September 9, 2015

Maybe it represents the weight we carry when we wander off alone.
Durfee

Last week there was an article in the paper about a sheep which had been lost for an unstated amount of time in the Australian scrubland of Canberra.  You may have seen it.  We don't know for how long it had been lost, but it had been long enough that it had grown about 89 pounds of wool.  The picture of the sheep that accompanied the story reminded me of those Looney Tunes cartoon sheep that Ralph E. Wolf was always trying to steal out from under Sam Sheepdog's watchful eye.

Durfee saw this article and gave me a copy after service on Sunday.  Before that, she had sent me an e-mail asking if I had seen the article and her thoughts on it.  In her e-mail, she was convinced that there was something biblical there, and gave me a litany of ideas that included Samson, hair shirts and the prodigal son.

But it was what she said at church that got my attention:  “Maybe it represents the weight we carry when we wander off alone.”

The more I thought about that, the more I decided she was right.

We travel through our lives as individuals, but, for most of us, we are not alone.  We have family members who, for however much they may annoy us, can offer support and insights we may not get elsewhere.  We have friends who can lovingly call us back down to reality or lift us up to dream.  We have partners with whom we can share our thoughts, dreams, fears, joys and whatever else might be on our mind.  And, for us Christians, we have a savior who knows what it's like to make this human journey and who shows us what it looks like to be in unity with God.

But when we wander off on our own, we begin to take on burdens that we would normally share with others.  The sheep in this story didn't grow 89 pounds of wool overnight.  He didn't suddenly find himself unable to stand, struggling under the weight of his burden.  Instead, it happened slowly, a little at a time.

The same is true for us.  We don't wake up one day with the weight of the world bearing down on us.  Instead, it's a slow process – an annoyance here, a crisis there, a lingering problem that just doesn't seem to go away.  And, like good, self-sufficient Americans, we usually try to handle these problems ourselves.  Whether that's out of a fear of being seen as incompetent, or not wanting to be a bother to others, or who knows what other reason, if we try to deal with all of our problems on our own, we will end up looking like that sheep carrying an extra 89 pounds of wool.  We might be able to carry that burden, but it's not the best option for us.

If you find yourself wandering out in the scrublands alone, ask for directions.  If you find yourself with a burden you think you can handle, ask for help in the beginning.  Even God understood that it was not good humans were alone.

What might be weighing you down?  What burdens might you need to unload?  You may want to consider asking for help before you end up looking like that sheep.

Amen.