Of Missing and Broken Shepherds

By Gemie Johnson Martin

As I was putting away our Christmas decorations in late December 2019, I was reflecting on how rough it was for shepherds at our house that year. It started during the summer, when a package arrived from Jericho, Israel. One of the olivewood figures to the Nativity I purchased while there, a kneeling shepherd, had broken in transit. I placed a quick call to Jimmy’s Bazaar and soon another arrived to replace it.

For years we have had a hand painted ceramic Nativity set. This year I placed it to be displayed on a shelf of the hutch at my husband Jerry’s computer desk to keep it out of easy reach of the smaller visitors we were expecting. You guessed it. Jerry presented the shepherd to me in two pieces. I super glued his head back on and returned him to his sheep on the shelf placing him back a little further from the edge.

Years ago, my sister Marlene did tole painting. Pictured is a Nativity puzzle she made. I intentionally put this Nativity down where the children can play with it. When I went to play with it myself a few days after Christmas, I realized one figure was missing. It was the shepherd. We looked high and low for him. I worried that perhaps he had been inadvertently thrown out with the Christmas wrapping paper and boxes. Photos taken Christmas morning confirmed that he was with the set on the large table that sits in the center of our living room as we were opening gifts.  After several days, our missing shepherd finally turned up 20 miles away in Coppell, Texas in my three-year-old grandson’s new fire truck which had been opened at our house Christmas morning. Seems this shepherd had taken on a new profession. The stow-a-way shepherd piece is now safely put away with the rest of the puzzle.

 

The shepherd piece is missing from the puzzle in the picture above. 

 The shepherd that was missing is the figure in a brown robe on the right in the picture above.

I posted the above story and pictures on Facebook.  The comments of two of my friends caused me further reflection.  Carma wrote, “The story of the lost shepherd, not sheep.  Nice take.” Reflecting on her comment, I started sensing a deeper meaning in my experience and the place of shepherds in the Nativity, especially that living Nativity on that first Christmas night.  That small babe in the manger, was in fact, the Son of God, the most important human being ever to be born into mortality.  And he would grow up to liken Himself to a shepherd and us to his flock.  Just as a shepherd watches over his flock of sheep, so we are watched over by our Savior, the Good Shepherd.

It was to shepherds that this most important of births was first announced by angels on that glorious night so many centuries ago.  Shepherds who were at their post, “keeping watch over their flock. . .” (Luke 2:8). My husband Jerry and I were privileged to visit what is presumed to be the field where these shepherds experienced this miraculous event.  Those humble shepherds believed the angel who appeared to them.  They went to worship the newborn babe who was to become the Savior of the world.  Yes, shepherds were very important in the events that transpired at our Savior’s birth. Their significance should not be lost to us.

Our Savior has given us the charge to become shepherds like Him. “Feed my sheep,” (John 21:17) he directed his early disciples.  Modern prophets have instructed us that this directive applies to us as well.   As ministers, we are to stand in place of our Savior, the Good Shepherd.  We are to care for and watch over His sheep, our fellow human beings.  We are to share the good news of the gospel with them. We are to love them and care for those of them who need our care.  Sister Bonnie H. Cordon in her conference address entitled “Becoming a Shepherd,” posed the question, “So, how do we become the shepherds the Lord needs us to become?” Her answer, “. . . we can look to our Savior Jesus Christ—the Good Shepherd. The Savior’s sheep were known and numbered, they were watched over, and they were gathered into the fold of God.” (October 2018)

But we are not perfect like our Savior.  Unlike Him, we sometimes make mistakes in our lives.  At times, we find ourselves off course.  As imperfect beings, subject to temptations and sin, we may find ourselves in places we are not supposed to go, doing things we are not supposed to be doing (as was the case of my puzzle piece shepherd).  We may also neglect to do the things we should be doing, like ministering to others. In short, we may wander from or leave our post.

