Shepherd

Shepherd

Psalm 23:1

March 10, 2019 • Mount Pleasant UMC

Without question, it is the single most loved passage in the Old Testament, maybe even in the whole Bible. Even those who have no affiliation with the church or who have never set foot in a church building will ask for it to be read at their funeral. In fact, when I sit down with a family to plan for a funeral, I will ask them what their loved one’s favorite passage of Scripture was, very often they will say, “Psalm 23” (cf. Williams, Communicator’s Commentary: Psalms 1-72, pg. 182). It is a beautiful psalm; the language brings up everything we think of as peaceful and calming. Quiet waters. Green pastures. Comfort, goodness and love. This psalm has brought comfort to countless believers for many, many centuries. And while that’s not a bad thing, it’s also a reality that the words “The Lord is my Shepherd” is more often carved on tombstones than written in our lives. This psalm is meant to be more than a collection of words we read in difficult times. In reality, this psalm, words written by a shepherd boy centuries ago, is a guide to the good life (cf. Willard, Life Without Lack, pg. xvi).

That’s what we’re going to be exploring in these next few weeks during this Lenten season. We’re going to walk very slowly through this psalm and see what David, and his descendant Jesus, have to say to us about the kind of life God intends for us. Along the way, I’m going to ask you or challenge you to memorize this psalm over the next few weeks so that it gets deep down inside your soul, so that it becomes part of who you are. You’ll receive a wallet card on the way out this morning to help you with that. But it’s my belief that only when we know the kind of “abundant life” Jesus is offering us (cf. John 10:10)—only then can we truly welcome his death and resurrection as the path to that life. So while we will be walking toward Calvary and the empty tomb this Lent, as we always do, we’re going to be taking a different route this year, one that begins in a field outside of a small town in the Judean wilderness.

This psalm, as with a lot (but not all) of the psalms, is labeled as “a psalm of David.” That phrase, “of David,” could mean “by David” or “about David” or even “for or in honor of David.” Historically, it’s always been assumed that David did indeed write this psalm, and that would make sense since we know that as a young man, he tended the flocks of his father Jesse. Before he was a king, David was a shepherd.

But in this psalm, David is not talking about his own life as a shepherd. Instead, he’s using that experience to talk about God and his relationship to God. It may be that one day, as he was walking through the wilderness around his hometown of Bethlehem, or maybe wandering through one of the wadis (dry streambeds) along the Dead Sea, that it hit him: there are a lot of parallels between the way he handled his sheep and the way God handled him. God is a shepherd, and more than that, David says, God is his shepherd. One of the first things that jumps out at you when you read this psalm is that little word, two letters in English, “my.” The Lord is MY shepherd. This may have been one of David’s big realizations as he prayed these words. He knew the creator God was the God of Israel, the God of his people, maybe he even knew God as the God of his family. But that’s not what he celebrates in this psalm. The Lord is MY shepherd; not only is God a tribal or corporate God. He is a personal God (cf. Williams 183). Now, that’s true, wonderfully true, but we have to be careful that we don’t focus so much on that that we begin to believe God is just there to do whatever we want him to do. That, very often, is the mistake of the modern American church. God is MINE, we say. God must agree with everything I think, approve of everything I do, and always be on my side. Nothing could be further from the truth, and this psalm reminds us of that. God is not just MINE. God is my shepherd.

