The Shepherd planted two fields side by side, both with the same type of grass seed. He fertilized both the same, and watered both the same. When the grass in both fields was at the same peak of young, tender perfection, he placed a sheep named Christian in the field on the right, and a goat named Religion in the field on the left. The Shepherd looked at the sheep and the goat and said, “Eat and enjoy the grass of my pastures.” Then he explained that the grass he had planted was a special grass, that actually grew better when it was cut short, that is, well-grazed. “You will never have to worry about overgrazing these pastures because it is my job to see that they are fertilized and watered. Taste and see that it is good.”
Now the sheep was a young lamb who had only vaguely heard of life’s troubles. His father, however, had made it very clear to him that as long as he followed the Shepherd’s instructions, it was the Shepherd’s job to keep him out of those troubles. So the sheep looked at the lush and tender grass and decided, well, if the Shepherd said eat, that’s just what he would do.
The goat, however, was a seasoned veteran of many high rocky fields that he had led himself into. He had seen for himself how pulling the thin, sparse grass from those fields had left absolutely nothing to graze on when he had returned the next year. He cocked his eye and harumphed at the idea of this seemingly perpetual supply of lush grass the Shepherd had promised. He looked at the small pasture and said, “Harumph, I know the way of grass; I’ve seen it disappear along many a rocky road I’ve traveled. Better to go hungry a little now than to starve to death later.” And he settled into a very disciplined pattern of eating - a little, just when his stomach mandated an absolute need for it.
The sheep, meanwhile, settled into a pattern of thoroughly enjoying the sweetness of every square foot of his own little pasture. He ate up one side and down the other, then across the middle and around and around, until every tender blade had been cropped as short as his teeth could cut it. He found the Shepherd’s word to be true, for by the time he grazed back to the spot where he had started, he found that the blades of grass had grown out again, tender and sweet like the young grass he had first eaten. After a few days, the goat watched the sheep enjoying himself and harumphed. He looked with pride at his own pasture, for by superior discipline the grass in his pasture was now much taller than the grass in the sheep’s pasture. It looked as though the silly sheep had eaten himself into starvation, while he, the goat, now had much more fodder for himself. He chewed thoughtfully on a long blade, much too caught up in making sure he got just enough to even notice that it wasn’t near as tender and sweet as the blades he had eaten at first.
A few weeks passed. The little sheep had gotten quite fat by now, and was still enjoying his tender and delicious grass, although the blades admittedly barely grew over the top of his hooves. The goat, meanwhile, was wading through knee-deep grass and, he told himself, also enjoying the fruits of his discipline. He could now pretty well eat his fill when he wanted to. He barely noticed that it didn’t take much of the fibrous stalks and broad, tough blades to fill his shrunken belly. In spite of the over-abundance he seemed to be wading in, the goat grew leaner.
In a few more weeks the rain came. When the sun came back out, the sheep gamboled in delight through the green lushness now tickling at his ankles. The goat could hardly move about to gambol, for the flanks of his belly were now being tickled by the thick stalks and coarse blades in his own pasture. He glared malevolently at the sheep as he trotted up and down the path he had had to make to get from one end of the pasture to the other through the thick grass, which by now was hardly worth eating, it was so tough and tasteless.
The Shepherd returned a few days later. He beamed in pleasure at the lush greenness of the sheep’s pasture and the fine wool the sheep had grown. He thought to himself, “This field looks so good that next spring it can feed two sheep.” Then he looked in dismay at the scraggly goat, standing forlornly in a muddy path cut through the coarse dry stalks of overgrown grass. “There’s nothing I can do with this field but burn it and start over with it,” the Shepherd sighed aloud. “And goat, I may just barbecue your scrawny flesh at the same time.” The goat harumphed and turned his back on the Shepherd. “It would be fine if he had given me the same grass the sheep had,” he muttered to himself, entirely forgetting that was just the way the story began.
“The Sheep and the Goat”
Copyright 1990, 2002 Jeffrey Brent Clifton
Published September 1990 in The Trumpet,
The Newsletter of Rhema Faith Center Church,
Tyson’s Corner, Virginia.
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