and its breakfast cookout and head to Jerusalem in the dead of winter. Why? Because the Lectionary says so. The fourth Sunday in Easter always has as the appointed Gospel reading one of Jesus’ Good Shepherd discourses. One might think these comforting stories, but they have a rather dark and dangerous cast, showing Jesus at his most contentious. (If you want a more cuddly good shepherd story, read Jesus’ parable about the shepherd who leaves the 99 sheep to go find the one who’s lost. That’s very comforting – unless, perhaps, you happen to be among the 99 left behind…)
Why can’t we just stay with resurrection appearances for the whole seven weeks of Eastertide, or at least the 50 days that mark Jesus’ resurrection sojourn in this world? More time to wrap our minds around resurrection life might help us be more God-centered in this life. Or maybe not – just as we proclaim life in the midst of death, it remains true that, this side of glory, we must contend with death the midst of life. So back we go, back to before Jesus’ arrest and passion, death and glorious resurrection, to Jerusalem in winter: At that time the festival of the Dedication took place in Jerusalem. It was winter, and Jesus was walking in the temple, in the portico of Solomon.
What is the Feast of Dedication, you ask? I had to look it up – it is the eight-day remembrance of the Maccabean revolt that regained the temple from the defiling Seleucid rulers. Part of that festival recalls the miracle of the small quantity of unprofaned oil found in the temple that somehow lit the lamps for eight days until they could bless more. This is the festival we now know as Hanukkah. So that’s the “when” in this week’s story – a festival of light, a festival recalling the victory of God’s people over evil. Hmmm....
The “where” has significance as well – we are in Solomon’s Portico, “a many-pillared, three-aisled portico that ran the length of the eastern boundary of the court of Gentiles.” Perhaps I am making too much of this proximity to the area of the Temple where Gentiles were permitted – but we will see in this encounter Jesus setting a clear distinction between his followers, those who “know my voice,” and those who do not. In the end, this definition will lead to the Good News being proclaimed not only to Jews but to Gentiles as well. This is the sacred geography in which Jesus proclaims his message of eternal life for all who believe in him.
This message has life for us as well, even if we have to leave our stories of happy discovery of the Risen Christ for a time. We now see all stories – those we find in the Bible, and those we experience in our own lives – from the vantage point of Jesus’ resurrection.
Where are you being challenged to find new life in what seems like a sad story? Because Jesus rose, we can find new life in any story, especially our own. As we watch spring unfurl from winter’s firm grip, maybe this winter’s tale will renew our faith in new life.
© Kate Heichler, 2025. To receive Water Daily by email each morning, subscribe here. Here are the bible readings for next Sunday. Water Daily is also a podcast – subscribe to it here on Apple, Spotify or your favorite podcast platform.
4-17-24 - To Be Known
You can listen to this reflection here. Sunday's gospel reading is here.
In his conversation about shepherding, Jesus highlights an important quality of a “Good Shepherd” – she knows her sheep. In contrast to a hired hand, who might only know the number of sheep he’s to keep track of, the good shepherd knows the sheep individually, knows what each looks like, its characteristics, which ones follow well, which ones are inclined to wander, which ones are more vulnerable.
Jesus doesn’t discuss this quality in the abstract; he makes it personal: "I am the good shepherd. I know my own and my own know me, just as the Father knows me and I know the Father."
Being known – it is perhaps the richest, most intimate experience a person can have. (Is that why ancient Hebrew texts use the verb “know” to suggest sexual encounters?) To be known means we have been seen, and studied; been deemed worthy of time and attention. The one who knows us has weighed our strengths and shortcomings. Being known does not imply being loved, but one often follows the other (and not always in the same order).
That we are known individually by the God who made us, who doesn’t just lump us all together as “humankind” but treasures the particularity and specificity of each one of us, is a radical reality. Yes, God cares about communities, and yes, an over-emphasis on “just me and my Jesus” can imperil the integrity of our spiritual life. Yet the personal, relational dimension to Christian faith is undeniably present in the bible, and life-changing when we acknowledge it.
