Sheep (and Mankind)

Sheep are another fascinating example of God's creation. Sheep not only display God's glory in their biology, they can provide very good eating, both as meat and through their dairy products. Different varieties of sheep display various traits appreciated by their domesticators, depending upon the variables of climate, habitat, disease resistance, type of meat, and dairy product advantages.10

Sheep are herbivores, eating grasses and grass-like roughage. Sheep chew their cuds. Similar to other ruminant animals, sheep digestion permits complex carbohydrates (including the cellulose in grasses, which are digested by microorganisms in the sheep's multi-chambered gut) to be broken down into simpler carbohydrates that in turn are metabolized according to the sheep's food energy needs. There is no evolutionary explanation for the detailed digestive systems of sheep-it is as if the bodies of the sheep are biochemically singing to their Creator "How great Thou art!"

Christians are often familiar with the Bible's teachings about sheep. On the negative side, our predisposition to stray is compared to that imprudent behavior of sheep (Isaiah 53:6). On the positive side, sheep are known to recognize the voice of their shepherd (John 10:3-16). Although they generally prefer lighted places to dark ones, sheep are known to move in the dark toward the voice of their shepherd, and often they vocally respond to his or her voice. Sheep usually (although not always) tend to stay together, whether they are where they should be or where they should not be (Luke 15:4-7). Such gregarious behavior can be either good or bad. Sheep are trusting animals (Isaiah 53:7).

Of course, Jesus Himself was the ultimate Passover Lamb (1 Corinthians 5:7). John the Baptist aptly identified Christ as "the Lamb of God" who takes away (i.e., removes) the sin of the world (John 1:29).

The relationship between God and His redeemed human children is likened to that of a good shepherd and his sheep (Psalm 23Psalm 100). Yet, unlike sheep who have a mere mortal as their shepherd, believers in Christ are created by their Shepherd:

Know ye that the Lord he is God: it is he that hath made us, and not we ourselves; we are his people, and the sheep of his pasture. (Psalm 100:3)

No human can honestly say he or she is a "self-made" man or woman. The Lord made us, and not we ourselves. The proof of this is in our own physical bodies, which we inhabit each moment of our earthly lives:

Because that which may be known of God is manifest in them [i.e., in God's human creatures]; for God hath shewed it unto them. (Romans 1:19)

All of us know that we did not make ourselves. This author was reminded of that simple fact, recently, while watching a one-year-old child intently looking at the fingers of his hands as he turned them back and forth. Even little babies learn that they have hands with fingers that move, but their control of those finger movements must be learned-we did not invent our own fingers, so we must learn how they work, and they work according to the design of their Designer!

And, even as exceptionally trained as our human bodies may become-capable of extraordinary feats, as athletes remind us of from time to time-our physical bodies are still dependent upon our Creator God (Colossians 1:17).

Furthermore, as we age-if we live long enough to qualify for senior coffee discounts-we will learn to be even more dependent upon our Creator to sustain these physical bodies that provide daily evidence of their divine Manufacturer.11

In sum, we have a harmonious chorus of four witnesses singing out God's glory as the awesome Creator He is: the bodies and behaviors of tuna fish, and those of red crabs, sheep-and even us.

Truly, no one has an excuse for failing to glorify and thank God for being the wonderful Creator He is. Even our own bodies testify-we might say they "carol"-that He is our great God.

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