Good Shepherd,
Open our hearts as we open your book today. Help these ancient words to be made new in our lives. May the Good Shepherd be real for us today. We trust you. Speak our names and we will follow where you lead. Amen.
As I heard these words and these words, I see the story come to life in the Joy Journeys classroom at St. Giles. Using Sonja M. Stewart and Jerome W. Berryman’s book, Young Children in Worship, stories like the Good Shepherd are told weekly to some very special children. And after years of hearing the stories and seeing how the stories lived in the children, youth, and adults who heard and told the stories, I see the Scripture when it is read. Of course, the sheep followed and trusted the Shepherd-he kept them from danger, found them cool water and green grass, and knew them by name. In Joy Journeys, ancient stories became new again and I wanted to be a sheep following the Good Shepherd.