As intimately as the Father and the Son and the Spirit know each other – they who are distinct, yet One – that’s how closely Jesus knows us, our dreams and longings, our disappointments and losses, our passions and foibles, those shadow parts of ourselves we loathe, as well as what we treasure. Jesus knows us better than we know ourselves, and loves us without reservation or condition.
The question is: Will we let him in? Will we open ourselves to this one who already knows us? Will we take the time to get to know this Good Shepherd?
“I know my own and my own know me” begs an interesting question: Maybe it’s not whether or not Jesus is the Good Shepherd, but whether we consider ourselves his sheep.
The choice is always ours – his offer of relationship is always extended. Maybe we should come to know him as he already knows us.
© Kate Heichler, 2024. To receive Water Daily by email each morning, subscribe here. Here are the bible readings for next Sunday. Water Daily is also a podcast – subscribe to it here on Apple, Spotify or your favorite podcast platform.
In his conversation about shepherding, Jesus highlights an important quality of a “Good Shepherd” – she knows her sheep. In contrast to a hired hand, who might only know the number of sheep he’s to keep track of, the good shepherd knows the sheep individually, knows what each looks like, its characteristics, which ones follow well, which ones are inclined to wander, which ones are more vulnerable.
Jesus doesn’t discuss this quality in the abstract; he makes it personal: "I am the good shepherd. I know my own and my own know me, just as the Father knows me and I know the Father."
Being known – it is perhaps the richest, most intimate experience a person can have. (Is that why ancient Hebrew texts use the verb “know” to suggest sexual encounters?) To be known means we have been seen, and studied; been deemed worthy of time and attention. The one who knows us has weighed our strengths and shortcomings. Being known does not imply being loved, but one often follows the other (and not always in the same order).
That we are known individually by the God who made us, who doesn’t just lump us all together as “humankind” but treasures the particularity and specificity of each one of us, is a radical reality. Yes, God cares about communities, and yes, an over-emphasis on “just me and my Jesus” can imperil the integrity of our spiritual life. Yet the personal, relational dimension to Christian faith is undeniably present in the bible, and life-changing when we acknowledge it.
As intimately as the Father and the Son and the Spirit know each other – they who are distinct, yet One – that’s how closely Jesus knows us, our dreams and longings, our disappointments and losses, our passions and foibles, those shadow parts of ourselves we loathe, as well as what we treasure. Jesus knows us better than we know ourselves, and loves us without reservation or condition.
The question is: Will we let him in? Will we open ourselves to this one who already knows us? Will we take the time to get to know this Good Shepherd?
“I know my own and my own know me” begs an interesting question: Maybe it’s not whether or not Jesus is the Good Shepherd, but whether we consider ourselves his sheep.
The choice is always ours – his offer of relationship is always extended. Maybe we should come to know him as he already knows us.
© Kate Heichler, 2024. To receive Water Daily by email each morning, subscribe here. Here are the bible readings for next Sunday. Water Daily is also a podcast – subscribe to it here on Apple, Spotify or your favorite podcast platform.
4-15-24 - The Good Shepherd
You can listen to this reflection here. Sunday's gospel reading is here.
Every year on the fourth Sunday of Easter our lectionary delivers up a section of Jesus’ “Good Shepherd” discourse from the Gospel of John. This set of teachings is sandwiched between Jesus’ healing of a man blind from birth (John 9), which sharpened the ire of the religious authorities with whom he’d already been tussling, and his raising of Lazarus (John 11), which caused those leaders to seek his execution. So this Good Shepherd passage is far from cuddly or comforting – it crackles with the growing danger in which Jesus finds himself, speaking of death and sacrifice, of negligent shepherds and thieves.