When I discovered the broken olivewood shepherd and contacted the shop owner in Jericho, he not only promised to send me a shepherd to replace the broken one, he also suggested I glue that broken shepherd back together and keep him.  I took his advice and now have two almost identical kneeling shepherds.  I must look hard to determine which is the one that was broken and where the break occurred.

The Atonement works like this in our lives.  Our Savior, the Good Shepherd, has made it possible through His Atonement for us to become like new again.  The only blameless person to ever live, He needs no repairs in the form of repentance. In accomplishing the Atonement, He “. . .descended below [us] all.” (D&C 122:8) In some miraculous way, He suffered for all our sins and infirmities so that we do not have to suffer if we but choose to embrace the Gospel, repent of our wrongs and follow in His footsteps. As my friend Judy commented, “. . . the Master Shepherd wants all of His shepherds with him!  He will seek for them, repair their broken parts, and accepts them no matter how far they have gone astray.  He prepares a way for their return.” Just as I was glad to have my shepherd Nativity puzzle piece back, so will our Savior rejoice when His lost sheep (including lost shepherds) return to the fold.

You see a faint white line around the neck of this shepherd where his head was glued back on and a white chip at the base of his neck.

A tiny chip marks the spot where my ceramic shepherd was broken.  I may or may not purchase some flesh-colored paint to cover this chip (which shows up as a small white spot at the base of the shepherd’s neck).  He was broken, through no fault of his own, when someone carelessly knocked him from his place in the display. Often, like the ceramic and olivewood shepherds, our brokenness is not due to sin on our part.  Sometimes we are damaged through the wrongful choices of others. We can also suffer heavy burdens and trials as we go through this imperfect mortal existence. Again, our Savior stands ready, through His Atonement to comfort and heal us of our hurts and imperfections.  He not only suffered for our sins, but for our hurts and infirmities “. . . that his bowels may be filled with mercy . . . that he may know according to the flesh how to succor his people. . .” (see Alma 7: 11, 12). In other words, because of his suffering, he knows how to care for us and what we need to heal from our sufferings.  In time, healing will take place.

There is security in knowing that The Good Shepherd, our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, will never get lost, or leave his post.  He stands as a constant beacon, showing us the way to happiness and Eternal life.  That is His purpose (see Moses 1:39). 

I’m going forward in this new year and new decade with a renewed effort to follow Him who showed us the way to be good shepherds.  I have committed to memory the thoughts and feelings I had as I so recently stood in the field where the glorious announcement was made to those shepherds over two millennia ago.  I will pray more earnestly to know what the Good Shepherd would have me do in His place with those “sheep” who come within my sphere of influence and care.  I will try harder to be like Jesus, the Good Shepherd.

Evidences of the Power of Fasting and Prayer in My Life

My mother had had rheumatic fever as a child and it had damaged her heart. During my Freshman year, she became very ill with what the doctors presumed to be trouble with her heart valves. At a Stake conference, the Stake President called for a special fast for two members of the Stake. One of those was my mother. The Stake fasted for the two individuals. My mother was scheduled a short time later for open heart surgery. In the pre-op visit, it occurred to the doctor to see if her thyroid function had been checked. It had not; so he called for further testing to rule out a thyroid disorder. The diagnosis came back that she had Graves Disease. Instead of the surgery, she began treatment to suppress the over-activity of her thyroid gland. She responded well to the medications and her heart symptoms disappeared. The surgery that was scheduled was never needed. Coincidence? I think not. I firmly believe that doctor was inspired by a higher power to check out one more thing before stopping my mothers heart. She lived to be 86 despite many other autoimmune disorders and difficult medical conditions.

