A Shepherd after God's heart

UV 419/10,000 Jeremiah 3 v 15 Shepherds after God’s heart Jer 3:15 And I will give you pastors according to mine heart, which shall feed you with knowledge and understanding. The word, “ pastor” comes from “ shepherd” or the one who takes the sheep to the pasture to feed. Jesus is the Chief Shepherd but in every generation He has anointed shepherds over his flock who imbued with knowledge and understanding fed the flock from the Word of God. All of the pastors start off as sheep or as believers but are groomed by Lord over a period of time to become transformed into being shepherds. A shepherd must be moulded after God’s own heart, loving, caring, considerate and humble. From the Lord’s perspective, feeding the sheep or believers with the Word of God is the equivalent of leadership. A shepherd must be devoted to the well being of the last person in his flock like the shepherd who went looking for the lost sheep. A shepherd who is a hireling is more interested in the profit or the lucre that the sheep will bring in. Such a hireling is only interested in shearing the sheep of their earnings and not in defending or providing or feeding them. In contrast, a true shepherd or pastor is not interested in self aggrandisement or self glorification but in reflecting the love of the very heart of God. A shepherd needs two gifts : the Word of knowledge and the word of wisdom. He must know the apt portion of scripture to share at the needed time. He must also have the sensitivity to people’s needs and be able to give wise counsel. A knowledge of the Word accompanied by a deep understanding of people will enable a shepherd or pastor to be effective. The Lord promises to give such faithful pastors who would lead or feed the sheep. Prateep V Philip

On the Banning of Humour

ON the Banning of Humour WE the people of India must vote to ban humour from our country. When we have so many serious challenges and problems to confront, humour is an unnecessary luxury. Look at the frequent controversy erupting in the recent past over cartoons: if we ban humour such controversies are not likely to emerge. No disrespect to any person living or dead, intended or unwitting would be shown. Some people may argue against the banning of humour. They might say that such a law would be unenforceable. There would be too many violations. The people being laughed at might however agree and enthusiastically support the motion. The trouble with humour is that it has often unintended innuendos. Take the word, “ motion” for example. It means different things to different professionals, for instance, an honourable legislator or a medical professional. It will also evoke different kinds of emotions in the audience. Some others might think that a total ban on humour might be too harsh. Like smoking, humour in public spaces can be restricted. We can have boards to demarcate “ No humour zones.” Come to think of it -what has humour achieved in the history of mankind or of any particular nation? Has humour won a war? Taking things too lightly might have cost some victory in war. Humour has not helped anyone invent anything new. The flippant and the frivolous have never achieved anything serious in life- that’s the lesson of history. Humour has never been known to have helped any country’s GNP or per capita income increase at a faster pace. Take Japan as a nation, though humour is not banned- we can rarely see people smile, laugh or crack jokes. No wonder the country has progressed rapidly. Imagine what a complete ban on humour could do to a nation’s progress. Humour does have a distracting effect on our focus. Still some others still hold on to the urban legend that humour is the best medicine. Laughter has therapeutic effects, they argue. This is at best a myth or at worst a joke on human gullibility. We all know of people who laughed heartily but died of heart attacks. At the same time, there are lots of serious people who outlived the less grave and went to the grave much later than their more humorous counterparts. Now, once we are convinced that humour should be banned or at least regulated or restricted, how do we get enough people to support such a move. There are enough people around who have been hurt by humour at one time or other. If all of them can be organized around this one point –manifesto : Ban humour, we can build a lot of momentum into the campaign. What are the penalties that can be imposed on those violating the law once it is passed? Should it be fines or solitary confinement? Solitary confinement can be thought of for habitual offenders but for first offenders, we can have fines. The fines should not be so light that the offender would laugh it off. Once humour is banned, it would certainly have a salutary effect on society, not just economically in terms of greater productivity but also in terms of cultural effect. We would have better music, art, drama and literature. The serious canon of the arts and letters would develop and we would have no loose cannons around. Education would also achieve the chief and only purpose it has ever had-to educate people to be serious about life and their pursuits. What do we do about the existing jokes,cartoons, amusing anecdotes and humour available online and offline?We can find ways to destroy or make inaccessible all such stuff. Prateep V Philip