Before we look at all that, though, let’s note how subversive it was for Jesus to compare himself to a shepherd in the first place. The impact of this image may be lost on us, as we tend to think of shepherds as earthy, pan-pipe playing rustics tending the land and their cute little flocks. In Jesus’ time, though, shepherds were considered crude and base ruffians, unkempt, unwashed, often dishonest and generally suspect. That’s why our Christmas story of angels appearing to shepherds in their fields is so astonishing – how could such low-lifes would be the first to hear of Christ’s birth?
Yet, as we know, Jesus made a practice of consorting with people considered by “respectable” folk to be the dregs of society. He was often in trouble for dining with tax collectors and prostitutes, honoring lepers and the ritually impure with his company and healing. Here he claims a demeaned profession as his own. To say “I am the good shepherd” is to assert that there can be such a thing as a good shepherd. In explaining what distinguishes a good shepherd from a bad one, he manages once more to skewer the ruling elite.
There is yet a deeper level of affront to those leaders in this statement: Jesus’ use of “I am” in making this claim. This could not but echo for his hearers the name God gives when Moses demands his name: “I am that I am,” a statement of pure being. Each of the “I am” sayings recorded in John’s Gospel begins in Greek with “Ego eimi…” However, the “I” (“ego”) is implied in the word “eimi,” or “am.” Putting “ego” before it is redundant, rendering it “I I am” – thus amplifying the “I am” so that the comparison to God’s name is inescapable.
In these few words, Jesus manages to offend the powerful on several levels, and to signal to those on the margins of society the Good News of what God is up to. When he says, “I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep,” he redeems the role of shepherd and claims it for himself. And he frames in advance his suffering and death as a redemptive sacrifice, alerting his hearers that this Good Shepherd will be called upon to lay down his life for the sheep he loves.
This Shepherd of ours is a fierce and vigilant warrior – and he is still on watch over us, leading us out, to good pasture, and in, to the safety of the fold; guarding us from forces of evil that would prey on us or try to lead us astray. We still have the freedom to wander, but as we choose to stay near, what joy and power will be ours.
© Kate Heichler, 2024. To receive Water Daily by email each morning, subscribe here. Here are the bible readings for next Sunday. Water Daily is also a podcast – subscribe to it here on Apple, Spotify or your favorite podcast platform.
Every year on the fourth Sunday of Easter our lectionary delivers up a section of Jesus’ “Good Shepherd” discourse from the Gospel of John. This set of teachings is sandwiched between Jesus’ healing of a man blind from birth (John 9), which sharpened the ire of the religious authorities with whom he’d already been tussling, and his raising of Lazarus (John 11), which caused those leaders to seek his execution. So this Good Shepherd passage is far from cuddly or comforting – it crackles with the growing danger in which Jesus finds himself, speaking of death and sacrifice, of negligent shepherds and thieves.
Before we look at all that, though, let’s note how subversive it was for Jesus to compare himself to a shepherd in the first place. The impact of this image may be lost on us, as we tend to think of shepherds as earthy, pan-pipe playing rustics tending the land and their cute little flocks. In Jesus’ time, though, shepherds were considered crude and base ruffians, unkempt, unwashed, often dishonest and generally suspect. That’s why our Christmas story of angels appearing to shepherds in their fields is so astonishing – how could such low-lifes would be the first to hear of Christ’s birth?
Yet, as we know, Jesus made a practice of consorting with people considered by “respectable” folk to be the dregs of society. He was often in trouble for dining with tax collectors and prostitutes, honoring lepers and the ritually impure with his company and healing. Here he claims a demeaned profession as his own. To say “I am the good shepherd” is to assert that there can be such a thing as a good shepherd. In explaining what distinguishes a good shepherd from a bad one, he manages once more to skewer the ruling elite.
There is yet a deeper level of affront to those leaders in this statement: Jesus’ use of “I am” in making this claim. This could not but echo for his hearers the name God gives when Moses demands his name: “I am that I am,” a statement of pure being. Each of the “I am” sayings recorded in John’s Gospel begins in Greek with “Ego eimi…” However, the “I” (“ego”) is implied in the word “eimi,” or “am.” Putting “ego” before it is redundant, rendering it “I I am” – thus amplifying the “I am” so that the comparison to God’s name is inescapable.
