What It Means to Be a Sheep

[This was shared during worship with the people of Saint Matthew Lutheran Church in Logan, Ohio on Sunday, May 3.]

John 10:11-18
The first time I prepared to preach on this Gospel lesson back when I was a young pastor, I felt pretty confident about what Jesus meant in calling Himself "the good shepherd." In ancient Near Eastern culture, the image of the shepherd was often used of kings. The tradition in that region had long been that kings would make covenants with their own people, as well as those peoples they may have conquered, in which they pledged to be the protector of their subjects. In calling Himself "the good shepherd," Jesus was claiming kingship and promising to lovingly lead and guide those who follow Him.

I thought that I had a good handle on Jesus as our shepherd, then. But I realized that I was clueless when it came to understanding what it meant for us to be Jesus' sheep. I was a city slicker and I knew nothing about sheep.

So, I called a man in our congregation who, I knew, once kept sheep. "Vic," I asked, "tell me about sheep." "The first thing you have to know about sheep," he told me, "is that sheep are dumb...I mean really, really dumb." He went on to tell me about how completely helpless and dependent sheep are, how much they need shepherds to care for them.

I wondered: Is that how Jesus sees us? Are we so helpless that we need Jesus as our good shepherd?

Last night, as you know, we had a middle-of-the-night breakfast for Logan High School students who attended the Prom. As I watched them--these sixteen, seventeen, and eighteen year old young people--walk into our fellowship hall, they all seemed to feel the way I did when I was their age, like they had the world on a string. Only a few of them may have realized how vulnerable we all are, how much we need a shepherd to guide us through life and death, how clueless they are about what may be ahead of them in life.

Ann and I have a friend who we'll call Nick. Nick is a year younger than I am. When he graduated from high school, he joined the Air Force and went to Vietnam, where he served two tours of duty. Before he shipped out, his grandmother asked for him to stop by her place. "I know you don't have anything to do with God or the Church, Nick. But I want you to know that I'm praying that God will help you through and that no matter what happens, you'll know that God loves you." Several years after Nick returned home, he--like me--met his wife-to-be and she was a Lutheran. I'll never forget the day that Nick was baptized. This strapping man of 25, a jet mechanic who had gone through service in Vietnam, cried like a baby because he knew just what it meant to have Jesus, the good shepherd, leading him through life. He knew that he needed the good shepherd.

Of course, our good shepherd doesn't promise that the horrors of this life will go away. Like him, we will endure crosses. We will go through what our psalm calls "the valley of the shadow of death." But even then Jesus will lead us.

Years ago, I heard Dr. James Dobson* tell the story of a six year old terminal patient at the UCLA Medical Center where he then worked. The child was on morphine. But occasionally, he would cry out, "The bells! The bells!" Someone asked the duty nurse whether she could explain that. It seems that the day before, with his death clearly impending, a relative had told the child to keep looking for Jesus and when he got to heaven's gates to listen for the bells. "He's been talking about the bells all day long," the nurse said. That child was being led by the good shepherd.

Jesus says we are sheep in need of a shepherd.

Thankfully, Jesus is the good shepherd who wants all who dare to follow Him to know that He will lead them through this life and into eternity with Him.

May we all follow our good shepherd every day! Amen

*Regular readers of this blog will know that I have been critical of Dr. Dobson's forays into the political arena. But I think that in earlier years, he provided sound psychological and spiritual advice on family relationships. Even in that, I don't agree with him on every subject. But I still harbor a deep respect for his early work. ALSO: I may have some details of this anecdote wrong. But the basic story is true and is remembered from a video made in the 1970s, which I haven't seen in about twenty years.

A Look at the Bible Lessons for This Coming Sunday (May 3, 2009)

[These "looks" are something I write every week, mainly with the idea of helping members of the congregation I serve as pastor, Saint Matthew Lutheran Church in Logan, Ohio, to get ready for worship. But since our congregation uses a lectionary (a plan of Bible lessons) rooted on the Church Year shared by most Christians throughout the world, I hope that others find these pieces helpful, too.]

Fourth Sunday of Easter
May 4, 2009

The Bible Lessons:
Acts 4:5-12
Psalm 23
1 John 3:16-24
John 10:11-18

The Prayer of the Day:
O Lord Christ, good shepherd of the sheep, you seek the lost and guide us into your fold. Feed us, and we shall be satisfied; heal us, and we shall be whole. Make us one with you, for you live and reign with the Father and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever.

General Themes:
1. In the Gospel lesson, Jesus identifies Himself with the Lord (Yahweh) Who is Shepherd from the Old Testament. In Near-East culture, shepherd imagery was often associated both with protectors and royalty.

2. The God of Israel, ultimately revealed in Jesus Christ, is the Lord of all creation. Through Christ, God wants to save all people, which means coming to faith in Christ, because, as Peter puts it, "There is salvation in no one else; for there is not other name given among mortals by which we must be saved" (Acts 4:12).

Acts 4:5-12
(I'm probably going to preach on this text. So, a few thoughts.)

A coalition of unlikely allies, including the religious elites which rejects the whole idea of resurrection and the religious mass movement (Pharisees) who believe in resurrection, are amassed against the early Christians, represented by Peter and John. They're introduced in Acts 4:1-4, and include Annas and Caiaphas, who are mentioned in John 18:13-14, as among those who stood in judgment over Jesus. To stand with Jesus is to incur the same rejection He endured.

This "coalition" is alarmed by a healing performed by Peter and John in Jesus' Name. In Jesus' Name, a crippled beggar now walks. The coalition has the two disciples arrested.

The question posed by the officials in v. 7 gets at the nub of what they don't want to hear. They thought that they had successfully wiped out the Jesus' movement by crucifying Jesus. It should be pointed out that there had been and would be others who claimed the mantle of messiahship, some gaining large followings. But their movements were successfully snuffed out when the would-be messiahs were executed. The Jesus movement endures.

In v. 8, Peter doesn't answer the question in his own power, but by the power of the Holy Spirit. Jesus told His followers (Luke 12:11-12) not to be concerned about what to say when powerful people challenged them to explain their faith. The Holy Spirit, Jesus said, would give them the words they needed at the moments they needed them.

I love the way Peter characterizes the action for which he and John were arrested, "a good deed." And it's true, they've been arrested because they healed a crippled beggar.

Peter makes no bones about confessing Jesus. Nor does he spare his accusers of blame for rejecting Jesus, in spite of Jesus being the Foundation of the creation.

Peter ends with a ringing affirmation of Jesus' teaching that it is only through Him that humanity is saved from sin and death.