C, Easter 4 - Revelation 7:16-17 "Hunger and Thirst"

Revelation 7:16–17 (ESV)  “They shall hunger no more, neither thirst anymore; the sun shall not strike them, nor any scorching heat.  For the Lamb in the midst of the throne will be their shepherd, and he will guide them to springs of living water, and God will wipe away every tear from their eyes.”

The transfer of power happens in many ways.  At its most elementary is the transmission of creative power that occurs to produce the following generation.  Man gives of himself in marriage to the woman; woman gives of herself carrying and giving birth to a child.  They both give to the child as a family and then the child grows and does the same with someone else’s  adult child.

Therefore, one generation serves the following generation.  They continue the creative process which God began and sustains in every generation since.  God gives each successive generation breath, having first breathed life into Adam.

From this first transmission of life in Adam comes all other transmissions of power between humans —  their empires, in politics and business, in sport, society, institutionally, sexually, and family. Where power passing began and was broken between Adam and Eve and their sons Cain and Abel.

The transfer of power can occur chaotically with bloodshed, or with order.  However, just because it occurs with bloodshed does not mean it’s bad, and similarly just because it occurs with order doesn’t necessarily mean it’s good. The transfer of power between humans is corrupted.   

Because of our sinful nature, it’s hard to tell if bloodshed or order has been ordained by God.  Yet at the cross bloodshed and order that brings eternal peace are bound together in the death and resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ, whom all in the heavenly realm glorifies, saying, “Salvation belongs to our God who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb!” (Revelation 7:10 ESV)

The reality is the Lamb of God is our Shepherd, and to him belongs salvation.  This is the truth and love by which God works in our sinful world through his bloodshed and peace, rather than our perceived truths or the peace and order in which we take pleasure, and love.

Last week and today we’ve heard from Revelation of the Lamb’s sevenfold worthiness, “Worthy is the Lamb who was slain, to receive power and wealth and wisdom and might and honour and glory and blessing!” (Revelation 5:12 ESV)

The transfer of power from God’s perspective, as God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit, sees that these seven elements of worthiness always remain with him.

We can see the corruption within ourselves and within the world when we see ourselves and others seize these seven elements of worthiness, as God’s alone, and steal them for ourselves.

Like the world, we hunger and thirst with desire to bask in our own power, wealth, wisdom, might, honour, glory, and blessing.  But when this occurs within a believer, they know it’s sin, and in having the knowledge of sin within revealed, they flee to him to whom salvation truly belongs — the God of truth and love.

When Simon Peter is called to the death of a disciple, Tabitha, or Dorcas, he is met by widows displaying her works.  She is dead and has been bathed for presentation to those who’ve come to pay their last respects before her burial.  Why has Peter been invited to come by the disciples who mourn her death?  We’re not told! 

This event in Acts occurs between Peter healing Aeneas, paralysed and bedridden for eight years, and the call of Cornelius’ a Gentile, and the conversion of him and his family, the giving of the Holy Spirit and their baptism into God’s church.

Although we don’t know why Peter was called to Tabitha’s side in her death, what happens on this occasion and the events before and after, calls us the hearers of God’s word, to understand the transfer of God’s power works contrary to transference of power everywhere else.

Living in our society today, I am pleasantly surprised, when hearing of Jesus’ healing in the Gospels, God is glorified and not Jesus.  Most didn’t know Jesus was God’s Son, so they didn’t know they were glorifying Jesus when they glorified God!  Now when we hear of Peter’s work in his healing, preaching, and raising of the dead, those who witness don’t believe in Peter, but believe in the Lord.

God’s transfer of power stands out, way ahead of the rest of the world.  When power is passed on in our world, the glory passes onto the next generation.  It matters not much whether there is order or bloodshed in this passing of power, glory does not remain with those who were before.  Sporting finals fade as future finals come and go, politicians riding the wave of an election win are put to pasture, corporates sway and institutional supremacy falls and rebuilds elsewhere, and a family’s fortune is usually inherited by the next generation. 

The power and glory pass on, and the previous powerful party is relegated “to history” as they pass away in death.  In today’s climate, history is not always looked upon favourably.  Unless you’re a keen genealogist, most would not be able to name our ancestors beyond our grandparents, at best.  Their glory and power have been drained down to us.

The transfer of God’s power is different!  This is because the hunger and thirst stay with God; those who believe, hunger and thirst for salvation that comes from God.  Or, to put it another way, God satisfies the hunger and thirst of those who hunger and thirst for him.  The Shepherd satisfies the sheep, because the Shepherd causes his sheep to remain in places where they’re caused to be fed and watered, producing restoration and righteousness within, through the worthiness of God’s name, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.

For those who hear God’s Word, and respond to his call within it, receive the transition of power just as Peter received it and passed it on to Tabitha. However, the transfer of God’s power from Jesus to Peter, Peter to Tabitha, and Tabitha to those who witnessed her resurrection, didn’t transfer the power from God, so that God passes away, becomes unglorified, and forgotten. 

This is what the devil, the world, and our sinful human nature wants.  They want the hearer of God’s Word to forget everything comes from God’s kingdom, power, and glory, and for the hearer to return to believing in themselves and the world.  The devil, the world, and our sinful selves tempt us to transfer all power to ourselves; to believe salvation doesn’t belong to God alone.