While we were serving a mission for our Church in Southern California, we learned we were expecting another grandchild. Of course we were overjoyed! Then we received news from our daughter that according to the sonogram, our new grandchild may be born with congenital birth defects. They ruled out Downs Syndrome, but told our daughter and her husband that the placental abnormalities meant that more testing would need to be done to see if there were birth defects. On the day of the testing, Jerry and I fasted and prayed. It was during a week of Zone Conferences. Jerry must have said many silent prayers that day, but as the Mission President, he was not able to leave the Zone Conference. At the time the test was to be done, I remember slipping out of the conference, finding a quiet room in the Church building we were at, kneeling down and pouring my heart out to my Heavenly Father. I remember assuring him that I would be prepared to love and accept any child we would be sent but asked that if it were possible, our grandchild would be born without birth defects. Before I went back into the conference, I heard from my daughter. They could find nothing wrong with her baby. There is something extra special about that creative, energetic, and very normal child.

Warned by The Holy Spirit

I represent The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in Collin County on the Collin County VOAD Council (Volunteer Organizations Active in Disasters).  It is a council where many different organizations get together to pool resources and make plans on how we can work together to cope in the event a disaster were one to happen in our area.  I fall into the group of those representing a Faith Based Organization, namely the Church.  The Collin County VOAD generally meets on the first Wednesday of each month at 9:00 a.m. in different locations many of them City and County government offices.

About a year ago our VOAD meeting was to be held in McKinney, Texas about 30 miles away from where I live.  It was to be a breakfast meeting.  I got ready to leave for the meeting and realized I had a few minutes to do a task before I left.  I thought of something I could do, but realized there was not time to do it before time for me to leave.  The words went through my mind, "You don't have time to do that, but you do have time to check your blood sugar."

I have Type II Diabetes.  I should confess that I was not as good to take my blood sugar readings as often as I should have.  Back then especially, I would eat when I was hungry, take my Metformin (a medication to lower blood sugar) and just rely on symptoms such as shakiness, brain fog, and hunger to suspect my blood sugar was too low.  I should also say, it rarely happened that I would have low blood sugar. On this particular morning, the only symptom I had that my blood sugar may be low was hunger, but like Scarlett O'Hara, I would ". . . do my eat'n at the Barbecue," (or in this case the VOAD meeting).

"Yes," I remember saying to myself, "I do have time to take my blood sugar."  I got out my blood sugar monitor and proceeded to test myself.  I had to blink at the results that popped up on the monitor.  I had never seen a reading as low as 44. I pressed the submit button on the monitor, sending the information to the system I was connected to (Livongo at that time).  "That can't be right," I remember thinking.  I tested again with the same result.  Just in case it was correct, I went to the pantry and retrieved some peanut butter crackers and hastily downed those.

After eating the crackers, I went about trying to find another blood glucose meter. I had some other meters that I used before my insurance company sent the Livongo brand meter out to me.  Failing to find a satisfactory meter, I checked my phone which had beeped.  It had a message from Livongo.  "We must hear from you immediately," the words read and there was a phone number to call.  I called the phone number and began explaining what was going on to the customer service representative on the other end. After I assured the representative that I had eaten, he proceeded to talk me through testing my meter.  It tested out as accurate.

After thanking my helper, drinking some orange juice, and checking my blood sugar again, I determined it was safe for me to drive to McKinney.  On the way to my destination, I began pondering this experience.  I realized that if I had not tested my blood sugar, I could have been in serious trouble as I drove the 45 minutes it would take me to get to my destination.  I realized that it was the Holy Ghost who had prompted me to check my blood sugar.  And even though I did not recognize it at the time, the prompting came in much the same way as other promptings have.  Instead of thinking, "I have time to check MY blood sugar," the words in my mind were, "YOU have time to check YOUR blood sugar."  This should have been a clue to me. The Holy Spirit had once again spoken to me in the second person as He so often does.  I said a quick and silent prayer to my Heavenly Father thanking Him for sending two angels to watch over me that morning.  I arrived at the meeting about 20 minutes late.

I have since gone off that insurance plan and onto Medicare which does not pay for a monitoring service.  It would cost me $50.00 to have Livongo continue to do that.  I decided I could take on the responsibility of monitoring my blood sugar myself.  I am also happy to report that I have also gone on a very low carbohydrate diet and am now controlling my blood sugar without medication, but that's another story for another time.