The Parable of Abed and the Shepherd

There once was a man named Abed who lived a happy life in a small village by the desert.  Abed had a good job and good friends and a fluffy dog named Cedric and was happy with his life. At least he was happy with his life until he came home one day to discovery that his house was in pieces.

Cedric was fine, but parts of Abed's house were strewn about everywhere.  Abed didn't know what happened or why, but he blamed the wind and began gathering the pieces together.

What else could he do?

Most of the first pieces he found had blown into the desert, so Abed starting rebuilding his house there. Enough material was left so that it wasn't long before Abed had food and shelter and the basic necessities to live in the new house he was building. The spot where the parts had blown was still close enough to town to see his friends and go to work everyday, so life kept on as usual.

Except that now, Abed lived in the desert.

For the next year, Abed slowly and painfully rebuilt his house, finding a few new materials every few days.

The only thing that sustained Abed during that year were his friends and Cedric. It turned out that Abed was an adept dog trainer, and every night Abed taught Cedric a new trick. Abed had treated Cedric kindly for all the years since he had found Cedric on his doorstep as a puppy, but it was during that year in the desert when Abed devoted almost all his free attention to Cedric.  Cedric had never learned much in the years before, but when Abed gave him his almost undivided attention (when he wasn't rebuilding his house), Cedric learned amazing tricks beyond what anyone had ever thought possible.

Soon, word spread about the tricks Abed had taught Cedric. Abed's old village lined up to watch the show when he and Cedric passed through town, and people invited Abed into their own villages for him to teach their dogs too. It didn't hurt that Abed loved to tell stories about Cedric and anything else and could entertain the people even when Cedric was tired.

Abed still didn't like living in the desert. But because of Cedric, he was a success.

After almost a full year of collecting spare parts he found scattered across the desert, Abed had finally almost rebuilt his house. But a few weeks before it was finished, Cedric disappeared. 

Abed looked everywhere: in the house, throughout the desert and even back in the village, but he    couldn't find Cedric. Abed yelled for Cedric as loudly as he could for weeks, but Cedric had vanished without a trace.

Abed was crushed. The only thing that has sustained Abed for the last year had disappeared without warning.

Abed took it harder than anyone could understand.  Other people asked Abed to train their dogs, but he said no. He knew it wouldn't be the same.  And deep down, he didn't really want to be a professional dog trainer. He had something special with Cedric that he could never replicate in another setting.

Abed had not only lost Cedric. He had not only lost his source of comfort.  Without Cedric, he had lost his purpose.

In the midst of his sadness, Abed kept working on his house. When he finally finished, he realized that he was all alone in a house in the desert with nothing left to do with his time.

He thought of selling it, or even tearing it down, but he wasn't sure where else to go. The village he had left the year before had changed while he was gone, and it didn't feel like home anymore. He sometimes dreamed of life in the distant villages he saw on the desert horizon, but that would mean starting over yet again.

A few months later, there was a big celebration in his old village. Abed wanted to go, but there was a rare desert storm that day, so Abed just sat on his porch and stared. As he was sitting, he saw a rain-soaked shepherd walking by.

The shepherd looked familiar, but Abed couldn't place where he had seen him before.

"Hello, friend," the shepherd said. "Why do you live in this desert when the village is only a few miles away?"

"My house blew down," Abed said. "And the wind took most of the parts here, so this is where I had to rebuild."

The shepherd paused before responding. 

"The wind didn't blow your house down, and the wind didn't blow the parts here," the shepherd answered back. "I am a carpenter as well as a shepherd, and I am the one who built that house of yours in the village."  The shepherd paused again, this time for a moment longer.  "I am also the one who tore it down," he said.

"You did what?" Abed cried, rising from his chair.

"I tore the house down, but I also helped rebuild it," the shepherd said. "The wind didn't bring the building materials here. I left the parts you needed every day in a place where you could find them.  Had you decided to rebuild in the village, I would have left them there. But since you started rebuilding here, I brought them to the place where you were."

