When sea lion pups are born, their mothers stay with them on the beach nursing them for about a week. After that, the mothers leave their seal pups alone on the beach for hours at a time while they hunt for themselves and their pups. Often, the mothers swim back to beaches crowded with seals, like this picture. It can be difficult to find their pups in the midst of this sea of seals. All seal mothers and their pups, however, have their own distinctive bark. They know each other’s voices so they can find one another in the midst of hundreds of other seals.
There are many voices today that yell different definitions of what it means to be a follower of Jesus Christ: “If you’re a follower of Jesus Christ, you should be against a, b, and c,” or “If you’re a follower of Jesus Christ, you should be against this person or that person.” While there are definitely times when we need to speak up, let’s first make sure we’re following the right voice. The voice of Jesus Christ, the good shepherd.
How do we know we’re following the voice of the good shepherd?
Well, the window which this sermon is based upon helps us answer that question. The “I am” statement of this particular window (remember that all of these windows portray an “I am statement” of Jesus as mentioned in the gospels), is “I am the Door.” Jesus at the center has a sheep (not a neck pillow!) around his shoulders. He is holding the traditional shepherd’s hook with one hand, while gently holding the leg of the sheep he’s holding. He has a look of compassion for the rest of the flock.
So what do doors have to do with sheep and shepherds? The Greek word for “door” can also mean “gate” or “entrance.” In our passage from John, Jesus calls himself the good shepherd who lays down his life for his sheep. In Jesus’ day, shepherds would corral their sheep into a pen at night. There wasn’t a gate that you could open and close, but merely an opening into the pen. Shepherds would lie across that opening so that any potential predator or thief would have to get past the shepherd to get to the sheep.
Jesus is the good shepherd who put the lives of his flock ahead of his own when he laid down his life on the cross, just as a shepherd lays himself at the entrance of the pen to protect his sheep. Jesus did for us what we could never do and was obedient unto his death on the cross so that we could always have a way back to God, regardless of our sin.
Another way we can think of Jesus as the door is that Jesus himself is the entrance into the family of God and to knowing God. Doors always lead into a new space, right? Likewise, Jesus himself is the door, the way into the love of God. Jesus is the door to a new life where we can rest in God’s love. God’s love is best seen in how Jesus loved and acted out of love.
Yet the question remains: How do we know the voice of Jesus Christ? Especially in today’s world, when there are so many who say they follow Jesus, but their actions and words don’t reflect the compassion and humility of the good shepherd. Again, the answers lie in our window for today.
Those who follow the voice of Jesus are those who act selflessly. This includes the good Samaritan. In that story, a man traveling alone from Jerusalem encountered robbers who stripped him, took everything he had, and left him for dead. Both a priest and a Levite, high-ranking religious figures, walked by the beaten man, refusing to help. It wasn’t until a Samaritan man (remember there was animosity between the Jews and Samaritans at that time) chose to stop and help the beaten man. Not only did he tend to his wounds, but he also brought him to an innkeeper where he could recover, paid the innkeeper to care for him, and told the innkeeper to keep track of added expenses so he could pay him back. Of the three people who encountered the beaten man, one would guess that the two most religious people, the priest and the Levite, would be the ones to stop and help. But instead, it was someone who was seen as an “outsider” and whose background was seen as “less than.” Yet Jesus lifts up the Samaritan as an example of what it means to follow God, because he acted selflessly and showed mercy.
We also have the father of the prodigal son as an example of someone who follows the voice of the good shepherd. While the father had every right to punish his son, who squandered his inheritance, and not welcome him back into the family home, he chose otherwise. In an undignified manner of a man of his standing, the father runs, not walks, to greet his repentant son and welcome him home. The father unexpectedly responded with forgiveness and love for a son who didn’t deserve it.
Both are examples of people who acted out mercy, humility, and compassion. Both acted radically out of love for another. Both acted in ways that are self-sacrificial, at cost to themselves, for the sake of the other. Both, thus, acted like Jesus. These stories are examples of how we are to treat and view others because we’ve been transformed by the voice and actions of the Good Shepherd. We are so floored by the humility and selfless acts of Jesus Christ on our behalf that we too are changed. Changed into people who are not afraid to help or welcome those whom others see as undeserving of such a response. That is how we can spot those who are following the voice of the good shepherd.
