The Reverend Victoria Millar

Covenant Presbyterian Church, Racine , WI

Sunday, April 13, 2008

Sermon “The Shepherd’s Voice”

John 10:1-11

Listen for the word of the Lord to us.

10[Jesus said,] “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 is the word of the Lord.

Thanks be to God.

Summertime. 

On this snowy day in April, do you remember summertime?

Author Gregg Levoy in his book Callings

speaks of summertime and the spiritual life with these words. 

He writes:  “Some years ago, along a country road outside of Fresno , CA ,

the invisible world was made, for a brief moment, visible to me. 

I saw, in the light lancing through a row of trees,

great streams of yellow pollen sweeping by on the wind,

every speck filled with information—

blueprints for making perfect flowers,

the dark musculature of trees,

meadow grasses.

I saw, in that moment, the whole sky is filled with furtive transmissions

—pollen and seeds, radio waves and subatomic particles, the songs of birds,

satellite broadcasts of the six o’clock news and the Home Shopping Network.

And I saw that what is necessary to make substance or meaning out of any of it

 is a receiver, somebody to receive.”[1]

And so I wonder:  how much information, how many transmissions wash over us? 

How many voices compete for our attention? 

Stereos are still sold in components—speakers and receivers.

I particularly like the little button on my car stereo receiver labeled “seek.”

A large part of the spiritual life, the Christian life,

 is about trying to be attentive and selective in a noisy world.

I try to be a receiver

with a seek button for the wide scans

and then the fine-tuning,

a receiver trying to hear the divine voice

                                                that is ever speaking.

In today’s text from the gospel of John, Jesus taught about recognizing the divine voice of the good shepherd.

Through all the Bible, especially the Psalms, especially Psalm 23,

God cares and leads the people           

like a good shepherd tends his sheep.[2]

In today’s text, Jesus is speaking after an episode  

      in which some religious leaders were outraged by his healing a blind man on the Sabbath.

 Two weeks ago our student pastor Matt Morin spoke about the via negativa,

            via meaning way and negative meaning negative,

                        the way of explaining what is by first defining what it is not.

Jesus also explains the good shepherd beginning with what it is not.

            In the gospel of John, Jesus is denouncing the leaders who lacked compassion for the blind man.

He is making a comparison between false vs. good shepherds.

And he is saying the false shepherds are not even shepherds,

but are thieves, bandits and strangers

                        whom the sheep will not follow

and run from because they do not know their voices.

Damaging the flock in God’s name is not new.

Six hundred years before Jesus, the prophet Ezekiel cried out against the kings of Israel

saying they were false shepherds who do not have the best interest of the flock at heart,[3]

because they “did not feed the sheep,

                        did not strengthen the weak

did not heal the sick,

did not bind up the injured,

did not bring back the strayed,

and did not seek out the lost.”[4]

And how painful it has been in the last few years and again this week

     to open the newspaper to cases of sexual abuse against church leaders, Catholic, Protestant and fringe groups.

There have always been false shepherds, predators and fleecers.          

                            And one huge yardstick of goodness is

        the extent to which the shepherd protects the most vulnerable in the flock.

 It has always been necessary for the flock to be vigilant about which voice it follows.

In today’s text, Jesus is saying there is a relationship, an intimacy, between himself and the flock

            which helps us recognize his voice and to follow him.

                        He says he is “the good shepherd” who “calls his own sheep by name and leads them…

                                    and goes ahead of them.

                                                The sheep follow because they know his voice.”

                                    He says “he is the good shepherd who came

that we may have life and have it abundantly.”

Even if we cannot name it,   

I believe we are born with a deep longing

to receive the voice of God,

the voice of Jesus, the good shepherd’s voice.

And we hunger for the good shepherd’s promise to lead us to abundant life.

But how do we open ourselves to the good shepherd’s voice?

Over the centuries, the tried and true spiritual practice is to seek silence in order to hear the voice,

which the prophet Elijah called  “still, small voice, the sound of a light whisper.”[5] 

But we live in a culture where silence is scarce, undervalued and seemingly uncomfortable.

We live in a culture with 24X7 programming, news, weather, advertising and jingles,

where iPods are normal,

and televisions are multiplying in airports, grocery stores, cafes and waiting rooms.

And to make matters worse, by the time we are adults, most of us have acquired a head full of internal voices.

            The Eastern religions say we all have “monkey minds” filled with internal chatter.

And if you are like me, you can sometimes trace the voices inside your head to their source. 

·        When I hear, “That is pleasing to my eye,” that is my husband’s voice.

·        When I hear, “Everything happens for a reason,” that is my mother’s voice.

