"Finding Pasture"

Numbers 27:12-22

John 10:1-10

I had occasion, last Sunday, to attend Plymouth Congregational Church in Fort Wayne, IN. Pastor John Gardner preached on the 10^th chapter of John in a way that got my attention. It is the story of Jesus as the Good Shepherd. We have feminized this story so much, I think, that it has been reduced to Warner Sallman’s picture of Jesus with a lamb in His arms, surrounded by sheep. The sun is shining; the grass is green; everything is very peaceful looking.

That is all well and good, but Jesus’ description of Himself as the Good Shepherd is a very tough, masculine image – so much so that it fails to square with our neat little efforts to reduce the Gospel to a simple, unilateral prescription for Eternal Life. In looking John 10 over, we find thieves, robbers, fear, killing, destruction, sacrifice, wolves and demons. This is a far cry from Sallmon’s painting and probably a far cry from our image of Jesus as the Good Shepherd.

I suspect that if anyone were to capture John 10 on canvass, it would be a horror picture with predators climbing over the walls of the sheep pen, while God’s people are going in and out of the pen, sometimes being attacked and sometimes going in and out peacefully. What is critical to understand is that this sheep pen is not a place of escape from the outside world. People don’t just go in there and never come out. An accurate picture would perhaps have Jesus lying dead at the entrance, while His spirit is the covering over God’s people. I will get back to that later, but I think you understand that this is not a pretty picture.

And yet it is a very comforting picture. It is a picture of God’s people coming in and going out of a safe place with impunity.

I want to take a minute to consider the latter part of v. 9, where Jesus describes His sheep as coming in and going out and finding pasture. It somehow raises the specter of danger but yet with assurance. In fact, I believe it may well be the setting for the abundant life that He promises in v. 10.

What does it mean to come in and go out of the sheep pen? Once you are inside and safe, wouldn’t it be reasonable to expect that you would never have to go back out into that uncertain and dangerous world? Some churches believe that and become ghettos of safety for their members. In the Catholic tradition, we call these cloisters. In the fundamentalist tradition, we sometimes call them cults.

There is something very insidious about pulling inside the safety of a Christian community for anything other than getting rested and your batteries charged. We know what happens to cloistered communities at times – Jim Jones and David Karesh, for example; lately, the Reformed Latter Day Saints Church. Jesus is not offering a safe haven for cowards. He is offering the freedom to continue living in the world in the full knowledge that this world is not our home – that our home is the present and yet absent Kingdom of God. In that sense, we have a freedom that those who do not know the Good Shepherd cannot experience.

Many want in, perhaps, but they are limited to the strategies of the world in getting in. Those strategies include wars and guns and lying and cheating – all those strategies that our government uses to force other nations to comply with its wishes. Jesus would describe such folks, not as Christians, but as thieves and robbers.

Moses employs the metaphor of “coming in and going out” of God’s people as he prepares to leave God’s people.

He is praying to the Lord that, in his absence, God will raise up a man to “bring them in” and “lead them out.” Otherwise, they will be as sheep without a shepherd. They will wander about aimlessly, not knowing where they are going and perhaps not caring.

The Lord answers Moses’ prayer. Joshua will be that man. However, he must stand before Eleazar the priest and the entire assembly and be commissioned in their presence. He will be granted authority over the people. It is Eleazar, however, who will obtain decisions for Joshua by inquiring of the Lord. Joshua will lead them, but God will direct them so that at Joshua’s command, “…he and the entire community of the Israelites will go out, and at his command they will come in.”

We see in the Bible a picture of a people led by a shepherd who provides safety, liberty and satisfaction of their needs. Notice that the shepherd must be responsible for their safety both within the fold and outside the fold. There is an assurance here of a special grace that heightens the vitality of life itself.

We are told in 1 Samuel 18:16 that “…all Israel and Judah loved David, because he went out and came in before them;” in contrast, King Saul was afraid of him. We are told 2 verses previously that “…the Lord was with him.” They loved David because David walked in the assurance of the hand of God on his life.