In these few words, Jesus manages to offend the powerful on several levels, and to signal to those on the margins of society the Good News of what God is up to. When he says, “I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep,” he redeems the role of shepherd and claims it for himself. And he frames in advance his suffering and death as a redemptive sacrifice, alerting his hearers that this Good Shepherd will be called upon to lay down his life for the sheep he loves.
This Shepherd of ours is a fierce and vigilant warrior – and he is still on watch over us, leading us out, to good pasture, and in, to the safety of the fold; guarding us from forces of evil that would prey on us or try to lead us astray. We still have the freedom to wander, but as we choose to stay near, what joy and power will be ours.
© Kate Heichler, 2024. To receive Water Daily by email each morning, subscribe here. Here are the bible readings for next Sunday. Water Daily is also a podcast – subscribe to it here on Apple, Spotify or your favorite podcast platform.
4-26-23 - Coming In and Going Out
You can listen to this reflection here. Sunday's gospel reading is here.
“I am the gate. Whoever enters by me will be saved, and will come in and go out and find pasture.”
Earlier this week we explored Jesus’ saying that he was the gate of the sheepfold, the means of entry. I said it was hard to imagine a person as a gate. But here’s something I learned about sheepfolds in Jesus’ day: scholars think they often had no gate. The shepherd, when the flock was safely enclosed, would lie down to sleep in the opening as a way of securing the flock. Thus, the shepherd became a gate.
Putting aside the amusing image this prompts of a sleepy shepherd trampled one morning by hungry sheep going out to pasture, it helps make sense of Jesus’ words. The shepherd is the one who leads the flock in and out of the fold. Jesus says those who enter the Life of God by way of relationship with him will come in and go out and find pasture.
It occurs to me that sheep don’t get sustenance in the sheepfold – for nourishment, they go out to pasture. What they get in the sheepfold is rest and security. What does that say to us as churchgoers? Often people say they go to church to be fed. What if instead we saw church-time as a time to rest and recharge, be renewed, safely enclosed in the fold with the rest of our flock – and then sent back out to find God’s nourishment in our lives the rest of the week?
What if we were fed in spiritual conversation with other people, by sharing our faith stories with people who aren’t in our “fold?” What if God wants us to be "pasture" by which others to be fed? The going out becomes as important as the coming in, maybe more.
Why do you go to church? What do you seek there? What do you seek when you leave and head back to your “life?”
Where do you, or where might you find spiritual nurture in the week between worship services? Where might you offer it?
In prayer today, we could ask, “God… what pastures are you leading me to in my life right now? Who might you be asking me to provide a feast for?” See what occurs to you, or who crosses your path.
We don’t come and go alone. The Great News is that the shepherd goes with us, coming in and going out. The shepherd leads us to green pastures and the shepherd leads us home again. We don’t have to search for pasture – we only have to learn the voice of the Shepherd and follow him.
“I am the gate. Whoever enters by me will be saved, and will come in and go out and find pasture.”
Earlier this week we explored Jesus’ saying that he was the gate of the sheepfold, the means of entry. I said it was hard to imagine a person as a gate. But here’s something I learned about sheepfolds in Jesus’ day: scholars think they often had no gate. The shepherd, when the flock was safely enclosed, would lie down to sleep in the opening as a way of securing the flock. Thus, the shepherd became a gate.
Putting aside the amusing image this prompts of a sleepy shepherd trampled one morning by hungry sheep going out to pasture, it helps make sense of Jesus’ words. The shepherd is the one who leads the flock in and out of the fold. Jesus says those who enter the Life of God by way of relationship with him will come in and go out and find pasture.
It occurs to me that sheep don’t get sustenance in the sheepfold – for nourishment, they go out to pasture. What they get in the sheepfold is rest and security. What does that say to us as churchgoers? Often people say they go to church to be fed. What if instead we saw church-time as a time to rest and recharge, be renewed, safely enclosed in the fold with the rest of our flock – and then sent back out to find God’s nourishment in our lives the rest of the week?
