Shepherds: Week 1

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0:00 This idea of role model because it stuck with me that I was saying, I think last week or the week before that we can tell the quality of a shepherd by the culture that goes behind him. And we've been talking about how for the last several weeks how badly we need shepherds. And the story of scripture kind of paints this picture of God as a shepherd in several different points in Psalm 23 in the prophets and then in the gospels.

0:37 And the type of shepherd that God is is the shepherd who guides sheep, sheep are animals that are willing to follow the shepherd that they know, the leader that they know. The type of shepherd that is described in the scriptures is one who leads people through peril towards good things. And then the promise of the God of the shepherd of the scriptures is that he will lead us to

1:07 green pastures, to banqueting tables amongst our enemies. And that this banqueting table goes on forever. And the idea is that even when sheep get lost, when they lose track of their shepherd, when they wander away from the green pastures following their own nose on where they think they ought to go, the shepherd described in the Bible will leave his whole flock and go

1:38 and find the one. And we've been saying that we are people who need shepherds because if we follow our own devices, the world is too loud and confusing and our own faults are too persistent, right? That we can't decide for ourselves which way to go. As a matter of fact, in the gospel from last week, Jesus said that all other leaders besides him all have come as thieves to kill and destroy. And we talked about what happens when we follow the leadership of materialism or greed, when

2:13 we follow the leadership of anger or frustration and where that goes for us, how that robs from us rather than give to us. I've been thinking about how we need shepherds. And then I was thinking about this thing from last week where we said how do we decide the shepherd to follow? And we were saying the shepherds that we follow, the leaders that we're able to follow are ones who leave in their wake, the values, the culture of the reign of God.

2:48 And one careful distinction here because I realized last week that when I started talking about leaders during the presidential election season, everybody thinks I'm talking about political leaders. And I'm just not. I several, almost a decade towards the end of my seminary career realized that my first identification is as a citizen of the reign of God. That I live under the reign and authority of God, the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob,

3:21 the God of Christ and the church, the God of creation and life. And that God governs my life. And I happen to live as a citizen in the country of the United States and I engage in their systems as appropriate, but my identity doesn't come there and my first leadership doesn't come there. I submit to all authority as that given by God, but it is not what governs or determines my outcome in life. That is governed and determined by my good shepherd.

3:53 And so when I talk about that, we all need leaders in life, I'm talking about that we need spiritual leaders. We need leaders that guide us towards this great spiritual and enduring kingdom, the kingdom that lasts beyond this world into the next. And then as we're formed in that culture by those leaders, we can form opinions about political leaders in the United States, but that has less to do with us and more to do how we engage and help and serve the world, less to do with our identity and our future.

4:26 So we need leaders, how we decide to be a leader by the culture that follows them. And I landed on this passage to kind of evidence that to Assistant Matthew's gospel, if you want to look there with me. Matthew is the first gospel in the New Testament. Matthew Mark Luke John. And the text that I'm looking at is in Matthew chapter 11.

5:00 In Matthew chapter 11, Jesus has been prepping his 12 closest followers to go out and announce that the reign of God has made its way onto earth, that the reign of God has come in the person of Jesus, that he's inaugurating a new reign of God on earth. And he's just finished teaching your 12 disciples to send them out to go do that. He's going to have some time to proclaim it by himself now. In chapter 11 verse 1, it says, when Jesus had finished instructing the 12 disciples,

5:35 he went on from there to teach and preach in their cities. He's going around Galilee like the 12. And now when John heard in prison about the deeds of Christ, he sent words of disciples, remember John the Baptist is that cousin of Jesus's that left in the womb when he met there. And then he lived out in the desert and his preaching was so compelling and the mission with which he lived was so engaging that people came out of the cities, out into the desert to find John the Baptist there.

6:07 When you look at the story of our people, there had been about 400 years without significant prophecy. They had lived for generations with always having prophets, people speaking on behalf of God. And then something happens where there is no compelling prophecy. It stops, right? And then there's a period of several hundred years where there is no prophet, no one speaking on behalf of God to his people. And then they realize there is one out in the desert who is speaking on behalf of God.

6:40 And the way they know, it's not that there had not been someone who claimed to be a prophet, but the words of the prophet, the people came with a weight and an authority that couldn't be dismissed. So when John the Baptist spoke, it was different than anyone else spoke. So they would come out to see it. And John the Baptist, it was so compelling, several people thought that John the Baptist might himself be the Messiah, the promised delivering king, come to inaugurate again Israel, the reign of God on earth.

7:12 Of course he turns that down. Then he backties in Jesus and he's like, this is the one, the Holy Spirit tells him this is the one. But then John the Baptist gets arrested, it's a compelling story for another time. And he's sitting in prison and he's thinking this might be the end of his life, but he knows he's supposed to prophesy until the Messiah comes. He's pretty sure Jesus is the Messiah, but then he sees just as Jesus might be building a movement as he's gathered his twelve followers, he then disperses them and sends them out. And he's like, maybe this isn't the guy.

