Chapter II: What the Shepherd Knows

AUNT RUTH sat in the chimney corner. It was a cold, snowy day, and the children had come in from a walk, and said it was bitter.

They gathered close to the fire, and all seemed inclined to stop there, rather than seek for employment or amusement.

"The fields looked so bleak," said Rose, warming her hands for the twentieth time. "We saw a shepherd leading home his sheep, Auntie!" said Jean.

"Did you? How interesting! Not driving them, then?"

"No, that was what I noticed and I thought you'd perhaps have a twilight talk over that?"

Jean smiled as she said it, and Aunt Ruth smiled too.

"So you are beginning to look-out for spiritual lessons from everyday things?"

"I like that sort of lesson," said Jean, "so much better than geography and history!"

"Ah! But we cannot properly learn the spiritual, unless we are in touch with Christ in the everyday things!"

"Can't we, Auntie?" asked Tom, soberly.

She shook her head. "Well," she said, "directly Jean told me she had seen a shepherd leading his sheep, I thought of one of my favourite texts."

"And that was?" asked Oswald.

"'My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow Me; and I give unto them eternal life, and they shall never perish, neither shall any man pluck them out of my hand.'"

"Children! The sheep hear; and He knows them, each one; and they follow; and He gives. There is a world of meaning in every one of those short sentences. Many children and grown-up people, too, hear, and follow, and forget the clause that comes between. Do you remember what that is?"

"'I know them,'" said Rose, gently. She had been learning the whole verse, and could repeat it perfectly.

"Yes—and what do you think they miss by forgetting that clause?"

The children did not know, so they looked up earnestly.

"They miss assurance. The first clause and the third belong to themselves, 'they hear, they follow'; but the second clause is all Christ's, 'I know them.' Here is safety and peace."

"Once there was a revival in a large school that I knew of, and one of the naughtiest girls was brought to Christ. Most of the mistresses thought it impossible that Lizzie could be really converted, and laughed much at a younger teacher, who believed that there really was a change in the girl. This young teacher at last was driven into a corner in defending Lizzie's conversion, and said, in desperation, 'Well—Christ knows.' Very soon after the holidays came, and the young mistress left the school."

"But at the end of a year, she paid her friends there a visit; and when she was hearing all the news, one of them said, 'You remember Lizzie, who was such a naughty girl? Well, she is totally changed. Instead of being the most tiresome, she is the brightest of all the little Christians!"

"Then the mistress took heart, and remembered how she had said, 'Christ knows'?"

"Yes, dears, He knows His sheep, and they follow Him. And in proportion to our realising that He knows, so shall we be strong to follow Him closely!"

"That's very nice," said Tom. "Thank you, Auntie."

"Another day we will have 'following,' for I think it will help us."

They looked up gratefully. They did want to learn more of Christ, and this dear Aunt Ruth had learned in His School, and could help them because she had been close to Him herself.