Day 15

Today's Scripture is suitable to use with Imaginative Contemplation or Lectio Divina

Stilling: Come into the presence of God and still yourself

Grace: In this time of anxiety, to see your life more as God sees it. To see with God your deeper self, the person behind all the activity, a person made in God’s image.

Prayer Suggestion: Perhaps there is a line or a phrase from the reading that stands out for you. Repeat it, ask God to show you how it relates to your life, let it lead you into prayer and stillness. Alternatively you can imagine yourself one of Christ's followers listening to him teaching.

Image from the Catacombs of St Priscilla, Rome. The Good Shepherd is feeding the lambs. It is the most common image of Jesus in the early iconography of the Church

John 10:1-10 HCSB

The Ideal Shepherd

“I assure you: Anyone who doesn’t enter the sheep pen by the door but climbs in some other way, is a thief and a robber. T

he one who enters by the door is the shepherd of the sheep.

The doorkeeper opens it for him, and the sheep hear his voice.

He calls his own sheep by name and leads them out.

When he has brought all his own outside, he goes ahead of them.

The sheep follow him because they recognise his voice.

They will never follow a stranger; instead they will run away from him, because they don’t recognise the voice of strangers.”

Jesus gave them this illustration, but they did not understand what He was telling them.

The Good Shepherd

So Jesus said again, “I assure you: I am the door of the sheep.

All who came before Me are thieves and robbers, but the sheep didn’t listen to them.

I am the door.

If anyone enters by Me, he will be saved and will come in and go out and find pasture.

A thief comes only to steal and to kill and to destroy.

I have come so that they may have life and have it in abundance.

Conversation: Follow the Scripture with a conversation with Christ the good shepherd.

Final Prayer: As usual end your prayer with your favourite formal prayer, such as the 'Our Father' - The Lord's Prayer.

Mosaic Good Shepherd. Some of the earliest images of Christ were as a beardless Good Shepherd.

A Thought for Today

We learn to recognise the voice of God in our lives, but often only gradually.

Ignatius said the voice of God can be recognised because it is uplifting, consoling, encouraging.

In time we learn to listen for that voice in our hearts;

it becomes easier to identify, and when we hear it clearly, it is easier to answer.

It is the voice that calls us to be who we are meant to be.

What is the Lord’s name for you?

How do you recognise his presence in your life?

What is it Lord, you've placed in this sheep heart of mine?

What is it that keeps me bonded to you in spite of all my arrogance and independence?

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