[Jesus said:] “I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep. The hired hand, who is not the shepherd and does not own the sheep, sees the wolf coming and leaves the sheep and runs away—and the wolf snatches them and scatters them. The hired hand runs away because a hired hand does not care for the sheep. I am the good shepherd. I know my own and my own know me, just as the Father knows me and I know the Father. And I lay down my life for the sheep. I have other sheep that do not belong to this fold. I must bring them also, and they will listen to my voice. So there will be one flock, one shepherd. For this reason the Father loves me, because I lay down my life in order to take it up again. No one takes it from me, but I lay it down of my own accord. I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it up again. I have received this command from my Father.”
John 10:11-18
My sermon from the 4th Sunday of Easter (April 21, 2024) on John 10:11-18
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So last Sunday, folks from all over Woodcliff Lake met at the reservoir for a clean up. This event was something I’ve always wanted to do and I had, in my mind, a sort of idyllic expectation of how the day would go. Me, my kids, and a lot of our neighbors would carefully, safely, and without any grumbling or complaining, work together to take care of God’s creation on a pleasant day. If there was a word to describe the soft-focused image of what I expected that moment to be – it would be pastoral. When we arrived, everyone put on a pair of thick disposable plastic gloves, grabbed a trash picker, and a heavy duty contractor grade plastic bag. We were ready to make a difference in our community when, right when it was scheduled to begin, it started to rain. I’ll admit that standing along the lakeshore in the cold pouring rain while surrounded by garbage that flooded the lake during prior rainstorms wasn’t as fun as I thought it might be. The work we were going to do was necessary but it was going to be quite messy trying to fish out all the plastic bottles, soccer balls, old tires, pieces of lawn furniture, propane tanks, medical syringes, as well as a million tiny pieces of styrofoam out of our drinking water. The pastoral scene of an entire community coming together to make things better ran into the reality that this kind of work is often more difficult and dirtier than we’d like it to be.
In the three year cycle of Bible readings we use for Sunday worship, the fourth Sunday of Easter is set aside as “Good Shepherd Sunday.” And we take time over these three years to read through 30 or so verses from the tenth chapter of John. These verses seem related to each other since they all seem to talk about a shepherd and some sheep. Now Jesus, from what we can tell, didn’t have much first hand experience living as a shepherd during his earthly ministry. He was, after all, the son of a carpenter and spent most of his time traveling from village to village and city to city. We don’t have any direct evidence he ever woke up in the middle of the night to wander into the fields to check on the sheep entrusted to his care so his use of the words sheep and shepherd are more attuned to some kind of metaphor rather than any personal experience. The people he was speaking to knew, and accepted, the image of a shepherd as a kind of idealized image of who God is. It was the responsibility of the shepherd to keep constant watch over those who don’t always listen. They would need quite a bit of patience, resilience, and all kinds of grace to not only lead those entrusted to them but also to care for their needs, hurts, concerns, and worries. This idealized shepherd would let the sheep be exactly who they are but not let that be the limit of who they could be. And when a sheep went astray, this shepherd would put themselves on the line for whoever is part of their fold. We can, if we pause and take a moment, probably imagine exactly what this kind of shepherd might look like. And yet I wonder if our image of the shepherd would highlight just how dirty, dusty, and dangerous this kind of work truly is. Metaphors have a habit of revealing the truth of what something can be while, at the same time, masking the reality of what that truth actually looks like. Jesus, I think, was aware of this kind of disconnect since, in his day, the shepherd was an image for God yet actual shepherds were viewed with suspicion, worry, and fear. It was easy to dismiss them as merely hired hands since most were from the lowest rungs of the social ladder working long hours under extremely dangerous conditions overseeing sheep they didn’t own. These shepherds played a vital role in an economy where flocks were a sign of wealth, power, food, and industry. Yet these people were often viewed as being worth less than the sheep they cared for. God, as a shepherd, was an idealized image of love and support easy to see yet we can also separate it from all the dirt and grime real life actually brings.
And Jesus, I think, knows how our idealization of faith, hope, God, and Jesus, can get in the way of what our life can be. Too often our expectations of faith are littered with idealizations that assume a life of faith should look and feel as if we were sheep hanging out in a green field on a perfect warm spring day. Faith, though, is often a bit more murky since it’s meant to hold us even through those rainy days when we’re living with all the garbage life brings. Jesus wasn’t’ the good shepherd because he promised us a life that would match the idealized life we assume we’re supposed to have. Rather, he’s our good shepherd because even when life is far from perfect, we’re with the One who promises we will always belong. This kind of shepherding and living is messy which is why today’s reading is his interpretation of what had happened in John, chapter 9. Jesus, after running into a man born blind, made him one of His own. Rather than playing the game of wondering what this man or his parents did to cause his condition, Jesus simply did what a good shepherd does by showing him where a more abundant life could be found. We could, if we stay too focused on our idealized assumptions about faith, act as if Jesus’ physical actions around the man are what being with God is all about. Yet even before his sight was made brand new, he was already part of Jesus’ flock. Jesus spoke – and the man listened – which then led to an unexpected life that was full of its own turmoil and struggle. The community, unsure of what was going on, separated the man from them since they couldn’t handle what he had become. And so Jesus, after learning this, left everything behind to find the one who was pushed aside and show how he was worth so much more. In Jesus, this man found a place where he will always belong. And when Jesus’ journey in the world led him to the cross, Jesus showed the man born blind – and everyone else – just how far God will go for the world God loves.
There’s a tendency to use the metaphors of sheep and shepherd to unintentionally craft an idealized image of what being with Jesus is all about. Jesus, though, doesn’t choose to be with us only in these so-called pastoral moments. Jesus chooses to do the hard work of living our lives with us – especially during those moments that are dirty and grim. Jesus knows that, no matter our expectations, there will be days when the rain just falls. And while those moments are not God’s dream for us, Jesus promises that, in Him, we will always belong. What we or others say and do will not be the limit of who we get to be with our God. Instead, we are led by a good shepherd who knows you, sees you, and shows you what love actually looks like. This love that we receive is also the shape of love we get to express to others. And when we put into practice a way of life letting others know how they belong with us and with their God, we aren’t simply being idealized sheep living in an unideal world. We are, rather, showing what the Good Shepherd will do because we belong to Him and He belongs to the world.
Amen.