{"id":57,"date":"2023-08-23T20:59:29","date_gmt":"2023-08-23T20:59:29","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/candiceclarkcoaching.com\/?p=57"},"modified":"2023-08-23T21:00:17","modified_gmt":"2023-08-23T21:00:17","slug":"whats-helpful-and-what-isnt-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/candiceclarkcoaching.com\/?p=57","title":{"rendered":"Who Is the Shepherd?"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<div id=\"buzzsprout-player-13264830\"><\/div><script src=\"https:\/\/www.buzzsprout.com\/2220508\/13264830-who-is-the-shepherd.js?container_id=buzzsprout-player-13264830&#038;player=small\" type=\"text\/javascript\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script>\n\n\n\n<p>SHOW NOTES<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>What do we learn if we consider that WE might be the lost sheep in the\u00a0<a rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/www.churchofjesuschrist.org\/study\/scriptures\/nt\/luke\/15?lang=eng\" target=\"_blank\">parable of the lost sheep<\/a>?<br><br><a rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/www.churchofjesuschrist.org\/study\/general-conference\/2021\/10\/24porter?lang=eng\" target=\"_blank\">\u201cGod\u2019s Love: The Most Joyous to the Soul\u201d<\/a>\u00a0by Susan Porter, First Counselor in the Primary General Presidency of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints<br><br><a rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/www.churchofjesuschrist.org\/study\/general-conference\/2016\/04\/tomorrow-the-lord-will-do-wonders-among-you?lang=eng\" target=\"_blank\">\u201cHeaven is cheering you on today, tomorrow, and forever.\u201d<\/a>\u00a0Elder Jeffrey Holland, Quorum of the Twelve Apostles of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Want to talk about the episode? Join the&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/groups\/205368982502000\/\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" target=\"_blank\">No Empty Chairs Podcast private Facebook group<\/a>. If you&#8217;d like more help, schedule a&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/app.acuityscheduling.com\/schedule.php?owner=23933741\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" target=\"_blank\">free Conversation with Candice<\/a>&nbsp;or visit&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/candiceclarkcoaching.com\/\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" target=\"_blank\">candiceclarkcoaching.com<\/a>&nbsp;for more information about how coaching tools can help you keep your relationship with your children and your faith.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>TRANSCRIPT<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Welcome, everyone! Today I am thinking about a talk I heard at church recently that is going to stick with me for a long time I think. The speaker shared a quote from Susan Porter\u2019s talk in October 2021 General Conference called\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.churchofjesuschrist.org\/study\/general-conference\/2021\/10\/24porter?lang=eng\">\u201cGod\u2019s Love: The Most Joyous to the Soul.\u201d<\/a>\u00a0Susan Porter is the First Counselor in the Primary General Presidency of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. She said,<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cBrothers and sisters, do you know how completely God, our Heavenly Father, loves you? Have you felt His love deep in your soul?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>When you know and understand how completely you are loved as a child of God, it changes everything. It changes the way you feel about yourself when you make mistakes. It changes how you feel when difficult things happen. It changes your view of God\u2019s commandments. It changes your view of others and of your capacity to make a difference.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>It\u2019s something to consider. When I think about the moments when I am most trusting in God\u2019s love for me, deep in my soul, these are the moments I feel most at peace. These are the moments I realize that God already loves me, without my needing to do anything differently. God loves me even though I have made parenting mistakes. God loves me even though I continue to stumble around, uncertain of the next right thing to do with or for or about my children. My Heavenly Parents love me, knowing that I have made and will continue to make mistakes. They love me\u2013whether or not I repent or grow.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Think about that. God\u2019s nature doesn\u2019t change based on our behavior. As Elder Jeffrey Holland has said,<strong>\u00a0<\/strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.churchofjesuschrist.org\/study\/general-conference\/2016\/04\/tomorrow-the-lord-will-do-wonders-among-you?lang=eng\"><strong>\u201cHeaven is cheering you on today, tomorrow, and forever.\u201d<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0Our Heavenly Parents are cheering us on, and not only us, but our children also. Today, tomorrow, and forever. Our children are Their children, just as loved as we are. When I trust in God\u2019s perfect love for me, and for my children, I don\u2019t see challenges in my life as judgments against me or punishments, but rather as simply part of the mortal experience. Mortality is about having a human experience. Part of the mortal experience is that people we love make choices we would prefer them not to make. Part of the mortal experience is us making choices that our loved ones would prefer that we not make. Think about the last time you said or did something that someone you love didn\u2019t like. Mortality is happening all around us, mortality operating as designed. We are all human beings with agency, so now what?\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>After sharing this quote from Susan Porter, the speaker went on to talk about the parable of the lost sheep. I\u2019ll read it from\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.churchofjesuschrist.org\/study\/scriptures\/nt\/luke\/15?lang=eng\"><strong>Luke 15:4-7<\/strong><\/a><strong>.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201c4 What man of you, having an hundred sheep, if he lose one of them, doth not leave the ninety and nine in the wilderness, and go after that which is lost, until he find it?