In his nature as God the Son, Jesus didn’t hinder the glory from going to God in his ministry.  Yet when he was born and baptised into his ministry the Holy Spirit was given to him.  This demonstrated to his disciples, and us, that Jesus became the same as us.  Jesus put aside his Godliness, and relied on the Holy Spirit, as we too, need the Holy Spirit in our lives.  Not because we have a divine nature like Jesus to put off!  But in Adam’s transfer of corrupted power, we have lost the original ability to see our salvation in God alone.

Peter and the disciples saw the Holy Spirit’s work in Jesus, and even so, didn’t receive the transfer of power without misunderstanding and misuse.  After Jesus’ resurrection they needed continual acts of the Holy Spirit, so they could act in the stead of Christ.  Because of the Holy Spirit, they served as Jesus served and allowed all worthiness to be recognised in Christ alone.

Two thousand years on from Jesus’ death, resurrection, and ascension, and the bestowal of the Holy Spirit, the worthiness of the Shepherd’s salvation, sees all power, wealth, wisdom, might, honour, glory, and blessing remain with him, who together with our Father and the Holy Spirit are worshipped and glorified!  As we so often pray.

If the Holy Spirit was not given, Peter, nor you or I, would be able to receive the sevenfold worthiness of Jesus Christ, the Lamb of God, and would not allow this Lamb to be our Shepherd, nor pass on his truth or love.

Jesus taught us to pray, for our Father’s kingdom to come, because salvation belongs to God. The Holy Spirit empowers us to pass on the power of God’s truth and love, through our daily baptismal bloodshed in Jesus’ death, and resurrection in repentant peace, having had our hunger and thirst satisfied in our salvation through Jesus’ body and blood.

For the kingdom, and the power, and the glory, are in the Shepherd.  He satisfies the hunger of his sheep with his pleasing pastures, and he quenches the thirst of his lambs with springs of living water.  Amen.

B, Midweek Lent 2 - Mark 14:22-52 "The Cup Passed On"

The way of the cross ramps up a notch as Jesus takes the Passover meal and redefines it with what is about to happen to him. 

The Passover, a meal practised by the Jews since the days of Moses, was a meal  first prepared in haste before the angel of death passed through Egypt pouring out the tenth plague upon all first born.  The angel spared only those who had the blood of the lamb smeared over their doorway, those who had eaten the lamb roasted over the fire together with bitter herbs, dressed for a quick departure from Egypt.

Jesus now takes this remembrance meal and gives it a renewed function.  We remember what he said and did with his word, instituting the bread of the Passover meal with his body sacrificed on the cross, and the cup of wine with his blood poured out as a sacrifice which would, and continues to, save many.

Now that the cup of salvation in his blood is instituted, the new covenant is set to be fulfilled.  The Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world heads out to the Mount of Olives for the events to be enacted which would make Jesus the Lamb to replace all sacrificial blood required for the old covenant.

Jesus’ interaction with Peter takes on special significance as he tells the disciples what is about to happen.

Jesus said to them, “You will all fall away, for it is written, ‘I will strike the shepherd, and the sheep will be scattered.’  But after I am raised up, I will go before you to Galilee.”  (Mark 14:27 ESV)

Some years prior Zechariah prophesied, “On that day there shall be a fountain opened for the house of David and the inhabitants of Jerusalem, to cleanse them from sin and uncleanness.”  “Awake, O sword, against my shepherd, against the man who stands next to me,” declares the LORD of hosts. “Strike the shepherd, and the sheep will be scattered; I will turn my hand against the little ones.” (Zechariah 13:1, 7 ESV)

Jesus was that fountain of blood, he was the Son from the right hand of the Father, who was incarnated as man, as the shepherd of Israel, was about to be struck.   Jesus’ little ones were to be scattered as the shepherd takes the place of a sheep to be slaughtered, of whom the disciples are Jesus’ little ones.

Peter flatly disagrees with Jesus saying, “Even though they all fall away, I will not.” (Mark 14:29 ESV)

Even after Jesus tells Peter he will deny him three times, Peter says forcefully, “If I must die with you, I will not deny you.” (Mark 14:31 ESV)  The other disciples also agree with Peter.

In the wake of this reading, we heard on Sunday, Jesus scolds Peter with the harshest of rebukes.  We hear,  “But turning and seeing his disciples, Jesus rebuked Peter and said, ‘Get behind me, Satan!  For you are not setting your mind on the things of God, but on the things of man.’” (Mark 8:33 ESV)

John Mark was Peter’s scribe.  The Gospel of Mark is Peter’s account of Jesus’ ministry written down by John Mark.  Incidentally the naked young man we hear leaving the scene in Gethsemene, is believed to be the author of this Gospel.

How Jesus deals with Peter, which Peter proclaims, and Mark records, seems quite abrupt.  Perhaps today the sensitivities of many would be offended.  We can learn much, however, from not only Jesus’ abruptness, but also the willingness of Peter to preach about his weakness recorded in the pages of Mark’s Gospel.

Peter’s forceful and impassioned statements  “Even though they all fall away, I will not” and “If I must die with you, I will not deny you”  stand in absolute contrast to what happens next.

In Gethsemene, as Jesus prays, we see his human flesh as our flesh.  Peter, James, and John see it too.  Jesus is willing, yet in the weakness of human flesh, he prays and waits, despite being dumbfounded, distressed, and overwhelmed by the weight of the world he is about to carry.