What if we were fed in spiritual conversation with other people, by sharing our faith stories with people who aren’t in our “fold?” What if God wants us to be "pasture" by which others to be fed? The going out becomes as important as the coming in, maybe more.
Why do you go to church? What do you seek there? What do you seek when you leave and head back to your “life?”
Where do you, or where might you find spiritual nurture in the week between worship services? Where might you offer it?
In prayer today, we could ask, “God… what pastures are you leading me to in my life right now? Who might you be asking me to provide a feast for?” See what occurs to you, or who crosses your path.
We don’t come and go alone. The Great News is that the shepherd goes with us, coming in and going out. The shepherd leads us to green pastures and the shepherd leads us home again. We don’t have to search for pasture – we only have to learn the voice of the Shepherd and follow him.
4-25-23 - The Shepherd's Voice
You can listen to this reflection here. Sunday's gospel reading is here.
Are sheep responsive to sound? I don't know, but Jesus - who must have known more about sheep-keeping than I do - says that sheep know the shepherd’s voice:
“The one who enters by the gate is the shepherd of the sheep. The gatekeeper opens the gate for him, and the sheep hear his voice. He calls his own sheep by name and leads them out. When he has brought out all his own, he goes ahead of them, and the sheep follow him because they know his voice.”
This passage evokes for me Jesus’ encounter with Mary Magdalene in the garden on Easter morning. Deep in grief at finding the tomb empty, assuming the body of her beloved lord has been stolen, Mary has a conversation with someone she takes for a gardener. It is only when he says her name that she recognizes Jesus by his voice. “He calls his own sheep by name and leads them out.”
I can’t claim to know Jesus’ voice, but I have had enough prayer conversations with him that I believe I recognize his voice – by content if not by tone. When I get a response in prayer that is simple and profound and sometimes a little sharp, something I’m pretty sure I would never have thought of, I attribute it to Jesus. And if it bears good fruit, I feel that hunch confirmed.
One way to describe spiritual growth for Christ-followers is to become familiar with the Shepherd’s voice, so that we are led to green pastures and still waters, to fruitfulness and refreshment. Christ’s leading, which comes to us through the Holy Spirit, can also steer us away from ravines and precipices. As we learn to trust God’s guidance, we also become more hip to false shepherds who try to lead us away from the One who makes us whole.
How do you experience Jesus’ voice in your life? Through scripture or prayer? In worship? Inner promptings? Other people offering interpretations?
If the very idea of “hearing” Jesus seems strange to you, consider a prayer like this: “Okay, Jesus, if you call your own sheep by name and lead them out, call me in a way I can understand.” And then see what happens over the next hours or days or weeks… check in periodically with that prayer and see if your relationship is changing at all. It’s not up to the sheep, it’s up to the shepherd… yet it helps if the sheep are open to possibilities.
Jesus had to watch a lot of people who drifted into his community be drawn away by fear-mongering leaders who warned people not to trust him. I imagine it pained him to watch people come close to the love he offered and then wander off. But Jesus never forced anyone to follow him, and he doesn’t now. He only calls to us, with open arms. Do we hear with open ears?
Are sheep responsive to sound? I don't know, but Jesus - who must have known more about sheep-keeping than I do - says that sheep know the shepherd’s voice:
“The one who enters by the gate is the shepherd of the sheep. The gatekeeper opens the gate for him, and the sheep hear his voice. He calls his own sheep by name and leads them out. When he has brought out all his own, he goes ahead of them, and the sheep follow him because they know his voice.”
This passage evokes for me Jesus’ encounter with Mary Magdalene in the garden on Easter morning. Deep in grief at finding the tomb empty, assuming the body of her beloved lord has been stolen, Mary has a conversation with someone she takes for a gardener. It is only when he says her name that she recognizes Jesus by his voice. “He calls his own sheep by name and leads them out.”
