Third Sunday of Easter, April 14th, Year of Our + Lord 2024
Our Redeemer and Our Savior’s Lutheran Churches
Custer and Hill City, South Dakota
Good Shepherding and Good Sheeping: John 10:1-18
Sermon Audio available HERE.
Christ is Risen!
Who is your shepherd? Are you
a wise sheep? Are you shepherding anyone? Are you shepherding anything?
On this Good Shepherd Sunday,
my first question seems excessively obvious.
Jesus, who laid down
His life, and has taken it up again, He is our Good
Shepherd. Christ is Risen, and He is our
Shepherd. Case closed. No question.
But is He? Are you following Jesus as a sheep follows a
shepherd? Jesus focuses on hearing and following His voice. The disciples struggled to understand what
Jesus meant by declaring “I AM the door of the sheepfold.” That is pretty hard to wrap your mind
around. So Jesus laid aside the
mysterious “I AM the door” metaphor, and switched to a relationship they could better
understand. Sheep and Shepherd. God had long talked about Israel as His
flock, and He as their Shepherd. Ancient
Israel depended on shepherds and sheep for clothing, milk, and meat, not to
mention writing material. They get
sheep and shepherds. They can grasp that
God’s people is the flock, and Jesus is the Shepherd.
And, when the Lord says His
sheep listen for and hear His voice, it doesn’t take a Master of Divinity
degree to understand that our Savior is pointing us to His Word. Followers of Christ live in this world for as
long as the Shepherd wills, and necessarily we interact with the culture and
the economy; we hear many voices, many strange voices. But the Word of Christ, recorded and
preserved for us in Holy Scripture, the Old and New Testaments of the Bible, is
our authoritative voice, our primary and final tool for interpreting the world
and our lives. The Bible is to guide our
choices and interaction with the broader world.
Can we say this is true for
us? Are we mostly guided by Christ and
His Word in our day to day lives? Or is
the Word of God more like a weekly reminder, that is quickly drowned out by the
cacophony of voices and kaleidoscope of images that bombard our senses, from
early morn till late at night? Are we
truly hearing the voice of our Shepherd and following Him?
It doesn’t help that today
following any shepherd is distinctly out of fashion. Or perhaps it would be more accurate to say
that it is out of fashion to admit that we are following
someone. “Chart your own path, be your
own person, make your own way in the world.
Just do it, they say.” But amen,
amen I say to you, the truth is we are all following someone or
something. The world suggests we can and
should all be self-directed, autonomous, free agents. But this is silly. This mantra is a really play for control, by manipulative
people and powers who want you to follow them. And we will follow someone, consciously or
not, because we are creatures made to follow our Creator.
The declaration of
independence from God that was our fall into sin means that we do not naturally
follow God’s good shepherding. But if
you imagine you aren’t following something or someone, be careful. Because this is not how we human beings are
made to be. We will follow the Lord, or
we will follow someone else. It may be a
philosopher, or a social trend, or a popular leader. But we all follow something or someone. The key question is: Are we following a good
shepherd, or are we following foolishly after folly?
Bad shepherds abound, a dime
a dozen. Jesus says a good shepherd
knows his sheep and cares for them. He
defends them from wolves, and is even willing to lay down his life for his
sheep, regardless of how foolish they may be.
Bad shepherds fleece their flock, using and even devouring them, all the
while making a great show of how much they care for the sheep. But bad shepherds don’t love their
sheep. They abandon their followers,
when danger draws near, or when they cease to be useful. I’ll let you fill in the blank with the
shepherd who has disappointed and perhaps deeply injured you. Maybe a politician? A boss?
A relative? A pastor?
Shepherding isn’t just about
Sunday morning. All of life is a gift
from God, however we may use or misuse it.
So, any bad shepherding or any foolish sheepishness has a relation to
God and true religion, because God cares about His whole creation. Good shepherds help us know God, and walk in
His path. Bad shepherds pervert all that
God wants for His creatures.
