Jesus of Nazareth is to be Followed

Sermon by The Rev. Lynda Z. Tyson

John 10:1-10

 

 “…we are the people of his pasture and the sheep of his hand.
Oh, that today [we] would hearken to his voice!” – Ps. 95

Thanks to Sally Joslin I just discovered the writings of Verna Dozier.  Dr. Verna Dozier was a public school teacher and administrator who became a leading theologian and lay preacher in the Episcopal Church.  By the time she died a couple of years ago at the age of 88 Dr. Dozier had become a prolific writer and one of the most high-profile African-American women of her era.  She was also a champion for lay ministry.  It’s fair to say Verna Dozier had some issues with the church.  Some called her a prophet, the likes of Jeremiah.  Verna loved the institution even while she spoke words of judgment.

In her book, The Dream of God, Dozier wrote, “The church missed its high calling to be the new thing in the world when it decided to worship Jesus instead of following him.”  The Risen Christ is to be worshiped, she says, but Jesus of Nazareth is to be followed.  She reminds us, “Jesus didn’t come to bring a new religion…Jesus came as the Way, a new possibility for encountering God ever anew in the…changing experience of life…In Jesus,” Dozier says, “God has come and offered us another way to live…  Jesus of Nazareth is to be followed.”

Jesus is at once our shepherd and our gate – our protector and our access to God (the gate-keeper), so says John’s Gospel.  As Jesus is one with God and his disciples are one with him, so his disciples are one with God.  All who pass through the gate with the shepherd have a path to God.  Jesus of Nazareth is to be followed into a new pathway of living.  He practices compassion for the other – especially the meek, the weak, the lonely, the oppressed – and he wants to awaken that compassion and faith in the people around him, to have his behavior (his actions, his deeds) modeled in a world run by bandits and thieves – heartless rulers and authority figures concerned only for their own gain.  Jesus doesn’t ask to be worshiped.  He asks to be followed.

Following Jesus of Nazareth is all about love as a verb – love in action.  At last week’s Discovery Hour we heard stories of love in action along the coast of Maine where the Sea Coast Mission takes everything from food to diagnostic medical care to isolated coastal and island dwellers.  The Mission has created a nationally recognized after-school program that has turned around lives of middle-school students and their families.  One of the key ingredients in all those success stories is companionship – the Jesus model of bringing people together into caring communities.

Jack Calhoun’s book, Hope Matters, The Untold Story of How Faith Works in America is a collection of stories about love in action – stories of everyday people whose so-called “place of worship” is outside the church walls, where they carry on all kinds of compassionate ministries.

Tillie Burgin is one of those people in Jack’s book.  Starting with a $1,000 grant from a local church Burgin founded what is now a $2MM Mission in Arlington Texas.  She says at Arlington Mission “We connect with the lives God has put in our path.  We meet people where they are.  We let people know that we know and care about them.  We call them by name.”  Burgin says “She didn’t find God; God found her.”  She says, “He just finds some of the most ignorant people, and we just don’t know anything else except to follow.”   “Ignorant” is a word that is often confused with “unintelligent” or “stupid,” but ignorant means uninformed or unaware.  Tillie Burgin is right on: when God touches people who were unaware we suddenly don’t know anything else except to follow.

Jesus says the sheep will hear and recognize his voice, and will follow him, and not a stranger.  Sheep, by the way, get a bad rap: dense, stubborn, follow-the-crowd co-dependents...  Actually, sheep have an excellent sense of hearing, and are only a little less intelligent than pigs, which happen to rank fourth in animal intelligence behind chimpanzees, dolphins and elephants.

It’s amazing what you can learn online.  Sheep were first domesticated in the 10th c BCE, so maybe the writers of ancient scripture knew that humankind has more in common with ewes and rams than today we care to admit.  Sheep have a high degree of independence at birth.  They are gregarious social animals, preferring to be with a group.  So, huddling in the flock is apparently more than a source of protection from predators; it’s a social thing.  Sheep see in color but they have poor depth perception, so they avoid shadows and they will move toward the light.  A sheep on its back cannot stand up without help.
Sheep have what is called a “flight zone,” which is the space they like to keep between themselves and others, and this flight zone is the reason shepherds are able to use dogs to move sheep around.  Maybe you’ve seen this demonstrated at Boarder Collie Trials – the sheep consider the dog a predator, so the dog can move the sheep forward by positioning itself behind the flock and a little too close for comfort – the sheep move away from the perceived danger.
So the Shepherd-sheep metaphor in scripture goes beyond simply painting humankind as ignorant or unaware of the divine.  It recognizes humanity’s intelligence, our independence at an early age, our social nature, our need for protection, our ability to hear and recognize voices of friends and strangers, our lack of theological depth perception that draws us toward the light (the one true light), our inability to right ourselves without help when we fall and land flat on our backs…and the sheep metaphor acknowledges that we want a comfortable distance between ourselves and those we fear.  One of the hardest parts of following the Jesus model is getting over our fear of welcoming and being welcomed by the stranger who stands at the edge of our own flight zone.

There is a sense of community in the sheepfold, an interdependent and social kind of living together.  Jesus isn’t just calling people together to spend an hour with each other once a week.  Paul Carling made a powerful presentation two weeks ago on Creating Christian Community, and I want to borrow two of his quotations.  I think the first are the words of Frederick Buechner: “Inhabiting the same worship space does not equal Christian community.”  And Henri Nouwen may have said it best, “Community is the place where the person you least want to live with is always there.”

This past week everyone in the Saint Luke’s community received a letter inviting us all to participate in our 6th annual Outreach Weekend at the beginning of May.  Not only is Outreach Weekend an opportunity to give and receive in the experience of mission, it’s a chance to close our own flight zone gap – to build an accepting community by working alongside our neighbors – love in action.
Creating community is about hospitality – welcoming the stranger with the best we can put on the table.  In Psalm 23 the opening Shepherd-sheep imagery gives way to the Lord as host whose guest is the believer.  Like the Shepherd, the Lord offers food, and drink, and sanctuary – a resting place.  And just as the shepherd meets the sheep’s needs in the first part of the Psalm, the believer’s most basic needs are met, and then some.  The cup overflows.  The Lord refills it without the believer asking.  The believer could not possibly want for more.  With Lord as Shepherd we have what we will need to get through the struggles when the lush pastures and still waters of our lives seem like a mirage in the desert.  John’s Gospel mirrors the psalmist’s image: Jesus says, “I came that they may have life and have it abundantly.”  In Verna Dozier’s words, “God calls us to trust God,” and God’s dream for us is that we will live as Jesus calls us to live.   Even as we celebrate with joy the Resurrection, even as we worship God in the Risen Christ, the Gospel reminds us the Shepherd, Jesus of Nazareth, is to be followed.

“…Oh, that today [we] would hearken to his voice!” – Ps. 95