Fourth Sunday of Easter (A) — John 10:1–10
Trinity Lutheran Church, Pleasant Valley, PA
Bethany Lutheran Church, Stony Creek Mills, PA
Faith Lutheran Church, Mount Penn, PA
Good readings inspire good questions. The fourth Sunday of Easter doesn’t usually get a lot of questions, though, with readings so familiar and well-loved. “The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want.” It brings us comfort, not challenge. Maybe that’s what we need most right now. Still, I can’t help but ask.
One common question, all over commentaries and even my old sermons, asks what it means to be sheep. The more you know about sheep, the sillier they are. On my drive here to church, I always pass a bunch. They look foolish, a bit over-grown, in need of shearing, like small children with too many layers of snow pants. They’re terrified of all the wrong things. Cars zoom by, two-tons of metal moving 50 miles an hour, and the sheep are unfazed. But a bug catches them in the corner of their eye, or their own reflection in the water bucket, and they go running away to safety.
Sheep can’t do anything for themselves. They have no built-in defense mechanisms, no sharp claws, no poisonous fangs. They practically invite predators, with a neon sign above their heads, flashing, “Eat me.” I was told recently, though I don’t know if it’s true, that if a sheep falls over, legs in the air, it can’t right itself. Just like a turtle, except the sheep could actually, physically do it, if it weren’t so stupid.
A sheep is completely dependent. And so are we. God made us, and called us very good, and so we are: Complex, thinking, creative, inventive, made wondrous in the image of the Almighty. But unlike the Creator, we destroy what we create. We nurture loving families and then nurture dysfunction just to support the psychology profession. We devise governments and ideologies to unite people and lift up the marginalized, and then we abandon the common good for political wins. We invent technologies to cross the globe, and use them to communicate distrust, and transport disease, and well, here we are.
We are forced to depend on God, our Good Shepherd, to bring us to still waters, who rights us when we turn ourselves upside-down. We must admit that we are dependent, but we can depend on God. It IS an incredible comfort for us, especially now, struggling against a microscopic organism taking lives by tens of thousands. We know that God has given us everything we need to accomplish this, and more, that God will keep inspiring us, and surrounding us with love.
But Jesus doesn’t talk much about the sheep in our Gospel reading. Instead, he seems focused on the shepherd, versus the thieves and bandits that steal the sheep. The question: Just who are they? The forces of evil or darkness, or just the worldly powers that drag us from God? Not a bad interpretation, but Jesus gives another.
This passage in John follows a story we heard just before Easter: The man born blind. Jesus gives him sight, but the miracle itself only takes up a few verses. The rest of the story focuses on the religious leaders, who interrogate the man and his parents, trying to make a case against Jesus. Jesus himself finally says these leaders who should be able to see—the truth of the world, the Love that loved creation into being—have proven they are blind.
Then immediately, today’s reading. When Jesus talks about thieves stealing the sheep, he means the religious leaders. They should lead people to God. Instead, they drive them away, with empty rituals and meaningless rules, trying to free people but making them slaves to religion instead. It’s nothing new. In our short reading from Jeremiah, the prophet condemns the leaders of Israel in his time. God himself will take their place.
It continues even today, and is a warning to us. We are faith leaders, whatever our role at church. As we practice our faith, we ought to wonder if we are good shepherds, leading one another into deeper relationship with the real, living God; or if we are bandits, leading people into what we think is freedom, but gives no life.
If we are the shepherds, we will fail. Even me, a pastor—the word means “shepherd” in Latin—I am not a shepherd; I am a sheep with a certain responsibility, and so are you. Real faith has only one shepherd: Jesus. The rest of us can only follow. Hopefully we will do it well, and other sheep might come along.
This might trouble independent, modern Americans, but it should be a comfort. We think we have to do everything. Achieve. Fix every problem. Succeed always. Not a chance. But we can follow Jesus, and trust that he will do what we cannot. And look what happens: God has given us everything we need to handle today’s crisis. Medical science and technology. Courageous workers in medicine and every trade. The hope and strength of community, even when separated. God leads us in paths of righteousness and safety, and we can have faith and follow.
Jesus is our Good Shepherd. But how do we make sure we’re following the shepherd, when there are so many distractions out there? Which voice should we listen to, to be sure we do not chase after the thieves or the bandits? More good questions. Does Jesus have an answer to them? Listen:
The sheep follow [the gatekeeper, the shepherd] because they know his voice. They will not follow a stranger, but they will run from him because they do not know the voice of strangers.
That really is at the heart of what Jesus is trying to tell us today. There are lots of things that try to pull us away from God, pull us into fear or hate, anger or despair. But when we hear the voice of Jesus, we recognize it. So we chase after the voice we know. We are like sheep—stupid, foolish sheep who operate not on knowledge but on instinct. A sheep does not follow its shepherd after a well-informed decision. It just hears the shepherd’s voice and instinctively knows it will find its needs met there, and off it goes.
It’s like Mary Magdalene in the Easter story told by Matthew. Mary thinks Jesus’ body has been stolen, and she is desperate in her grief. So desperate that she can’t recognize Jesus standing in front of her. She assumes he’s the gardener. It is only when Jesus speaks her name that she, not even thoughtfully, but instinctually looks up, and blurts out, “My Teacher.” And then she finally knows her Lord and her friend.
We are the same. God, your shepherd, knew you when you were still in your mothers’ womb. He called you and nurtured you from the beginning. He fulfills all your needs. And so you know him, not just by knowledge but by instinct. Made in his image, you have his voice woven into your DNA. And so in every struggle in your life, even in the loneliness and existential crisis of this pandemic, you will find yourself chasing the voice of Jesus because it is the voice that makes your heart sing.
It’s interesting. When we think about the Good Shepherd, there are many questions, many different paths we can follow. And yet they all lead to the same place. They take us to Jesus, the best, Good Shepherd. We find ourselves able to depend on him for all our needs. We don’t have to be in control, but can take our place as his followers, his sheep. We hear his voice, and know we are loved, as he reaches out with his loving arms and picks us up, carrying us on his shoulders into joyful, abundant life. We live in a time desperate for comfort. And so we have it, for all paths lead to Jesus, the Christ, the loving presence of God. Amen.