Listen to the Sermon or the Entire Service
April 21st:
Potsdam
Call: John 10: 1-16
Text: John 10: 22-30
Read: Psalm 23 (137)
Miller's Window
Some weeks, sermons write themselves
And as my remarkably clear mind directs my fingers across the key board
I marvel at how easy it is to write a sermon.
This has not been one of those weeks.
For a while my remarkably clogged up mind
Sent no messages to my fingers
And I marveled at how hard it is to write a sermon.
Part of the reason for this week's difficulty
Is that having successfully downshifted my energy gears
So that I could actually rest on vacation
I now I find that that I am not as quick as I had hoped
at shifting back
into the gear required for productive work and writing.
In addition, I have to admit that I have spent some potential work and thinking time
Watching the televised coverage of the hunt for those responsible for the Boston Marathon bombings
This was an intentional choice because I believe
that a pastor cannot minister from an ivory tower
I believe
That to be an effective servant he or she needs to be aware of what is going on in the world.
And this particular event was made more personal
Because Betsy's daughter lives in Belmont
A community that was locked down on Friday
And Marge and I have visited her there.
But what really made this week difficult
was that the message of these scriptures seemed so obvious that I was challenged to find anything to say
that amounted to more than mere words
that would fill up space and time.
I wondered whether I should simply give a four sentence sermon:
One: Jesus is the Good Shepherd and we are his sheep
Two: Christ as the Good Shepherd may well be
our most familiar and comforting image of him.
Three: The OT prophet Ezekiel tells us that the Good Shepherd
Cares for the sheep
Rescues the sheep when they have been scattered
Feeds the sheep
And Tends to the weak, injured, and lost sheep
Four: You and I should be thankful that we are his sheep.
I might well have also tried to get a chuckle or a groan
by telling you that in the fourth sentence
I spelled the word "E W E" rather than "Y O U"
That is certainly something that you might have expected of me.
But with the exception of the specific reference to Ezekiel
I would not have told you anything that you didn't already know;
And probably not anything about which you needed a reminder.
That brief, succinct sermon would have let us get right out to the fellowship time.
That brief, succinct sermon would have let us get home so that we could do whatever we plan to do this afternoon.
And that brief, succinct sermon would have saved both you and me energy
because it would not have required anything of us.
All we would have had to do was
Smile and nod our heads in agreement.
But that brief, succinct sermon would have cheated you and me.
For worship requires our involvement
It should encourage - and challenge us - to be involved
Involved With the scripture
Involved With the reflection on it
Involved With our God.
Worship is not passive;
It is active and it is participatory.
Worship is not a polite smile and a nod of the head.
It is an experience where we ask questions like
"How does this apply to me?"
and "Is this something I need to work on?"
And thus I had to shake off my post vacation lethargy,
shift into a higher gear
And drive more deeply into the scripture's most obvious message
As I did so I found myself focusing on verses 14 and 16
"I am the good shepherd.
I know my own and my own know me."
"I have other sheep that do not belong to this fold.
I must bring them also, and they will listen to my voice."
And similarly, from the passage that I was going to read, but chose not to,
Verse 27: "My sheep hear my voice
I know them and they follow me."
These verses demonstrate that
As Christ sees things, and as he uses the terms,
The relationship between the sheep and the shepherd
is an intimate relationship.
It is not simply a formal, business like relationship.
Which can be described as
"You do this for me and I will do that for you."
It is a relationship where they know each other
And that knowledge and that intimacy
Are the reasons that the sheep follow him.
The Jewish leaders of Christ's day
Had come to think of their relationship with God
As a formal, "quid pro quo" relationship.
Thus their accent on the law.
Thus also, the need for Christ (and later Paul) to establish
That the relationship between God and the people
Was and is one of love and grace
Not of law and obedience to it.
The image of Christ as the Good Shepherd
(and of us as His sheep)
Is a part of our understanding that love and that grace.
But digging into our scripture
instead of simply smiling and nodding
takes us even further.
It takes us to verse 15
The verse between the two on which I focused
This verse tells us of Christ's declaration,
"I lay down my life for the sheep."
It was only after saying those words
That he let us know that there are other sheep
whom he wants
To bring into his fold
This is where my eyes began to open
And I really began to understand why we need to go past the obvious and dig deeper into this scripture.
For our tendency is to approach the good shepherd passage
As a still photo
Or a very short news clip
Instead of as the opening portion of a motion picture
About our relationship with Christ
And his charge and commission to us
But it is a motion picture
A picture that begins here with Christ telling us
that our relationship with him is based on love
that he knows us and we know him
and that he wants and needs to bring others into the fold.
That motion picture continues with his death and resurrection
Which he told us about in this scripture
"I lay down my life for the sheep."
"For this reason, the Father loves me,
because I lay down my life in order to take it up again."
"No one takes it (his life) from me,
but I lay it down of my own accord."
And after all that,
Our motion picture concludes with Jesus tying everything together when he talks with Peter after breakfast on the shore of the Sea of Galilee,
We know this story: From chapter 21: 15-17
Do you see what happens here?
Jesus, in this post resurrection period repeatedly tells Peter
"Feed my lambs." "Feed my sheep"
and thus builds on this morning's scripture
thus telling not only Peter,
but also the other disciples and those of us who are their successors
That he (they) (we) are to be his good shepherds
That's not a nod and smile kind of thing
Not even as one resumes work after a week of vacation
Not even in a week of remarkable tragedies brought on
By human hate, chemical explosion, and earthquake
It is instead a commitment
A commitment that - like worship - requires involvement and participation.
For our relationship with the good shepherd
Not only comforts and benefits us as his sheep
But also requires that we be the shepherds
Who care for and feed others
And bring still more sheep into his fold.
I am reminded almost daily of my roles
As both a sheep cared for by Jesus
and a shepherd called to service by him.
For my office is dominated by
the Horwood window depicting Christ as the Good Shepherd
a window that is dedicated to Rev. and Mrs. John W. Miller
John W. Miller shepherded this congregation over a century ago
And was the shepherd when the work began on our building
And participated in the first wedding in this sanctuary.
Like John W. Miller
We are sheep in Christ's fold
We know him and we love him
He knows us and he loves us
And like John W. Miller
We are shepherds
doing Christ's work of caring for and rescuing other sheep.
As I worked on this message,
Even in this week of devastating events,
I could not escape the comfort that window provided
To me as one of his sheep
Nor the awe
that I am one of his shepherds
entrusted with looking after and increasing his flock
For a moment I even wondered
If the Good Shepherd in Rev. Miller's window would have had tears in his eyes
If I had tried to get away with a "smile and nod" sermon
And cheated you by doing so.