We need to realize
shepherding is a really broad term.
Shepherd and pastor are the same word.
But shepherding is not just a religious concern. King David was a shepherd, charged
with leading and caring for the nation of Israel, with slingshot and lyre,
sword and Psalm. Moses was certainly
called by God, and served a priestly function.
He was also a shepherd, literally tending the flocks of his
father-in-law. And, Moses was a
political leader, both before and after he stepped up to serve as the redeemer
of Israel.
We used to commonly use ‘shepherding’
as a leadership verb, and in a positive way.
As in “this community leader will shepherd this worthy project to its
completion, for the good of all.” But
today formal authorities are automatically suspect, and nobody is supposed to
want to be a follower. We are all
supposed to be self-actualizing, in charge of our own lives, not following
anyone or anything but our heart.
But, can we even claim to be shepherding
our own lives? For the Christian, the
first thing to consider when asked this question concerns, as we said before,
God’s Word. Does His Truth occupy the
center of our lives? Do the principles
of loving God and neighbor guide us, however imperfectly we fulfill them? Do we take responsibility for the redeemed life
God has given us? Do we get out of bed
with a Godly purpose in mind for our day?
Or do wake up thinking only of our goals? Or perhaps we awake with a vacant stare, waiting
to be told what’s important, waiting to be fed through a screen, waiting to be
told what direction our thoughts and actions will have today.
Our Good Shepherd comes to us
today to re-establish good shepherding, and good ‘sheeping,’ according to His
definition. At the heart of good
shepherding and ‘sheeping’ is the Cross and Empty Tomb. And we’ll come back to that.
But before we do, let focus a
bit more on this: the principles of
shepherding that Jesus declares today are for more than eternal
salvation; they are for all of life. Now, don’t hear me wrong. The Good Shepherd is most importantly and
ultimately concerned with your eternal salvation, with greeting you in
heaven. God’s most important goal, and the
most important priority, for yourself and your loved ones, is to arrive at that
blessed moment, when your Good Shepherd will embrace you in His arms and wipe
away all your tears, adding you to the forever joyful congregation of all the
faithful departed. Keep your eyes on that
prize, by deepening and feeding your faith, daily.
And, at the same time,
never forget that your eternal life began the day you were baptized. Which should make some difference in how you
live, now, today. Even as we look
forward to the joy of heaven, we are called to be wise sheep, and also to good
shepherding, right now.
The same principles we can
draw from our Good Shepherd going to the Cross and bursting from the Tomb
should govern and guide every facet of our lives as Christians. For the dynamics of God’s saving work for
mankind also reveal who God is, within Himself.
That reality, preached by Jesus today, is God’s desired foundation, the
principle of life, that He would have define every area of our lives. To be known by Jesus and to know Him is to be
drawn into the mystery of Godly shepherding, and Godly ‘sheeping.’ And here is where true security and love and
joy are found.
The Way that Jesus saves us
is not unique to His relationship to us.
It is also essential to the reality of who God is and how the Father and
the Son relate to each other. Think for
a minute about how Jesus compares His relationship to us with His relationship
to His Father. 14 I am the good shepherd. I know my own
and my own know me, 15 just as the Father
knows me and I know the Father; and I lay down my life for the sheep.
We
might expect Jesus to say something like, “just as the Father knows me and I
know the Father, and we rejoice in our shared glory forever and ever.” But that’s not what Jesus says. He connects the mutual self-knowledge He
shares with the Father with laying down His life, for us. Right in the middle of Jesus’ mutual
knowledge shared with His sheep, and also in the middle of Jesus’ eternal
shared knowledge of His Father, is His self-sacrifice. The Cross is essential not only to the
relationship between Jesus and us, it is also essential to the relationship
between God the Father and His only begotten Son. The priority of rescuing the sheep and the
willingness to endure the pain of the Cross, pain for both the Son and the
Father, this terrible and wonderful act of justice and love, defines who God
is.
