Can You Hear Me Now?

“The sheep hear His voice, and He calls His own sheep by name and leads them out.  When He has brought out all His own, He goes before them, and they follow Him, for they know His voice.”  John 10:3-4

Most of us remember the old Verizon Wireless commercial.  The one where the guy walks around to various places where a phone normally wouldn’t work – where the voice message would be unclear or dropped all together such as in stores, in valleys, and way out in the middle of nowhere.  As he goes further and further away from the main connection, he asks, “Can you hear me now?”  And getting the affirmation that he has been heard loud and clear, he responds, “good!”

God’s Word gives us a renewed clarity – clearer than any Verizon cell phone – we serve a risen Shepherd!  He is alive and He is still speaking to us as the Christ.  And when He speaks it is clear and precise.  He is our shepherd, and by the grace flowing from His work on the cross and the empty tomb, we are His sheep!

As sheep of the Good Shepherd we listen to His voice in His promises found in Scripture.  We rely on the promises made in our Baptism that made us sheep of the Good Shepherd.  This equips and enables us to hear our Good Shepherd’s voice through anything that life throws our way.

When the storms of life are raging, the Shepherd says, “Can you hear Me now?”  When we’re down to our last dime, the Shepherd says, “Can you hear Me now?”  When the doctors have given up and said there is nothing left to do, the Shepherd says, “Can you hear Me now?”  When we come to a crossroads in life, the Shepherd says, “Can you hear Me now?”  And the Shepherd says to us once again today: “My sheep listen to My voice; I know them and they follow Me.  I give them eternal life, and they shall never perish; no one can snatch them out of My hand.”

Thanks be to God – for we are sheep of the Good Shepherd.  Because of the words and actions of our Shepherd, we are His sheep.  And by those same words and deeds, may we be strengthened to listen and follow Him now and for all eternity!