So to understand what that means, we need to think about what a shepherd does, and there are really three things I want to focus on. First of all, the shepherd is the owner and master of the sheep, so if God is our shepherd, God is our owner and master. Someone who wants to be a shepherd, whether in Biblical times or even in our own time, goes to a livestock auction or some place where sheep are for sale, and purchases a flock, a group of sheep. He pays cash for the flock. He gives up something valuable in order to possess the sheep. Now, I don’t know how David thought about this, but as Christians, we have a clear parallel in what Jesus did for us. The New Testament says Jesus, the Son of God, bought us with a price (cf. 1 Corinthians 6:20). Jesus himself said, “The Son of Man came…to give his life as a ransom for many” (Matthew 20:28). Theologians for centuries have debated as to how, why and to whom the ransom was paid, and I don’t have time or desire to get into that whole debate today. It’s enough for now to recognize that, in some way, Jesus bought us. He gave something valuable—his life—to gain his people, to save us from our sin. In fact, at the very end of the Bible, John describes a scene in heaven where a group of people called the “twenty-four elders” are singing a song to Jesus that goes like this: “You are worthy to take the scroll and to open its seals, because you were slain, and with your blood you purchased for God persons from every tribe and language and people and nation…” (Revelation 5:9). That’s why we call Jesus “Lord.” It’s the same as calling him “Shepherd.” He is our owner. He is our master. He rules over us, and that means, friends, that we are supposed to listen to him, follow his direction and live the life he intends for us. When we decide to become part of his flock, Paul says, we are no longer our own (1 Corinthians 6:19). In fact, that’s what we pray at the start of each year in the Wesley Covenant Prayer. Do you remember the opening words of that prayer? “I am no longer my own, but thine.” We live in a world bent on rejecting that idea, rebelling against that truth. Dallas Willard wrote, “We live in a world filled with people trying to be their own saviors” (4). As God’s people, we recognize we cannot be our own savior. It is Jesus who has paid the price for us. The Lord is my shepherd; he is my owner.

Now, a good master, a good owner, takes care of his or her sheep. As author Philip Keller puts it, David knew that “the lot in life of any particular sheep depended on the type of man who owned it” (Keller, A Shepherd Looks at Psalm 23, pg. 4). Keller, who once worked as a shepherd in East Africa, tells the story of the shepherd on the property next to his. The man was a tenant shepherd, one who didn’t own the sheep or the property but was paid to look after them. However, because he had no investment, he didn’t do all that much for them. The land was untended and often bare, which meant the sheep had no grass to graze on, and the sheep themselves were thin, weak and diseased. There was very little shelter for the sheep from storms or blizzards. To the tenant farmer, these sheep weren’t fit for anything except being sent to the slaughterhouse, and Keller tells how he would often see those sheep, huddled together in little knots, staring through their fences over toward his property where there was lush grass and plenty of room to graze. Keller concludes, “It’s the boss—the manager—the Master in people’s lives who makes the difference in their destiny” (16-17).

But David says that for those who allow God to be their shepherd, he will provide. “The Lord is my shepherd, I lack nothing” (23:1). Notice he does not say, “I have everything I want.” That’s the way we usually interpret it in our consumer-oriented culture. That’s the way we usually pray as well! Give me this, give me that, I want it all. No, David says, “I lack nothing.” What I need, I have. Jesus, in teaching his disciples and all of us to pray, emphasized the same attitude: “Give us today our daily bread” (Matthew 6:11). It’s not, “Give us everything we want” or “Bless us with everything we ask for.” No, it’s “give us today our daily bread.” Basic stuff. Is there anything more basic than bread? It’s not about wants; it’s about need. Paul echoes the same idea when he writes to the Philippians, reminding them to have confidence in God: “My God will meet all your needs according to the riches of his glory in Christ Jesus” (Philippians 4:19). “The Lord is my shepherd, I lack nothing” that I need.

God is our owner who generously provides for us. In fact, it's fair to say we are dependent on God for everything, including our very being (Willard 27). Thankfully, “what we need, God has—in infinite supply” (Willard 31). Now, remember, and we’ve talked about this before, that God is most interested in giving us what we most need. Certainly—air, food, water, clothing, those things are important. But they are not the ultimate things we need. Over and over again in the Bible we are reminded that what we most need is the presence of God. That was the need in the very beginning of the Bible, at the start of history. When Adam and Eve rebel against God, what they lose is not air, food, water or clothing. What they lose is the constant presence of God. They cut themselves off from the shepherd, from their master and Lord. Creation was broken because it was cut off from the one who sustains it all. And God has been working ever since to put it back together, to reconnect with his people. What we most need is his presence. And of course, that’s exactly what Jesus promises us. As one of his very last words to his disciples, as we talked about last week, he said this: “Surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age” (Matthew 28:20). He will be with us; he has promised us his presence.

