Third Sunday of Easter April 10, 2016
Easter 3 (Misericordia Domini)
John 10:11-16
April 10, 2016
“You Sheep are His Sheep”
Grace, mercy, and peace to you from God our Father and our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen.
From the Gospel reading today, “He who is a hired hand and not a shepherd, who does not own the sheep, sees the wolf coming and leaves the sheep and flees…”
We don’t use the term “hired hand” all that much anymore. Now we just call them employees or workers or whatever. A hired hand is somebody who does the work to get paid. It’s not really his or her work. It’s somebody else’s work. But they do the work to get paid. You pay someone to mow your grass—that’s a hired hand. It’s not their grass. Not their house. You pay them to do your work. Or if you pay someone to build your house—that’s a hired hand. It’s not their house, it’s yours. You pay someone to work for your business, that’s a hired hand. If you work for someone else’s business, you’re a hired hand. Easy enough, right? Many of us have been and are hired hands. And we’ve hired hands to help us.
Now when I grew up on the dairy farm, we had a lot of different hired hands. Some really good, some not so good. They would milk the cows, feed the cows, help with fieldwork, etc. Obviously, they didn’t actually own the cows or the land. They were working for a paycheck. Now one of the longest hired hands and best hired hands we had was a guy I looked up to a lot. A really good guy. And one time he told me that when he worked somewhere, he treated everything as if it was his own. So he treated the cows and treated the machinery as if it was his. Of course, that’s what made him a much better hired hand than the rest. He tried to care.
Now here’s the thing, though. None of us actually does that. It sure would be nice if we did, right? How nice would the world be if we treated everything and everyone as if it was our own? What if we treated every single person in the world as if he or she was OUR friend and OUR family? Treated them as our own? That kinda sounds a lot like Jesus words, right? Do unto others as you would have them do unto you? Treating others as your own? Loving your neighbor as yourself?
What if we treated everyone else’s time as our own? Whoa, would that be a change. What if we never got impatient or tried to get in front of others or tried to hurry others up. Does that ever happen? What if we treated everyone else’s secrets as our own? Never tried to gossip them around. Never used them to get a laugh out of others. Wow, what a change that would be.
What if we treated everyone in the world as our fellow citizens? What if we considered every nation of the world as if it were our own nation? What if we truly treated everything as our own?
That’s not the way the world is, though. The world is full of selfishness and betrayal. We mostly just take care of our own. Everyone and everything is sold for a price. We want so badly to be liked and to get what we want that we will quickly betray anyone and anything to get it. Even those whom we’re nice to today, we can turn on tomorrow. Who hasn’t had that happen to them? Been treated kindly only to be betrayed the next day? And which of us hasn’t done it.
But not only do we betray others, we even betray ourselves. We don’t even treat our own bodies and family as our own. We eat, drink, and smoke things that are quite harmful to our bodies. So we betray our bodies. We betray our minds to hours of TV that only makes us dumber. We betray our hearts and bodies to others who are not our husband or wife and have not promised to care for us. Even the stuff that is supposedly ours—we betray.
This is the problem with hired hands. We’re all selfish. We’re just plain selfish. It’s always about the paycheck, the payday, the price. Just look at most of our jobs. How many of you, if you’re being honest, would work the same job if you were not paid for it? Maybe for a little while you’d do it, but forever? Some work for State Farm and like it there. But do you own the place? If you were offered more somewhere else, would you go? Some work for the State. Even the best state employees will treat their own stuff and their own time much differently than they treat the State’s stuff and time. Because we’re all selfish. Or many of you are teachers, working for the school district. The best teachers will surely treat the students as if they are their own children. But at the end of the year, those students move on and sometimes you’re okay with that. They aren’t truly your children and everybody knows it.
Do any of us truly treat things as if they’re our own? I don’t think so. No, we’re hired hands who most of all will look out for our own hides. When the wolf comes, if it’s not going to pay for us then we’re going to run. This is why there’s only one Good Shepherd. This is why you need Jesus. This is why you need Jesus. He is the only one who treats others as His own. Truly. And He says to you, “I know My own.” That’s you. He knows you and you’re His own and He’s no hired hand. He’s no selfish, betraying, unfaithful hired hand who runs away at the sign of any trouble or at the sign of better pasture. He takes care of His own. He takes care of you. And He gives His life for you.
Now one thing should be dealt with as you hear Jesus tell you right now that He is your Good Shepherd. This isn’t just some nice, quaint, little parable from the first century. This isn’t just some nice thing that Jesus did for you way back when. No, this is twenty-first century, right now—Jesus is right now your Shepherd. Because, of course, He is risen! He is living. He is the Shepherd who lives and is right now shepherding you. A dead shepherd isn’t going to help you and I very much. Because the wolf will come back again and get us. But Jesus lives and is every day laying down His life for you against the wolves and in spite of the hired hands.
Don’t entrust your life and soul to hired hands like yourself. You don’t even know what’s best for you. We’re constantly betraying our own selves. Don’t entrust your life to people who just want to make money off of you. Don’t entrust your life to celebrities who just want your attention and approval. Don’t entrust your life to any government, prince, or society. There’s only one who owns you and loves you. Jesus the Good Shepherd. Listen to HIS voice.
Repent of your sin and your betrayal and your selfishness and turn to the Good Shepherd. You are His and He treats you as His own. He lays down His life for you. When you come here to His altar, He lays down His body and blood to forgive you and strengthen you. When the wolf comes after you, He will never run away. He will never have more important things to do than care for you. He has laid Himself on the line to make sure that you are taken care of in every situation. To make sure that all things work for the good of His little sheep. He’s committed to you. He’s no hired hand. He’s not working for payday. He’s working out of pure love.
Now your Good Shepherd has other sheep also besides you. He has lots of sheep. Every sheep who has been called and baptized into His name is part of His flock. Some of the Jews couldn’t stand the idea of Gentiles being part of the flock. That’s because they were just selfish, betraying hired hands. But the Good Shepherd wants all people to be part of His flock. And He doesn’t like us sheep kicking each other, head butting each other, pushing, shoving, stealing food from one another, and fleecing each other. He wants a peaceful, loving flock.
So He calls us sheep to treat each other as our own friends and family. To treat one another as we would have others treat us and to love our neighbors as ourselves. Betrayal and selfishness are definitely part of this world. But they need not be part of this flock and need not be part of your life. As the Good Shepherd lays down His life for us, so we also ought to lay down our lives for the other sheep.
We shouldn’t be like hired hands who use each other for our own gain. Or who use the Church for our own gain. This is your flock. This is your Church. This is your family. When one sheep suffers, we all suffer. When one sheep is in pain, we all come to help. When one sheep is in need, we lend a hand. When one sheep sins, we all call them to repentance and forgiveness and we love them. When a new sheep joins the fold, we all welcome them and celebrate with them. When one sheep gets lost, we all call them back to the Good Shepherd. When the flock needs workers, needs greeters, teachers, offering counters, officers—we all seek to help.
You are Jesus’ own sheep. He is your own Shepherd. And this is your own flock. There’s no betrayal or selfishness here. It’s all washed away in the precious blood of Jesus. And our Shepherd is no hired hand. We are His own and He will never flee. He will stand by us forever and defend us from the wolf. He lays down His life that we may all have life. Thanks be to God for our Shepherd and our flock. In Jesus’ name. Amen.