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We have a bummer lamb on Skye Moor Farm. On the Saturday before Easter, my husband heard baby lambs mewing in the corner of our barn. Their first-time mother accepted one but not the other twin. Perhaps it was because the second appeared premature, its eyes unopened, its mouth too weak to suckle. So this wee lamb spent the night in a laundry basket in our home where we tube-fed him colostrum.
Lambing season always brings lessons about birth, rejection, death, and life.
This year, especially, feeling isolated and removed from friends, I sympathize with this bummer lamb. He will face certain loneliness and isolation unfamiliar to the other lambs who all cuddle together. If he tries to nuzzle the other mama ewes in the nursing pen, he will be head butted away, never receiving a motherly connection. He will lack siblings to skip around with in play.
But, this I know, he cries unless he’s in my presence. And when he is later returned to the field, he will be the first to run to greet me, calling out in a happy voice. How happy I'll be to see him.
I, too, am imperfect, but so thankful that I have been adopted by my heavenly Father and can run to Him, calling out, “Abba, Father" and He is glad to see me.
Easter morning, I looked for the lamb, but he wasn't in the laundry basket. Then I heard him bleat from under my daughter’s bed. With bottle in hand I tried yet again to get him to suckle. This time he quickly guzzled three ounces. I gently stretched his fuzzy face and opened his eyes. I wonder what it looked like to the little lambie to, for the first time, see the world on Easter Sunday?
I pray we all see and are all fed this Easter and beyond. My Heavenly Father sent His Son, the Perfect Lamb to make Himself known to all of us. The Perfect Lamb died and rose again that others may have life and have it abundantly.
May your Easter be blessed with the peace of knowing that through His sacrifice, you have the opportunity for new and eternal life in Him.
“Behold, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world!” (John 1:29) Jesus said to him, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me. (John 14:6)
I’m reminded of the William Blake poem:
The Lamb
Little lamb, who made thee? Dost thou know who made thee, Gave thee life, and bid thee feed By the stream and o'er the mead; Gave thee clothing of delight, Softest clothing, woolly, bright; Gave thee such a tender voice, Making all the vales rejoice? Little lamb, who made thee? Dost thou know who made thee?
Little lamb, I'll tell thee; Little lamb, I'll tell thee: He is called by thy name, For He calls Himself a Lamb. He is meek, and He is mild, He became a little child. I a child, and thou a lamb, We are called by His name. Little lamb, God bless thee! Little lamb, God bless thee!
(William Blake)
