Sue's Views ...: The Open Flock

sermon preached by the Rev Sue Judson Hamly on May 3, 2009 at Faith United Church, UCC, International Falls, MN

Texts: Psalm 23 and John 10:11-18

Many people have a tendency to think—or assume—that sheep are stupid. But it’s not true. Sheep tend to stay close with other sheep. If they get separated they become quite agitated and uncomfortable. They know when they are together as a flock they are more protected from predators.

Sheep recognize sheep faces—and human faces to some extent. They recognize sounds and can even recognize the voice of the shepherd who tends to the flock of which they are a part.

Sheep know how to choose the kind of food that will give them the best nourishment based on the season and their dietary needs. (THAT’s pretty amazing!!)

So, all in all, the intelligence level of sheep isn’t just “not baaaaaad,” it’s pretty good![i] (I know, that’s a terrible joke.)

But it does get us thinking, perhaps differently than we might otherwise think. What is Jesus talking about in this story? Traditionally we think he’s talking about his being the Good Shepherd—and of course Psalm 23 talks of God being the Shepherd who takes such good care of us. Sometimes we think of pastors as shepherds and congregations as flocks.

There are lots of ways of looking at this story from John’s gospel and I’ve learned a lot about sheep and shepherds over the years of preaching on this text.

But what I noticed this time around is that this story is about who’s IN the flock … and the answer is EVERYBODY!

We belong to Jesus and we are known by Jesus in the same way sheep and shepherd know each other. And this trust and knowing defines communities of faith. This isn’t a personal, just-me-and-Jesus relationship but that of a community, a flock, watched over by the Good Shepherd. Theologian, Karl Barth, once observed that “there is no such thing as an individual Christian.” There is also no “separate singular form of the word sheep.” We are not separate from one another: “In our essential belongingness, our being is bound up with the entire flock: with believers who break bread and recite prayers with us, and with those sheep whom Jesus knows and God sees, but whom we can scarcely bring ourselves to acknowledge and welcome, let alone live alongside or die to protect”[ii]

So, here’s where things become more difficult, making room for one another in the fold of God’s love. It seems like we ought to find it easy and even natural to relax into the warmth of God’s care, to move over and make room for everyone else. And yet this image, of religious leaders themselves not recognizing the immeasurable worth of each individual in the eyes of God, is just as powerful today as it is in any age. Leaders and their flocks in the church have a hard time not thinking about who’s in the flock, and who isn’t, and that can equate with who’s loved by God, and who isn’t…or at least, who isn’t loved by God quite as much, or in the same way, as we are.

But, as I think we all know, it’s not up to us to decide who’s in or who’s out; this text tells us that Jesus has “other sheep” elsewhere and that he intends to draw them in, too. So it’s important to realize that “the flock is not yet finally fixed. It is open-ended. There are always others who recognize the shepherd’s voice and enter the fold.”[iii]

I’m sure you’re all aware of the Hate Crimes Bill that has been in the news this week and that it has passed the House of Representatives. A few days ago I began receiving e-mails from a group that I thought I had reported to yahoo as spam and wouldn’t hear from again. This organization comes out of North Hollywood and calls itself jail4judges. Its self-proclaimed aim is to “end the rampant and pervasive judicial corruption in the legal system of the United States.”[iv] “JAIL” stands for “Judicial Accountability Initiative Law.” (I learned all this on Google.)

The e-mails I have recently received from this group claim that adding gender and sexual orientation to the Hate Crimes Bill will cause clergy to be prosecuted and jailed for, I quote, “preaching the gospel.” They are trying to frighten people into believing that the Hate Crimes bill would be used to prevent pastors who believe homosexuality is a sin from preaching that belief.

The Hate Crimes Bill is, of course, what it says it is—a bill focusing on violent crimes, not on what clergy preach in their pulpits and I am angry that I am still receiving such revolting e-mail. However, it’s always good to know what others are saying. And it makes me wonder why it’s so difficult for people to understand what Jesus said in today’s gospel reading.

Here it is again, “I have other sheep that do not belong to this fold. I must bring them also, and they will listen to my voice. So there will be one flock, one shepherd. For this reason the Father loves me, because I lay down my life in order to take it up again…”

So, the image of the good shepherd isn’t as warm and fuzzy as we’d like or as we may have always thought. No, it’s really quite unsettling, which is how Jesus was most of the time—unsettling his listeners, and us too. It’s important to remember that “the life of a shepherd was anything but picturesque. It was dangerous, risky, and menial. Shepherds were rough around the edges, spending time in the fields rather than in polite society. For Jesus to say, 'I am the good shepherd,’ would have been an affront to the religious elite and educated. The claim had an edge to it. A modern-day equivalent might be for Jesus to say, ‘I am the good migrant worker,’”[v] or “I am your transgender neighbor,” or “I am…” and we can fill in the blank with whatever person or group of people makes us most uneasy.

But we must remember that “Jesus did not exclude people based on the standards of the day….He embraced the outcast, the oppressed, and the overlooked….John[’s gospel] makes it clear that the work of gathering the flock belongs to Jesus and God and we are to provide a space where all are welcome. The community that John envisions is open and celebrates its diversity as a gift from God.”[vi]

Jesus provides a space where all are welcome and we are called to do the same. The flock is open-ended, not closed. Jesus owns up to having “others” that he cares about, too, and remembering that should nurture in us a whole new perspective on hospitality. It’s more than a warm welcome to worship and a cup of coffee downstairs afterward (although those are very good things). Hospitality is difficult; it tests us. It calls and even pushes us out to our growing edges.[vii]

What is our growing edge here in this community? Whom do we need to welcome to our congregation? The flock IS open, so we must be open too—who might be just waiting for an invitation to come here and learn about the open-ended love of God, Jesus and Faith United Church?

We know the Shepherd and we know we are called to make room for others in the open flock. All of us want safe pasture and God offers that to us. When we truly do become the open flock, surely goodness and mercy shall follow us all the days of our lives and we shall dwell in the house of God our whole lives long. AMEN.

Endnotes