·        When I hear, “What am I, chopped liver?” that is my ego’s voice.

A psychologist friend believes each of us lives with a whole internal committee of voices,

not always a friendly committee.                                   

Then how will we ever receive the shepherd’s voice?

It is the work, the privilege, of a lifetime to hear the shepherd’s voice with greater clarity.

But this is what I have learned so far.

First, we repeat to each other the voice of the shepherd we have received in scripture.

Jesus said:

• Do not be afraid, little flock.[6]

• Listen and understand. [7]

• Watch and pray.[8]

• My peace I give you.[9]

• Forgive and you will be forgiven, give and it will be given to you. [10]

• Love one another as I have loved you.[11]

• When you cared for the least of these, you did it to me.[12]

• Come to me all you who are weary and I will give you rest.[13]

• Even the hairs of your head are numbered.[14]

Then, little by little, what seems to be the shepherd’s voice joins the internal committee.

Over time, the shepherd’s voice speaks up.

·        When a friend calls and needs to talk, the voice says, “Stop what you were doing. Listen.”

·        When someone is struggling, the voice says, “Ask: How can I pray for you?”

·        When I feel overwhelmed, the voice says, “Do not be afraid.  My peace I give you.”

·        When someone offends me, the voice says, “Forgive.”

·        When I am the offender, the voice says, “Ask to be forgiven.”

·        When someone delights me, the voice says, “Be joyful and love one another.”

·        When I consider those caught in poverty, the voice says, “Give, and remember the least of these.”

·        When the day is done, the voice says, “Come to me and I will give you rest.”

·        And when I’m feeling forgotten, the voice says, “Even the hairs on your head are numbered.”

And the test for whether it is the shepherd’s voice is this:           

Does it lead us to be life givers? 

Does it lead us to do what is life-giving?

A few days ago, I found a profound voice in a Newsweek clipping.

The article was called “Fighting for My Life—For the Second Time”

The subtitle was “How Likely It Is That I Can Beat Cancer Twice In Four Years? 

Whatever the Odds, I’ll Take Them”

It was in the personal essay column called “My Turn” in December, 2002,         written by Mary Buckingham,[15]

her story about beating ovarian cancer four years prior

                        and now discovering breast cancer which was deemed unrelated.

About chemotherapy, she writes this: 

“Four years ago, I took pains to never let [my husband] see me without a hat.  

This time…I ditch the hat.”

She writes this about the radiation oncologist:

            “He shared his philosophy that people get cancer to learn a life lesson

                        before realizing I am dealing with a second cancer site.

                                    This seems to throw him…

                                                Apparently, I still have lessons to learn.”

And she concludes with this:

“What do I think now?

                        I think our time here is fragile.

                                    The playwright Tom Stoppard wrote, ‘Life is a gamble with terrible odds—

                                                if it was a bet you wouldn’t take it.’

                                                            Toddlers fall into pools and drown,

                                                                        planes fly into skyscrapers.

                                                                                    There is a terrifying randomness to life;

                                                                                                indeed, why couldn’t I get cancer again?

            But I take comfort in a God who I believe knows even the number of hairs on my head

                        (an easy assignment at present)

                                    and I feel lucky to have seemingly caught two cancers in time.

                                       And I am also thankful for pills that fight nausea and friends who send small gifts

                                                            and tell me I look better bald then some women do with hair.”

I like and admire her, Mary Buckingham, whom I have never met

            and we share comfort in a God who knows even the number of hairs on our heads.

I cannot dispute what she calls the terrifying randomness of life.

But I will dispute with her playwright’s quote:

                        “Life is a gamble with terrible odds, if it was a bet you wouldn’t take it.

Inside me, a voice rises up and says, oh no.

You have already beaten the odds.

The odds that you were conceived,

the odds that the only two cells that would ever create you came together,

            is infinitely small,

roughly 6.3 x 10 raised to the -12,000.[16] 

                                                                        (Some of the voices in my head are math voices.)

Inside me, a voice rises up and says,

            each of us was called into life.

                        And now we are called to follow the good shepherd in a way of life

which is the most loving and satisfying and enduring,

come what may.

                                                            His way of life—attentive, giving, forgiving--

                                                                        is the path for us.                                             

This is what I hear, this is what I receive. 

And at our best, we are a community united by the good shepherd’s voice.

And if the voice is growing inside us

                                    how could we keep from singing,                     

“The King of Love, My Shepherd is,

whose goodness faileth never.

                        I nothing lack if I am his,

and he is mine forever.”[17]

In the name of the Father who sent the Son and the Son who sends the Spirit.

They are for us the divine search party,

from whom we shall never be lost.  Amen and amen.