Sermon: Hearing the Shepherd’s Voice

If you have ever been captivated by the stories of those who heard the voice of God, then today’s lectionary reading will appeal to you. This is the sermon I’m preaching on how those of us who aren’t mystics can hear the voice of the Good Shepherd today. I hope your congregation will hear the voice of Jesus as they gather for worship.

Hearing The Shepherd’s Voice

John 10:22-30 NIV

22 Then came the Festival of Dedication at Jerusalem. It was winter, 23 and Jesus was in the temple courts walking in Solomon’s Colonnade. 24 The Jews who were there gathered around him, saying, “How long will you keep us in suspense? If you are the Messiah, tell us plainly.”

25 Jesus answered, “I did tell you, but you do not believe. The works I do in my Father’s name testify about me, 26 but you do not believe because you are not my sheep. 27 My sheep listen to my voice; I know them, and they follow me. 28 I give them eternal life, and they shall never perish; no one will snatch them out of my hand. 29 My Father, who has given them to me, is greater than all; no one can snatch them out of my Father’s hand. 30 I and the Father are one.”

Farm Life As I Remember It

I think I’ve told you about the two weeks my mother sent me to south Georgia where her family lived so I could experience life on the farm. At least I think that’s why she and my dad sent me there, but I was about 10 at the time, so it could be they needed a break from my frequent misadventures.

In any event, I spent two weeks with my cousins, and of course my aunts and uncles, at about the time the tobacco was harvested. I’ve told you that story, but in addition to the tobacco harvest, life on the farm went on as usual. Part of farm life was calling the various animals primarily at feeding time.

Each animal grouping — pigs, cows, chickens, and horses — all had distinctive calls they responded to. Chickens were the easiest because all you had to do was show up in the chicken yard with the pale of feed and the chickens flocked around your feet. Which was a little scary for a boy from the city, primarily because I had been warned about the rooster who had a nasty disposition.

The cows responded to the pickup truck in the pasture, which usually had bales of hay on the back which we pitched out as the cows gathered around. My cousins also put out salt licks, but I stayed pretty much on the back of the pick up because cows were a lot bigger than chickens, and the bull apparently also had a bad attitude.

But I remember the pigs most. Now they didn’t have a lot of pigs, maybe six or seven, and they were all in the pig pen out back. The pig pen was not huge, but big enough for a half dozen really big pigs, and of course it was a muddy mess and the pigs were muddy, and the whole thing kind of reeked of, well, pigs. So, after each meal, we went out to slop the hogs. Now that term pretty much describes the whole event. Slop is not a word you use for anything that’s anywhere close to appealing, but that’s what we did.

One of my aunts had a lot of kids — two girls and four boys — plus I was there, and then there were some other cousins who came along to help with the tobacco harvest, so at mealtime there was a pretty big crowd.

After the meal, all the plates were scraped into the slop bucket. This produced a kind of slurry of mashed potatoes, lima beans, half eaten biscuits (although there weren’t many of those), soppin’ gravy, tomato peels, and so on. You get the picture. It was not a pretty sight.

Once the plates were scraped, and the kitchen scraps all dumped into the slop bucket, off my cousin and I set to slop the hogs.

For some reason, you had to call hogs to come get the slop. The hogs were usually lying on the sides, in the mud, up near the back part of the hog pen. So my cousin would have to holler, “Sooo-eee, sooo-eee.” Which seemed like a ridiculous way to call pigs, but since the pigs were going to become bacon sometime in the future, they didn’t have names, so I guess they had to be summoned to dinner with some call.

Sure enough, the hogs, because they were really to big to be called pigs, would rouse themselves, get up, and head toward the direction of the sooo-ee call to dinner.

The amazing thing was, I discovered during my two weeks on the farm, that each type of animal knew what the feed bucket, or the pickup truck, or the call of  “sooo-ee” meant. And they responded to whatever it was that got their attention.

My cousins didn’t have any sheep, so I don’t know what calls sheep respond to, but Gene Logsdon, one of my favorite writers about rural farm life recalls this story from his childhood:

“I grew up— woke up many mornings— to the wail of my cousin, Ade, calling his sheep. His farm was next to ours and he took to practicing this primitive ritual at about four o’clock in the morning. Mom said he wanted us to know he was already up and about and anyone still in bed was a sinner. But his sheep call was music to my ears. Up the little creek valley that connected our farms would roll this long drawn-out wail of “shoooooooooooooopeeeeeee” that began on about high A over C on the musical scale and fell, quaveringly, a couple of notes on the second syllable. The call lasted as long as he could keep expelling air with enough force for the sound to carry a mile or two.” (Gene Logsdon, The Contrary Farmer, “Calling Home The Sheep”).