In the 23^rd Psalm, David wrote of the safety and assurance that comes from walking with the Shepherd of his soul: “The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want…He makes me to lie down in green pastures, he restoreth my soul.” There is in this poem the acknowledgement by David that even in his coming in and going out, there may be danger. He says this about the danger:

“Yea though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for Thou are with me. Thy rod and thy staff they comfort me. Thou preparest a table before me in the presence of my enemies; Thou annointest my head with oil. My cup runneth over” (life abundant).

David then defines the abundant life that Jesus offers in John 10: “Surely, goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life, and I shall dwell in the house of the Lord forever.”

David has found refuge in the Kingdom of God – the house of the Lord. He will dwell in that Kingdom, not sometime in the future, but forever beginning right now. In his going out, even into the valley of the shadow of death, no evil will befall him, though he may indeed be killed in the process. That, my friends, is abundant life! It is experienced by entering through the gate of safety, leaving through the gate of liberty and passing through the gate of satisfaction in Jesus Christ. Because David walks in the presence of the Lord both within and outside the camp, the people of Israel love him.

This is life in its fullness, is it not? Pastor John Gardner suggests that it is a life that is informed, a life that is involved and a life that is invincible. Jesus frees us, he suggests, from a life driven to distraction by compulsive behavior and motivated by a fear of loss or scarcity.

Last Thursday, I was listening to the inmates in Yokefellows. One inmate suggested that the options available within that evil place – the prison – were much clearer than on the outside. “In here,” he said, “I have nothing left but Jesus.” Christians in such a place can come in and go out with Christ as their shepherd. The non-believer is driven by the moment, giving in to compulsive behavior motivated by a fear of loss or scarcity. There’s is a life of anxiety, fear and compulsive reaction, while Christ leads God’s people to a life of green pasture, even within a prison. Isn’t it wonderful that you can have abundant life even in a prison – maybe especially in a prison?

This passage of Scripture is rich with metaphor. Pastor Gardner points us to metaphor as the essence of understanding life.

He quotes writer and poet Kathleen Norris who, as a Protestant in the early 90’s, had an encounter with the Benedictine monks. She became so intrigued by their mysticism that she eventually became a Benedictine oblate and spent two 9-month terms in monastic residence at St. John’s Abbey in Minnesota.

Norris wrote a book within which she included a chapter entitled “The War on Metaphor.” She had this to say:

The Protestant worship service just seemed like a word bombardment. They were all these heavy-duty words, lots of baggage, lots of meaning, but I had lost touch with them.

If you are looking for a belief in the power of words to change things, to come alive and make a path for you to walk on, you are better off with poets these days than with Christians…Poets believe in metaphor, and that alone sets them apart.

The metaphor to which Gardner points us begins in v. 7: “I am the gate for the sheep. All who ever came before me were thieves and robbers, but the sheep did not listen to them…I am the gate; whoever enters through me will be saved. He will go in and out and find pasture.”

Jesus takes two bites of this apple. First, He tells us in v. 2, that the man who enters the sheepfold by the gate is the shepherd of the sheep. All others are crooks. Then, He tells us that He is not only the shepherd; He is the gate itself. How do we reconcile that?

There is a story about a scholar who was doing research in the Middle East and ran across an Arab shepherd. This shepherd was showing off his flock from inside the pen and claiming proudly that they were perfectly safe. The scholar noticed that the pen did not have a gate on it. Yet, the sheep were sound asleep.

“I noticed that your sheep sleep soundly in that pen, but there is no gate on it.” “Yes, that’s right,” the shepherd said. “I am the gate. After my sheep are in the pen, I lay my body across the opening. No sheep will step over me and no wolf can get in without getting past me first. I am the gate.”

Jesus is the shepherd whom the sheep follow into safety. Yet, He is also the gate itself that gets opened and shut – perhaps nothing short of His crucified body. At the risk of stretching the metaphor too far, Jesus may be speaking both of His leading God’s people to safety – His body, and also His blood through which we pass to enter that safety.

Nevertheless, it is the “going out” of the pen that captures our imagination. Jesus becomes not a one-way pass to safety but a two-way gate. He not only locks up behind us to keep us safe, He also unlocks and swings open so that we can enter into a life dripping with more fullness that we could possibly know. This abundant life describes a life in a Christ who is not only the gate to the sheep but is the gate for the sheep.

