There’s a famous painting, ‘His Master’s Voice’, by the English painter Francis Barraud. The subject of the painting is Barraud’s little mixed-breed terrier dog, Nipper, peering and listening intently into the horn of an early phonograph record player in the 1890s.
For over a hundred years the image has been one of the most recognized corporate trademarks in history. The early Edison-Bell cylinder phonograph records were a marvel at the time, though the sound quality is terrible by today’s standards. To modern ears, a lot of scratchy noise nearly overwhelms the signal. But the point of the painting, and the company logo, was that the sound was so good that Nipper could recognize his master’s voice, even if he couldn’t tell exactly where it was coming from, or how.
The signal in the Bible is like this. Jesus used a metaphor that people of his own time and place could relate to: shepherds and sheep. His people at that time had been farming sheep for thousands of years. Sheep herding ran very deep in their blood. According to the book of John in the Bible, Jesus referred to himself as “the good shepherd” and his followers as his sheep who “follow me because they know my voice.” He also said that there are people who “do not believe because you are not my sheep. My sheep listen to my voice; I know them, and they follow me.” Jesus’ people hear the signal of his spiritual ‘voice’ cutting through the noise of the non-spiritual, physical, material, sensual world. It’s like a compass in your heart. A spiritual lighthouse that you can’t see with your eyes but can sense with your spirit. An invisible and often subtle (but sometimes not subtle at all) beacon that your inner self and soul can ‘hear’ and that calls you. Like a lost dog or sheep that hears its master’s voice.
In truth, an even better analogy is the modern device known as a tractor beam. It doesn’t just call, it pulls, like a tractor. Some would even say it drags you. The book of John in the Bible uses the Greek word ἑλκύω / helkó meaning to drag, draw, haul, or pull.
When I’m tuned in to the signal, I feel that I’m one of Jesus’ “sheep”, that I “know his voice” and am drawn (or even dragged) to follow him somehow. I’m like Nipper and the phonograph; there’s something making me turn and listen. Why is this happening to me? Why me? Why now? Is this a sign? What’s that sound? Where’s it coming from? What IS it?
ReligioMedici 