He leaves Peter, James, and John to pray alone.  Jesus knows his fate.  In the flesh of humanity, he struggles knowing what is going to happen to him.  Like any human that learns of their impending death, and struggles with its reality, so too does Jesus!  

With the weight of the known, Jesus stumbles and falls to the ground, he prays that the hour of suffering and death might pass over him.  But he is the new covenant, he is the new Passover Lamb, he has instituted at the last supper, all that God the Father has led him to do.  And he is led by the Holy Spirit to give him the spirit with which to be the Passover Saviour!

Hear in Jesus’ struggle, Jesus hates death.  Like any of us that pray when our utter helplessness is pressed upon us,  Jesus prays, “Abba, Father, all things are possible for you.  Remove this cup from me.” (Mark 14:36a ESV)

In true faith, Jesus prays a confession about the nature of God the Father.  Everything is possible for God our Father!  With his Word he could have removed the cup from Jesus!  But knowing the evil and the good this cup bears he contradicts what he’s just said and continues, “Yet not what I will, but what you will.” (Mark 14:36b ESV)

What are the disciples doing?  Is Peter waiting, watching, and praying as Jesus asked?  The one who confesses Jesus as the Christ, the one who says, even if I die with you, I will not deny you, cannot even stay awake.  When Jesus returned from praying, he did not find Peter, James, and John supporting him with prayer, but sleeping.  Three times this happened, impressing on us the reality that even if the spirit is willing, we need the Holy Spirit to enliven our weak flesh.

Judas comes to betray Jesus, with him is a mob from the chief priests, scribes, and the elders.  When they seized Jesus, one of them gets his ear cut off.  Mark does not report who, but in John’s Gospel, we’re told its Peter. 

In keeping with Peter’s lack of understanding, demonstrated throughout the Gospels, Peter cuts off the servant’s ear, overcompensating for his inability to stay awake and pray with, and for, Jesus.

But Jesus having come to fulfil the scriptures drinks the cup the Father has given him to drink, and all left him and fled.

Some years later Peter is martyred by Nero on an upside-down cross.  In coming weeks, we will hear more about Peter as he denies Jesus and the cock crows. 

The change in Peter who comes from understanding only the things of man to enduring death knowing the things of God, is a comfort for all in the church of the living God. 

Peter drinks the cup Jesus drank.  But it is said that out of respect for his Lord he was crucified on a cross upside-down. 

The event that is Peter’s life, saw a work of God, that took time!  From Jesus calling him on the sea of Galilee, working with the erratic ebbs and flows of his faithlessness and faith, right the way through to where he trusts the Holy Spirit to lead him as the Spirit led his Lord, even to death on an upside-down cross, all occurred in the fullness of God’s time.

In this Lenten season, there is opportunity for us to reflect on the work God is doing in us.  Our life is God’s event, he works in us as he did in Peter.  He gives us a cup of salvation and servanthood from which to drink, and the Holy Spirit will enable us to drink it over time!  Let us pray.

Heavenly Father, thankyou for working with Peter, even as you were sending your only Son to the cross.  Thankyou that our life is your event and that you are patient with us, willing us with your Word.  Help us not grieve the Holy Spirit.  But drink the cup of the new covenant, deny ourselves, pick up our cross, and drink deeply from the font of forgiveness, servanthood, and salvation.   Amen.  

A, Last Sunday of the Church Year Proper 29 - Matthew 25:31-46 "To Be Confessional"

“Jesus is coming!  Look busy!”  These are far from the most theologically sound words to have come from someone’s lips or be written down!

Apparently, these are the words written on the buttocks of the phony conspirator, disguised as the Archbishop of Canterbury, who’s a part of the plot to remove the British monarchy and anoint an imposter to the royal throne.

Does this sound a little farfetched and comical?  That’s because it’s the plot of the comical spoof movie, “Johnny English”.  Rowan Atkinson plays Johnny English, a bumbling idiotic English secret agent, seeking to save Great Britian and the Commonwealth from the evil French megalomaniac, Pascal Sauvage.   Johnny English is no James Bond!

“Jesus is coming!  Look busy!”  As hilarious and as silly as it sounds that an archbishop would have this inked on his backside, the idea of being busy when Jesus returns, is buried and hidden deep within every person’s psyche.

From where does this come?  Every child, every employee, in fact, every person knows, what this is about.  “Quick, quick, mum is coming!  Dad is coming!  The boss is coming!  Stop doing what you’re doing and look busy!”  We’ve all done it; we’ve all caught someone else out, doing it!

This sense of guilt and shame does not have to be taught to anyone!  From the moment we become aware in infancy, we seek to hide what we’re doing from those who are responsible for us and our upbring.  Be it parents or any other authority! 

In the Garden of Eden, the same thing happened.  We hear, “And they heard the sound of the LORD God walking in the garden in the cool of the day, and the man and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the LORD God among the trees of the garden.”  (Genesis 3:8 ESV) You can almost hear what Adam and Eve were thinking when God came looking!  “Quick, quick, God is coming, look busy!”

Busy doing what?  Every parent knows the sound of silence, then scampering feet and excited expressions of children trying not to get caught out!  None of us seem to learn that looking busy, makes you look guilty, and trying not to look guilty, just makes you look even more guilty.  I can hear mum saying, “I wasn’t born yesterday!  I didn’t come down in the last shower!”

