Very truly, I tell you, anyone who does not enter the sheepfold
by the gate but climbs in by another way is a thief and a bandit. 2The
one who enters by the gate is the shepherd of the sheep. 3The
gatekeeper opens the gate for him, and the sheep hear his voice. He calls his
own sheep by name and leads them out. 4When he has brought out all
his own, he goes ahead of them, and the sheep follow him because they know his
voice. 5They will not follow a stranger, but they will run from him
because they do not know the voice of strangers." 6Jesus used
this figure of speech with them, but they did not understand what he was saying
to them. 7So again Jesus said to them, "Very truly, I tell you,
I am the gate for the sheep. 8All who came before me are thieves and
bandits; but the sheep did not listen to them. 9I am the gate.
Whoever enters by me will be saved, and will come in and go out and find
pasture. 10The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy. I
came that they may have life, and have it abundantly.
This Sunday is the 4th Sunday of
Easter, also often referred to as "Good Shepherd Sunday." There are a
lot of things sort of percolating all at the same time. First, there's the idea
that Jesus applies a shepherding metaphor to himself. On the one hand this is a
very ancient Jewish metaphor. The Old Testament speaks in similar terms about
God, Israel's kings, and prophets. Ironically, by the New Testament era the
'profession' of shepherd is thought of as suspect. It was a necessary thing in
an ancient agrarian society, yet shepherds themselves were thought of as
shifty, transient, unreliable people. Scholars tell us that a shepherd was not
allowed to give testimony in a legal proceeding, for instance. So when Jesus
adopts the metaphor for himself, he is at one and the same time borrowing from
Old Testament imagery (think Psalm 23), but also putting himself in a [current]
unappreciated category.
Another interesting detail about the
story is that the immediate context is the expulsion of the man born
blind. This occurs in John 9. The disciples see the man born blind and ask who sinned, this man or his parents? Jesus
replies His blindness has nothing to do
with his sins or his parents' sins. He is blind so that God's power might be
seen at work in him. At which point he goes through the complex process of
spitting in the dirt, placing the mud in the guy's eye, telling him to wash,
etc. Of course this was all done on the Sabbath, prompting the Pharisees to
object: The man who did this cannot be
from God, for he does not obey the Sabbath law. More things happen, as
there's a debate about whether or not the healed man really was born blind;
they quiz his parents, etc., with the end result that they expelled him from the synagogue (9:34). Following that, Jesus makes
a statement about 'spiritual blindness'... applying it to the Pharisees, and
then immediately launches into the Good Shepherd monologue.
Within the
passage, Jesus uses several words to describe 'other voices.' He uses 'thief,'
...one who steals what does not belong to him; 'bandit' (marauder) ... one who
willingly uses violence to get his way; and 'stranger'... anyone who is
unknown. Within the narrative, all of these terms would apply to others who are
in competition with Jesus for the
lives/souls of the sheep.
In many
ways, I think that’s what the passage boils down to for us in our context
today. Who/what is in competition for our souls today? I can think of a lot of
things: false religion; NO religion; general apathy; a pervasive sense that God
doesn’t matter; materialism, consumerism, and at the opposite end of the
spectrum a rabidly legalistic fundamentalism. Over and against this cacophony
of ‘voices,’ Jesus says: He calls his own sheep by name and leads them out. 4When
he has brought out all his own, he goes ahead of them, and the sheep follow him
because they know his voice. And
therein, is where we as sheep of the flock find our calling: we are to listen
to our Good Shepherd’s voice and follow him: follow him to the still waters of
holy baptism, and to the lush green restorative pastures of holy communion.
As
so many commentators point out, this picture of “sheep-herding” is entirely
different from our culture. To the extent that we think much anymore about such
things, shepherds from our culture ‘drive’ the flock from the rear and with the
help of dogs. In the ancient culture of the Bible—and in places in the world
where this still holds true today—the shepherd is alone and **leads the flock
from the front.
The
point is that we go where HE goes. And this is a life-long process.
Cheers,
T.M.
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