Logsdon continues by saying that he practiced his cousin’s sheep call until he got it down pretty well himself. He said later when he had sheep of his own on his own farm, all he had to do was start the call “shoooo…” and before he could get it all out, the sheep came trotting down the path to the new pasture he wanted them in.

But How Do The Sheep Know The Shepherd’s Voice?

Okay, that was a long introduction to the scripture for today, but if you haven’t figured it out by now, the verse I want us to focus on is verse 27 —

“My sheep listen to my voice; I know them, and they follow me.”

Jesus made this statement in response to the rather impatient insistence from some in Jerusalem, in the Temple during the Festival of Dedication, that he tell them plainly if he was the messiah or not.

Jesus reply was that he had already told them, but they did not believe him. Jesus told them that the works he did in his Father’s name was testimony that he was the messiah, but they didn’t get it because they aren’t his sheep.

It’s then that Jesus says, “My sheep listen to my voice; I know them, and they follow me.”

So, the one question we have to answer today is, How do we hear the voice of Jesus today?

There Are More Sheep Than There Are Mystics

Of course, we might point to examples of extraordinary people who heard the voice of God in extraordinary ways. God calls Abraham out of the Ur of Chaldees and makes him the father of a great nation. God appears to Moses in a burning bush and speaks audibly to him about the assignment to lead the Hebrews out of bondage in Egypt. God speaks to a discouraged Elijah with a still, quiet voice. And then there are the priests, and kings, and prophets of the Old Testament, many of whom God speaks to directly and unmistakably.

The history of Christianity is also filled with stories of people who had a special ability to hear the voice of God. From Paul’s Damascus road experience, to the revelation God gave to John on the Isle of Patmos that has become our Book of Revelation, we know that God speaks directly to certain people at certain times.

Amazingly, God’s voice does not go silent with the passing of the Apostles. The Desert Fathers — and there were Desert Mothers, too apparently — were mystics who lived lives of asceticism separated from the urban centers in order to seek to hear God more clearly and fully.

These monastics lived solitary lives at first, then later formed communities of monks and nuns who lived separated from the everyday distractions to spiritual devotion. Prayer, scripture, work, deprivation, vows of silence, poverty, and celibacy, and other acts of devotion marked their existence. And down through the centuries there were those who heard the voice of God and lef their mark on Christian spirituality.

But there are others who have heard the voice of God, too. Joan of Arc claimed to hear God’s voice calling her to save her people. Some thought her mad, others thought her a mystic. In any event, she died a martyr’s death for her witness.

We could spend more time than we have this morning naming the outstanding mystics of the Christian faith who heard the voice of God. But for most of us, their experiences, while interesting, are the stuff of inspiration, not our experience. Most of us are not mystics. So how do we hear the voice of Jesus calling us today?

Sheep Congregate in Flocks Just Like We Gather For Worship

When Jesus said, “My sheep listen to my voice; I know them, and they follow me,” he gave us some clues as to what this means for us today.

First, for sheep to listen to the shepherd, he or she has to say something. The first thing we need ot realize is that Jesus still speaks to us today. Of course he speaks through Scripture, which is how most of us know anything that Jesus has said.

But Jesus said, “My sheep listen to my voice…” For sheep to listen, the shepherd has to be speaking. Now this may seem obvious, but we often gather for worship, go through the order of worship, sing our songs, give our offerings, listen for more or less 20 minutes to people like me, and then go home. And we can do all of that without being aware of the Shepherd’s voice at all.

The first expectation of worship is that Jesus is going to say something to us.

The second expectation of worship is that Jesus is going to say something to us all — as a group, or flock, if you will. Because Jesus imagery was not accidentally chosen. Jesus knew that sheep congregated in flocks, and he referred to himself as the Good Shepherd.

So when he says, “My sheep hear my voice…” he means the flock, the whole bunch of them, as a group — or in Israel’s case, as a nation.

Most of us aren’t mystics, but we are members of this congregation. And it is gathered here that we hear the voice of Jesus speaking to us. It is the congregation gathered for worship that should have the expectation that Jesus is going to speak to us, and speak clearly. About who we should be. About what we should do. About the mission to which he has called us.

Each week when we gather here, we should ask ourselves, “What will Jesus say to us today?” and then we should listen for the way in which he might say it. Because I’m pretty sure that most of the time, the voice of Jesus is not going to be my voice. Of course, I hope I speak the words of Jesus faithfully, but most of the time I think Jesus is going to speak to us in some other way that we have to pay attention to.

