I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep.

John 10.11

Do we love ivory, or elephants?

I once heard the story of an ivory hunter back in the days when the sun never set on the British empire. He returned to England fabulously rich, and at a dinner party the young men plied him with questions as to how they could replicate his success. The old boy replied, "Everyone goes to the jungle to hunt for ivory and they all discover the same thing: It isn't that hard to find ivory; the problem is that when you do, there's always an elephant attached."

Well, not necessarily. 

Elephants world-wide face extinction due to the predations of poachers who slaughter the beasts for their valuable dentition. A mature animal mounts a set of tusks that top out at over one hundred pounds each; at $1K per kilogram, that cashes out to about $100,000. At the Addo Elephant Preserve on the Eastern Cape of South Africa this pressure has led to a unique survival strategy: tuskless elephants. A recessive gene that normally affects about two percent of the population now appears in a large percentage of the females in this region. Poaching has dropped to nearly nothing; why kill the animal when there's no payday attached?

But here's the interesting thing: Addo's park rangers have not stood down. Instead, this eighty-soldier army polices its ponderous charges using military tactics and weaponry, including air support and motion-detecting sensors. They shepherd their charges through thick bush rife with plants that have names like pig's ear, spike thorn, and mother-in-law's tongue! They place a high price on useless beasts; they risk their lives for pointless pachyderms.

Few people in Jesus' world had ever seen en elephant, so he chose sheep to make the same point. The good shepherd sacrifices himself for the flock, a clear statement that he cares for them as living things rather than simply so much rolling stock. Esau's birthright meant nothing to him if he was dead; Jesus instead operated on the logic of love and laid down his life for his mangy inheritance.

In a day when aftershave-soaked televangelists preach sweet-smelling sermons from behind a shield-wall of ivory dentition, God calls pastors to admire ivory, but to love elephants. Sheer your sheep for the wool, but love the sheep for themselves.

Ministry is not all ivory and love-offerings. It is often thick hides and sharp brambles. God calls pastors to go on safari through thick thistles suitable for weaving a crown of thorns, to spend their lives on useless elephants whose only claim to care is that Christ loved them enough to die for them. Our best preaching may fall like pearls before pachyderms, but we will one day hear the Good Park Ranger say to us, "Well done, thou good and faithful servant."