In
case we miss the point, Jesus doubles down on this mystery, a few sentences
later. 17 For
this reason the Father loves me, because I lay down my life that I
may take it up again. Did you catch
that? Jesus says the reason the Father
loves Him is because of His self-sacrifice.
Does this mean that the Father wouldn’t love the Son if He hadn’t gone
to the Cross? No. The love shared between Father, Son and Holy
Spirit is eternal, unchanging, it has always and will always be the same.
So,
that the Father loves the Son because of His self-sacrifice means that the Son
was always laying down His life, for us, and for His Father. From eternity, the Cross was always in
view. Selfless sacrifice for the good of
others, doing whatever it takes in order to have a beautiful flock of believers
to bless forever in heaven, this has always defined who the Son is. It is almost as if He is the Lamb of God,
slain from before the foundation of
the world. (Revelation 13:8) Which He is.
How
sure is God’s love for you? How much
does God want to have you and the rest of His flock with Him forever and
ever? So sure and so much that, even
though God knew exactly how things would turn out, how we would wander, how
earthly shepherds would time and again abuse others, how painful it would be to
win us back from Satan, even though the Father, Son and Holy Spirit knew all
this, before time began, they created us anyway. God freely and lovingly chose to create us,
for the joy of having us for His very own, even though this meant the Cross was
always in view.
Sacrificial love is at the
heart of God. Within the Godhead, this
sacrificial love is both freely given and entirely deserved, entirely
earned. Loving freely and also serving
perfectly are both natural to who God is.
For us, whose sins required
Jesus to lay down His life for us, God’s sacrificial love is undeserved. And yet, God has freely loved us in precisely
this way. So also, as children of God,
as sheep of His sheepfold, sacrificial love and the forgiveness it delivers
should be at the heart of everything in our lives.
Each of us are given roles
where we are followers, sheep to someone else’s shepherding. As sheep to imperfect earthly shepherds, we
know this will be a bumpy ride. So, we
are called to wise cross-bearing, always trusting that our eternal deliverance
is already assured, by the Cross Jesus bore for us. God grant us the wisdom to stay close to our
true Good Shepherd, through His Word, through His feeding, so that we can both
rightly discern good and bad earthly shepherding, and know best how to follow,
or choose not to follow.
Each of us has also been given
roles where we are to shepherd someone or something. We are all given faith, and the charge to
follow Jesus. And we are to work out our
salvation with fear and trembling, knowing that God is at work in us both to
will and to do for His good pleasure. (Philippians
2:12-13) Christian
living is holy and awesome, because the Holy, Holy, Holy LORD is with and at
work in every believer.
God grant us wisdom to truly
follow Jesus in the path He has set before us, to follow by hearing Him, and gathering
to the places He has promised to be serve us.
To prioritize hanging out in His good pasture, that we may know Him and
the power of His resurrection.
We all have many other roles,
callings, as fathers and mothers, as children, brothers and sisters, as citizens,
and as Christian friends and neighbors, to fellow Christians and to unbelievers. In these relationships, we are given moments
to follow, and moments, even whole lifetimes, to lead, to shepherd others. God grant us wisdom to remember how Jesus
shepherds us: not with threats or force,
not with anger, but with self-sacrifice and wisdom. Our sacrifices for others do not save us, but
we can sacrifice for others because we have been saved, by the self-sacrifice
of Jesus. And our Good Shepherd will be
in the midst of all of it. Indeed, this
is the height of living, the most human we can be, when we give ourselves for
others.
Christ is Risen!
The great Shepherd of the Flock of God has
laid down His life, and taken it up again, for you! Rejoice in His victory, which is your
victory. Marvel at His love. Receive it every day, and so be filled to
overflowing, made ready to share that love with others. And the Peace of God, which passes all
understanding, will keep your hearts and minds with Christ Jesus our Lord, unto
life everlasting. Amen.
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