John 10:11-18
The good shepherd is Jesus, and now that Jesus is with the Father there is a response to this which we are supposed to fulfill. There are ones who have not heard his voice and they still need to be brought in. Our response to the Good Shepherd is for us to bring others into the fold. At least this is what the first believers would have heard. If they had only sat around waiting there would be no reason to write about the good shepherd and what the shepherd does and that there are those trying to lead them astray. This still happens today. We get caught up into inaction, or being led astray, or not doing anything for the flocks we are attached to because we figure its a job for one person. This is not disciple making though. We are all disciples and in John's gospel the disciples become disciples after Jesus is raised from the dead and the last conversation we have with this is around the fire.
On the beach for breakfast the disciples gather with Jesus and he asks Peter three times, "do you love me?" This question could be for all of us too. Its meant to be. We have all denied we know Jesus. Not in the same way Peter did but in other ways, ways in which we have denied God's goodness in ourselves and in one another. This is where the discipleship comes in, we are to feed, tend and shepherd the sheep.
Well how do we feed others? Paul gives us the answer to this, "the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control." (Galatians 5:22-23a). If this is fruit this is what feeds others. Giving kind things truly does feed others. People are starved for this kind of response nowadays because we have fallen into the secular trap of right and wrong and forgotten all of these things go a long ways. It is different than Rome and power, it is different than strength and might and it is the fruit we all long to eat from. How often have you felt filled by any of the opposites of these? Feeding others means we try to tend to making these fruits of the Spirit. We may not possess all of them, but each one drives us closer to being able to feed one another.
It is no accident we give the peace to one another. Truly wishing peace to one another brings us to the table of love, God's love sacrificed and this is what Jesus is saying about the Good Shepherd. It is ultimately in Christ's example that we see this come alive. Especially in John's gospel, whether it is a visitor at night with questions like Nicodemus, or a Samaritan woman at a well, or a blind man who we get a fuller story of these are the examples Jesus leaves us of discipleship. Patience, kindness, love, and always the self-control of knowing whose we are and what we are called to do.
Tending the sheep. Tending is a lot of watching. Tending is watching just like we do for our young ones. It involves all of the Spirit's gifts. It also means we don't grow weary and take our eyes off of one another. This is what marked the early Christians as we read in Acts. They had care one for another. There was a song long ago called they will know we are Christians by our love. This is a mark of tending and one which doesn't seem to mark us today. We were marked by the ultimate price of love, Jesus laid down his life and in today's gospel Jesus says it is by his own choice.
Would you choose to tend the flock this much. There have been ones who have done this. Taking care of the sick, tending the dying, all for his love's sake. Tending is a gift and we need to learn to give it freely and abundantly. We will find tending never is a limited action because in tending we are being tended to also. It is an act of giving and receiving.
Shepherd my sheep. By feeding and tending we are shepherding. We are watching out one for another and showing God's love in the world. Shepherding means we try our hardest to follow the example made by Jesus the Good Shepherd. We try as hard as we can to follow this example. It is hard work. It means attending to ourselves, to one another, to the dangers outside which can come and weaken us to seeing what it means in the first place. It means listening to the voice of the first Shepherd and finding it in our own lives.
These last two follow if we are attentive to feeding one another. It is our response to the love we have been given. In Madeleine L'Engle's book "A Wrinkle in Time" the shepherding comes from these three women to Meg, her brother Charles Wallace, and Calvin, her friend. These women give the foundation for a choice Meg has to make later on. A choice for life or death and she is well equipped to make it, she just has to believe in herself. To rely on the foundations of what she has been taught and to give that foundation in answer to all the darkness which begins to surround her. The answer is love. When we have good shepherding we can begin to know just who we are and whose we are. To choose the way Christ chose and lay down love for others. It is what the world needs.
The good shepherd is Jesus, and now that Jesus is with the Father there is a response to this which we are supposed to fulfill. There are ones who have not heard his voice and they still need to be brought in. Our response to the Good Shepherd is for us to bring others into the fold. At least this is what the first believers would have heard. If they had only sat around waiting there would be no reason to write about the good shepherd and what the shepherd does and that there are those trying to lead them astray. This still happens today. We get caught up into inaction, or being led astray, or not doing anything for the flocks we are attached to because we figure its a job for one person. This is not disciple making though. We are all disciples and in John's gospel the disciples become disciples after Jesus is raised from the dead and the last conversation we have with this is around the fire.
On the beach for breakfast the disciples gather with Jesus and he asks Peter three times, "do you love me?" This question could be for all of us too. Its meant to be. We have all denied we know Jesus. Not in the same way Peter did but in other ways, ways in which we have denied God's goodness in ourselves and in one another. This is where the discipleship comes in, we are to feed, tend and shepherd the sheep.
Well how do we feed others? Paul gives us the answer to this, "the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control." (Galatians 5:22-23a). If this is fruit this is what feeds others. Giving kind things truly does feed others. People are starved for this kind of response nowadays because we have fallen into the secular trap of right and wrong and forgotten all of these things go a long ways. It is different than Rome and power, it is different than strength and might and it is the fruit we all long to eat from. How often have you felt filled by any of the opposites of these? Feeding others means we try to tend to making these fruits of the Spirit. We may not possess all of them, but each one drives us closer to being able to feed one another.
It is no accident we give the peace to one another. Truly wishing peace to one another brings us to the table of love, God's love sacrificed and this is what Jesus is saying about the Good Shepherd. It is ultimately in Christ's example that we see this come alive. Especially in John's gospel, whether it is a visitor at night with questions like Nicodemus, or a Samaritan woman at a well, or a blind man who we get a fuller story of these are the examples Jesus leaves us of discipleship. Patience, kindness, love, and always the self-control of knowing whose we are and what we are called to do.
Tending the sheep. Tending is a lot of watching. Tending is watching just like we do for our young ones. It involves all of the Spirit's gifts. It also means we don't grow weary and take our eyes off of one another. This is what marked the early Christians as we read in Acts. They had care one for another. There was a song long ago called they will know we are Christians by our love. This is a mark of tending and one which doesn't seem to mark us today. We were marked by the ultimate price of love, Jesus laid down his life and in today's gospel Jesus says it is by his own choice.
Would you choose to tend the flock this much. There have been ones who have done this. Taking care of the sick, tending the dying, all for his love's sake. Tending is a gift and we need to learn to give it freely and abundantly. We will find tending never is a limited action because in tending we are being tended to also. It is an act of giving and receiving.
Shepherd my sheep. By feeding and tending we are shepherding. We are watching out one for another and showing God's love in the world. Shepherding means we try our hardest to follow the example made by Jesus the Good Shepherd. We try as hard as we can to follow this example. It is hard work. It means attending to ourselves, to one another, to the dangers outside which can come and weaken us to seeing what it means in the first place. It means listening to the voice of the first Shepherd and finding it in our own lives.
These last two follow if we are attentive to feeding one another. It is our response to the love we have been given. In Madeleine L'Engle's book "A Wrinkle in Time" the shepherding comes from these three women to Meg, her brother Charles Wallace, and Calvin, her friend. These women give the foundation for a choice Meg has to make later on. A choice for life or death and she is well equipped to make it, she just has to believe in herself. To rely on the foundations of what she has been taught and to give that foundation in answer to all the darkness which begins to surround her. The answer is love. When we have good shepherding we can begin to know just who we are and whose we are. To choose the way Christ chose and lay down love for others. It is what the world needs.
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