The Gospel has two lessons for us today. The disciples want to know who is the greatest in the Kingdom of God. Jesus replies that unless they imitate the docility of children they will not even begin to belong to the Kingdom and God's way. Children, at their best, are eager to listen and to learn what is true and good. We, too, need to have that listening attitude with regard to the teaching of Jesus, who is the Way, who is Truth and Life. We only belong to the Kingdom when Jesus' Way becomes our way and it is something we spend our life learning to do.

But Jesus also knows and recognises our weaknesses, that like children, we can fall, that we can stray far away. And so he gives the example of a shepherd who has 99 well-behaved sheep and just one who wanders far from the flock and gets lost. Such is the love of the Shepherd for every one of his sheep that he will leave the 99 good ones to go in search of the one that is lost. These are consoling words for us. It is for us to put these two things together - total docility to what Jesus wants from us and at the same time, the awareness that, no matter what we do wrong, he will always take us back.