Rejoice with me,” He would say, “I have found my sheep that was lost”

One day Our Lord stepped ashore and saw a large crowd. He took pity on them, because “they were like sheep without a shepherd, and He set Himself to teach them” (Mk 6:30-34). It happened immediately after He had clearly expressed His will: “Come away to some lonely place, all by yourselves, and rest for a while”. Why then did He change His mind?  Today’s gospel gives us a fascinating insight into the way of Jesus’ thinking and into His feelings. His heart becomes more transparent to us when we listen to what He is about to say. ‘Rejoice with me’ He says. We find ourselves as the Lord’s most treasured possessions. We are His precious and beloved! We are His! We belong to Him and He would never sell us to anyone. We can be useless in the eyes of everyone around us and we can be useless in our very own eyes. Regardless of our views, feelings and opinions Christ puts Himself into the position of being seen as a crazy person. He wastes His time only with the aim of finding us, the tiniest creatures on the planet, similar to a needle, and bringing us back He shouts with you: ‘rejoice with me’. From a business point of view it does not make sense. The relationship between the time & energy spent and the benefits reaped says something other than joy. However, Christ is focused on individuals. The crowd does not exist for Him. Apart from that, Jesus believes in us. He believes in our trust in Him. When we are helpless, weakened, not able to live without a Shepherd, already lost – He believes in our transformation. When it happens, He is full of joy. Every single case brings Him joy when a life comes back again. As we see, Jesus believes in His lost sheep, who at this very moment are obsessed with their ideas about the meaning of life.

Father Stan