I can’t claim to know Jesus’ voice, but I have had enough prayer conversations with him that I believe I recognize his voice – by content if not by tone. When I get a response in prayer that is simple and profound and sometimes a little sharp, something I’m pretty sure I would never have thought of, I attribute it to Jesus. And if it bears good fruit, I feel that hunch confirmed.
One way to describe spiritual growth for Christ-followers is to become familiar with the Shepherd’s voice, so that we are led to green pastures and still waters, to fruitfulness and refreshment. Christ’s leading, which comes to us through the Holy Spirit, can also steer us away from ravines and precipices. As we learn to trust God’s guidance, we also become more hip to false shepherds who try to lead us away from the One who makes us whole.
How do you experience Jesus’ voice in your life? Through scripture or prayer? In worship? Inner promptings? Other people offering interpretations?
If the very idea of “hearing” Jesus seems strange to you, consider a prayer like this: “Okay, Jesus, if you call your own sheep by name and lead them out, call me in a way I can understand.” And then see what happens over the next hours or days or weeks… check in periodically with that prayer and see if your relationship is changing at all. It’s not up to the sheep, it’s up to the shepherd… yet it helps if the sheep are open to possibilities.
Jesus had to watch a lot of people who drifted into his community be drawn away by fear-mongering leaders who warned people not to trust him. I imagine it pained him to watch people come close to the love he offered and then wander off. But Jesus never forced anyone to follow him, and he doesn’t now. He only calls to us, with open arms. Do we hear with open ears?
5-6-22 - The Not-So-Gentle Shepherd
You can listen to this reflection here. Sunday's gospel reading is here.
Reading the Gospels, we can see Jesus in different lights – and come away with a picture very different from the one our culture presents. Popular art and hymnody often portray him as gentle and mild, serene, a peacemaker and solemn teacher. Maybe it’s all those pictures of him carrying a cuddly little lamb in his arms, and our desire for a world in which the meek inherit the earth. He did say they would, and he meant it in the long-term, but “meek” was not the way Jesus went about doing business.
In fact, the image of Jesus as a gentle shepherd shows ignorance about what went into shepherding in his day. It was a dirty, dangerous, fierce and sometimes nasty business. Shepherds were hired to tend valuable livestock; if they lost a sheep to a predator or a poacher or a ravine, they were responsible for the cost. It was not a field that attracted the finest of men. I wonder if Jesus' taking on the label “shepherd” itself raised some eyebrows.
The Jesus we find in the Gospels is strong; fierce on behalf of the broken and marginalized; merciless with the self-righteous; challenging to the wealthy and powerful; harsh with his followers; often sarcastic and occasionally rude. He is frequently seen arguing with the religious leaders, whom he mocked to their faces and in his parables. He spoke with authority and did not hold back, even when threatened with death. He was “in your face” to the max – especially when it came to his claims about his relationship with God, as he does again in this week's Gospel reading: “What my Father has given me is greater than all else, and no one can snatch it out of the Father’s hand. The Father and I are one.”
More clearly than we see in other passages, Jesus defines his “flock” and his mission as a gift from his Father, and with all humility elevates himself above all others. I say “with all humility” because humility means having an accurate, “right-sized” view of yourself, and Jesus was, after all, God. But he didn’t look like God to the religious leaders around him, so they often took great offense at such claims. After hearing him say, “The Father and I are one,” we’re told, “The Jews took up stones again to stone him.”
How we see Jesus matters, because it shapes how we reveal him to the world. Our churches often reflect the cultural view of Jesus – solemn and contented, comforting and complacent, slow to challenge the structures of society or provoke our members to action. No wonder we’re in decline. Too often the Jesus we project is someone to have tea with, not one to join in reclaiming, restoring and renewing all of creation.
Let’s become reacquainted with the Jesus of the Gospels, even if it means reading them back-to-back several times over. Let’s look at our congregations and see how well we reflect the Jesus that multitudes found so compelling they left everything to follow him, whom thousands testified rose from the dead, bearing that conviction to a martyr’s grave.
