Year B
Acts 4:5-12
Psalm 23
1 John 3:16-24
John 10:11-18<\/p>\n\n\n\n
May the words of my mouth\u2026 O God\u2026 speak your Truth\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Literary philosopher Ren\u00e9 Girard described the scapegoat mechanism… as a ritual to transfer onto an animal\u2026 everything likely to poison relations between members of the community\u2026 and its effectiveness was based in the idea that the community’s sins were expelled with the animal\u2026 so the community was rid of them\u2026 the sacrifice attempted to restore order and reinvest administrators of the law with control over an unruly population\u2026 but a scapegoat has come to mean any animal\u2026 or any individual.. or any group\u2026 which innocently bears the blame of others\u2026 which can make the law lawless\u2026 and rulers unruly\u2026 <\/p>\n\n\n\n
And in today’s reading from Acts\u2026 all of those who gathered\u2026 the scribes\u2026 Annas the high priest\u2026 Caiaphas\u2026 and all who were of the high-priestly family\u2026 they gathered\u2026 because at the beginning of chapter three\u2026 Peter and John healed a man lame from birth\u2026 who others would carry and lay at a gate of the Temple called the Beautiful Gate\u2026 so that he could ask for alms from those entering the Temple\u2026 and so Peter and John were arrested because they were healing\u2026 and teaching the people\u2026 and proclaiming that in Jesus there is the resurrection of the dead\u2026 and so in today’s reading\u2026 they are brought before this group\u2026 and after being questioned by what power\u2026 or by what name they did this\u2026 Peter confronts the leaders of his people with a truth about themselves and their society\u2026 that they killed Jesus\u2026 who was the cornerstone\u2026 whom they\u2026 the builders\u2026 the authorities… rejected\u2026 these builders of society\u2026 turned Jesus into a scapegoat in their attempt to maintain power\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n
And in today’s Gospel\u2026 Jesus warns about wolves who snatch and scatter the sheep\u2026 perhaps these wolves are those who also attempt to maintain power and authority\u2026 while keeping it from others\u2026 perhaps they are systems which keep people scattered\u2026 divided\u2026 which contribute to there being many flocks… instead of the one flock which Jesus sought\u2026 and many shepherds instead of the one shepherd Jesus\u2026 and Jesus warns about hired hands\u2026 who don’t own the sheep\u2026 who don’t really care about the sheep\u2026 who may inherently support the wolves’ agendas by not confronting them\u2026 and who run away at the first sign of trouble\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n
But in the Gospel\u2026 Jesus affirms that he is the Good Shepherd\u2026 and so what does it mean to be a Good Shepherd… when we read that Jesus lays down his life\u2026 our minds immediately go to the cross\u2026 but God had already laid down God’s life in the incarnation\u2026 and Jesus will give up his life at his arrest in John 18\u2026 before the cross\u2026 and when Jesus says he is the Good Shepherd\u2026 he is making that claim in line with the Jewish understanding of “shepherd”\u2026 which is a royal term\u2026 a messianic claim\u2026 because in Ezekiel and Jeremiah\u2026 God fires the shepherds of Israel\u2026 and says\u2026 I myself will shepherd my people<\/em>\u2026 God’s very self will be our shepherd king\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n And the wider context of today’s good shepherd story\u2026 is the story in John 9: about the healing of the man born blind\u2026 you know\u2026 where on the Sabbath\u2026 after the disciples asked whether this man or his parents sinned that he was born blind\u2026 and Jesus says it was that God\u2019s works might be revealed in him\u2026 and Jesus made mud with his spit\u2026 and put it on the man’s eyes\u2026 and told him to wash in the Pool of Siloam\u2026 and his blindness was cured\u2026 and the man was interrogated by the Pharisees\u2026 who ended up disliking his explanation\u2026 and so they cast him out of the Temple\u2026 and when Jesus heard this\u2026 he found him\u2026 the Good Shepherd found him\u2026 and brought him back into the fold\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n The story on the front cover of our bulletin\u2026 is that Jesus sides with all those\u2026 like the blind man\u2026 who have been cast out\u2026 we know this because Jesus said\u2026 I have other sheep that do not belong to this fold\u2026 I must bring them also\u2026 <\/em> so by extension\u2026 any time anyone demonizes those who are unlike them\u2026 any time they build a wall between themselves and those who are unlike them\u2026 Jesus is on the side of the wall with the rejects\u2026 any time anyone insists that their denomination is better than any other\u2026 Jesus is standing in solidarity with the discounted\u2026 or when someone insists that God loves their religion and despises all the others\u2026 Jesus is buying cookies at the others’ bake