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>5 And when he hath found it, he layeth it on his shoulders, rejoicing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>6 And when he cometh home, he calleth together his friends and neighbours, saying unto them, Rejoice with me; for I have found my sheep which was lost.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>7 I say unto you, that likewise joy shall be in heaven over one sinner that repenteth, more than over ninety and nine just persons, which need no repentance.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Often we talk about this parable in terms of those of us at church \u201cgoing after\u201d people who are not at church. There\u2019s nothing wrong with caring about people who don\u2019t come to church. I am all for it! Let\u2019s meet them where they are. But I was intrigued by the idea shared by this speaker, that \u201cYou are always the sheep.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>What? How can that be? This person is the lost sheep? He\u2019s at church every Sunday. He serves faithfully in his calling. We don\u2019t normally think of people like this as lost. There was a time when I didn\u2019t think of myself as lost. I was comfortable in my vision of myself as one of the ninety and nine.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>But what do I learn if I consider that \u201cninety and nine just persons, which need no repentance\u201d don\u2019t actually exist. There is only one just person who needs no repentance. That one is Jesus. And the way Jesus tells the story, any one of us is worth celebrating with joy, more than 99 of Him. That math doesn\u2019t make sense at all. And I think that\u2019s the point. The point is our infinite worth\u2013before, during, and after we are lost and found. We are always the sheep, and Jesus will always find us because we are worth more to Him than can be measured.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>When I\u2019m coaching I help people slow things down to take a closer look at what they\u2019re thinking. I help them gain more awareness around their beliefs and what those beliefs are creating in their lives. I want to do that now with this parable and circle back to verse 5. \u201cAnd when he hath found it, he layeth it on his shoulders, rejoicing.\u201d Already Jesus is rejoicing, and they haven\u2019t gone anywhere yet.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>When I\u2019ve thought of this story in the past, I\u2019ve had this movie in my head where the shepherd finds the sheep, lifts it up and immediately carries it home, and then celebrates with everybody else. But when we slow it down we realize there isn\u2019t a timeline here. A friend of mine pointed out that, in her experience, Jesus is just out with the \u201clost\u201d sheep, for however long they\u2019re away. He always knows exactly where they are and He is there with them, waiting for them to turn to Him. He doesn\u2019t immediately haul them back to the fold. And I think we can read the parable that way. Jesus is the shepherd who knows where every one of His sheep is. He is the shepherd who lays them on his shoulders, keeps them close to Him, and rejoices in their inherent value. Joy doesn\u2019t wait for them to be back with everyone else. Joy is there in the relationship, in the closeness to Jesus, in the closeness\u00a0<em>of<\/em>\u00a0Jesus.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>We don\u2019t know exactly when, but at some point in the story, this sheep does get reintroduced to the flock. It\u2019s still the sheep that it was before Jesus carried it back, but now it\u2019s here with the rest so they can all celebrate together, just because they\u2019re here together, in the same way the shepherd rejoiced in the sheep when it was just the two of them. I wonder whether we could do better at celebrating together just because people are here with us, as they are, whatever that looks like for them. And maybe that is some of the work we need to do to repent and grow ourselves, because there\u2019s a case to be made that we are always the lost sheep in this story.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>And I wonder how we could do better at encouraging and celebrating the people who aren\u2019t here with us, especially our children.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Remember, there are no empty chairs.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>SHOW NOTES What do we learn if we consider that WE might be the lost sheep in the\u00a0parable of the lost sheep? \u201cGod\u2019s Love: The Most Joyous to the Soul\u201d\u00a0by Susan Porter, First Counselor in the Primary General Presidency of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints \u201cHeaven is cheering you on today, tomorrow, &hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_block_theme_hide_title":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-57","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"hentry","6":"category-uncategorized","8":"without-featured-image"},"featured_image_src":null,"featured_image_src_square":null,"author_info":{"display_name":"candiceclarkco","author_link":"https:\/\/candiceclarkcoaching.com\/?author=1"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/candiceclarkcoaching.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/57","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/candiceclarkcoaching.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/candiceclarkcoaching.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/candiceclarkcoaching.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/candiceclarkcoaching.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=57"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/candiceclarkcoaching.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/57\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/candiceclarkcoaching.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=57"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/candiceclarkcoaching.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=57"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/candiceclarkcoaching.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=57"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}