I spent two hours yesterday learning about the shearing of sheep. Lest you think we have suddenly gone urban farmer, I can assure you we are sticking to two dogs (which is more than we are truly equipped to handle). If you would have told me yesterday morning that I would be crying as I read about the delicate choreography of sheep shearing, I would have laughed in your face. But, such is the way of the Lord.

For a few weeks, I have found my soul restless and wrestling. Though I have been in the Word more than usual and have found myself longing for more of God, I still felt distant from Him. I’ve walked with the Lord long enough and lived as an ensouled being for long enough to know that such seasons of soul stirring usually set the stage for sweet moments with Him. David’s exclamation, “O Lord, all my longing is before you; my sighing is not hidden from you….But for you, oh Lord, do I wait; it is you, O Lord my God, who will answer” resonated deeply (Psalm 38:9 & 15).

When wrestling with what feels like distance from the Lord, I’ve learned the best way to wait is to spend more time in the Word– since that is how God speaks to His people. So wait I did, primarily in Psalm 37. Yesterday, still longing and waiting, I kept wading slowly through verse 3: “Trust in the Lord, and do good; dwell in the land and befriend faithfulness.”

The imagery is shepherding imagery. One of the commentaries I read mentioned allowing ourselves to be shepherded. Simple, right? Nothing I haven’t heard (or written about) before. Yet, that was the watershed moment.

Let God shepherd you. I’d thought I had exhausted all the angles of shepherding over the years: pastures, rods, staffs, crooks, parasites, and such. But, as I prayed and processed through my state as a sheep, I told the Lord I just felt heavy, dragged down, encumbered–– to sum it up, I realized I needed shearing.

Shearing

As someone quite distant from an agricultural economy, I needed to learned about what shearing entailed. What I read brought tears to my eyes and levity to my long-hampered soul.

Sheep grow wool; it’s a natural, good, God-intended process. But too much wool with not enough care can become a dangerous hindrance rather than a help. Sheep who haven’t been sheared move more slowly, which makes them more susceptible to predators. Thick, matted wool not only invites dangerous, potentially life-threatening parasites but also leads to overheating and discomfort (imagine wearing a thick sweater in the dead of summer in the Southeast). Finally, unshorn sheep can become wool blind when their wool begins to act as literal blinders to their vision and perspective.

The description of an unshorn sheep read me more than I read it. Heavy laden and uncomfortable: yes. Beginning to lose perspective: yes. Feeling more susceptible to sin patterns and lies: yes. And the cause of these symptoms was neither a sinful habit nor a strange circumstance. Rather, it was the natural outworking of good things overgrown and needing to be given over to another. Bearing burdens in our church flock, fighting to be attuned to the quiet but persistent and often surprising needs and moods of teenagers, keeping up with writing projects: these are all good, glorious, God-given tasks entrusted to me, just as making wool is part of a sheep’s purpose. But left unattended and uncollected, they become impediments to my purpose.

The Lord was quick to remind me that a sheep can’t shear itself (even wild sheep need thorn bushes and bramble to “help” shear them). I have a strong propensity towards sinful self-sufficiency. But I cannot shear myself. I need the shepherd to do so.

The Shepherd’s Role/ The Sheep’s Role

From what I read, shepherds look forward to shearing, as it gives them a one-to-one check in on each sheep: a short, but significant and even intimate encounter. Shepherds try to keep the session short and sweet to avoid prolonged discomfort to the sheep. That being said, one of the ways to ensure the safety of the sheep is to make sure the power dynamic is clear. The shepherd’s job is to gently, but firmly direct the process; the sheep’s job is to yield to the shepherd’s care. Shearers report that for a few moments after being shorn, sheep act, well, sheepishly, shyly getting used to themselves without all their usual wool. Losing what has long covered one can feel exposing. However, after that adjustment period, they tend to frolic and play in the freedom of so much weight released.

I literally felt different after studying about shearing, as the process perfectly described my experience over the past few weeks. What had been a stubborn, resisting spirit yielded to the care of the Good Shepherd, as I remembered that all He does and allows is for the flourishing of my soul.

It may take a few days to feel confident after so much soul-wool was removed, but I look forward to some levity on the other side of a merciful removal. What a dear Shepherd is our Savior; what a skilled shearer we have in Him!