The Lord is my Shepherd I shall not want

Good Shepherd Sunday (April 29, 2007)

Rev. Steven D. Spencer

John 10:11-18

John 10:11 "I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd gives His life for the sheep. 12 "But a hireling, he who is not the shepherd, one who does not own the sheep, sees the wolf coming and leaves the sheep and flees; and the wolf catches the sheep and scatters them. 13 "The hireling flees because he is a hireling and does not care about the sheep. 14 "I am the good shepherd; and I know My sheep, and am known by My own. 15 "As the Father knows Me, even so I know the Father; and I lay down My life for the sheep. 16 "And other sheep I have which are not of this fold; them also I must bring, and they will hear My voice; and there will be one flock and one shepherd. 17 "Therefore My Father loves Me, because I lay down My life that I may take it again. 18 "No one takes it from Me, but I lay it down of Myself. I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it again. This command I have received from My Father."

Over the past two decades I've had to meet with many people in funeral parlors, hospitals and nursing homes. These are the type of places where a message of comfort is really needed. The words that often seem to be most comforting are from Psalm 23, “The Lord is my Shepherd I shall not want.”  These are some of the most beloved Words in all of Scripture, so well loved that it makes hymn selection for this Sunday rather easy, because so many have sought to set these words to music:

We Sing the Verse 1 of The King of Love My Shepherd Is!  

What is it about this imagery of Christ as the Good Shepherd that is so endearing to us?   Why is it so comforting?  Because we know deep down that left to our own, we are dumb, defenseless, needful sheep. To confess Jesus as Shepherd is to confess one’s sin, for if I’m fine on my own why would I need someone to lead me.  

Christ knows His sheep and His sheep know Him.  Those who don’t believe in Christ don’t confess that He is their Shepherd.  Oh, they may like the quaint shepherd-like imagery, but they don’t know Him as their shepherd nor can they, for the sinful mind is hostile towards God.

The Pharisees to whom Jesus addressed His Words here in our Gospel lesson were spiritually blind.  They liked the outward appearance of true belief, they liked to think of themselves as the true shepherds, or leaders, of Israel, but they didn’t recognize God’s anointed one as He stood right before their very eyes, even though He spoke very plainly to them.

Jesus had just told them another analogy concerning sheep.  He said, “I am the gate; whoever enters through me will be saved.  He will come in and go out, and find pasture” (John 10:9). And after He had said these words to them and claimed He was the Good Shepherd, those Jews who heard His Words were divided.  “Many of them said, “He is demon- possessed and raving mad. Why listen to Him?”  (John 10:20) Jesus says: “I know my sheep and my sheep know me” (John 10:14).  But others there said, “These are not the sayings of a man possessed by a demon.  Can a demon open they eyes of the blind?” (John 10:21) Jesus also says: “My sheep hear My voice, and I know them and they follow me” (John 10:27).

We sing verse 2 of the King of Love My Shepherd Is!             

When a baby is born it can instantly recognize the voice of its parents, especially the father.  Though a baby is defenseless, dependent, and relatively dumb, it knows the voice of the One who will take care of it.  A baby cannot understand the words, but it knows those words are meant for him or her and when it hears that voice it clings to the one who speaks them.   

As Christ’s sheep, re-born through the waters of Holy Baptism, we by the grace of God’s recognize our Father’s voice.  We are still every bit as defenseless, dependent, and relatively dumb in spiritual matters, but through faith, though we cannot explain very much at all, we know that our Father’s Words are meant for us, and we cling to the one who speaks them to us, Jesus Christ!  Amidst the clutter of noise in this world that would simply drown out all other voices or blend them together, we know His voice and we follow Him.

But though we recognize His voice, because of the sinful mind we still possess, we often complain that we do lack, that all our wants are not satisfied in Christ but must be sought elsewhere.   We recognize we don’t know what is spiritually best for us, but yet we are tempted to tell our Good Shepherd what He should do, that He should listen to our voice, and when we sin, we urge Him to look past it, and at times we don’t listen to His under-shepherds who try to rebuke and correct us according to His command to them. We know His voice and we recognize it, but at times, we grow, oh, so bored of hearing it, and when we stop listening to His voice we follow our own voice.  And in those times instead of letting Him guide us into paths of righteousness for His names’ sake, we stray into places where His voice is lost amidst many other loud and foreign voices. We event try to move out of the range of His calls.  Sometimes we look beyond the fences that He provides for our own good and we say, “Ah, there on the other side, there is the real lush grass, why doesn’t our Shepherd let us go there.  He is keeping us from the good stuff,” though in that field we long for there may be poison.

We Sing verse 3 of The King of Love My Shepherd Is!

My friends in Christ; the Good Shepherd does what is best for us even when we don’t understand it.  And He’s a shepherd in a way that no other shepherd could ever be.  Any shepherd could valiantly lay down His life in defense of his sheep, to protect them from wolves or thieves, but what good would that do them once the shepherd was dead?  The poor sheep would be completely at the mercy of the wolves or thieves.  But Jesus, the true Son of God, and the true Son of Man, is the one and only shepherd who saves His sheep by laying down His life and then taking it up again, thereby driving off all would harm them- sin, death, and the power of the devil, the wolf who is constantly on the prowl to steal us away and devour us. When Jesus died on the Cross He died in place of all His sheep, He the Good Shepherd became the sacrificial Lamb in order to take away the sins of the world.