Voices that do not follow God are those who act in the opposite manner. Instead of possessing a spirit of humility, they only care to lift themselves up. Instead of seeing others as neighbors to serve and love, they relish in looking down on others. Such people are not following the voice of Jesus. Even if they say they do. Such an example is the Pharisee and the tax collector. Both are offering prayers at the Temple. But the Pharisee’s prayer is all about thanking God for not making him a despised individual like a tax collector. The Pharisee is almost gleeful in his condescending comments about the tax collector in a prayer. The Tax collector, on the other hand, is weighed down by the choices he’s made in betraying his people by collecting unfair taxes for the oppressive Roman Empire. Only one of them truly knows how much they need God’s forgiveness and grace. And again, it’s the least likely person to do so.
The tax collector is the type of person who most clearly hears the voice of the good shepherd because he knows he needs the good shepherd. We know this because he is repentant. He knows he has done wrong, and he is sorry for it.
There are many voices today that say they are for Jesus Christ, but their convictions and actions are anything but Christ-like. Such voices lack the humility the tax collector showed. They are unrepentant. Their actions lack humility and mercy. Such people are even using the name of Christ to justify inflicting harm on others, such as the tearing apart of families. It’s safe to say that such voices are just using the name of Jesus Christ to further an agenda that is an antithesis to all Jesus said and did.
But those who have not just heard, but know the voice of the good shepherd, are transformed by the radical love of Jesus Christ. That transformation is seen in how people embody the radical love of Jesus.
Fannie Lou Hamer is a name that many of us don’t know, but should. I didn’t learn about Fannie Lou Hamer until long after I graduated from college. Hamer was a Civil Rights activist from Mississippi. The youngest of 20 children on a sharecropper plantation, she grew up to be a force in the civil rights movement. But it cost her. She was imprisoned, assaulted, and beaten so badly that she forever walked with a limp. Yet, Frannie kept speaking up for African Americans and was instrumental in raising support for the Voting Rights Act of 1965, resulting in the right to vote for African Americans and other people of color.
Her activism was born out of a deep faith. God came first in life for Fannie Lou Hamer. Her biographer, Kate Clifford Larson, wrote that it was because of her faith, she was able to not succumb to hating those who traumatized her and wanted to kill her. She could only do this by praying daily: “Where are you, what is happening here, give me the strength to carry this weight forward.”
Those who supported segregation were of course not fans of Fannie Lou Hamer. Many of those same people professed to be Christian. According to Larson, Fannie Lous Hamer used the Bible to shame her white oppressors who claimed also to be Christians, following the path of Christ. She would use the Bible and say “Are you following this path by what you’re doing to me, to my fellow community members and family members?” And she used the Bible passages to remind Christian ministers “This is your job, and what are you doing up on that pulpit? You’re telling people to be patient. Well, in the Bible it says stand up and lead people out of Egypt.”
She also made some of her fellow civil rights activists angry. There were those who wanted to use violence and abandon the non-violent ethos. They were tired of seeing friends and family brutalized or murdered. Having been beaten to near death herself, she cautioned against giving in to hate for their enemies, saying that was not the way of Jesus. Essentially, she preached: If we can’t love our enemies, we are not loving Jesus Christ.
That is radical love. Radical love that comes from knowing the radical love of Jesus. In Christ’s love, we find strength, security, wholeness, and hope. We need that because when we live out Christ’s radical love, it doesn’t always end well. The Samaritans were still seen as outcasts even after Jesus elevated them in the parable of the Good Samaritan. The father in the parable of the prodigal son was chastised by his older son for being too soft. Fannie Lou Hamer passed away from cancer in her mid-50s and still lived in poverty.
More often than not, following Jesus and living out his commands to show compassion to the outcasts and the marginalized, and to not give in to hate, but to love our enemies, will not make us popular. But what is the alternative? If we’re not following the voice of Jesus, what voice are we following? If it’s not the voice of Jesus, it’s a voice that is not for mercy, compassion, and humility. My hope for all of us is that through prayer, scripture, and in our encouragement of one another, we would discern the true voice of the good shepherd from all of the other loud voices of the world.