IF YOU LOVE ME, FEED MY SHEEPS.

(You can't see it in this picture, but that same little girl tagged, in pencil, an S onto my "sheep")  

A couple of weeks ago I had the opportunity to teach the 4-7 year olds in primary. I taught the kids about service.  I had the children read the scripture that talks about "...If you love me, feed my sheep..."After that, I gave each child a piece of paper and asked them to draw a picture of an act of service they had done that week.  After they drew their cute, stick-figured pictures, I had them write the scripture on it too.  When the first child wrote the scripture on her paper, she said, "See Sister McKell!  This is how it SHOULD be written."  She then proceded to show me her paper which had the scripture written out like this...

"If you love me, feed my sheepS."

After proudly showing me her picture, she said, "Sister McKell, Jesus wants us to serve EVERYONE! He doesn't just want us to serve ONE person.  That's why you have to put an S on the end of sheep!" haha, I didn't have the heart to tell her that sheep is already plural. ;) 

Even though the wording wasn't exactly correct, this little girl taught me a profound message.  How often do we do a small act of service for one person and then say to ourselves, "Hey!  That was nice of me to open that door for that old, tired woman!" and then call it good? Or we help someone out and say to them, "It's okay that I helped!  That'll be my act of service for the day."  

As I have been reading the New Testament I have realized just how much Jesus gave, gave, gave.  He was always serving and loving others.  Not just some of the people some of the time, but ALL OF THE PEOPLE ALL OF THE TIME.   

This is one thing that I want to really work on... 

recognizing and acting on opportunities to serve.

I will never read this scripture again without reading it like the little girl read it in our class that Sunday. 

"If you love me, feed my sheepS."

(Who said adults can't learn from children? :))