And let’s look at ourselves, how we walk with Jesus among the people we know, how well we reflect the Jesus of the Gospels. That’s a guy people want to know better. Let’s make him known.
Reading the Gospels, we can see Jesus in different lights – and come away with a picture very different from the one our culture presents. Popular art and hymnody often portray him as gentle and mild, serene, a peacemaker and solemn teacher. Maybe it’s all those pictures of him carrying a cuddly little lamb in his arms, and our desire for a world in which the meek inherit the earth. He did say they would, and he meant it in the long-term, but “meek” was not the way Jesus went about doing business.
In fact, the image of Jesus as a gentle shepherd shows ignorance about what went into shepherding in his day. It was a dirty, dangerous, fierce and sometimes nasty business. Shepherds were hired to tend valuable livestock; if they lost a sheep to a predator or a poacher or a ravine, they were responsible for the cost. It was not a field that attracted the finest of men. I wonder if Jesus' taking on the label “shepherd” itself raised some eyebrows.
The Jesus we find in the Gospels is strong; fierce on behalf of the broken and marginalized; merciless with the self-righteous; challenging to the wealthy and powerful; harsh with his followers; often sarcastic and occasionally rude. He is frequently seen arguing with the religious leaders, whom he mocked to their faces and in his parables. He spoke with authority and did not hold back, even when threatened with death. He was “in your face” to the max – especially when it came to his claims about his relationship with God, as he does again in this week's Gospel reading: “What my Father has given me is greater than all else, and no one can snatch it out of the Father’s hand. The Father and I are one.”
More clearly than we see in other passages, Jesus defines his “flock” and his mission as a gift from his Father, and with all humility elevates himself above all others. I say “with all humility” because humility means having an accurate, “right-sized” view of yourself, and Jesus was, after all, God. But he didn’t look like God to the religious leaders around him, so they often took great offense at such claims. After hearing him say, “The Father and I are one,” we’re told, “The Jews took up stones again to stone him.”
How we see Jesus matters, because it shapes how we reveal him to the world. Our churches often reflect the cultural view of Jesus – solemn and contented, comforting and complacent, slow to challenge the structures of society or provoke our members to action. No wonder we’re in decline. Too often the Jesus we project is someone to have tea with, not one to join in reclaiming, restoring and renewing all of creation.
Let’s become reacquainted with the Jesus of the Gospels, even if it means reading them back-to-back several times over. Let’s look at our congregations and see how well we reflect the Jesus that multitudes found so compelling they left everything to follow him, whom thousands testified rose from the dead, bearing that conviction to a martyr’s grave.
And let’s look at ourselves, how we walk with Jesus among the people we know, how well we reflect the Jesus of the Gospels. That’s a guy people want to know better. Let’s make him known.
5-2-22 - A Winter's Tale
You can listen to this reflection here. Sunday's gospel reading is here.
Alas, we have to leave the morning beach and its breakfast cookout and head to Jerusalem in the dead of winter. Why? Because the Lectionary says so. The fourth Sunday in Easter always has as the appointed Gospel reading one of Jesus’ Good Shepherd discourses. One might think these comforting stories, but they have a rather dark and dangerous cast, showing Jesus at his most contentious. (If you want a more cuddly good shepherd story, read Jesus’ parable about the shepherd who leaves the 99 sheep to go find the one who’s lost. That’s very comforting – unless, perhaps, you happen to be among the 99 left behind…)
Why can’t we just stay with resurrection appearances for the whole seven weeks of Eastertide, or at least the 50 days that mark Jesus’ resurrection sojourn in this world? More time to wrap our minds around resurrection life we might help us be more God-centered in this life. Or maybe not – just as we proclaim life in the midst of death, it remains true that, this side of glory, we must contend with death the midst of life. So we go back, back to before Jesus’ arrest and passion, death and glorious resurrection, to Jerusalem in winter.
At that time the festival of the Dedication took place in Jerusalem. It was winter, and Jesus was walking in the temple, in the portico of Solomon.