“Jesus is coming, look busy!”

It’s actually comical we think this way, when like our parents, Jesus already knows who you are and what you’re doing! 

However, the silliness and the hilarity of who we are and what we do has a serious consequence if we continue believing in these foolish and faithless ways!  Jesus will judge the sheep from the goats.  Neither the sheep nor the goats say to Jesus, the King, “When were we busy?” Or “When were we not busy?” Rather the sheep and the goats both say, “When did we see you?”

Jesus has been here the whole time!  What is it he sees?

What is Jesus looking for in us?  What is he seeing buried in the depths of your being?  A sheep or a goat!

The picture of sheep and goats Jesus wants us to see is a picture of passivity verses a picture of  roguish deviousness.  Sheep by nature if left to their own devices will spread out over a field to feed, but when led by a shepherd they flock behind him. 

Goats, like sheep will follow a shepherd.   However, unlike sheep goats are opportunist.  They don’t need a shepherd.   Unlike sheep, goats travel together, they feed together, and they get into trouble together. 

This opportunistic herding instinct in goats, however, works in one’s advantage when yarding young goats.  They all want to be first!   They all race to see what’s in the yard; to beat everyone else to the unknown.  Sheep don’t herd as well, especially lambs!  They need a good dog to keep them together!

But regardless of the passivity of a sheep or the devious desire of a goat, neither knows what the shepherd knows, nor sees what the shepherd sees!

To the surprise of this son of a goat farmer, these days a goat has embedded itself into the modern vernacular in a new way.  To most people when you ask, “What is a goat?”, they will tell you, “It’s an animal that bleats and eats!”  Once, if a person was referred to as being “a goat”, it was not a compliment!  But to teens and young adults a G.O.A.T., is an acronym meaning, “Greatest Of All Time”.

Nevertheless, this new meaning for a two-legged goat, still fits nicely with the opportunistic desire of the four-legged animal to which Jesus refers.

Goats don’t need a shepherd.  Those who strive to be the greatest of all time, usually don’t flock behind a shepherd!   No, rather, one usually sees them out in the lead, herding the desires of those longing to be like the goat to whom they’ve flocked.

But the goat who thinks it is the greatest of all time, is seen by the God Of All Time who “is” the greatest of all time.  He sees, and he will sort the sheep from the goats! 

So, what is the desirable quality Jesus seeks in the sheep?  The sheep know Jesus is coming, but there is neither the need to look busy, nor the need to look bored.  No!  The sheep are not interested in looking anywhere but to Jesus.  They are not interested in a knowledge of goodness, nor a knowledge of evil.  They are concerned about gaining a knowledge of Jesus Christ, the King coming to his kingdom, who has busied himself for all, and won the battle.

His sheep know, knowing him is greater than a knowledge of goodness.  His sheep know he is so good, he bore all evil knowledge, and its deeds on the cross.

When you think “Jesus is coming”, and you act like a goat looking busy, you’ve already missed the mark.  When you think “Jesus is coming”, and you think you have to act like a sheep, you are a goat disguised as a sheep.  You will end up being like a fat sheep who acts like a goat!

When you think “Jesus is coming”, confess to your heart, “I am Jesus’ little lamb!”  

Rather than think, don’t do, but be!  If you think, and you do, then you’re dead!    But you’re already dead to sin, and now you’re alive in Christ, by the power of the Holy Spirit!  So don’t do!  Be!

Let the Holy Spirit, lead you, in the Word of God, to the Lamb of God, to be with the King of creation!  You are standing under the cross with Jesus, like Jesus, being led like Jesus by the Holy Spirit.

Jesus is coming, he is the greatest of all time.  Therefore be!  Because you are!

See Jesus in your enemies, the weak, criminals, the poor, the rejected, all those with whom you do not want to associate!  Then you will see why Jesus has come to you! 

Jesus is coming, he is the greatest of all time, therefore be because you are!

Know you are a redeemed sinner, a sinner being redeemed, and a sinner who will be redeemed! 

The Redeemer is coming, be redeemed!  Because you are redeemed, and he is your Redeemer!

Be a confessor of Christ, a seer of sin, within, without!  Therefore, be a faithful forgiver!  Be a servant of salvation!  You can!  Because Jesus is your Saviour!

St James tells us, “The prayer of faith will save the one who is sick, and the Lord will raise him up.  And if he has committed sins, he will be forgiven.  Therefore, confess your sins to one another and pray for one another, that you may be healed.  The prayer of a righteous person has great power as it is working.”(James 5:15–16 ESV)

On this last Sunday of the Church year, it’s a reminder to us to “come out”, as sinners.  To be what God sees!   But also, to see with the eyes of faith, Jesus in those he wills you to serve!   Let the Holy Spirit lead you, to confess the reality of your full being, as a forgiven sinner, forgiven of true tangible confessable sins, that have lost their deadly power and received lifegiving power at the cross.

In your confession of Christ forgiving you, and your confession of the deeds he has forgiven you, you will stand under those in whom you see Jesus Christ.  And therefore, you will be serving them with Jesus Christ, under whom you stand!