sales\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n We can think of sheep as indistinguishable from each other\u2026 and think of them as just\u2026 well\u2026 sheep\u2026 but God knows each one as unique and beloved\u2026 and so I wonder\u2026 are the sheep those who are scattered\u2026 and divided by the individual and systemic wolves among us\u2026 the wolves of the domination systems\u2026 who don’t see us as unique and beloved\u2026 because that serves them protecting their power and authority\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n According to reports\u2026 Alexei Navalny just ended his hunger strike\u2026 Alexei is an anti-corruption activist\u2026 and an opposition leader\u2026 who has worked to expose corruption at the highest levels of the Russian government\u2026 Russian wolves poisoned him with a nerve agent last August\u2026 and he almost died\u2026 but even after recovering\u2026 he returned to Russia\u2026 only to be arrested and jailed\u2026 he has seemingly been willing to sacrifice himself for righteousness and truth\u2026 and is being scapegoated\u2026 so that those in power\u2026 can protect their power\u2026 according the The Wall Street Journal\u2026 Putin avoids saying his name\u2026 and we at least have to wonder to what degree George Floyd was murdered by the wolf of white supremacy\u2026 <\/p>\n\n\n\n The crucified Jesus is the resurrected Christ\u2026 and Jesus’ ministry is resurrected too\u2026 as the Good Shepherd\u2026 he calls by name those who don’t come out on top\u2026 those who haven’t got the power reserves to face the wolf\u2026 but as the body of Christ\u2026 it’s the church’s vocation and responsibility to name the wolf\u2026 to face it\u2026 to call it out in whatever form it may take… <\/p>\n\n\n\n Our reading from Acts reminds me of the late John Lewis’ suggestion for us to get into good and holy trouble\u2026 Alexi Navalny’s been getting into good trouble\u2026 Darnella Frazier\u2026 who recorded George Floyd’s murder got into good trouble\u2026 those who stand against the rash of new voter suppression laws are getting into good trouble\u2026 those who speak truth to power get into holy trouble\u2026 those who deny any of God’s children\u2026 our sisters and brothers\u2026 a place at the table because they’re not part of the domination system\u2026 and we can do that because God never runs away or leaves us to be snatched by wolves\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n But then we also have to look at our own wolves\u2026 the dark spots\u2026 the malingering sins like thorns in our side\u2026 those things that continue to necessitate a life of discipleship\u2026 and we must listen for Jesus’ voice\u2026 calling us by our names\u2026 calling us to truth and action\u2026 we can lay down those dark parts of our lives\u2026 and take them up again when they have been given new light\u2026 but there are too many wolves in our lives\u2026 for us to do it all on our own\u2026 we need each other and we need Jesus to come after each and every one of us\u2026 to make sure we are safe\u2026 and we need to continue to lay down our lives for each other\u2026 almost certainly not in the way that Jesus did\u2026 but by loving our neighbors as ourselves…<\/p>\n\n\n\n Because until our hearts are one\u2026 we’ll never be able to reflect the cosmic Christ\u2026 it’s by dying and rising\u2026 over and over\u2026 by baptism into his death and by rising to new life in his resurrection\u2026 and at this Table\u2026 when we celebrate Eucharist\u2026 when we remember Jesus’ promises\u2026 and when we worship God\u2026 we do so not from a place of being perfect or being really ready for this Mystery\u2026 but because God as the Good Shepherd continues to love us\u2026 and sees us just as we are\u2026 in all our imperfection and brokenness\u2026<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Year B Acts 4:5-12 Psalm 23 1 John 3:16-24 John 10:11-18 May the words of my mouth\u2026 O God\u2026 speak your Truth\u2026 Literary philosopher Ren\u00e9 Girard described the scapegoat mechanism… as a ritual to transfer onto an animal\u2026 everything likely to poison relations between members of the community\u2026 and its effectiveness was based in the idea that the community’s sins were expelled with the animal\u2026 so the community was rid of them\u2026 the sacrifice attempted to restore order and reinvest administrators of the law with control over an unruly population\u2026 but a scapegoat has come to mean any animal\u2026 or any individual.. or any group\u2026 which innocently bears the blame of others\u2026 which can make the law lawless\u2026 and rulers unruly\u2026 And in today’s reading from Acts\u2026 all of those who gathered\u2026 the scribes\u2026 Annas the high priest\u2026 Caiaphas\u2026 and all who were of the high-priestly family\u2026 they gathered\u2026 because at the beginning of chapter three\u2026 Peter and John healed a man lame from birth\u2026 who others would carry and lay at a gate of the Temple called the Beautiful Gate\u2026 so that he could ask for alms from those entering the