The contrast between the sheep and those who try to climb in by another way, such as by their works instead of repentance, is riveting. “All who ever came before me were thieves and robbers,” He says in v. 8. He is speaking there of the religious leaders who offer strict rules and regulations to enter righteousness – the Sadducees, Pharisees and scribes and perhaps any number of religious evangelists in our day.

Like thieves, they were more interested in personal gain than in the well-being of the sheep under their spiritual care. The thief invades and intrudes in the lives of the sheep.

Like robbers, they were fleecing the sheep instead of caring for them. Robbers lie in wait and attack.

We don’t like that sheep metaphor, do we? It suggests a mindless following. That is a poor description, however. In order for the sheep to know the voice of the shepherd, it takes a great deal of studying, preparation and work. It takes a great deal of discernment. We have to work in order to know the shepherd.

We have seen in our time many pastors and churches that we might call the “Church of the Open Palm.” Those are the mindless people without discernment. Their leaders are always holding out their hands for money. “Send me $10M,” Oral Roberts said, “or God will take me home.” Jimmy Bakker was convicted of outright fraud. The sheep know the voice of the Good Shepherd because they will follow Him who comes in love rather than for personal gain.

Becoming the sheep of God’s fold, then, is a delicate process. We have to be weaned from our attraction to glitch and glamour. We have to learn how to listen for the Master’s voice and to reject all others. In a later epistle, 1 Jn 4:1, we have to test the spirits to see if they are from God and not man. That is no easy task. On point is the number of people who are looking to the three presidential candidates as Messiahs. Even the Church of the Open Palm looks to the presidential outcome as its hope. That demonstrates a pathetic display of an inability to hear the shepherd.

God’s sheep come in and out and find pasture because they know the shepherd. All others wander around looking and listening for a direction. They are not interested in the Good Shepherd but are looking vainly for another voice. Even in the church there are thieves and robbers who care more about their pocket, their place, their politics and their power than they do about the Gate to abundant life (Gardner).

Finally, we need to take a look at this abundant life that Jesus promises: “I am come that you might have life and have it more abundantly.”

The life that John is describing here is not the opposite of death. It is not some kind of salvation after death. It describes a special quality of relationship that Jesus establishes between God and His people now.

We know that these Christians to whom John is writing were plunged into persecution and uncertainty every day of their lives. Victory over poverty was not the issue at stake here. Instead, there is a confidence expressed here in the midst of uncertainty. What is suggested has nothing to do with a quantity of physical blessings but is about something that cannot be measured. Otherwise, abundant life would be an impossible attainment for 90% of the people on the planet. Instead, abundant life contradicts the uncertainty of life – the scarcity of life. It overcomes the vulnerability of life.

Using John Gardner’s thoughts, abundant life is an informed life that discerns between the Good Shepherd and all that other random noise out there. Abundant life is an involved life – so involved that we want it not only for ourselves but for others. The abundant life is an invincible life. It has nothing to do with prosperity and comfort. It is a life that proves invincible when faced with adversity, sorrow, heartache and tragedy. It is expressed in that new commandment that we have talked about in recent weeks – “Love one another as I have loved you.”

The love that wants for our neighbor the best of what we want for ourselves is ours to proclaim and practice. It is never depleted and is always renewable. The love that fuels and fires our passion for mercy and justice is inexhaustible. It never runs out.

We have a good illustration in the story of Jesus’ miracle of the loaves and fishes. He performs this miracle and then explains the next day the significance of what He has done. He gives a very long speech on the bread that comes down from heaven, the bread of life. In that illustration, Jesus is the living bread come down from heaven; the multiplying of the loaves signifies the abundance of life that God offers to those whose existence is dominated by poverty and loss. It was not about well-filled stomachs. If it were, Jesus would not have rebuked the crowd the next day by saying, “…you seek me not because you saw signs, but because you ate your fill of the loaves.”

Well, I have, I suspect, just destroyed your nice image of the Good Shepherd. That having been done, I would encourage you freely to go in and come out and find pasture.