10 - 04 - 25 - Sermon - Year C - Easter #4 -
Psalm 23
Revelation:7:9-17
John 10:22-30
This is good shepherd Sunday. We have a psalm about a good shepherd, and we hear lots of shepherd imagery from Jesus. And in the centre of the Revelation text... a great party at the end of all time with a lamb right in the middle.
In or out? My sheep, not my sheep? A multitude bowing to a lamb. Following, not following. Hearing, not hearing. And for a special touch... immigration policy in Arizona USA.
Strange mix for a sermon.
But here we go...
Again this week we return to the book of Revelation - the apocalyptic literature that reveals what is hidden.... a vision that brings a message to a group of people suffering under Roman oppression... a vision of the end of all things:
A great multitude is gathered... nobody could count the number...
Every Nation...
All Tribes...
All Peoples...
All Languages...
All gathered... and standing before the lamb.
All cry out with the words that we have lifted from the text and stuck into our liturgies. “Salvation belongs to our God, and to Christ the Lamb forever and ever.”
Words right our of Revelation...
And what powerful words these are... and how clear...
Who does Salvation belong to? God.
Who works out our Salvation? Christ the Lamb.
Who is the lamb? The Shepherd of all those multitudes.
Who is the Good Shepherd? The Christ.
Who is the Christ? God incarnate in Jesus.
Jesus is God incarnate.
The Shepherd is the lamb.
And so in God’s equation of life and salvation... the vast, uncountable multitude, and all the rest listed in attendance gather and praise the lamb who has worked out the salvation for the whole of the multitude.
And it is true what they say...
Amen... blessing and glory and honor and power and might be to our God forever and ever. Amen.
All thanks be to God that it’s not about us hearing and getting it right... but it’s about the lamb who is the good shepherd who gets it right for us all.
It’s all about God’s action through christ on the cross.
Are you hearing the voice of this shepherd yet?
---
And just picture it... those oppressed people who first heard the revelation of John whispered and spoken and recited in hushed voices as small groups of believers...
To these people who could so easily lose hope -- this is good news as it reveals that there is something so much bigger than government...
so much bigger than their own faith crisis...
so much bigger than even death.
Revealed is the hidden reality that God has an equation for the great multitude to be gathered in.
---
This week I was reading about illegal immigrants in Arizona... to those immigrants... this would be a vision that is awe inspiring in it’s beauty.
No more hunger or thirst. The sun won’t scorch them (nor any hot thing). Maybe we could add... they won’t be cut by barbed wire fences, or hunted down like violent criminals or sleep alone in freezing dessert landscapes separated from their families in an attempt to just survive.
How? It’s in the text... last line... “for the Lamb at the center of the throne will be their shepherd, and he will guide them to springs of the water of life, and God will wipe away every tear from their eyes.”
And this is baptismal imagery... the springs of the water of life that wash clean and drown sin and offer life everlasting with God.
And this is good news... the lamb is the shepherd who will lead the multitude to this place.
Are you hearing the voice of this shepherd yet?
---
And why should we think about Mexican migrant workers on this Sunday?
Well...
Just signed into law this week by Arizona Governor Jan Brewer is the harshest piece of anti-immigrant legislation in the country.
Not only would those immigrants who are illegal be now hunted down by regular law enforcement, all those who are with the “suspects”... and anyone harboring “suspects”... or transporting them... will all face arrest.
So Arizona stands on the brink of becoming a state where you better have your wallet with you at all times... especially if you look hispanic. Any officer can ask to see your papers. No papers? No proof? You can be arrested. Sounds less like the the US and more evil regimes of the past.
Arizona is posed to become a place where you wouldn’t want to pick up a hitch hiker and transport an illegal... you might not want to go for coffee with someone after church either because... well... it might be illegal... you could get arrested for even associating with these outcasts.
In fact... if you were running a nursing clinic out of your church... or even a bible study... you might want to check people’s papers at the door before you let them in... you let the wrong people in... the police could do a raid and... if anyone is not carrying the right papers... all of you could be arrested.
Families will be divided... crimes against immigrants will go unreported because they have no one to turn to for help... the status of human seems to be stripped from them... they are aliens...
In a nut shell... in Arizona... it is literally illegal to love your neighbor. One more chapter in the long history of just how divisive we can be.
