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Good evening, little lambs. Tonight's story is called The Mark That Doesn't Move, inspired by the gospel of Matthew twenty two fifteen twenty one. There is a kind of question that has no good answer, no matter which way you turn it, the kind grown ups call a trap, and children feel in their stomach before they ever find the words for it. Tonight's gospel from the Gospel of Matthew chapter twenty two verses fifteen through twenty one is about exactly that kind of question, asked of Jesus by people who wanted to see him trip. But Jesus wasn't afraid because he knew something they didn't. Some things belong to Caesar, and some things are already marked as belonging to God, and no trick question can ever change whose mark is whose? And so tonight we're back on Shepherd's Hill, where a mix up in the dark is about to teach soft hearted Jonah that very same thing. Every lamb on Shepherd's Hill wore one thing to bed that was entirely their own, a small grey stone worn smooth and warm from the day, hung on a loop of soft cord around the neck. Old Wooly cut a tiny notch pattern into each stone himself on the very night each lamb was born, three short lines for one lamb, a little curve for another, a cross mark for a third, and no two patterns in the whole flock were ever the same. When the sun went down and every blanket in the sleeping row looked exactly maddeningly alike, a lamb found her own bed the old fashioned way, by feeling in the dark for the notches on her own stone. It was Jonah's job to keep the peace about such things. He was the one lambs went to when a borrowed feather hadn't been returned, or when two of them both swore the best napping spot under the oak was theirs first. Jona never rushed to answer, and he never picked favorites, and because of that, ask Jonah had become the flock's way of settling almost anything. That evening, Bramble was playing her favorite game, hopping stone to stone across the sleeping row without touching the grass, and in her hurry, she bumped loose two neck cords at once, her own and steady, broad shouldered pebbles. She scooped both stones off the ground, laughing, and looped them back on in such a rush that she never noticed she'd switched them. By full dark the trouble was plain. Pebble lay stretched out on a blanket so small it barely covered his back. Bramble was curled up lost inside a blanket big enough for three of her. Somebody giggled. Somebody else said it wasn't funny actually, because this was her blanket, and she wanted it back. Within minutes a little knot of lambs had gathered around the mix up, and all of them turned, the way they always did, toward Jonah. Well, said one of the littler lambs, not unkindly, just curious. You're the fair one. Whose is whose? Jonah looked at the two grey blankets. They told him nothing, the same grey, the same shape, worn the same soft way at the corners. He looked at Bramble and Pebble, both of them certain, both of them right in their own way. For the first time in a long while, Jonah did not know the answer, and a whole circle of lambs was waiting for him to give one anyway. His stomach went tight and small, the way it does right before you have to admit out loud that you don't know something everybody expects you to know. That was when Jesus came and crouched down at the edge of the sleeping row. The blanket won't tell you, he said, but the stone will. He held out his hand, and Jonah passed him the two stones, still looped on their cords. Jesus turned them slowly in the firelight, running his thumb over the notches on each one. Three short lines, he said, holding up the first. Whose is that? Mine, said Pebble. And this one, the little curve? That one's mine, said Bramble. Then it was never lost, Jesus said. It only got moved. The mark on it didn't change, no matter how far it travelled or how dark it got. Old Wooly cut that notch for you the night you were born, Pebble, and for you, Bramble, and it has never once belonged to anybody else. He handed each lamb back their own stone, and the right blanket followed easily after. The circle of lambs let out a breath they hadn't known they were holding, and somebody laughed, and this time everybody laughed with them. Jesus turned to Jonah, who was still sitting very still. You didn't fail tonight, he said. You just didn't have the answer in the blanket. It was never going to be there to find. Jonah felt something in his chest loosen that he hadn't known was tight. Bramble, who felt bad about starting the whole mix up, tucked herself in close to Pebble's side. I'm sorry, she said. I really am. Pebble only bumped his head against hers, easy as anything, and that was that. But Bramble wasn't quite finished worrying. What if a stone got lost for real, though? she asked. Or broke. What then? Jona thought about it, really thought, the way he thought about everything, and then he answered it himself. Old Wooly remembers every mark he's ever cut, he said slowly, working it out as he said it. If my stone broke clean in half tomorrow, he wouldn't even need to look twice. He'd know which half was mine, and he'd cut it again exactly the same. Jesus smiled at that, as if Jonah had just said something worth remembering. That's how it is with you and your father in heaven too, Jesus told the whole circle of them. He marked each of you himself long before anyone ever gave you a name. No trick question, no mix up in the dark, and no one else's claim can ever move that mark or make it belong to somebody else. It was never a puzzle for you to solve. It's simply true, the way your own name is true. And so tonight we remember you don't have to win every hard question to be loved, and you don't have to prove you belong to God, you already do, marked by him before you had words for it, in a place no trick question and no dark night can ever reach. So before you close your eyes tonight, you might ask yourself, is there a mark on you that only God could have put there? Dear God, thank you for marking me as yours before I even knew your name. Help me stay calm and honest like Jesus, even when a question feels like a trap. Thank you that nothing, not a mix up, not a hard day, not anyone else's claim, can ever move your mark on my heart. Amen. Good night, little lamb. God loves you so much. Sweet dreams.