7:45 And so John the Baptist has his own group of disciples and he can't leave prison, so he sends a group of his own disciples, his own followers to Jesus to ask him, hey, are you to just clarify this? Because if you are, I'm not going to worry about breaking out of prison, I'm just going to stay here and finish my job, right? But if you're not, then I guess I'm not done, my job's not over yet. So now when John heard in prison about the deeds of the Christ, he sent word by his disciples

8:16 and said to him, are you the one who is to come, or shall we look for another? And Jesus answered them, go and tell John what you hear and see. The blind receive their sight and the lame walk. The leopards are cleansed, and the deaf hear, and the dead are raised up, and the poor have good news preached to them. And blessed is the one who is not offended by me.

8:51 One, that's beautiful, like a beautiful lineup of words, right? He's quoting from Isaiah, which is our use for our call to worship, and it's amazing to me. It's worth just noting for just a second that those words of Isaiah are the words of God, Isaiah the prophets speak on behalf of God to the people, and I love that the God of creation and life orchestrating the ark of humanity, speaking to Isaiah hundreds of years

9:27 before the Messiah, quoted by Jesus, it's orchestrating the events and has the patience and the energy to construct his message in beautiful poetry. Like this could not be a more critical question. John the Baptist is a precursor of Jesus, the embodiment of Elijah preparing the way for the Messiah, and then answered by the Messiah, the delivering king, the turning point for

10:01 all of humanity. This could not be a more critical question, and the answer comes in terms of poetry. I love that, that our God prizes beauty and creativity. I love that. I love that God is the source, the beginning and the end of beauty.

10:32 I like the idea that I don't know what God will look like, but I love the idea that when I see him, when I see God unfiltered, I'll be struck by the beauty of God. And I'll realize that everything beautiful I've seen up to this point has found its beginning in God, and is finds its culmination there as well. John the Baptist asked this critical question, are you the one to come or should we expect

11:04 another? And Jesus answers in this beautiful thing, but doesn't say yes. Right? Doesn't say, are you the one to come? And Jesus doesn't say, yeah, I am the Christ. I mean, it might be easier if he has, but he doesn't. I guess he assumes John knows the words of Isaiah. John doesn't have the text written down like this with little footnotes where a cross-reference

11:37 notes where we can go back and see is that quoted so much. He doesn't have that. John, Jesus just tells him, go back and tell him what you see, the blind received sight, the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, deaf ear, dead are raised, and the poor have good news preached to them. The evidence that Jesus is who he ought to be, that Jesus is the good shepherd, is not

12:07 Jesus's word for it, it's the work that follows out behind him. It's the outcome of his life. Now we know we can follow Jesus because we look and see what happens after Jesus. And it says, go and tell John what you hear and see the blind received sight, the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, the deaf ears, dead are raised, and the poor have good news preached to them.

12:38 And blessed is he who is not offended by me. Said, blessed is he who is not offended might be because Jesus doesn't look like what anybody expected him to look like. So Jesus is the leader that then the disciples of John, the Baptist, follow. We are able to follow him, but what occurred to me is like, I think Jesus is a good model, I'd like to be a person like Jesus, but good heavens, I'd like someone a little bit closer

13:08 to my life as well. Because I mean I have prayed for some healings and seen some interesting things happen in prayer. But like if you looked at my life, you might not see the blind received sight, the lame walk and the lepers healed. You just might not. I was thinking about this, then that got me thinking about this next passage in 1 Corinthians.

13:39 So if you go to the right, if you're in Matthew, you go to the right a little bit. Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, Acts, Romans 1st and 2 Corinthians, Galatians, Ephesians 1st Corinthians chapter 11.

14:09 Paul in the very first verse of chapter 11 says this like, can't be in this line. Imitators of me as I imitate Christ or in another translation follow me as I follow Christ. And that's like a simple premise, but like remember who Paul was, right? The Jew of Jews, right?

14:42 Like on a mission to physically, brutally execute all the followers of Jesus, like going out on a crusade to end the followers of Jesus, breathing anger and self-righteousness. And Jesus, the good shepherd, leaves in I-9, comes down out of heaven, makes a special visit to get Paul.

15:13 And then Paul is able to, the power of the selection of Jesus on Paul is so effective that Paul is able to say, now you can, you don't have to just do what I say, you can actually do what I do. The confidence of Paul to say, follow, make similar choices to me in life. Like to say, my life is an example for you.