Then, through your being in Christ, the Holy Spirit can lift up, the poor, the lonely, the destitute, and the undesirables to the Lord.  Therefore, confessing your “full” being in Christ!  They will hear what you have received, what you are receiving, and desire to share in what you will receive.  Forgiveness of sins, life, and salvation!

This is the fullness of Jesus Christ who fills all in all.  Amen.

A, Post-Pentecost 3 Proper 6 - Matthew 9: 36, 10:5-6, 16a, Romans 5:1–8 "Flayed and Flung"

Romans 5:1–8 (ESV) Therefore, since we have been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. Through him we have also obtained access by faith into this grace in which we stand, and we rejoice in hope of the glory of God.  Not only that, but we rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope, and hope does not put us to shame, because God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us.  For while we were still weak, at the right time Christ died for the ungodly. For one will scarcely die for a righteous person—though perhaps for a good person one would dare even to die—but God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.

Matthew 9: 36, 10:5-6, 16a (ESV) “When Jesus saw the crowds, he had compassion for them, because they were harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd.  These twelve Jesus sent out, instructing them, ‘Go nowhere among the Gentiles and enter no town of the Samaritans, but go rather to the lost sheep of the house of Israel.  Behold, I am sending you out as sheep in the midst of wolves.’”

Jesus paints the picture of sheep without a shepherd.   The sheep are harassed and helpless.  Harassed and helpless are rather tame words here in the English.  The Greek suggests the sheep are flayed and flung without a shepherd.  To be flayed is to be stripped of skin, to be skinned alive!

This picture is much grimmer when we realise the sheep have no protection from the shepherd or even their own skin, dispersed all over the place without the protection of numbers. They were walking meals for every wild beast out there.  That’s not good!  In our English slang we might say they were skint!  But it’s for these, skint, skinless sheep, Jesus has compassion.

It is to the sheep of Israel that Jesus sends his apostles.  They are ones sent to stand in the place of Jesus, having carried his command to “go” and “proclaim as you go that the kingdom of heaven is near”, in Jesus Christ and his word of promise.  The authority he receives from our Heavenly Father, is to send the apostles with authority to clothe the skinless, helpless sheep with his love.  To give them protection, he brings his kingdom into the world with his human presence, and with it, the authority to pass on what he brings from our Father to those he longs to clothe.

The reality is those whom Jesus sends are sheep too!  They are not called to go out with a thick skin, so to speak, but to go to the skint lost sheep of Israel, skint as well.  The only thing they were to take was the word of Jesus.  A word he promises is so powerful in judgement, that if those who heard it were to reject it, they would be in greater peril than Sodom and Gomorrah on the day of judgement.

Yet, it is to these “sent ones” he also says, you sheep will encounter wolves.  Jesus paints a picture that is far from rosy and romantic.  There is no bait and switch in his word, but rather the unhidden truth of reality.

In the midst of this picture of death, Jesus reassures those he sends, “When they deliver you over, do not be anxious how you are to speak or what you are to say, for what you are to say will be given to you in that hour.  For it is not you who speak, but the Spirit of your Father speaking through you.  Brother will deliver brother over to death, and the father his child, and children will rise against parents and have them put to death,  and you will be hated by all for my name’s sake. But the one who endures to the end will be saved.”  (Matthew 10:19–22 ESV)

As they go, they will suffer pain, hatred, and death, for bearing his name.  Yet here is the opportunity God will create for one to speak with authority the word, given by the Holy Spirit, from Jesus and the Father.

In Romans chapter eight, Saint Paul asks the church in Rome, “Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or danger, or sword?  As it is written, “For your sake we are being killed all the day long; we are regarded as sheep to be slaughtered.”  No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us.” (Romans 8:35–37 ESV)

One would assume that with the promise of being flayed and flung, that not many would accept the call to carry Christ, out into the world of wolves.  Yet, the history of the church, tells us otherwise, demonstrating over and over again the power of the Holy Spirit is greater than that of the human being.

The fear of suffering is real, we all know it and feel it!  Self-preservation kicks in!  We, in our natural state, will do anything to flee a fight, especially knowing we are not thick skinned.  But rather, are helplessly skinless, flayed and flung out into the wilds of the world without protection.  Such is our default human nature!

Paul speaks of Abram’s hope against hope to the Romans.  He says, “In hope he believed against hope, that he should become the father of many nations.’” (Romans 4:18a ESV)

However, we struggle with a fear and a hope that leaves us hopeless like sheep without a shepherd.  Our sinful nature tells us the love of Christ will separate us from the comfort in which we clothe ourselves.  Everything against the kingdom of God, tells us being killed for Christ, being regarded as sheep to be slaughtered, makes us conquered, not more than conquerors!

In our hopelessness we are tempted to believe against hope.  The opposite of Abram.  And in doing so we seek to clothe ourselves with the righteousness of the world.  These clothes of comfort might seem to be appealing but they are not clothes of endurance character or hope.  Rather they cover one’s flayed helplessness and provide no security or salvation.

Paul makes the claim that we who are in Christ, “stand, and rejoice in hope of the glory of God”.  (Romans 5:2b ESV)   This is the hope in which Jesus called the apostles to stand and rejoice, despite the wolves, and it is the hope in which we are called to stand and rejoice too! 

These are the clothes of Christ put on by the Holy Spirit for helpless flayed and flung sheep, to be righteous and joyful as we face death all day long, knowing we are more than conquerors in the clothes of Christ’s righteousness.