Now the whole story of immigration law in the states is to complex and detailed to go into here. It’s a mess. Suffice to say that some areas of Mexico have become too unsafe with drug runners and too economically poor to live in... there is little choice for many. And entire industries in the states like Idaho Potatoes and other labour intensive agriculture has become so dependent on migrant workers, especially the cheaper non-tax paying, non-minimum wage earning workers that, they are only viable now with these illegal aliens... and so... the two countries are locked in a relationship that can’t be solved with this draconian, dehumanizing laws.
I bring this up becayse, this whole mess is just a microcosm of the tendency of humans to figure out who is in, and who is out. Who the community accepts as human, and who is seen as less than human... and both the oppressor and the oppressed are broken and wounded in this relationship. There is truly not Joy on either side because in the end... nobody wins a fight like this... everybody is broken either in who they exclude, or by being forcible excluded.
And this ever shrinking group of who is included... this nation building and lines on maps, flies in the face of John’s vision of a great multitude from every tribe and nation and tongue that are called to live in community with one another before the lamb.
This Immigration law... if signed into policy... is;
putting rules before caring.
Laws before compassion.
It’s treating our neighbor like... our enemy.
Which shepherd’s voice is heard in this mess?
---
My first reading of the Gospel of John text today made me think in these exact terms, who is in and who is out. It was scary to read.
In my panic I asked:
Am I one who hears but doesn’t believe?
Am I a sheep in the flock?
Am I hearing the voice of God?
Do I know where to follow?
What must I do to make sure I’m strategically positioned to be “in”?
Well... this long list of question jumped up and immediately... because of self preservation worries... Am I in... or am I out? How decpetive and fear driven the mind can be... I just read “Salvation belongs to God” and suddenly I’m worried that salvation somhow belongs to me... or depends on me... or requires that I respond properly... as if the equation was about me... and not God.
It was a panic moment... and the voice of shepherd was lost.
It’s ironic that in worrying about whether I was hearing... I became unable to hear what was saying...
In fact... by focusing on me... all these questions embrace fear and doubt.
And so Thanks be to God that God’s salvation doesn’t depend on me, or you or us... if we open our eyes... we see that our hurting and divided world speaks of our condemnation more than any words of God. God doesn’t speak words that kill... but words that bring life.
Hearing the voice of this Shepherd is life.
But even as the shepherd Jesus today speaks of those who don’t hear his voice today, he does so in defense of his central point. “No one will snatch them out of my hand...” The voice of Jesus proclaims “What my Father has given me is greater than all else... and no one can snatch it out of the Father’s hand. The Father and I are one.”
The fact is... Jesus always spoke of:
Caring before rules.
Compassion before laws.
Drawing in and coming too the least, the lost and the lonely before affirming the Community norms.
Jesus always speaks life into a world that is already broken... already condemned... he doesn’t need to condemn anything... and his purpose was to bring life.
Nations draw lines, communities build fences, humans desperately try to be safe and secure by embracing fear of the other and holding to rules that actually trap and make us more fearful. We cannot hear... we cannot follow. We even make it illegal to love our neighbors at times.
And so Christ does what we cannot. Where the best and brightest minds of the day crucify Christ... where elected officials pass laws to make life harder on those already suffering... where even today we are more at war with each other, and more efficient at killing than ever before... Christ rises from the dead and speaks life! Speaks words that forgive and gather and... as John’s Revelation so clearly shows... God’s Good news depends not on us joining the plan... we are simply lead by the lamb to the waters of life
This is the voice of the good Shepherd?
Salvation... fullness... wholeness... the healing of communities in faith.... the opening of doors to neighbors... the reconnection with God now... and a promise of resurrection for life eternal...
and all this fully and only belonging to God... and we can’t snatch that away from God... we don’t get that power... nothing can snatch salvation away from God.
There is a lesson about how wide God’s love is hearing the roar of praise from the great multitude of people that cannot be counted.
The great multitude of people cannot be counted... and they cannot be snatched out of Jesus hand.
And so for the oppressed... and for the oppressor... for immigrants in Arizona, for law enforcement officers and governers, for you and for me... the voice of the shepherd speaks for all of us broken messed up humans... and leads us all to springs of the water of life.
Amen.
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