But in that same promise, just before the promise, Jesus tells us he expects something from us. And that’s true of a shepherd/owner/master as well. It’s not just about us laying around and receiving good things. It’s not just about sitting in a church pew and soaking it all in. The relationship between sheep and shepherd is a working relationship. The Good Shepherd, Jesus, came to seek and save the lost (Luke 19:10), and he calls us to go with him on the same mission (Matthew 28:19-20). I’ve been here long enough that, either due to missing a meeting when elections took place or because of my own ignorance, I’ve ended up on several committees, boards and similar such groups in the community. Thankfully, each one of them that I’m on are working boards; they all have a specific task and a worthy goal. So I count the time I spend in those meetings as worthwhile. But a couple of weeks ago, I was in one of those meetings and I noticed one member of the team never spoke up, never volunteered to do anything, and always put their head down when it was asked who would take on such-and-such a responsibility. You’ve been with people like that, right? They want their name on the list, they want to be part of the group, but they’re not willing to do anything. In fact, that was my big question when I left that meeting: why is that person on the team? Can you imagine if someone like that was on your favorite basketball or football team? “I’d like to be on the team, but I’m not really interested in playing. I just want to be seen with the jersey on, have my name on the list, but don’t ask me to do anything.” They wouldn’t last long on the team—and rightly so! It’s the same thing in the flock, my friends. God calls us to not just take up space in the pew, not just to have our names on the roll, but to be involved in his mission. He’s the shepherd who has come to seek and save the lost; we’re his sheep called to bring in other sheep.

So let me ask you this: where are you involved in the mission? Where are you actively seeking to live out your sheep-hood? Paul describes the church as a body, and he says that each part has its place. Some places are noticeable, and some are more behind the scenes, but every part has its place. What is your place? What is your role in the body? How are you listening to and following the shepherd?

Now, a quick word to some of you who are thinking, “Well, I’ve done my part in the past.” Friends, if the mission isn’t accomplished, then none of us have finished our part. And let me let you in on a little not-so-secret: the mission isn’t yet accomplished. There are still people out there who are not yet disciples of Jesus, so there’s still work to be done until he returns. But I also realize that some of us may have health challenges and family issues that have curtailed our activity level. Many years ago, I got the chance to know Pauline, who had once been active in the church, but when I got to know her she was a shut-in. Pauline lived by herself in a house her father had built, and when I visited with her, she was in her mid-nineties. After we talked for a bit, Pauline said to me, “I’m sorry I can’t do anything for the church anymore.” I told her I didn’t think that was true, and she sort of looked at me with that look that says, “Are you calling me a liar?” So I quickly asked, “Can you pray?” Pauline assured me she could and did pray. “Then you can still do something for the church,” I told her. “You can pray for us, because we need prayers. We need your prayers.” Pauline died a few years later at the age of 99, and I believe she prayed for us more than we will ever know. So I’ll challenge you to do the same thing: if you have challenges in your life that prevent you from being actively involved in the mission, then pray for those who can. Pray for our church, pray for the United Methodist Church, pray for God’s kingdom in all places around the world, that we would be able to make disciples of Jesus Christ for the transformation of the world.

