Risen Christ, faithful shepherd of your
Father’s sheep: teach us to hear your voice and to follow your command, that
all people may be gathered into one flock, this we pray by the power of your
Spirit. Amen.
Some
of you know the story of why I’m a priest. When I was a boy growing up at St.
Joseph’s Episcopal Church in Boynton Beach, Florida, I starting serving as an
acolyte when I was maybe 8 or 9 years old. And I loved it. I loved being close
to the altar and I loved having this way to serve God and that’s where my call
to the priesthood began. In that parish, there were different classes of
acolytes, depending on one’s experience and reliability. The top one was called
the Level 4 acolyte, and no one had achieved that level since this program was
instituted. Well, I’m competitive enough and enough of a perfectionist that I
probably don’t need to tell you who the first was. As a small aside, all of the
acolytes wore wooden crosses around their necks when serving, but the Level 4
acolyte got a silver cross – and it’s still the one I wear to do this day when
I get vested for worship.
But
the point of this story is that in order to become a Level 4 acolyte, you had to
pass a test. To be best of my memory, I had to answer some questions about the
liturgy and what the acolyte does, I had to write out, in order, every book of
the Bible, and I had to write out the Creed and Lord’s Prayer. And given the
ministry of an acolyte, those things made sense. But then there was one more
thing that I had to memorize – the 23rd Psalm. When I asked why, I
believe it was our deacon who answered, “When people get older and forget
things like their address, sometimes they even forget their names, one of the
things that they still remember is that the Lord is their shepherd.”
Indeed,
this image of Jesus being our Good Shepherd is one of the most central in our Christian
imagination. Many churches, ours included, depict Jesus as the Good Shepherd in
stained glass and we’ve found sketches of Jesus the Good Shepherd in burial catacombs
dating as far back as the 200s. This Psalm resonated with the people of Israel,
as Moses and David, their greatest leaders, were shepherds. And even though
none of us have ever raised sheep, somehow this metaphor still is cherished.
It’s full of wonderful imagery: green pastures of abundant provision, still
waters of refreshment, the guidance of holy living, the abiding presence of
God’s protection, the comfort of consolation, a table of feasting, the
anointing of blessing, the peace of reconciliation with enemies, the mercy of
steadfast love, and dwelling with God into eternity. It is a balm for the soul.
One
of the prayers in the liturgy of Compline includes, “Be present… and protect
us… so that we who are wearied by the changes and chances of this life may rest
in your eternal changelessness.” Life is certainly full of changes and chances
that are unsettling. This is always the case, and so recognizing Jesus as our
Good Shepherd provides us comfort when we are dealing with things like cancer,
family strife, depression, addiction, financial stress, or difficulties at work.
And all the more during this pandemic, we need and want a Good Shepherd to call
us into green pastures, to protect us from thieves and wolves, to carry us home
when we are lost. If you find yourself struggling these days, I’d commend
praying to Jesus, your Good Shepherd, to be with you and comfort you in this
valley of the shadow of death. You might search for painting or icon of the
Good Shepherd and make it the background on your computer or phone to remind
you that with Jesus as our Good Shepherd, all shall be well.
This
Fourth Sunday of Easter is often called “Good Shepherd Sunday,” because the
Collect and readings always draw our attention to this image of Jesus as the
Good Shepherd who puts us around his neck and carries us from death into his
Resurrection life. The lectionary though is obscuring how we understand what it
means to have Jesus as the Good Shepherd. And that’s somewhat understandable –
if we were to read the entire section it would have taken quite a while. The
context for Jesus’ talk about being a shepherd and gate for the sheep is a
passage we heard back on the Fourth Sunday in Lent, March 22. There, one
sabbath day, Jesus encountered and healed a man who had been blind since birth.
This drew the ire of the Pharisees and they drove this man out of the
synagogue.
Jesus
then goes to find the man and tells him that he is the Son of Man and suggests
that it is actually the Pharisees who are blind. It is immediately after Jesus
says to the Pharisees, “But now that you say ‘We see,’ your sin remains” that
he continues, “Very truly, I tell you, anyone who does not enter the sheepfold
by the gate but climbs in by another way is a thief and a bandit.” Jesus did
not speak in chapter and verse, nor was the Bible written in chapter and verse.
Those were added later for easier referencing of the text. As John writes it,
this is one seamless narrative. It reminds us of that parable of the Lost Sheep
that Jesus tells in Matthew and Luke – that a shepherd leaves the 99 sheep to
go find the one that is lost. That is what Jesus, as the Good Shepherd, is
enacting here. He goes to find this man he heald who has been put out of his
community.