Here before the Pharisees Jesus is prophesying of His own death and resurrection from the grave.  Jesus contrast who He is as the Good Shepherd, against the wickedness of the Pharisees who claim themselves to be shepherds of God’s sheep presently, Jesus says:  “But a hireling, he who is not the shepherd, one who does not own the sheep, sees the wolf coming and leaves the sheep and flees; and the wolf catches the sheep and scatters them.  The hireling flees because He is a hireling and does not care about the sheep.”

Jesus talks of two enemies- the hireling and the wolf. Who is this hireling?  Jesus doesn’t say, but by His actions we see that the hireling is someone who leads the sheep away from the true Shepherd, by portraying Himself as the shepherd.  The hireling embodies all false and self-seeking religious leaders within the Visible Church, and in effect all false teaching itself.  Christ’s sheep are to stay away from them.  Instead they are to cling to the True Shepherd’s voice, to His Word, and to His faithful under-shepherds who bear witness to His voice, His Words, instead of speaking on their own.

The other enemy is the wolf, who is the natural enemy of the sheep, and Jesus warns us of those false prophets who will come to us in sheep’s clothing, though they are ferocious wolves (Matt. 7:15).  In effect, the hireling and the wolf, is the devil working to bring the doom to the sheep.  The devil loves nothing more than to find a hireling with God’s sheep instead of some shepherd sent by Jesus and made courageous by Him.  Then he can complete what the hireling has already begun.  He can snatch with his fangs and kill by destroying the faith in the hearts of God’s children, and He can drive others away from the faith by deceiving them, making them think they can find their own way in the wilderness apart from their Shepherd’s Voice.  

In contrast to this, Jesus twice says: “I am the Good Shepherd,” and if there is one thing that this text shows us it is that we are entirely dependent on Him for everything.  It is through Christ that we have faith, and this is not of our own doing, and it is through Christ that our faith is sustained, and this too is not of our own doing either.  We’d be lost if not for Him, for only He could be our substitute and take our sins onto Himself at Calvary, and only He could take up His life once again, rising from the grave.  And only Christ could grant us dumb, defenseless sheep belief that this was done for our sake through the power of His Voice, the words through which the Holy Spirit has regenerated us.  And only Christ can lead us through this life, keeping us safe from our own sin, the hirelings around us, and the wolf whose hot breathe is always breathing on our backs.

We Sing verse 4 of The King of Love My Shepherd Is!

Christ is the Good Shepherd because Christ is everything.  He is both our sacrificial Lamb, the means by which we are saved, and our Good Shepherd, who gives us the means to continue in the salvation He has won, through His Word and Sacrament.   He is the beginning of our faith; He is the end of our faith; and He is our everything in between.

You see to confess Jesus as Shepherd is also to confess the forgiveness that we have in Him, for He is our Good Shepherd because He laid down His life for us and took it back up again, even when we were unwilling.  Just as a sheep doesn’t volunteer itself to be sheared, but must be dragged kicking and screaming, we are that way too.  But again, this is why He is our Good Shepherd and all glory must always go to Him. 

In the words of Luther:  “My friend, if you can nourish ourselves, rule yourself, keep yourself from error, through your own merit attain grace and forgiveness of sins, all Holy Writ must be a lie, for it testifies of us that you are lost, scattered, wounded, weak and defenseless sheep.  Then you need no Christ as a shepherd to seek for you, gather you, lead you, bind up your wounds, care for you, and strengthen you against the devil.  In that case He gave His life for you in vain, for, if you can obtain all this by your own strength and devotion, you do not need Christ’s help.  But this passage says the very opposite, namely, that you are a lost sheep and you cannot, of yourself, find the way to the shepherd.  Of yourself you can go astray, and unless Christ, your shepherd, sought you and fetched you back, you would simply fall prey to the wolf.  But now He comes, seeks you, finds you, and brings you back to His flock, that is, through the Word and the Sacraments back into the Christian Church, gives His life for you, keeps you henceforth in the right way, that you fall into no error.  There you hear nothing about your own strength, good works, and merits, except that your strength, good works, and merits mean going astray, being defenseless and lost.  Christ works, merits, and manifests His strength in this alone; He seeks, upholds, and leads you.  He wins life for you through His death.  He alone is strong enough to protect you so that you do not perish, and are not snatched out of His hand.”  The Words of Dr. Martin Luther

This is why seeing Christ as our Good Shepherd is so comforting, because He is just that.  Perhaps the most famous and influential Lutheran musician of all time, Johann Sebastian Bach, wrote a beautiful, tranquil piece entitled “Sheep May Safely Graze.”  And how true those four simple words are, for though our risen Savior has ascended to the right hand of the throne of God, He still shepherds us.  He has not left His sheep to fend for themselves for food and protection, for the pastures where he leads us today are His means of grace.  For what more fertile place could there be then the waters of Holy Baptism, and what greater nourishment could He feed us with than with His very own body and blood for the forgiveness of our sins.  Through these things we recognize Him because in them He recognizes us as His very own.  In these Holy things Christ knows His sheep and His sheep know Him.  What a privilege to hear our Shepherd’s voice, to hear Him speak to us still, and to know that we can hear it again and again and again. For Jesus speaks the words of eternal life.

The Lord is our Shepherd, my friends, and in Him we lack nothing!     

We Sing verses 5 and 6 of The King of Love My Shepherd is!

Good Shepherd, may I sing thy praise, within Thy house forever. For that is where “sheep may safely graze, now and forever!” In Jesus name, Amen!