Temple\u2026 and so Peter and John were arrested because they were healing\u2026 and teaching the people\u2026 and proclaiming that in Jesus there is the resurrection of the dead\u2026 and so in today’s reading\u2026 they are brought before this group\u2026 and after being questioned by what power\u2026 or by what name they did this\u2026 Peter confronts the leaders of his people with a truth about themselves and their society\u2026 that they killed Jesus\u2026 who was the cornerstone\u2026 whom they\u2026 the builders\u2026 the authorities… rejected\u2026 these builders of society\u2026 turned Jesus into a scapegoat in their attempt to maintain power\u2026 And in today’s Gospel\u2026 Jesus warns about wolves who snatch and scatter the sheep\u2026 perhaps these wolves are those who also attempt to maintain power and authority\u2026 while keeping it from others\u2026 perhaps they are systems which keep people scattered\u2026 divided\u2026 which contribute to there being many flocks… instead of the one flock which Jesus sought\u2026 and many shepherds instead of the one shepherd Jesus\u2026 and Jesus warns about hired hands\u2026 who don’t own the sheep\u2026 who don’t really care about the sheep\u2026 who may inherently support the wolves’ agendas by not confronting them\u2026 and who run away at the first sign of trouble\u2026 But in the Gospel\u2026 Jesus affirms that he is the Good Shepherd\u2026 and so what does it mean to be a Good Shepherd… when we read that Jesus lays down his life\u2026 our minds immediately go to the cross\u2026 but God had already laid down God’s life in the incarnation\u2026 and Jesus will give up his life at his arrest in John 18\u2026 before the cross\u2026 and when Jesus says he is the Good Shepherd\u2026 he is making that claim in line with the Jewish understanding of “shepherd”\u2026 which is a royal term\u2026 a messianic claim\u2026 because in Ezekiel and Jeremiah\u2026 God fires the shepherds of Israel\u2026 and says\u2026 I myself will shepherd my people\u2026 God’s very self will be our shepherd king\u2026 And the wider context of today’s good shepherd story\u2026 is the story in John 9: about the healing of the man born blind\u2026 you know\u2026 where on the Sabbath\u2026 after the disciples asked whether this man or his parents sinned that he was born blind\u2026 and Jesus says it was that God\u2019s works might be revealed in him\u2026 and Jesus made mud with his spit\u2026 and put it on the man’s eyes\u2026 and told him to wash in the Pool of Siloam\u2026 and his blindness was cured\u2026 and the man was interrogated by the Pharisees\u2026 who ended up disliking his explanation\u2026 and so they cast him out of the Temple\u2026 and when Jesus heard this\u2026 he found him\u2026 the Good Shepherd found him\u2026 and brought him back into the fold\u2026 The story on the front cover of our bulletin\u2026 is that Jesus sides with all those\u2026 like the blind man\u2026 who have been cast out\u2026 we know this because Jesus said\u2026 I have other sheep that do not belong to this fold\u2026 I must bring them also\u2026 so by extension\u2026 any time anyone demonizes those who are unlike them\u2026 any time they build a wall between themselves and those who are unlike them\u2026 Jesus is on the side of the wall with the rejects\u2026 any time anyone insists that their denomination is better than any other\u2026 Jesus is standing in solidarity with the discounted\u2026 or when someone insists that God loves their religion and despises all the others\u2026 Jesus is buying cookies at the others’ bake sales\u2026 We can think of sheep as indistinguishable from each other\u2026 and think of them as just\u2026 well\u2026 sheep\u2026 but God knows each one as unique and beloved\u2026 and so I wonder\u2026 are the sheep those who are scattered\u2026 and divided by the individual and systemic wolves among us\u2026 the wolves of the domination systems\u2026 who don’t see us as unique and beloved\u2026 because that serves them protecting their power and authority\u2026 According to reports\u2026 Alexei Navalny just ended his hunger strike\u2026 Alexei is an anti-corruption activist\u2026 and an opposition leader\u2026 who has worked to expose corruption at the highest levels of the Russian government\u2026 Russian wolves poisoned him with a nerve agent last August\u2026 and he almost died\u2026 but even after recovering\u2026 he returned to Russia\u2026 only to be arrested and jailed\u2026 he has seemingly been willing to sacrifice himself for righteousness and truth\u2026 and is being scapegoated\u2026 so that those in power\u2026 can protect their power\u2026 according the The Wall Street Journal\u2026 Putin avoids saying his name\u2026 and we at least have to wonder to what degree George Floyd was murdered by the wolf of white supremacy\u2026 The crucified Jesus is the resurrected Christ\u2026 and Jesus’ ministry is resurrected too\u2026 as the Good Shepherd\u2026 he calls by name those who don’t come out on top\u2026 those who haven’t got the power reserves to face 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