Now, I want to say one more thing about being a sheep. Sheep in a flock all have the same mark on them, usually on their ears. When they become a part of a flock, the shepherd marks the ears of each animal with his or her own distinctive sign or symbol. That way, even from a distance and even in a crowd, the shepherd can tell which sheep are his. A sheep is marked by the shepherd he or she belongs to (cf. Keller 10), and that begs the question: what marks us? What sets us apart? And can people tell, even at a distance or in a crowd, that we belong to the Great Shepherd Jesus. What marks us? In the book of Revelation, at the end of time, we are told that those who belong to Jesus (who, interestingly enough, is characterized often in the book as a Lamb) will have a mark on them: his name and his Father’s name written on their foreheads (Revelation 14:1). I don’t think that’s meant to be taken literally, though it could be. More than that, it’s an image of who controls your life; the forehead in the ancient world was seen as the center of decision-making, the place where you chose who you were going to follow, much like today we might say someone made up their mind. If a person’s forehead was said to be marked, that told you who they belonged to (Mulholland, Revelation, pg. 239). So, in one sense, Revelation says people should be able to tell by looking at us whose sheep we are. Now, Jesus himself said that he would be able to tell his people apart from everyone else by the ways they lived out their faith. He wasn’t saying that we are saved by what we do, but that we give evidence to our faith by the things we do. We feed the hungry, give drink to the thirsty, clothe the naked, heal the sick, welcome the stranger, visit the prisoner. Jesus says, “Whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me” (Matthew 25:40). So, adding to that same image, people can tell whose sheep we are by the distinctive ways we live out our faith. That’s one way we are marked by our shepherd.

Then there’s that famous passage in the letter to the Galatians, where Paul describes character qualities of a follower of Jesus. He contrasts those with the way the world lives, and he says those who are sheep should demonstrate what he calls “fruit of the Spirit.” Maybe you remember what those are: love, joy, peace, forbearance (or patience), kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. Is your sheep life marked by these qualities? But, I have to tell you, I think the mark Jesus most wants to see on us is even simpler. In fact, Jesus himself told us there is one thing we should be known for. Paul agreed that it’s the greatest of all qualities. When Jesus was asked what the greatest commandment was, do you remember what he said? I’m paraphrasing here, but he said it’s basically one thing: love God and love others. That sounds like two things, and you’re right, but it’s really two sides of the same coin. We love God by loving others and we can’t love others if we don’t love God. When Jesus looks at his flock, when he gazes over the gathering of sheep that is called Mount Pleasant or the one that is called United Methodist, does he see sheep that are marked by love?

Now, I’m not talking about the mushy-gushy Hallmark kind of love. Love is hard. As we said last week, sometimes love has to be tough. Sometimes love has to say no. When my kids were little, I would routinely tell them no because I loved them. No, you cannot touch that stove. No, you cannot run out into the street. No, you cannot paint the garage floor. No, you cannot have my Thin Mints. Sometimes love has to say no. Sometimes love has to set boundaries. The question I proposed several weeks ago still applies: what does love require? In our culture, we think “love is never having to say you’re sorry” or that love is letting you do whatever you want to do, but that simply isn’t so. A good shepherd sets boundaries for the sheep so that they don’t hurt themselves, so that they don’t wander off and get killed. Even when the sheep don’t understand, love sets boundaries. And love cares for other sheep enough to tell them about the God who loves them more than they can imagine; love does that because you don’t want that other sheep spending eternity without that God. The mark of a sheep of Jesus, what will help him identify us, is love—true, abiding, deep agape (no strings attached) love.

Have you let the shepherd mark you? Can others tell that you are part of his flock? Make no mistake: the path to the good life only begins when you say yes to the shepherd and let him begin his work in you. In October 2014, Rachel and I were on a “Lands of the Bible” trip, and one of our stops was in Patmos, the island where John was exiled and where, tradition says, he wrote the book of Revelation. We did a formal tour in the morning, but our afternoon was free to explore the island. So our friend David invited us to go on a hike to the top of the island, to check out the ruins of Kastelli, an important archaeological site. That sounded like fun (at least to me) and Rachel was up for the adventure, so off we went. What David failed to mention to us is that he had no idea how to get up there. He had been told there was a path to the top, but he didn’t really know where it began. I realized later, as we walked along the shore looking for some kind of sign, that knowing where to begin a journey is important. (By the way, we did eventually find the path, or at least a path, and, after several wrong turns and missteps, we had a great time exploring the top of the island.) Here’s my point and my invitation to you this morning: this Lenten season is a great time to start on the path to the good life. It begins with Jesus. You can’t have the truly good or abundant life without Jesus. So I’m standing here this morning, pointing to the place where the path begins. It’s up to you to take the first step.

The Lord is my shepherd, I lack nothing. Let’s pray.