No Shepherd

As the children of Israel prepared to enter the promised land, Moses, knowing that he would not be with them, asked God to call a successor to lead them:

Let the Lord, the God of the spirits of all flesh, set a man over the congregation,
Which may go out before them, and which may go in before them, and which may lead them out, and which may bring them in; that the congregation of the Lord be not as sheep which have no shepherd.

Numbers 27:16-17

In response, God called Joshua, but the poignant imagery of shepherdless sheep became a recurring theme in Israelite scripture:

• When Micaiah prophesied that King Ahab would lose a battle against the Syrian army, he said, “I saw all Israel scattered upon the hills, as sheep that have not a shepherd” (1 Kings 22:17; compare 2 Chronicles 18:16).
• Ezekiel and Zechariah both lamented the negligence of Israel’s leaders by observing that God’s people were scattered “because there was no shepherd” (Ezekiel 34; Zechariah 10:2-3).
• As Jesus traveled from city to city, preaching and healing people, “he was moved with compassion on [the multitudes], because they fainted, and were scattered abroad, as sheep having no shepherd” (Matthew 9:36). He urged His disciples to pray for more laborers.

A Book of Mormon prophet also echoes this phrase, but with a twist. Alma tells his listeners in Zarahemla that they are shepherdless, but by their own choice:

O ye workers of iniquity; ye that are puffed up in the vain things of the world, ye that have professed to have known the ways of righteousness nevertheless have gone astray, as sheep having no shepherd, notwithstanding a shepherd hath called after you and is still calling after you, but ye will not hearken unto his voice!

Alma 5:37

All of the biblical uses of this metaphor lament either the absence or the negligence of leaders. But Alma shifts the responsibility to the sheep. “The good shepherd doth call after you,” he says; “and if you will hearken unto his voice he will bring you into his fold, and ye are his sheep” (Alma 5:60). The remedy for wandering sheep, in Alma’s telling, lies within the sheep themselves. Shepherdlessness isn’t something that just happened to them, and it isn’t beyond their control to resolve. They can choose to hear the voice of their shepherd and follow Him.

Today I will take responsibility to hear the voice of my Savior. I will remember Alma’s testimony that the Good Shepherd is calling me, and I will overcome the barriers that prevent me from hearing and following His voice.