SHEPHERDS AND SHEEP

A Sermon for Good Shepherd Sunday

The image of the Good Shepherd who calls us each by name – who cares for, knows and loves the sheep – is reinforced today by the beloved 23rd Psalm. Together these scriptures paint a pastoral picture found everywhere, from children’s literature to stained glass windows to classical music. The Good Shepherd is also found every year, in countless churches like this one, on the fourth Sunday of the Easter season. This is Good Shepherd Sunday. Today, we learn about shepherds, sheep and God’s love for each and every one of us.

Jesus tells those gathered like sheep around him that his sheep hear his voice and know him and will follow him. Jesus implies that those around him are sheep, but they do not yet belong to his sheepfold, his flock. These sheep are not yet letting Jesus be the Shepherd-in-charge.

What do we know about sheep? First of all, we know they love to eat! So, it’s important for sheep to find a place where they can safely graze. One sheep will tend to lead other sheep to newer, greener pastures. That’s often a ram, a male sheep, those horns indicating just who it is who thinks he’s now in charge. Along comes the Good Shepherd, the One who knows that all herds of sheep, whether ram or ewe, need some help moving along on their journey. Because from time to time, all we, like sheep, go astray, as the prophet Isaiah put it, and we all tend to turn from the ways of God to our own way (53:6). Whether ram or ewe, we need, indeed, the love and leadership of Jesus, the Good Shepherd.

Lately I have been suggesting here at All Saints’ that Jesus is our vision of spiritual leadership, a vision of God we need. Today, the particular, concrete vision of God, held up for all of us to see, is Jesus the Good Shepherd. But what is it about that image, in this season of Easter? What is it that resurrects us? What about this image gives us new life? What is new and life-giving for us, today, about this vision, this image of God in Jesus, our Good Shepherd?

What may be new for you on this Good Shepherd Sunday is the story from the Acts of the Apostles. You may know of the ancient practice in the church during Eastertide to hear a reading from Acts, a story from the earliest Christian communities, instead of a lesson from the Hebrew Scriptures, the Old Testament. But it is only in recent years, with a new constellation of lessons appointed for our use, that we have begun to hear about Tabitha, also known in Greek as Dorcas. Tabitha/Dorcas was a widow “devoted to good works and acts of charity” (9:36). We learn that she has died, and Jesus’ disciples have sent two men to find Peter, their leader, asking him to come without delay. Peter, now established as a healer (9:33-35), finds his spiritual powers are increasing. So he goes to Joppa, where Dorcas’/Tabitha’s body lies in preparation for burial. Peter prays for her and then, echoing Jesus’ command that Lazarus rise from the dead, he says, “Tabitha, get up.”

Now, if we take time to read ahead into the next chapter of Acts, we will find a story like the one we heard last week from Acts, a story of conversion. At the beginning of chapter 9 of Acts, it’s the conversion of Saul, who later becomes Paul. At the beginning of chapter 10, it’s Cornelius. In between those two conversions, there are two healings. Clearly God’s Spirit is active in the time after Jesus’ resurrection. At work through the acts of Peter and Paul, the Holy Spirit brings healing to the sick, hope to the despondent – even new life to the dead.

But what does this story about Tabitha/Dorcas have to do with Jesus the Good Shepherd? Why put these two together? Well, we remember that Peter, the rock on whom Jesus builds the church, becomes the first Bishop of Rome – the first Pope. The emphasis in this text and throughout church history seems to be on Peter, who succeeds Jesus, becoming a new shepherd of the sheepfold. We also remember that Peter was once a sheep. Yet Jesus raised up Peter to be a shepherd among all the sheep. And the church has continued to raise up sheep as shepherds for more than two thousand years. I stand among you because of that tradition.

Yet our real, tradition – a word which means literally to hand over – our true, authentic tradition is…Jesus. If we are truly being the traditional Christians we claim to be, we hand over Jesus, from one generation to another. And we hand over Jesus the Good Shepherd, one to another, by learning what it means to be a sheep, first – and then, what it means to be a shepherd among sheep, remembering always that there is only one Good Shepherd. As rector of All Saints’, I need constantly to be reminded that I am a shepherd among all of us sheep. I need to remember that I am in charge – and that I am not in charge.

The problem is that we tend to confuse the Good Shepherd with those of us sheep who become shepherds. We sheep who are shepherds also get confused, sometimes thinking we no longer need the Good Shepherd. Popes, priests, politicians, presidents, parents – all of us forget from time to time that we are people first, sheep first. That is why I love the commendatory prayer in our Prayer Book to be offered at the time of death, whether we are bishop or baby: “Into your hands, O merciful Savior, we commend your servant…Acknowledge, we humbly beseech you, a sheep of your own fold, a lamb of your own flock, a sinner of your own redeeming” (The Book Of Common Prayer, p. 465).

All those sheep like Peter whom Jesus calls to be shepherds, all of us get distracted. Shepherds, like sheep, sin. Even Peter. It makes me wonder why Peter asked all those women to step outside. Those widows who stood alongside their sister Dorcas, who now stood with Peter in that room, who wept, who showed off the clothes Dorcas made – I wonder why Peter needed to put those women out of the room that held the body of Dorcas, so that he alone could pray for her? Yes, there is biblical precedent for prophets and healers to pray for the sick alone. But why DID Peter do it that way?

What if the reason we now hear the story of Dorcas/Tabitha on Good Shepherd Sunday has something to do with the other sheep who are shepherds? One scholar suggests, “The emphasis on this text is not upon Peter. It is upon the community…they lovingly cared for Dorcas’ body. They . . . (wore) all the clothes she had made . . . They shed communal tears. They waited prayerfully (for Peter . . . This congregation of resurrection hope had reason to believe in a God who transcends the categories of birth, life and death . . . The congregation at Joppa was vulnerable . . . weeping . . . hoping . . . celebrating . . . unafraid to wade into each other’s lives in transforming ways . . . to be) a healing community” (Feasting on the Word, p. 429, 431). I don’t know about you, but to me, that kind of community, that kind of resurrection hope sounds like what this church’s CareTeams are trying so faithfully, so lovingly to help us be.

Jesus, the Good Shepherd, is our vision. We are sheep, and we seek to be shepherds, one to another, a community of love and leadership, a congregation of resurrection hope. But we cannot do it alone. None of us will ever be the Good Shepherd. Yet together, we can be an image of Jesus, an icon of the living Christ, a community of sheep who try to love one another the way the Good Shepherd keeps on loving us. All we, like sheep, will go astray and lose our way. The Good News is that we belong to the Good Shepherd, who knows us and calls us home, each by name. Listen . . . can you hear the Good Shepherd? We shall never be in want, as long as we seek to follow Jesus. And when we choose to follow Jesus, our Good Shepherd, Jesus will give us new life, even life eternal.