Title: Fear not, for Christ has laid down his life for you!
Text: John 10:11–18
11 I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep.
14 I am the good shepherd. I know my own and my own know me, 15 just as the Father knows me and I know the Father; and I lay down my life for the sheep. 16 And I have other sheep that are not of this fold. I must bring them also, and they will listen to my voice. So there will be one flock, one shepherd.
Minister, Andrew Bonar, told a story about the Highlands of Scotland, where sheep would often wander off into the rocks and get into places that they couldn't get out of.
The grass on these mountains is very sweet he says and the sheep like it, and they will jump down ten or twelve feet, and then they can't jump back again, and the shepherd hears them bleating in distress. They may be there for days, until they have eaten all the grass. The shepherd will wait until they are so faint they cannot stand, and then they will put a rope around him, and he will go over and pull that sheep up out of the jaws of death.
So you might ask.:
"Why don't they just go down there when the sheep first gets there?" "Well" He said, "they are so very foolish that they would dash right over the precipice [ledge] and be killed if they did!"
And that is the way with men; they won't go back to God till they have lost everything. The Good Shepherd will continue to pursue you and all who need to hear and call you by the working of the Holy Spirit to himself. He will be with you and will comfort you even in that place of danger, despair and death and will gather and bring you to his place of rescue and life.
Moody's Anecdotes, pp. 70-71.
So you can, fear not, for Christ has laid down his life for you!
Love and Death is kind of a strange phrase. We might think life and death but love and death seems odd to me and may be to you as well? Going back in my past I remember a movie of Woody Allen’s from 1975 with that same title, Love and Death. It was a period piece set in czarist Russia, and the story was about a neurotic soldier [what else would Woody play but one who is neurotic] who is in love with his distant cousin on the one side and his formulation of a plot to assassinate Napoleon on the other – so the title Love and Death.
In our readings for today we see another love and death. Jesus says in an analogy of a shepherd to his sheep that he is the good shepherd and that the good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep.
In our epistle in 1 John also we hear in contrast that 16 By this [the death of Jesus] we know love, that he laid down his life for us, So, the good shepherd is Jesus and we, and all who believe, are his sheep and because of his love for us … he dies for us. And so again we have this odd phrase of … Love and Death.
Now we too know death, for from the time of Adam and Eve and the fall into sin, death came into the world. We see death around us. So our death, apart from Christ, would be a death without hope. But in Jesus, his death is a death that gives life. He also says that apart from him - those that might shepherd the sheep in ways opposed to Christ and his teaching - are liars leading the sheep away from him and who flee leaving the sheep to the wolf that scatters them.
Jesus says:
16 And I have other sheep that are not of this fold. I must bring them also, and they will listen to my voice. So there will be one flock, one shepherd.
Love and Death! Fear not, for Christ has laid down his life for you!
So who are the other sheep? Well, outside of the children of Israel – the believing Jews - it is you and me, but it is also those who will believe as the gospel goes forth throughout the world from now on until Christ returns.
Ill.
This coming week I get to see a bit of that in action as I go with my friend Rob Bourassa, and our Synod President Matt Harrison to Wittenberg, Germany for the opening of the Old Latin School as a mission and outreach center in the former East Germany which was Luther’s place of preaching at St. Mary’s church some 500 years ago.
It is hard to believe that this place where the birth of the reformation began has been largely void of the gospel during the communist years - and is now coming full circle - bringing the gospel back to where it had been preached for many years - back to the home where our own Missouri Synod claims its roots.
So, playing bluegrass … how does this fit in? Well, I thought it odd for the longest time. But then it hit me. What is the benefit of opening this outreach cent that the community knows or cares nothing about? Not much. So, why not have a free concert in the heart of Wittenberg at the newly built community center playing some traditional American music for a free concert … and then how about inviting the community to attend?
This happens on Saturday night and - oh by the way - why don’t you come down and celebrate with us the dedication of the beautifully restored Old Latin School? It’s right in the heart of Wittenberg and you can see and hear a bit more of why we’re here and excited about this place.
16 And I have other sheep that are not of this fold. I must bring them also, and they will listen to my voice.
Because of Jesus’ Love and Death we have life in his name!
So as we approach the 500th anniversary of the reformation in 2017 the command of Christ continues to be the focus.
19 Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, 20 teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age.” Matt. 28:19-20
The gospel will again go forth also in Wittenberg where Luther preach over 2000 sermons almost 500 years ago. The music is simply a means to meet our neighbors in Germany who get to know us and we them to open the avenue of communication so that Christ’s love and death can be proclaimed to those who need to hear and be brought into the sheepfold of the good shepherd and they will listen to [Christ’s] voice. So there will be one flock, [and] one shepherd.
God uses each one of us in our vocations as husbands, sons, mothers, daughters, friends, and workers in public or private service to be salt and light in a dark world. He gives each to his place and calls to life, that which is dead by his love for us and his death on our behalf.
20 plus my friend Rob and I would drive to Nashville to the Chet Atkins guitar festival to play guitar and to listen to great players, but all the while as we drove down there Rob would share his faith, why he became Lutheran, and the simple truth of being saved 8 … by grace … through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, 9 not a result of works, so that no one may boast. Eph 2:8-9
That witness from Rob, God used to draw me closer to himself. He uses each one of us to be Christ’s witnesses in the world so that by God’s word they may be brought into the sheepfold. It is Christ’s Love and Death that accomplishes all of this and he uses his Church as the means for proclamation and the sacramental gifts he gives to achieve this.
As Martin Luther said regarding God’s work throughout the world:
He is the Lord over all places. Wherever that word is heard, where Baptism, the sacrament of the Altar, and absolution are administered, there you must determine and conclude with certainty; “This is surly God’s house; here heaven has been opened.” But just as the word is not bound to any place, so the church is not bound to any place. One should not say: “The chief pontiff is in Rome. Therefore the church is there.” But where God speaks, where Jacob’s ladder is, where the angels ascend and descend, there the church is, there the kingdom of heaven is opened.
LW American Edition Vol. 5 pg. 244
In Waterford, Michigan or Wittenberg, Germany …
Love and Death - Christ has laid down his life for you!
In the name of the Father and of the Son + and of the Holy Spirit
Amen
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