Not only do we rejoice in the hope of the glory of God, but we also rejoice in our suffering.  How can this be?

In an age that’s so focused on pleasure, suffering is to be avoided at all costs.  In fact, ridding our lives of suffering, and not accepting suffering as an event that makes us mature as humans, has blinded people as they pursue pleasure and comfort.

Saint Paul says, “we rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance,  and endurance produces character, and character produces hope, and hope does not put us to shame, because God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us.  For while we were still weak, at the right time Christ died for the ungodly.” (Romans 5:3–6 ESV)

If we have no suffering, we have little to no endurance.  When we have no endurance, we have no character, and without character we have no hope.  Without suffering and the understanding of suffering’s function in the world, one sets themselves up for hopelessness!

Seeking self-comfort in the things of this world, while avoiding suffering, does not lead one in hope to Christ.  When we see ourselves with strength because of worldly comforts, our spirit might seem secure.  But when these comforts no longer give us comfort, or when they die, our hope too proves to be hopeless.  Rather than being, more than conquerors, we are more than conquered, we are flayed and flung, skint and skimped of salvation, helpless sheep without a shepherd. 

So, suffering allows one to grow to maturity.  This happens in a worldly sense, but also in a spiritual sense. 

Where suffering in a worldly sense makes us harden up, suffering in a spiritual sense softens us with the love of Jesus Christ, to be comforted, and to comfort, with forgiveness.  His love is why we rejoice in our suffering, suffering both physically and spiritually as believers and receivers of his love.

This love is a new skin!    For our peace with God the Father, the Spirit puts on the good news garment of grace in Christ.  This outfit bears the fabrics of faith and forgiveness.  We can hope to not only have our own sin conquered, but the wolves in sheep’s clothing will know their weakness and are given opportunity to receive forgiveness too.

In fact, the wolves are flayed sheep!  In their hopelessness, they look threatening, hidden in sheep’s clothing.  But in reality, they are sheepish and ashamed wolves, flayed and flung, skint and skimped of salvation too.

Because you are covered in the clothes of Christ’s righteousness, as the saved sheep of Israel, the Holy Spirit allows you to know that suffering produces endurance, endurance character, and character hope. 

The Holy Spirit encourages us, as he does all he sends out, to put on the garments of suffering, endurance, character, and hope.  A covering that does not end in shame.  Instead, these four coverings you wear, and bear, are the clothes of Christ’s love.   

The picture of us as flayed and flung sheep is not as grim as we would expect.  Now knowing we wear ,so to speak, the eternal skin of Christ, we awake and wear this bright new reality every day. 

Death no longer has power over Jesus Christ, whose skin bears the marks of death but has risen in power over death.  So too with us!  We are conquerors of death, the devil, and the wolves of the world, with the covering of Christ.  No one can flay from us the flesh of Christ!  Nor can we be flung from the kingdom of heaven, while the Holy Spirit leads us, in, with, and under, the forgiven body and blood of Jesus Christ!  Amen. 

A, Good Shepherd Sunday, Easter 4 - John 10:7,9 "Identity Under The Good Shepherd"

John 10:7,9 (ESV) “Truly, truly, I say to you, I am the door of the sheep.  If anyone enters by me, he will be saved and will go in and out and find pasture.”

Good Shepherd Sunday is full of rich language of a shepherd faithfully leading his sheep and his sheep, having heard his voice, willingly following.

In Acts two we hear the consequences of the Holy Spirit coming at Pentecost, after Peter preaches a sermon of Law and Gospel that brings three thousand to baptism and faith.  After which, the newly baptised into Christ, persevere and endure under the Apostles’ teaching, holy fellowship, breaking of bread (as both, Holy Communion, and as sharing their earthly gifts), and to prayers.

These were special times and those who believed, full of the Holy Spirit, lived to praise God for what the ascended Jesus had done.

We also hear of the providence our Heavenly Father, likened to a shepherd, in Psalm twenty-three.  King David, the shepherd made king of Israel, knew that to lead he needed to be led by our Father in Heaven.

He identified within himself the need to be cut off from trusting in himself, which was without trust and fear in God, living to writhe in its own desire for pleasure.  Left with himself he was acutely aware of his weak human spirit.  He knew he needed the Holy Spirit to give him a new spirit.  His experience in life was that of the enemy of the self within, aligning itself with the external enemy without.

In a strange irony, the enemies he fought against, were his sinful nature’s greatest allies within, leading him into worry and doubt, then therefore, misusing his authority to pleasure himself as his own god.

Therefore, against this, David claims the Lord as his shepherd.  He has no want.  He lacks nothing in having the Lord as his shepherd.  He does not fear the evil within, nor the evil without, over which he has no control.

In fact, King David’s Lord, his Shepherd, makes him lie down in green pastures, beside peaceful waters!  He knows the Shepherd’s goodness and steadfast love and mercy is constantly hunting him down to bestow upon him common life together with God.  Joyfully returning him to the house of the Lord repeatedly, then eternally, despite the dangers David and others, present to himself.

This  is a picture of restored paradise.  The house of the Lord on earth, even this church, is an image of the eternal, despite all its shortcomings, and its eventual destruction, just as the temple in Jerusalem was destroyed.