Like when our children touch our hearts with their sweet sincerity and honesty. Like when a concern moves us to pray, as I understand you prayed for me when I was so sick. Like when we rejoice at a new birth, either physical or spiritual, and are reminded that the kingdom of God continues in the lives of those just coming into it. Like when a song resonates with us all and together we sing or listen in the presence of the Holy Spirit.

So, the question for us in not, Does Jesus still speak to people today? But the question for us is, “What is Jesus saying to us this morning?”

What is Jesus saying to us about the violence in our nation? About the bombing in Boston? About the violent crimes tried in the courthouse across the street from this sanctuary? Does Jesus have anything for us to do to be his peace, his shalom, in this world? in our community?

What is Jesus saying to us today about the poverty in our county? About those who live in substandard housing, or who go to bed hungry, or who are victims of domestic abuse? What is he saying to us about how we can be salt and light in this community?

What is Jesus saying to us today about those who have no church family? Who, when sickness or difficulty come into their lives, have no one to gather and pray for them, as we gather each week and pray for one another.

Of course, I may be wrong today. Jesus may not be saying anything to us about any of those issues. But he is saying something. What are we listening for today?

“My sheep listen to my voice; I know them, and they follow me.”

 

Sermon: The Difference in the Good Shepherd and the Hired Hand

This is the sermon I’m preaching tomorrow, Sunday, May 3, 2009.  I hope your day is a wonderful one!

The Difference Between the Good Shepherd and the Hired Hand
John 10:11-18

¹¹“I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep. ¹²The hired hand is not the shepherd who owns the sheep. So when he sees the wolf coming, he abandons the sheep and runs away. Then the wolf attacks the flock and scatters it. ¹³The man runs away because he is a hired hand and cares nothing for the sheep.

¹⁴“I am the good shepherd; I know my sheep and my sheep know me— ¹⁵just as the Father knows me and I know the Father—and I lay down my life for the sheep. ¹⁶I have other sheep that are not of this sheep pen. I must bring them also. They too will listen to my voice, and there shall be one flock and one shepherd. ¹⁷The reason my Father loves me is that I lay down my life—only to take it up again. ¹⁸No one takes it from me, but I lay it down of my own accord. I have authority to lay it down and authority to take it up again. This command I received from my Father.”

A Real Live Encounter with a Sheep

When we lived in Lilburn, Georgia in 1974, we had a wonderful family in our church named the Eidsons.  They lived on Beaver Ruin Road, which is where the original Beaver Ruin Baptist Church was located.  I suppose at some point some beavers had ruined the creek, or the ruins of a beaver dam became a landmark — “Go two miles down the road and when you see the beaver ruin, turn at the next right.”  Kind of like our Tightsqueeze.

But, back to the Eidsons.  John and Margaret lived on a few acres with their three children — a boy and two girls.  John was a deacon in our church and grew up in the country, and still kept his hand in on the acres he owned in that part of Gwinnett County.  The Eidsons always had a garden, and they had a cow.  For awhile, we got milk from them and it was wonderful.  The cream separated and floated on top, and you had to shake the bottle before you poured a glass.  At church when the lesson called for the preschoolers to make butter by shaking a jar of whole milk, Margaret always brought the milk straight from their cow.

The Eidsons also had a sheep.  I think they just had one, at least I only remember one.  Now back in 1974, I was a young preacher boy all of 26 years old, and I had about a much interest in farming and gardening as I did in going to the moon.  I may have actually had more interest in going to the moon, now that I think about it, because we had just landed on the moon.  But back to the sheep.  We were over at the Eidsons one day, and John and I were talking about the church and walking in his yard behind the house.

We walked up to the fence, and the sheep came over to him.  John rubbed the sheep’s head, and asked me if I had ever felt the wool on a sheep.  “No, I don’t think I have,” I replied.  He said, “Put your hand in her wool.” This sheep had not been sheared for awhile and she was quite woolly.  “Feel the lanolin?” John asked me.

I had pulled my hand back and felt the kind of soft, oily substance on my hand. “That’s lanolin,” John said.  “It’ll keep your skin soft.”  Come to find out, it’s the lanolin that helps shed water off of sheep — a kind of waterproofing for all-weather flocks. Well, that was my first, and I think last face-to-face encounter with a sheep.  But even as disinterested as I was then, I was taken with John’s way with the sheep, and the sheep really seemed to like John.  He knew his sheep, even one, and the sheep knew him.

