Monday, December 6, 2021

He will feed his flock like a shepherd;

    he will gather the lambs in his arms,

and carry them in his bosom,

    and gently lead the mother sheep. (Isaiah 40:11)

This year at Vacation Bible School, the congregation I serve focused on the feeding of the 5,000 and food insecurity. To that end, I bought the second edition of “If the World Were a Village,” a book that educates children about the global population by imagining that the world is a village of 100 people.

In the section on food, I learned something interesting: “though nobody knows for sure, there are about 21 times as many chickens as people in the global village.” That’s a lot of chickens! According to the ratios in this book, there are about 31 sheep and goats to 100 people, but in some regions of the world it’s much higher. At “peak sheep” in New Zealand in 1982, there were 22 times as many sheep as humans, but by 2019 it dipped to just under 6 sheep per person due to changing agricultural practices.

I don’t know the sheep to human ratio in the time of Second Isaiah, but I’m sure they were more ubiquitous than twenty-first century eastern Pennsylvania. I imagine most of the population first hearing Isaiah’s words knew what it felt like to gather lambs into your arms. We know that petting a dog or cuddling a cat on your lap releases oxytocin, the so-called feel-good or “love” hormone, and I imagine lamb snuggling was the pleasure of a shepherd at rest.

In this particular passage, God promises comfort. In some sense, God seems to be acknowledging that unleashing the Babylonian army on the people of Israel may have been too great a judgment. This “comfort” represents God’s about-face: “you’ve suffered long enough, and I’m coming to you. My comfort will feel like soft fur cradled in your arms, warm lamb breath on your cheek.”

Comforting God, in this ongoing time of social isolation, cradle the lonely in your arms. Amen.

Inge Williams is Pastor at Friedens Lutheran Church, Shartlesville, Pa.