What is the Feast of Dedication, you ask? I had to look it up – it is the eight-day remembrance of the Maccabean revolt that regained the temple from the defiling Seleucid rulers. Part of that festival recalls the miracle of the small quantity of unprofaned oil found in the temple that somehow lit the lamps for eight days until they could bless more. This is the festival we now know as Hanukkah. So that’s the “when” in this week’s story – a festival of light, a festival recalling the victory of God’s people over evil. Hmmm....
The “where” has significance as well – we are in Solomon’s Portico, “a many-pillared, three-aisled portico that ran the length of the eastern boundary of the court of Gentiles.” Perhaps I am making too much of this proximity to the area of the Temple where Gentiles were permitted – but we will see in this encounter Jesus setting a clear distinction between those who “know my voice,” and those who do not. In the end, this definition will lead to the Good News being proclaimed not only to Jews but to Gentiles as well. This is the sacred geography in which Jesus proclaims his message of eternal life for all who believe in him.
This message has life for us as well, even if we have to leave our stories of happy discovery of the Risen Christ for a time. We now see all stories – those we find in the Bible, and those we experience in our own lives – from the vantage point of Jesus’ resurrection.
Where are you being challenged to find new life in what seems like a sad story? Because Jesus rose, we can find new life in any story, especially our own. As we watch spring unfurl from winter’s firm grip, maybe this winter’s tale will renew our faith in new life.
Alas, we have to leave the morning beach and its breakfast cookout and head to Jerusalem in the dead of winter. Why? Because the Lectionary says so. The fourth Sunday in Easter always has as the appointed Gospel reading one of Jesus’ Good Shepherd discourses. One might think these comforting stories, but they have a rather dark and dangerous cast, showing Jesus at his most contentious. (If you want a more cuddly good shepherd story, read Jesus’ parable about the shepherd who leaves the 99 sheep to go find the one who’s lost. That’s very comforting – unless, perhaps, you happen to be among the 99 left behind…)
Why can’t we just stay with resurrection appearances for the whole seven weeks of Eastertide, or at least the 50 days that mark Jesus’ resurrection sojourn in this world? More time to wrap our minds around resurrection life we might help us be more God-centered in this life. Or maybe not – just as we proclaim life in the midst of death, it remains true that, this side of glory, we must contend with death the midst of life. So we go back, back to before Jesus’ arrest and passion, death and glorious resurrection, to Jerusalem in winter.
At that time the festival of the Dedication took place in Jerusalem. It was winter, and Jesus was walking in the temple, in the portico of Solomon.
What is the Feast of Dedication, you ask? I had to look it up – it is the eight-day remembrance of the Maccabean revolt that regained the temple from the defiling Seleucid rulers. Part of that festival recalls the miracle of the small quantity of unprofaned oil found in the temple that somehow lit the lamps for eight days until they could bless more. This is the festival we now know as Hanukkah. So that’s the “when” in this week’s story – a festival of light, a festival recalling the victory of God’s people over evil. Hmmm....
The “where” has significance as well – we are in Solomon’s Portico, “a many-pillared, three-aisled portico that ran the length of the eastern boundary of the court of Gentiles.” Perhaps I am making too much of this proximity to the area of the Temple where Gentiles were permitted – but we will see in this encounter Jesus setting a clear distinction between those who “know my voice,” and those who do not. In the end, this definition will lead to the Good News being proclaimed not only to Jews but to Gentiles as well. This is the sacred geography in which Jesus proclaims his message of eternal life for all who believe in him.
This message has life for us as well, even if we have to leave our stories of happy discovery of the Risen Christ for a time. We now see all stories – those we find in the Bible, and those we experience in our own lives – from the vantage point of Jesus’ resurrection.
Where are you being challenged to find new life in what seems like a sad story? Because Jesus rose, we can find new life in any story, especially our own. As we watch spring unfurl from winter’s firm grip, maybe this winter’s tale will renew our faith in new life.
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