Jesus Echoes the Words of A Prophet

That story brings us to our passage today, from John 10.  Jesus has just come from healing a man by spitting on the ground and applying the mud to his eyes.  Of course, Jesus did this on the Sabbath, which incurred the wrath of those watchdogs of the faith, the Pharisees.  All that takes place in John 9, and John then records Jesus talking about the sheep and the shepherds.

Jesus says, “I am the good shepherd.”  Those words imply that there are bad shepherds, too.  And there were, both in Jesus’ day and in the Old Testament book of Ezekiel.  In Ezekiel 34, hear these words from the prophet Ezekiel:

¹Then the word of the LORD came to me saying,

²“Son of man, prophesy against the shepherds of Israel Prophesy and say to those shepherds, ‘Thus says the Lord GOD, “Woe, shepherds of Israel who have been feeding themselves! Should not the shepherds feed the flock?

³“You eat the fat and clothe yourselves with the wool, you slaughter the fat sheep without feeding the flock.

⁴“Those who are sickly you have not strengthened, the diseased you have not healed, the broken you have not bound up, the scattered you have not brought back, nor have you sought for the lost; but with force and with severity you have dominated them.

⁵“They were scattered for lack of a shepherd, and they became food for every beast of the field and were scattered.

⁶“My flock wandered through all the mountains and on every high hill; My flock was scattered over all the surface of the earth, and there was no one to search or seek for them.”‘”

⁷Therefore, you shepherds, hear the word of the LORD:

⁸“As I live,” declares the Lord GOD, “surely because My flock has become a prey, My flock has even become food for all the beasts of the field for lack of a shepherd, and My shepherds did not search for My flock, but rather the shepherds fed themselves and did not feed My flock;

⁹therefore, you shepherds, hear the word of the LORD:

¹⁰‘Thus says the Lord GOD, “Behold, I am against the shepherds, and I will demand My sheep from them and make them cease from feeding sheep So the shepherds will not feed themselves anymore, but I will deliver My flock from their mouth, so that they will not be food for them.”‘”

So, when Jesus identifies himself as the “good shepherd” and implies that there are bad shepherds, too, those who hear him instantly recognize he is indicting the religious leaders of his day — the Pharisees, Saduccees, and the chief priest — for spiritual corruption.

Jesus’ accusation is that the “hireling” in the King James, or the hired hand, does the shepherd’s job for personal gain, and not for the sake of the sheep.

And, when the hired hand sees a threat to the flock, he runs away leaving the sheep defenseless.  It was a poorly kept secret that the chief priest was in cahoots with the Roman occupation of Judea, and that the Pharisees enjoyed special treatment because they remained silent in the face of the outrages perpetrated by the presence of Roman troops in Jerusalem.

The description of the bad shepherds by the prophet Ezekiel surely came to mind when Jesus invoked the shepherd imagery.  Ezekiel says that the bad shepherds:

• Fed themselves, but not the flock.
• Slaughtered the fat sheep, dressed in fine woolen garments, but did not feed the flock.
• Did not care for the sick, diseased, or broken sheep.
• Did not seek the lost or scattered sheep.
• Dominated the flock with force and severity.

Then Ezekiel speaks the words of God: ‘Thus says the Lord GOD, “Behold, I am against the shepherds, and I will demand My sheep from them and make them cease from feeding sheep So the shepherds will not feed themselves anymore, but I will deliver My flock from their mouth, so that they will not be food for them.’

The Good Shepherd Lays Down His Life

But Jesus says there is a different kind of shepherd, a good shepherd.  As interested as the bad shepherd is in his own profit, the good shepherd is interested in his sheep.  There are three reasons Jesus gives for being a good shepherd:

1. “I know my sheep and they know me.”
2. “I lay down my life for the sheep.”
3. “I have other sheep…I must bring them, too.”

“I know my sheep and they know me.” That’s a picture of relationship, of time spent together, of trust, of care, of interest in those under his watch, and of personal knowledge of them.  This is no long-distance relationship.  This is not a cold professionalism.  This is an intimate understanding of which sheep likes to run ahead, of which lambs are the most playful, of which ewes the most attentive, of which rams the most defensive.  This is a shepherd who knows his sheep, calls their names, counts their heads when they enter and leave the sheepfold.  This is a shepherd who loves his sheep.

This is not just a job, not just a meal ticket, this is the shepherd’s life because these are his sheep.  And this shepherd knows that you can shear the sheep a couple of times a year, but you can only skin them once.  These sheep exist because he protects them, guards them, searches for them, and brings them home each night.

