[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

Pastor Marc's sermon on Fourth Sunday of Easter (April 26, 2015) on John 10:11-18. Listen to the recording here or read my manuscript below. 

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So, all week, as I chewed on today’s words from the gospel according to John - I found myself being brought back to a December night when I was in seminary. I was walking home from a late night birthday celebration for a friend in Greenwich Village - and as I unlocked the back iron gate, I walked into the last open park-like space left in Chelsea. And right there, as I walked up the handful of broken brick steps into the seminary grounds, I found myself face to face with my seminary’s chapel. 

It was after midnight, cold, the air felt frozen - and, rare for New York City, nothing was moving. I crossed the open space, walked past some large iron doors, and entered into a sanctuary that looks like something straight out of a Jane Austen novel. The chapel is long and narrow, full of red bricks and dark wood. There’s only a few pews in the back facing forward, with most of the pews facing the one aisle, so when we sang, we sang at each other rather than towards the front. And I also remember it was pitch black in there - except for one light that lit up a group of statues behind the altar. I walked through a large wooden archway, the marked the spot where students and professors sat, and I also went past the large pulpit that juts out into the congregation, making anyone who stands in it feel really tall. I went right up to the right, stopping before I went up the steps to the altar, and I just stared at those statues, carved in marble, looming over the entire place. 

Now, in the middle of these statues stood Jesus. He’s tall - the tallest person in the room - fully robed, elegant, holding a shepherd staff in one hand and his head is looking down, staring at this little fluffy white sheep he’s lovingly holding. It’s an incredibly peaceful and serene image of Jesus - an image of Jesus as the Good Shepherd that our reading today from John inspires. And this image - it’s a powerful one. Jesus as the Good Shepherd has been part of our Christian identity since the very beginning. The oldest preserved Christian church, from around the year 240, and which, through a oddness of history, is now currently sitting in Yale University’s Art Museum - that church has the image of Jesus as the Good Shepherd painted on its walls. The Good Shepherd, the one who gathers us in, protects us, and lovingly provides for us as if we are little sheep - there’s a peace in this image of Jesus that we sometimes need. But lurking within this image is another, a much more gritty version of Jesus that the statue in my seminary doesn’t really get. 

Jesus’ words today come in the middle of a conversation that he is having with a group of Pharisees. A conflict’s broken out because Jesus ran into a man begging in the street who was born blind. Jesus’s disciples asked him why this man was born blind - and Jesus, ignoring their assumptions that the person was blind because he was bad or because his parents did the wrong things or because God was getting back at them for some reason - Jesus, instead, spits into some dirt, makes some mud - and heals the blind man. That person can now see. And this causes a problem. The religious authorities don’t really understand what’s going on, people are confused, and they see this miracle healing as something other than what it is. They cast the man out - sending him far away from his community, his family, and friends. So Jesus, hearing that this happened, stops everything and goes out to find him. And Jesus does. He comforts this formerly blind man and brings him into Jesus’ family. Jesus’ words today don’t appear in just some poetic part of scripture. He’s not on some mountain top, preaching to those gathered around him. He’s standing there, in the middle of a conflict, after doing exactly what he says he does. Jesus isn’t just talking about being the Good Shepherd - he’s actually doing it. And he’s not grabbing onto a fluffy white sheep, lovingly caressing it, in a moment that’s so serene it could appear on a Hallmark card. Jesus, instead, is in the middle of a tussle - and he’s not letting go. He’s getting his hands dirty, literally and figuratively, claiming this person as his own. Others rejected him. Others feared him. Others couldn’t see that God loved him just as much as God loves everyone else. But Jesus did. Jesus gets messy - he gets involved - and he’s not afraid to muscle his way into our lives to claim us as his own even when we’re too afraid or distracted to see otherwise. 

Earlier this week, the First Communion students and I gathered in a room and we made bread together. In fact, we made the gluten-free bread we’re going to share together [at 10:30] [in a few minutes.] Now, I never tried this recipe before - and I’ve actually never tried to make bread in a room other than a kitchen before - so I made sure, before we began, that I was overly prepared. I had all the supplies, I got extra, and I had more bowls and spatules than I could possibly ever need. I felt ready. And the kids - they were too. K., P., E., S., E., C., and A. - [they] [you] were fantastic. They measured, they poured, they even cleaned up when something was knocked over. And they did even better when all my preparation started to go wrong. We had to fix what we were doing after I asked them to mix the wrong items together. And then we kind of ran out of the right kind of flour. And then the stand mixer didn’t start and the backup hand mixer couldn’t really handle the job - it actually started to smoke. But this didn’t phase [them] [you] at all. I asked [them] [you] to grab a bit of the dough and to kneed it - to get [their] [your] hands dirty or helped those who did. And [they] [you] totally did it. [They] [you] got hands on. And even though we were no longer following the recipe, and we were running way past where my lesson plan was suppose to take us, [they] [you] just dug [their] [your] hands in, and got it done. And that’s perfect because that’s what Jesus the Good Shepherd and what Holy Communion is all about. 

The Lord’s Supper isn’t only a little meal to feed us. It’s also a reminder that Jesus is in the business of gripping onto us and not letting go. There are days when we feel like fluffy sheep - and days when our wool is muddy, discolored, and just plain stinks. There are days when everything is going according to plan, when the world looks bright and we can’t imagine anything getting in our way. And there are days when having a hand mixer we’re holding catch on fire would be no where near the most difficult part of the day. And through all of this - through the good, the bad, and even the indifferent - Jesus is there. Jesus is there because Jesus gets his hands dirty. He’s busy reaching out to us, getting his hands into the dough of our soul, not worried about what it looks like or if the recipe is working according to plan. He’s there, with us, holding us, helping us to become the people God is calling us to be. And that’s not easy. It’s also not fast or quick. We’re not going to wake up tomorrow and end up living the perfect life. We’re never not going to make a mistake; we’re going to miss seeing our neighbor in need or loving others as much as God loves us. But Jesus isn’t in the business of letting us remain there. That’s, I think, why we have his table and why Jesus continues to invite us to take a little part of himself into our lives - over and over again - because Jesus is with us for the long haul. And whether we’re joining his table today for the first time like E., K., P., S., and E., or whether we’ve been away from the table for quite awhile - the Good Shepherd’s invitation still stands. The table is about to be set. The bread is about to be broken. So come and see Jesus getting involved and messy in our lives - and lets discover just how God is calling us to risk getting our hands dirty too, how God is calling us to get involved in the needs and the hopes and the dreams of those around us. And lets see how God is calling us to live out that love here and wherever God takes us. 

Amen.