I would like to apologize for taking so long to get to this blog post. It turns out that life involves other things too. In addition to other things the last time I tried to write this blog I just was not able to really feel what I was writing, I figured I could just come home Thursday night, jot some stuff down, have my wife proof read it, and slap it on the site. Turns out she gets tired just because she has been up all day raising six kids, keeping house, and “purdifying” herself for me.
What has been happening around here should be enough to fill up a few blog posts, but I must remind myself to be patient about all the news, and pace my stories. So first up on the table for discussion, and by discussion, I mean that I will type, and you will read it, but you know… like later after I have finished it and posted it, not right now because most of it is still missing. Therefore, I guess I really mean nothing like a discussion, but it is the topic that is on the table; well it is not really a table either, you see…oh, right… focus, sorry about that. Moving on.
Have you ever gone a long time without getting a haircut? I guess it does not matter if you do not get them often to begin with, but you see sheep, they do not really grow hair, at least not mine, they grow wool. Now wool does not come in only one type, there is a plethora of types of wool. We have two different types of sheep, we have the Babydoll Southdown, and we have the Finnsheep, both of them have different wool, the Babydoll, while softer is much shorter, and frankly harder to work with. The Finnsheep have much longer wool, but not as soft. We use to have a person come out and sheer our sheep for us, which was done very quickly and professionally, and was actually sheering. Well the problem with that is that it was not cheap, so I figured I would try my hand at it. However, what I do is not sheering, in fact it is just clipping, as I am using clippers. Sheering involves using a rather scary looking tool that I do not have the courage to use yet, but some day perhaps, but I digress, so while I am clipping my sheep, I cannot title the blog post clipping excitement. Though I supposed I could have used a play on words with clipping or a substitution for flipping, but none of those really came to mind until now, and that ship has sailed.
All this build up to say that I have successfully, or not, depending on your perspective (from my point of view, or the sheep’s) sheered all but three of my sheep, and I have plans to sheer them soon. As I was writing this I remembered of the part of Scripture where Judah’s wife dies, and then he gets comforted, and decides to go sheer some sheep, this is puzzling to me. In case you did not know, let me tell you, they did not have electricity or electric sheers, though now that I think about it, even if he did have one, he would not have had the other, and so it still would not work well. They did all this with hand sheers, which are BIG scissors that are used for cutting wool. Some sheep may be okay with the whole being sheered thing, but the majority of the ones I have seen (especially the young ones) are clearly not fans of this process. I cannot see this as something I would want to do while mourning my wife.
You may be wondering what it is like to sheer a sheep, and honestly I am not sure, what I did was more like a combination of a hair cutting judo competition, and I mean that. I watched video after video getting my idea of how this was going to go down. Then I go out, pick a sheep to sheer, and they run, they do not want to sit, they do not want to stay, and did I mention they are heavy?! I was actually using some of the techniques I have learned in my Judo classes to make these sheep submit. After most of them have been sheered, I read something on the sheering guide. Apparently, you should wash the sheep before trying to sheer them, because it makes it easier. So I build a stand to wash them, which was more like the stocks, and so I have them in there, I wash them, and I let them dry (to my amazement they do not shrink in the heat). I then sheer them a bit later and it is amazingly easier, but no less Judo was required.
Sheep are supposed to be sheered, not counting the ones that shed their wool, but for the large part of sheep out there, they need to be sheered. This is not something that you can really forgo, if you do not sheer a sheep their wool will continue to grow. It can become heavy, and hot, and gather a great many bits of things in it, fox tails for example that could actually hurt them and it is itchy. The analogy is not perfect here, but here it is, Christians are like sheep, the bible says that we are His flock, and that He is the Good Shepherd. A good shepherd protects his flock, takes care of them in many ways; one of those ways includes sheering them. They do not like it, but it is for their own good. It does not kill them, as some who like to vocalize their ignorance will tell you. Sometimes you need to be sheered, and you will fight the sheerer, but God, being a greater shepherd than I am, loves His flock, and does what is best for them, but we are the dumb animal that does not comprehend.
When Jesus was brought before his accusers, He was silent. Isaiah 53 tells us that like a sheep before the sheerer is silent, He never spoke a word. Our God, and our King, guiltless, blameless said nothing. The sheep is silent during the sheering and lets it happen, as He did some two thousand years ago. For our sake, He had to let this happen, it was just another part of His plan to redeem what was His.