Easter 4A Good Shepherds and Bad Shepherds
No longer living in a pastoral world, few of us have any
direct experience of sheep and shepherds. Such that when Jesus spins an
extended metaphor about sheep and shepherds, we are very much at a disadvantage
unlike the people to whom the evangelist John addresses this episode in chapter
10. We spend a childhood reciting, “Mary had a little lamb, its fleece was
white as snow/and everywhere that Mary went the lamb was sure to go.” We
devour candy and cake lambs at Easter. We think of sheep as cute, fuzzy little
things, when the only sheep I ever met were in a barnyard, and were nowhere
near white as snow, not very cute, rather smelly, and will do their level best
to head-butt you all the way from the backdoor to the outhouse. I would have to
grab one by the head to hold it at bay as I would back my way from the house,
to the outhouse and back.
They will graze a pasture to the ground, then eat the roots,
creating a desert, unless a shepherd moves them on. They will eat until they
bloat themselves to death on green alfalfa, lacking all sense to stop eating as
their bellies swell. They can be rude, rambunctious, and get lost at a moment’s
notice.[i]
It is safe to say, that when the Bible tells us that we are the sheep of the
Lord God’s pasture,[ii]
it is not exactly a compliment. The great 20th Century theologian,
Karl Barth, used to urge people to read the Bible in one hand and the day’s
news in the other. The daily news will most often confirm, that like sheep, we
humans tend to be an unruly bunch. We seem not to have learned our lessons;
have made little progress in getting along with one another, let alone love one
another; we tend to listen to the loudest voices in the room, ignoring the
voices of wisdom throughout the ages that have tried to guide us along right
pathways. We find ourselves seduced by the voices of bad shepherds telling us its
ok to be greedy, to be angry, to be ignorant of facts and believe in lies. As
the T’ang Dynasty Zen Buddhist poet Shih Te warned some 1500 years ago, “drink
deep these poisoned wines, and lie drunk in darkness and unknowing.” [iii]
Jesus and his co-religionists were faced with such darkness
and unknowing every day, some 800 years before Shih Te. Speaking of shepherds
and sheep, he taps into some 1800 years of experience as he speaks of good
shepherds and bad shepherds; thieves and bandits. God, his Father, YHWH, a God
of mercy and justice for all people, had chosen shepherds like Abraham, Isaac
and Jacob to guide people on the right pathway to a world of promise. But
straying from that way, they end up under the yoke of a harsh life of slavery in
Pharaoh’s Empire – an empire of greed and over consumption. God calls Moses to
lead the people back onto a right way of living together. Moses, himself a
shepherd of a flock belonging to the Priest at Midian after saving the priest’s
seven daughters from a band of bad shepherds who tried to drive the women away
from a well where they were drawing water. [iv]
Moses was a good shepherd.
For 40 patient years, YHWH and Moses outlined a way of
living together with mutual respect and a just life for all people. Yet, long
after Moses led them to the land of promise and abundance for all, bad
shepherds, kings and priests alike, forsook their responsibilities to shepherd
God’s people and gave-in to lives drunk on greed, anger and ignorance. YHWH,
God of mercy and justice, declared through the prophet Ezekiel some 700 years
before Jesus: “Mortal, prophesy against the shepherds of Israel; prophesy
and say to them: … Woe, you shepherds of Israel who have been feeding
yourselves! Should not shepherds feed the sheep? You eat the fat; you clothe
yourselves with the wool; you slaughter the fatted calves, but you do not feed
the sheep. You have not strengthened the weak; you have not healed the sick;
you have not bound up the injured; you have not brought back the strays; you
have not sought the lost, but with force and harshness you have ruled them…I
myself will be the shepherd of my sheep…I myself will find the strays, heal the
wounded, heal the seek and feed my sheep…[v]
Now captive by the Empire of Caesar’s Rome, with bad
shepherds like the Herods, Pilate, and the collaboration of some of the priests
and aristocracy of Jerusalem, not to mention those impressed into service by
Rome to be tax collectors, Jesus draws upon Ezekiel’ prophecy, first saying, “Very
truly, I tell you, I am the gate for the sheep… Whoever enters by me will be
saved, and will come in and go out and find pasture.” That is, unlike the
current and past bad shepherds, as the gatekeeper to the sheepfold keeps out
the bad shepherds and thieves, Jesus himself will protect the flock, let them
out to pasture and return to the safety of the fold. Jesus himself will feed
them, search for the lost, heal the sick, bind up the wounds of those injured,
and clothe those who are naked. He knows them by name. They know his voice.
They will follow him out of the darkness of the bad shepherds and into the
light of God’s mercy and justice. [vi]
Jesus also hints at other sheep and other shepherds, other voices, who will
also live out God’s promise and purpose.
Jesus then says, “I am the good shepherd.” That is, Jesus
asserts a particular relationship between himself and God. Jesus makes the
words of God in Ezekiel his own, and in doing so aligns himself with God’s purpose!
[vii]
Jesus becomes the fulfillment of the
prophecy Ezekiel proclaims. Jesus not only assumes God’s role as good shepherd,
he lives it out every day on every page of all four gospels! Throughout all
four gospels, Jesus the good shepherd issues only two commands: Follow me,
and Love one another as I have loved you. That is, we are to become a
community of good shepherds for the world and for one another. We are to listen
to his voice, and follow in the way he lives his life. It is just that simple
As John’s gospel ends, Jesus lays down his life for his
friends; he returns to remind them of all he has said and done; then he stands
on the shore of lake Galilee as they have a bad night fishing. He calls out to
throw their net on the other side. Change what you are doing. Suddenly, the net
and the boat is filled with very many fish – or, do they bring more sheep into
the fold to live together with the good shepherd? As mixed as John’s metaphors
may be, they come ashore, and there is Jesus, beside a charcoal fire, cooking
bread and fish. “Come and have breakfast,” he says. They know his voice.
Once again, he feeds them as he has so many times before. He is still their
shepherd. This is all they need to know. He is still here!
After breakfast, Jesus takes Peter aside and asks, “Peter,
do you love me?” Peter says, “Yes, Lord, I love you.” Jesus says, “Feed
my lambs!” Two more times Jesus asks, “Do you love me?” And two more times like
Peter we say, “Yes! Lord, we love you.” Two more times Jesus says, “...tend
my sheep…feed my sheep.” That’s it. We are to be a community of good
shepherds. Jesus’s final words to Peter, to us, and his last words in John’s
gospel are, “Follow me.” [viii]
Voices of good shepherds throughout the ages seek to call us
out of the darkness imposed by all bad shepherds. They all say the same thing:
Follow me, and Love one another. It is that simple. We can choose. We can
listen to voices of greed, anger and ignorance and live in drunken darkness.
Or, we can choose to listen to the words, “Follow me, and Love one another.”
Good shepherds love us, care for us, and lead us out of the darkness into the light.
It is just that simple.
[i] Swanson, Richard, Provoking the Gospel of John
(Pilgrim Press, Cleveland:2010) p.269-70
[ii]
Psalm 100
[iii]
Seaton, J.P., editor & translator, Cold Mountain Poems (Shambala, Boston
& London:2009) p.78
[iv]
Exodus 2:16-22
[v]
Ezekiel 34
[vi]
Ibid, Ezekiel
[vii] O’Day,
Gail R. & Hylen, Susan E., John (Westminster John Knox Press:2006) p.106
[viii]
John 21:15-19
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