No
matter how alone you feel, even if you’ve been kicked out of your social group,
or have family members that have disowned you, or have trouble making friends,
Jesus comes to bring you into his fold. When you are lost, afraid, or in a
perilous situation, your Good Shepherd comes with grace, mercy, and peace to
remind you that you belong, that you are forgiven, that you are loved. A few
chapters later in John, Jesus will tell us that in his Father’s house there is
plenty of room for all. This Good Shepherd carries us home to God.
And
he knows you by name. This isn’t some abstract thing where Jesus has been given
a bunch of sheep that he doesn’t really know but is just told “take care of the
whole flock.” Yes, of course, Jesus takes care of the whole flock, but he
doesn’t take care of us as a flock, he takes care of us as beloved sheep. He
knows each of us by name. He knows the things that make you beautiful, and
unique, and lovely. He also knows the idiosyncrasies of us all, our failings,
our sins, and yet he still comes for each of us because the Good Shepherd comes
to the lost.
It
might seem like Jesus is mixing his metaphors here because in these first ten
verses of John, Jesus doesn’t actually call himself the Good Shepherd. The
lectionary cuts off one verse too early; it’s verse 11 that reads, “I am the
Good Shepherd. The Good Shepherd lays down his life for the sheep.” In today’s
passage though, Jesus says that he is the Gate. The Shepherd and the Gate
though are one in the same.
When Tyler and I
were in Israel back in February, we visited some caves in Bethlehem that were
the sort of caves where the shepherds would have been when the angels announced
the Good News of the Messiah’s birth. Such a cave was also likely the sort
where Jesus was born. We tend to think of Jesus being born in a stable, but
when you go down into the grotto of the Church of the Nativity to see the place
where tradition holds that Jesus was born, you are in an ancient cave.
And these caves
generally had two small rooms. Caves, of course, don’t have doors that you can
close at night to keep thieves and predators out. And given that livestock were
often valuable commodities, they would sleep inside the cave with the family.
Hence, Jesus could have been laid in a manger, a feed trough, because that’s
something you’d expect to find in such a cave. So to protect the family from
these night dangers, whoever was on duty as the shepherd during the night watch
would sleep with their body lying across the entrance to the cave. The shepherd
is the gate. If anyone tried to wander out in the night, they’d be kept
inside and if anyone tried to break in at night, they would be caught.
This is what
Jesus, our Good Shepherd, does for us. He is the Gate or the Door. He lays down
his life to protect us. And notice that Jesus says that he is the Gate. He doesn’t say, “I’ll show you the gate that you can
choose to enter, or not;” nor does he say, “I’ll give you instructions on how
to get to the gate.” No, Jesus is that Gate and as we are joined to him in
Baptism, he brings us into his abundant life.
The final verse in
today’s passage is one that is central to my understanding of what Jesus'
entire life, Death, Resurrection, and Ascension are about – bringing into his
abundant life. There are a lot of ways to understand what abundant life means,
depending on how you want to translate that word. We could go with an extraordinary
life, flourishing life, eternal life, overflowing life. But the point is that
Jesus brings us into this. Abundant life is not like the piece of cheese at the
end of a maze. Abundant life is not something we have to search for or make for
ourselves. No, abundant life is given to us by Jesus and we enter it not
through anything that we do or say, but we enter into abundant life because
Jesus is the gate; he is the entrance into this abundant life.
Abundant life is
what happens when we don’t have to live in fear of death. Abundant life is what
happens when God’s love is the ethical norm. Abundant life is the grain of the
universe. Abundant life is given to us as God knows us each by name and makes
us to lie down in green pastures and leads us beside still waters, when God
walks with us the valleys of life, when God spreads a table before us and
blesses us, when we dwell in God’s house for all eternity. Abundant life is the
reality that Easter makes possible, where sins are forgiven, where death is
defeated, where peace is promised, and where all is made well in Christ.
This is what our
Good Shepherd does for us, Jesus Christ obtains abundant life for us through
his Passion and gives it freely to us by his grace. Abundant life is where
God’s eternal love intersects with our lives. Easter is the proclamation of
this intersection as a present gift for us all. This is why Psalm 23 features
so prominently in faith; it is a psalm that describes abundant life and
comforts us with that vision. Use Psalm 23 this week as a prayer to see
abundant life around you, and to ask God to lead you further along those right
pathways and to be with you in the dark valleys. Remind yourself that Jesus
Christ, who died for you and rose on the third day, is your Good Shepherd who
has come that you might have life, and have it abundantly. The King of love our
shepherd is, Alleluia.
