Shepherd > Sheep > Shepherd - Easter 4C

Psalm 23
Saint John 10:22-30 & 21:15-19

At the Tuesday Morning Bible Study I attend one of the members wondered about the effectiveness of street preachers.

I must confess that, as yet, I haven’t spent enough time in Aurora to have run into any but I am sure they are there.  In downtown Chicago it is impossible to walk four blocks without seeing or hearing one.

They are easy to spot with their signs that usually read something like “Repent or Die” or “The Wages of Sin is Death” and their bullhorn blasts condemning all who pass by to the fires of hell unless they embrace Jesus in the exact same way they have embraced Jesus.

My bible study friend, one of the kindest men I know, wondered if they get any takers.  He wondered if people really respond to their message.  He wondered if anybody ever went up to them and engaged in conversation.  He wondered if their efforts led to any converts. 

While everyone in the group had seen street preachers none had actually spoken to one.  They usually give them a wide berth and pass by.  If they run into one they say something like, “I’m late.  I gotta go.” Or, and I’ve never dared to use this one on anybody who was abrasive but I would love to someday, “I’m sorry, I’d like to stay and chat but I think my appendix just burst.”

I am not so sure that bellowing at people on a street corner while waving a big bible in their faces is the best way to share the faith.  

I prefer the way depicted in the picture above where one sheep says to another about the shepherd.  “What I like most about him is that he never tells you to stay in line but asks you to stay in line.” 

The fact is, beside the sheep, shepherds in Jesus day couldn’t make or even ask anybody to stay in line.  According to Fr. Raymond Brown:

To modern romantics the shepherds described [in Scripture] take on the gentleness of their flocks... In fact, in Jesus’ time shepherds were often considered as dishonest, outside the law.1

 No matter their keepers’ reputation sheep needed somebody who would care for them and these outsiders took on that responsibility.  They cared for the sheep isolated from society - keeping watch over the flock not only by night but by day.  The relationship between sheep and their shepherds was an intimate one.

Roy Howard, Pastor of Saint Mark’s Presbyterian Church in North Bethesda, Maryland once got a real lesson on sheep/shepherd relationships by a infuriated man in his congregation who insisted that sheep were not dumb.

He was offended that I would speak of sheep in such derogatory terms. (He didn’t say anything about humans.) When I told him that I was repeating what had been told to me by another farmer, who was also a member of the congregation whose family he knew well. He replied, “Huh! Well, that explains it! He is cattleman who doesn’t know a thing about sheep.” Then he said with confidence that sounded like love, “I know sheep and they know me. They do as I say, because they know who I am.”2

 That’s the kind of shepherd we have in Jesus. 

He’s is not seen as one of societies high and mighty but rather as someone who really is on the fringes.  He is a carpenter turned wandering rabbi who goes about teaching in humility about goodness and mercy.

He is not like some of the others.  He doesn’t condemn like the street preacher - telling us all the ways we have fallen short.  He encourages us.  He doesn’t tell us to stay in line.  He doesn’t even ask us to stay in line.  He shows us how to stay in line.  We listen to what he says because the way he says things makes us want to follow him.

We will go wherever he leads us because we trust him.

Think of the most peaceful place you have ever been, Jesus is there.  Think of the darkest time you have ever faced.  Jesus is there, too.  Not only does Jesus never leave our side or leave us out of his sight he never even lets us slip out of his hand.

Wouldn’t it be great if the street preachers were proclaiming that?  Wouldn’t it be wonderful if they were saying: “Did you know that somebody loves you?”  Wouldn’t it be great if the primary message coming from every church was not one of judgement but rather: “Did you know there is nothing you can do to break the bonds of God’s love?”

That’s the message of Jesus but it is a message the comes with  great responsibility.

That is why I added the end of the gospel from last week to this weeks lesson. 

Here Jesus asks Peter three times if he loves him and each time Peter answers with a stronger and stronger “yes.”  Then Jesus gives him something to do:  “Feed My Sheep.” “Tend My Lambs.” 

The good shepherd has made us, his sheep, into shepherds.  We are to care for others the same way that Jesus has cared for us.

I owe this insight to a pastor friend of mine who wrote in a recent devotion for his church.

Admitting that there were times when he “struggled with issues that have seemed overwhelming and insurmountable.”

A marriage that was not working. A child with special needs. A vocation in which I felt inadequate and ill-equipped. These were the times when I felt completely alone and cried out for a Savior. But I saw no savior come in obvious or dramatic ways. It was through a counselor, a social worker at our child’s school, an inspired idea that mysteriously came at just the right time, a group of fellow strugglers who let me know I was not alone after all. And it was often during worship when my eyes were opened to the Source of all these blessings. Through a sermon preached that mysteriously spoke to exactly what I was going through; a scripture that was read; an anthem or hymn that was sung.3

My guess is that this is how most of us have had Christ come to us. 

Christ did not come in the harsh harangues of the street corner, fire-and-brimstone, preacher but by the words and deeds of other sheep who know the shepherd and who are always with us, as our shepherds not telling us what to do but always watching, always willing us to turn in the right direction.

Christ comes in those who are willing to stand with us when wait for our life’s jigsaw journeys to come together.  Christ comes to us in those times when we wander, wonder, look for inspiration and find all that we need in the words and deeds of other sheep who know the shepherd.

That’s how it works.  The gospel is transmitted from Jesus, our good shepherd, to us sheep, so that we can becomes shepherds for one another. 

From Shepherd to sheep to shepherds is a better way to tell the story of God’s ever-lasting, never-ending, ever-living love than by blasting it at innocent passers-by through a bullhorn. 

Don’t you think?
 
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1. Raymond E. Brown, The Birth of the Messiah: A Commentary on the Infancy Narratives in the Gospels of Matthew and Luke. (New York: Doubleday, 2008), p. 420. 

2. Roy W. Howard, "This Is the Good Shepherd" (Sermon, Saint Mark's Presbyterian Church, North Bethesda, Maryland, May 10, 2019).
 http://www.saintmarkpresby.org/wp-content/uploads/2011/09/JOHN-10.2011.pdf

3.  David S. Handley, "Revelation 5:11-14," Daily Devotions, May 7`, 2019, , accessed May 11, 2019, http://www.fourthchurch.org/devotions/2019/050719.html.