“I lay down my life for the sheep.” This quality of the shepherd really has a double meaning.  Jesus, in this same chapter, refers to himself as the sheep gate.  When the sheep were out in the pastures, the custom was for the shepherd to usher them into the sheepfold each night.  The sheepfold was typically a stacked stone compound, high enough for keep out predators, but without a door.  The shepherd then lay down in the opening to the sheepfold, and literally became the sheepgate.  Nothing went in or came out unless it came by the shepherd first.

But then, of course, Jesus really does lay down his life for the sheep.  We have before us today the symbols of that sacrifice.  And, Jesus makes it clear here in John 10 that he is laying down his life of his own accord — he’s choosing to give his life for the sheep, and that is why the Father loves him so.

“I have other sheep…I must bring them, too.” Finally, the good shepherd is concerned for all the sheep, for sheep in general, not just the ones in his sheepfold.  Scholars have often interpreted this statement of Jesus to mean that the Gentiles would also hear the Gospel.  Which they — we — did and responded.  But, I think Jesus is saying something much bigger than that.  I think he’s saying “there are some unlikely sheep — the unclean, the poor, the diseased, the lame, the weak, the oppressed — these are my sheep, too.”  Not just the upright, the righteous, the powerful, the ones like us.  One preacher said if Jesus were making his “good shepherd” statement today, he would say, I am the “good migrant worker.”  Why?  Because shepherds were among the lowest classes of their day.  They were ceremonially unclean, and therefore could not worship God with the assembly of Israel.  They were the marginalized, the ones who did the dirty work, who lived with the herds out in the pastures, who did the jobs no one else wanted to do.  The good shepherd cares for all sheep, not just the ones who are currently in his sheepfold.

An Example of a Good Shepherd

In El Salvador in the late 1970s, the country was rocked by political turmoil and violence.  Death squads, under the direction of the Salvadoran political leaders, roamed the countryside kidnapping and killing all who opposed their policies and regime.  Archbishop Oscar Romero was an unassuming figure in the midst of his countries chaos.  Selected as the compromise candidate, Archbishop Romero had stayed clear of politics, and had even harshly criticized Catholic priests in the country who had embraced the new and radical liberation theology.

But one night as his assistant, a priest named Rutillio Grande, a 7-year old boy, and an old man, were all gunned down by one of the death squads.  Archbishop Romero went to the tiny village to claim the body of the slain priest, and to comfort the families of the little boy and old man.  That night the Archbishop of El Salvadore stood in a small parish church looking out at the crowd gathered to hear him speak.  Fear gripped the countryside, and Oscar Romero promised them that the violence would end.  That peace would come to El Salvador.  That he was with them in their fear and in their struggle.  One of Romero’s biographers wrote later “The peasants had asked for a good shepherd and that night they received one.”

At this point in El Salvador’s sad history, 3,000 people were being killed per month.  Bodies were dumped in streams, and in the garbage dump of San Salvador.  75,000 people would die, thousands more vanish, and 1,000,000 people leave the tiny country of El Salvador during this reign of terror.

Oscar Romero took to the airwaves, and in his weekly homily, promised that he would not rest until all the violence was ended, until peace came to El Salvador.  He refused to attend the inauguration of El Salvador’s latest president, which further inflamed the opposition against him.  All the bishops of El Salvador turned on him, complaining to the Vatican that he had become “politicized.”  But Romero continued to speak out.

He not only spoke out, he made frequent trips to the massive garbage dumps, accompanying families who were searching for the bodies of their loved ones.  He spoke at funerals for the murdered; stopped the construction of El Salvador’s majestic cathedral until the killing stopped; and, refused to hold communion during a period of particular violence.

The final straw came when Romero, in a radio address to the El Salvadoran troops, urged them to stop killing their fellow citizens, and told them that ” No soldier is obliged to obey an order that is contrary to the will of God . . . ”

The next day, while saying a public mass, Oscar Romero was shot in the chest by a man standing at the back of the church.  Romero fell behind the altar, at the feet of the massive crucifix of Jesus, who was shown bleeding from the wound in his own side.  There Romero died, a martyr for God, a good shepherd who laid down his life for his sheep.  Just before Romero was shot, he said, “”One must not love oneself so much, as to avoid getting involved in the risks of life that history demands of us, and those that fend off danger will lose their lives.”

The passage he had just read was,

“Unless the grain of wheat falls to the earth and dies, it remains only a grain. But if it dies, it bears much fruit ”(Jn. 12:23-26)