But Jesus is our true temple in which we now have access into the Father’s presence.  The curtain  has been torn asunder and through his suffering and death we have common life together with God our Father. 

In the Gospel reading for Good Shepherd Sunday, Jesus tells us, he is the door, through which one enters into God’s presence.  No one comes to God the Father except through this door.  Jesus Christ is the way, the exodus; the truth, the unhidden reality; the life, the revolving door of faith.  Having been brought to Jesus by the Holy Spirit, one’s sin is uncovered and nailed to the cross.  Those who retain this faith, walk in and out this door on the way of eternal life.

This is the same goodness and steadfast love to which King David refers in the Twenty-third psalm.  This is the same faithfulness with which God is pursuing you, so you might share in the common life of peace and holiness, having been led on the exodus from the self, into the community of God’s pleasure.

Jesus is the Good Shepherd as well as the door to salvation.  Many doubt this though and need encouragement as a result of suffering and the hopelessness that comes from being seduced by the spirit of this age. 

God the Father’s church gathered by the Holy Spirit into Jesus Christ’s death and resurrection, the family, historical tradition from the democracy of those who’ve died, all these forms of authority, are looked on with suspicion by society today.  This feeds one’s doubt and disbelief! 

Unfortunately, with this suspicion of all authority, the spirit of the age is believed, and one is encouraged to seek happiness within the self.  But once there, seeing the ugly reality of the unhidden self, the mirage of happiness just seems to move further away.

Like King David, our inner sinful self, our human spirit, allies itself with the spirit of the society in which we live, even though we know it’s completely corrupt.

Those in Peter’s day struggled under persecution and hopelessness of that age as well.  He proclaims, “By his wounds you have been healed.  For you were straying like sheep, but have now returned to the Shepherd and Overseer of your souls.”  (1 Peter 2:24b–25 ESV)

Our Good Shepherd watches over all who have been baptised, he has underwritten the assurance of our salvation with his own resurrected life.  The resurrection of Jesus is the hope that surpasses all other hopes because all other hopes lead to hopelessness!

The essence of this Good Shepherd comes from God the Father, and from the Father together with the Son, the shepherding of our souls continues today, as the Holy Spirit is sent to shepherd those who identify as the Good Shepherd’s sheep.

Jesus, as the Lamb of God, committed no sin, spoke without hiddenness or trickery, did not abuse or repay abuse, and bore pain without revenge. 

We his sheep know we need this Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world, because of our sin!    Isaiah proclaims the unhidden truth of Jesus, when he says, “We all like sheep have gone astray; we have turned—every one—to his own way; and the LORD has laid on him the iniquity of us all.” (Isaiah 53:6)

Peter picks up Isaiah’s thought from Scripture, and from his witness adds, “He himself bore our sins in his body on the tree, that we might die to sin and live to righteousness.  By his wounds you have been healed.”  (1 Peter 2:24 ESV)

Like King David, Peter knew by experience that he needed the Good Shepherd to bring him to the door of salvation.  Peter knew his sinfulness conspired with the sinfulness of all others to put Jesus on the cross.  It was Jesus alone who walked the way of the cross, who bore the unhidden truth of every person’s inner self on the cross, and lived the life that pleased our heavenly Father, despite the cross.

We now have the door open to confession, where we can have the deathliness of our sin, daily nailed to the cross, without costing us eternal death.  This is the true door that is Jesus Christ.

We steal and plunder God of his goodness by seeking to enter God’s kingdom through any other works, either good or evil.  But those who enter by the door that is Jesus Christ, have done so by the Good Shepherd.  He leads with the word of his rod, this is the Law, and his saving staff, which is the Gospel.   

Therefore, having been unhidden by his word of Law, are cleansed in his blood, through the work of the Holy Spirit who gives us the holy identity as God’s own Son. 

This cleansing is good news for those who believe it and receive it.  This is the Gospel of salvation for those who identify under the Sonship and subordination of Jesus Christ!

Jesus says to you, “Truly, truly, I say to you, I am the door of the sheep.  If anyone enters by me, he will be saved and will go in and out and find pasture.” (John 10:7,9 ESV)

Let us pray: Triune God you are three Shepherds, but one loving God.  Because you lead us, because you became one of us, and because you gather us, surely goodness and mercy will follow us all the days of our life, because you dwell here within the temple of our body, your body, so we might live with you forever in the paradise of your pleasures, your eternal body.  Amen.

C, Easter 4 - Psalm 23:1-2 "A Shepherd without Want"

Psalm 23:1–2 (ESV) The LORD is my shepherd; I shall not want.  He makes me lie down in green pastures.  He leads me beside still waters. 

The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want.  How many times have we heard this first line of Psalm Twenty-three?  We have all heard it and said it many times, in Sunday services, at funerals, and we’ve sung it to different well-loved tunes.  The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want!

But how many times have we told ourselves when the desire to get something is strong, “I shall not want because God is my shepherd”? 

So often, the grass seems to be greener on the other side of the fence, so I sidestep the Lord, and stray off seeking what I want.

Want is desire, something sought, what a person seeks or is looking for.  What one wants is what usually pleases someone!  Want is interchangeable with the word, love. 

Wanting can be coveting or worshipping.  So the question goes begging, what gods shepherd one’s life?

Are my finances my shepherd?  When I’ve got money, does that satisfy my want? 