15:47 This is what Paul is saying, follow my choices, mirror my choices in life, because I am mirroring the choices of Jesus. This is ought to be striking that someone could make that claim. You know, the leadership of the church, how the church is led has been an evolving question

16:21 the further we get away from that first proof of apostles. Remember that critical point where Jesus tells Peter, when Peter makes the confession, you are the Christ and Jesus says, Peter on this rock, I'll build my church. You know, there has been and still is a notion that Peter was then the first leader of the church and he prayed for and ensured the passing of the spirit to the next level of leaders

16:53 and that there has been prayer and assurance of the spirit on every, the apatosol of success. And like if you're in the Catholic or the Orthodox or the Episcopal churches is the notion that there's an unbroken line of people from Peter to the current priest today to make sure that we had people that carried the spirit that was able to turn Paul around. Now I think that you could go with that line that says, how do I decide my leaders?

17:26 It will be based on the succession, this absolic succession of lungs. I think that you could, but that doesn't always work. There are leaders in that line who don't bear out the culture of the reign of God. Jesus suggests the best path is to find leaders whose culture bear out the reign of God.

17:58 And what Paul tells me is that it is possible for Paul calls himself the chief of sinners, for people who are yet sinners to be full examples of the way of Christ. To like full examples of what sheep look like following the good shepherd. For us for the next several weeks this will have two means.

18:34 One it means that we ought to have people whose examples we are following. Part of the way that we be good sheep, like I think that Christ is our shepherd and he leads us in front. But it can be hard to translate and determine the leadership of Christ in our life. By his grace he has seen throughout the generations to not leave the church only with him.

19:10 He inaugurated the church and then came down and established Paul. And then Paul established Timothy together with Barnabas. And then he taught Timothy how to establish other leaders in Timothy chapter three. He said, here's what leaders look like. Jesus the good shepherd has always made sure that we have closer leaders to us. Always never left us without small little pastors, small little shepherds, people who lead us along the way. And so one of the things that this will mean for us is

19:42 I want us to look at who have been our examples in life. I'd love to hear who your examples have been in life. Send them to me with stories. And I'm going to pull some out from history. I have some great people who have been examples for me. And for the next several weeks we're going to tell stories of who are the people who have been examples for us. What are we looking for from known leaders like Oscar Romero, right?

20:14 This beautiful leader of the poor in Central America, martyred at the Eucharistic table. I mean just like beautiful leaders where we can mind the examples of these leaders that Christ has put throughout time to inspire us on what is possible. Because the second thing is that because Paul can say with confidence, follow me as I follow Christ, my life is an example of what she looked like. You can say the same.

20:48 The spirit of God is sufficient for you to be emblematic, like sheep who follow well. So well that people could follow you as you follow the shepherd. I'm praying in this season when confusion abounds that the people of the cross are people of faith, making faithful choices that inspire the people around them to the same.

21:21 And I know it is possible because Christ has ensured it throughout time and he will ensure it for us in this time. Let me pray. Hey Lord, thank you for the capacity to be your sheep. Come with grace and mercy and your spirit. To build us up as you are sheep today.

21:54 Put examples in our lives whose choices we might mimic and thereby follow you. In Jesus name we pray. Amen. I want to give us a few minutes to think about that and we did this practice last week. You know our friends that for us are out for a couple of weeks. So I'm been doing this lecture to be in a process for us in our time of worship

22:24 which has been really helpful for me throughout the years and the way we're going to do it is I'm going to read the same passage three times. And I'll read it once and I just want you to listen to it but there might be a word or phrase that sticks out to you the first time that I read it. And so then in that silence after the first reading I want you to ask the Lord why does this stick out to me. Maybe repeat the phrase in your heart or in your head and ask the Lord why does this stick out to me.

22:56 And then I'll read the passage again and do it again. See if the same phrase sticks out to you. If the same phrase ask the Lord Lord what do you have for me in this passage today? Then I'll read it a third time and after the third time I want to invite you to say something back to the Lord in your heart or in your mind. And then I'll conclude with a prayer. So I'm just going to read a short section from that call to worship in Isaiah chapter 35.

23:38 Strengthen the weak hands and make firm the feeble knees. Say to those who have an anxious heart be strong, fear not. Behold your God will come with vengeance with a recompense of God. He will come and save you.

24:08 ! I'll read it a second time. Strengthen the weak hands and make firm the feeble knees.

24:43 Say to those who have an anxious heart be strong and fear not. Behold your God will come with vengeance with the recompense of God. He will come and save you.

25:37 One more time. Strengthen the weak hands and make firm the feeble knees. Say to those who have an anxious heart be strong, fear not. Behold your God will come with vengeance. With a recompense of God he will come and save you.

26:29 Thank you for your persistence with us, your patience. Thank you for that you did not leave us alone but you.

27:01 You came in the person of Christ and then dispatched and continue to dispatch leaders that we might follow and emulate. Open our hearts to the role models you have put in our lives and Lord open our hearts to the ways we might be role models for others. Empower us with your forgiveness this morning, your grace, your mercy, your strength, your love.

27:33 In Jesus name you pray.