"Why would you do that? And why did you make you make me go through all this trouble? Do you have any idea what the last year of my life has been like?  I'm not even the same person anymore that I was a year ago!"

"Indeed you are not," the shepherd said. "You are a now a person who knows how to build a house, a person who knows how to survive in a desert, and a person who has seen what he can do through perseverance. Imagine what else is possible!"

"But you've left me here in this desert!," Abed protested. "Why?"

"I brought you here to start picking up the pieces, but you are the one who chose to stay. As I said, I would have brought the remaining parts to you wherever I could find you. But yes, I lead people here sometimes. From the desert, you can see more clearly for miles in all directions.

"And think of Cedric," the shepherd continued. "You would have never achieved so much with him in that village, amidst so many distractions."

"Did you take Cedric too?"

"I didn't take Cedric. But there's something you don't know. I've known Cedric even longer than you have. In fact, he was mine as a puppy before I left him on your doorstep. I let you keep him because you took good care of him and I knew what you could accomplish together. He left because you had taught him all you could.

"I showed him an opportunity. I didn't make him go, but I didn't stop him. What I showed him was exactly what I had planned for him all along. If you let me, I'll do the same for you. Even today, I've walked through the rain to talk to you, because it was the first day you'd stopped working long enough to listen."

"Why would I ever trust you about anything?" Abed asked. "You've taken away every single thing that ever mattered to me."

"You will see Cedric again, somewhere down the line and his journey will make sense to you then," the shepherd said. "But until then, what if I gave you a new dog to train? One that could learn even more tricks than what you taught Cedric."

Abed frowned. He had loved Cedric, but he didn't really want to be a professional dog trainer. He cared for Cedric because Cedric had fallen on his doorstep and they were a perfect fit for each other. With a different dog it wouldn't be the same.

"I see that isn't what you're looking for," the shepherd said. "So what if I found you a new house in one of those distant villages you see on the desert horizon? Or what if I helped you find a new house in your old village, or even helped move your new house back there? What would I have to do for you in order for you to trust me?"

Abed sat quietly. He knew that he was in some ways a better person for all he had been through. He had learned how to build a house. He had achieved more with Cedric that he ever thought possible. He wasn't sure what he really wanted at this point, but he knew that it wasn't a new dog, house, or village, or any other gift the shepherd might magically give him as some kind of Karmic Consolation Prize.

Besides, he was still mad at this stranger who saw fit to cause all these changes without so much as asking.

"It doesn't really matter what I want," Abed said. "My plans don't seem to matter much lately. Why don't you just show me what you, in your infinite wisdom, had in mind?"

The shepherd smiled a wry smile and pointed across the plains. When he did, the gray skies cleared and Abed saw more than he ever had.

Near the horizon were families trying to build houses, but who didn't know how. Closer in, there were dogs running wild, while their owners tried in vain to control them. Just a few yards away were travelers wandering through the desert, sweltering and miserable with thirst.

Abed was moved. He had never noticed any of these groups before.

He realized that he might not want to build another house, but maybe he could teach someone else how to do it. He might never want to train another dog himself, but he could help owners who were about to give up to break through. Abed might not like living in the desert, but he had learned enough while there to tell others the tricks to survive while they passed through it. Maybe he could even plant enough grass seeds to bring the desert and the village closer together.

And if Abed spent his time doing all these things, he wouldn't have much time left over to spend in the desert anyway.

Abed suddenly realized that all this was what he really wanted. His dream was not to build houses or to train dogs or to move to new places, but to share the story of how he done these things. In the process, he would find purpose in all that had happened to him and maybe help anyone else for whom his story might sound a little bit familiar.

Abed turned back to reveal his revelation to the shepherd, and ask for the shepherd's help in making it all come to pass. But the shepherd was gone.

Abed stood puzzled for a moment. 

Then he realized that nothing stood in his way.