Are my friends or my family my shepherds?  As long as I’ve got them am I content? 

The thing that shepherds us is your god and my god, and this god is what you and I want.  The problem is, the gods we want most of the time, are idols that deceive us as we seek them.

In the twenty-third psalm it’s as if the Psalmist is proclaiming to his own heart, “Yahweh is my shepherd, because I have got him there is nothing that I want!”

Rooted beneath this much-loved line from Psalm Twenty-three, is the First Commandment, “I am the Lord your God, you shall not have any other gods.”  What does this mean?  Luther rightly teaches, “We are to fear, love, and trust God above anything else.”

Another good description of what a loving shepherd looks like, is what we believe God the Father almighty, maker of heaven and earth, is and does, as our provider and protector.  The Small Catechism again teaches…

“I believe that God has created me and all that exists.  He has given me and still preserves my body and soul with all their powers.  He provides me with food and clothing, home and family, daily work, and all I need from day to day.  God also protects me in time of danger and guards me from every evil.  All this he does out of fatherly and divine goodness and mercy, though I do not deserve it.  Therefore, I surely ought to thank and praise, serve, and obey him.”

Like King David telling his heart to not want because the Lord is his shepherd, we confess to ourselves and each other that God has created me and all that exists, etc.

However, the only person to ever not want, is Jesus Christ.  He is the only one who truly looked to the Lord as his shepherd. 

Although King David wrote Psalm twenty-three or authorised someone to write it, the writer was inspired by the Holy Spirit to write down the word of God, which has its origin in the Son of God, Jesus Christ, the Word made flesh.

Jesus says of himself to the Jews who were looking for a preconceived Messiah for themselves, “The works that I do in my Father’s name bear witness about me,  but you do not believe because you are not among my sheep.  My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me.  I give them eternal life, and they will never perish, and no one will snatch them out of my hand.  My Father, who has given them to me, is greater than all, and no one is able to snatch them out of the Father’s hand.  I and the Father are one.” (John 10:25b–30 ESV) 

The Jews were looking for a Messiah like King David, and not to he who inspired King David to write the Psalms and lead Israel, all while submitting to he who was truly shepherding Israel through the shepherd boy anointed as King.

They did not want Jesus, the Lamb of God, to be their Messiah.  They wanted a zealot king to toss out the Romans, they wanted what  pleased them.  They wanted to be saved from everything else, but they did not want to be saved from themselves or their slavish wants.  Nor did they want the Romans to be saved.

The grass was greener on the other side of the fence, in oh so many ways!

The Jews did not realise the grass on their side of the fence was dead, because of what they had bound themselves to, what they wanted they had got in the past, and it had fenced them into a dead corner.  Now a shepherd had arrived to bring them and all nations to greener pastures and calm waters.  

Where was the grass greener?  Where they were, or where they wanted to be, or where this Messiah was seeking to lead them?

In the same way we confuse ourselves with what we want!  We double face ourselves, turning back on our tracks like a fox avoiding the spotlight, after devouring the landowner’s lambs.

But the Shepherd who desires us to trust him as our true shepherd, makes us lie down in the green pastures he wants us to lie in.  He leads us by his sustaining waters of peace.  Not to the pastures of our powers or pleasures, nor the surging temptations of seemingly progressive worldly human opinions.

Our Shepherd was the Lamb of God, who takes your sin away, when he took away the sin of the world on the cross.  But now this Lamb of God, is the Shepherd of God, who will guide to springs of living water that flows from the eternal throne of heaven.

Until we stand before that throne in heaven, our Shepherd causes us to lie down in green pastures on this earth.  Where he causes us to lay might not always seem green to us.  In fact, without faith, this pasture will seem dead to the hearts of sheep continually wanting a shepherd to justify what they want.

Here again Luther teaches in the explanation of the fourth petition  “God gives daily bread, even without our prayer, to all people, though sinful, but we ask in this prayer that he will help us to realise this and to receive our daily bread with thanks.”

These days the Shepherd of God sends his holy sheep dog to help us.  The Holy Spirit continually rounds us up and seeks to bring us back to our Shepherd.  We need this because we are continually tempted by many dangers.

In fact, we are in the great tribulation, and the great tribulation goes on within each of us, and around us, as the Lord Jesus Christ and the Holy Spirit struggle with your human spirit, and all the idols luring us towards a false salvation that has no hope.

Yet as the battle rages, it has already been won!  In the bloody battle we stand with Jesus Christ in the victory, having been washed in the blood of the Lamb he now shepherds us in robes of his holiness and righteousness.

Look and see not what you want, but what you need and already have!  See your Shepherd on the throne in heaven, see yourself in eternity with him, having received him whom you wanted. 

And as you look forward to the victory feast, see to it that you remain in the Lamb who takes away the sin of the world, by confessing your sin, and believing confessed sin is forgiven.

See with the eyes of faith as you hear of your heavenly celebration with the eternal congregation, who… “are before the throne of God, and serve him day and night in his temple; and he who sits on the throne will shelter them with his presence.  They shall hunger no more, neither thirst anymore; the sun shall not strike them, nor any scorching heat.  For the Lamb in the midst of the throne will be their shepherd, and he will guide them to springs of living water, and God will wipe away every tear from their eyes.” (Revelation 7:15-17 ESV)

The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want; now and forevermore, Amen.