4 Easter C April 17, 2016
Acts 9:36-43 Ps.23
Rev 7:9-17 John 10:22-30
Lamb, Lamb of God, Our Passover, Shepherd, Light, Life, Resurrection, Vine, Gate, Our Sin, All in All, King of Kings, Messiah, I am, Way, Truth, Life, Bread of Life, Bread from Heaven, Rabbi, Great High Priest, Alpha, Omega, First, Last, Beginning, End, Word, the Prophet, the Faithful Witness, the Firstborn from the Dead, The Almighty, One who is and who is to Come, Son of God, Son of Man, Lion of Judah, Root of David, Lord, Lord of Life, King of the Nations, Faithful, True, Judge, Lord of lords, Husband of the Church, Son of David, Son of Abraham, Emmanuel, God with us, King of the Jews, The Beloved....all of these are metaphors for Jesus of Nazareth. These metaphors used for Jesus are not literally true in ways that can be empirically verified but they are very much true to the language of love and faith for the people who have come to have an appreciative and transformative experience with the Risen Christ.
The metaphors of Christ can be contradictory and still have meaningful signification in our lives. Our readings today on Good Shepherd Sunday highlights two of the contradictory metaphors used for Jesus. Jesus is called the Good Shepherd but Jesus is also called the lamb. A crass scientific literalist might say, "Get your metaphorical act together...how can Jesus be both shepherd and sheep."
But we use a different part of our brain for poetry than what we use to ponder the brute facts of scientific empirically verified data. And we do not say scientific facts are untrue, just as we don't say that poetry is untrue.
The confusion has arisen because biblical interpreters often known by the pejorative designation of fundamental literalists, try to defend metaphors of poetry as scientific truth. And when they do this some scientists immediately consign such people of faith to the loony bin. The majority of popular atheists of our time, Richard Dawkins, Christopher Hitchens and Bill Maher, essentially base their atheism on the bad behaviors of religious people and their really bad thinking in how they present their faith. Atheism becomes the unfortunate response of many when people of faith do not live and practice lives of love and justice and when they use really confused thinking to present their faith.
The truths and meaning of our faith are matters of beauty; more akin to aesthetic meanings. We do not see atheists arguing against the truth and meaning of beauty as it is known in the sublime encounters with art. An atheist would not deny being profoundly moved hearing the performance of a symphony or being moved to tears in the theatrical productions of stage and cinema. But in the case of people of faith, they dismiss the truth of the meanings of faith and the statements of faith. Why?
Probably because people of faith have felt inferior in the face the overwhelming success of modern science and what scientific knowing has been able to bring to industry and technology. In the Middle Ages theology was the queen of the science but with the rise of the Enlightenment, and the rise of the expansive application of the scientific method, theology was dethroned and became regarded to be less of a practical and useful area of knowledge than science. Science is dealing with the visible or at least reasonable theories about causal unseen forces which have visible consequences. Theology became relegated to the arcane school of the irrelevant or the few specialists who speculate about things which cannot be seen or tested using the scientific method. A scientist would say, "I would believe in heaven and hell, if we could have regular and consistent reports of people who travelled there and back with experiences which could be proven by any observer." It is also true to say that the majority of people who have meaningful religious and faith experiences are not very adept in how they present those meanings in ways which could be appreciated by scientists and skeptics. It is easy to think that the narrative about events in the life of Jesus are historical reporting and not the theological metaphors of the early church. When people of faith present the root events of faith as literal scientific events, they have lost their credibility because it defies the notion of a uniformity of natural causes in a "closed system." If gravity isn't a consistent force present always and everywhere on earth and can be over ridden by outside, exterior, intervention of divinity, then there is something irrational about the structure of our world. However if people of faith understand that the Divine is an intervention from within the lives of people in the uncanny ways of inspiring transformation, then divine causality has a different and poignant meaning.
The Gospel for us today is not just about the content of the Gospel words, it is also an affirmation that we are users of metaphors. We are poetic people. We have profound experiences of love and faith and we wax eloquent with language which is not necessarily a mathematical equation or a scientific law. So Jesus is both lamb and shepherd in our Christian poetics. This can be meaningful poetics and transformative truth for us even as it defies actual truth status in science. Jesus was not a literal shepherd. He was not a literal lamb. But in poetic metaphor, he is both in true meaningful ways.
So how is Jesus a lamb, how is he the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world? How is he the Paschal or Passover Lamb? The lamb is the metaphor for the fact that everyone in life can become the innocent victim of innocent suffering in this world. For many events in the lives of people, we can never find the one-to-one corresponding cause of why such things happen. We try to give answers to health issues, disease and sickness. Genetics, stress, diet, environmental pollution. We would like to think we can gain some control by trying to explain why innocent suffering happens. We use a strategy of regress; "well, if this had happened then this wouldn't have happened." But this eventually just "wishes us out of existence" and is an attempt to escape our conditions of suffering. Ultimately, we just have to admit that innocent suffering occurs in the interaction of all of the free agents in the universe in full play with each other. Innocent victimhood is created because of the tremendous freedom which means some collateral effects are experienced as being very inconvenient and harsh to those who suffer.
In carnivorous humanity, people have gone to the sheep fold and picked a lamb. The lamb becomes the innocent victim who then is used to feed the family and give protein and other live giving substance to keep people alive. Why did this lamb get taken and not another? The lamb did not choose to become a victim, but in being the victim the lamb provides life for people.
As vegans we may want to dispute the carnivorous way of life, but the metaphor of lamb for Jesus was the meaning which Christians came to have regarding the value of Christ in giving them new and transformative life. Jesus was the lamb who was an innocent victim and the result of his victimhood meant that the church was born and fed into existence. The incredible impact of knowing the Risen Christ and the Holy Spirit meant that Christians have done the miraculous; they have transformed innocent victimhood into giving life to world. What you and I pray for when we experience innocent victimhood is that our experience will be able to be used to minister and help others who find themselves in the state of innocent victimhood. Innocent victimhood is not going to go away in a world that has genuine freedom, so in our experience of faith we need make our situations of innocent victimhood serve for the comfort and survival of others who find themselves in the throes of innocent suffering and need someone to be with them as their shepherd and guide. Jesus as the Lamb of God is the faithful way to transform the condition of innocent suffering into future ministry. We survive and we integrate the suffering to minister to people who are in the state of innocent or not so innocent suffering. We may want to protest, but the fact of faith is that in a free world, innocent suffering is a high probability.
We celebrate and know Jesus as the Good Shepherd, because we also have known him to be completely identified with the human condition of innocent suffering. Jesus was the ultimate innocent sufferer upon the Cross from which the church has heard him to proclaim forgiveness even to his tormentors. "Father forgive them for they do not know...they are ignorant." And to the thief he said, "Today you will be with me in Paradise."
The early Christians believed that Jesus was sacrificial Lamb and Shepherd even from the Cross of his suffering. From the cross he declared forgiveness and he promised Paradise. You and I do not rise immediately in the middle of our innocent suffering to be such confident shepherds. We often spend days and years of going through the grief process towards acceptance of what actually happens to us. Jesus as the Good Shepherd gives us the only vision of the meaning of our innocent suffering; we suffer because of the free conditions in the world in the probability roulette wheel of the spin of what can happen. The meaning of our suffering is to become a good shepherd like Jesus and to rise and recover from everything which happens to us and use it as a way to come along side of others as a ministering and comforting presence to others still stuck in the middle of innocent suffering.
The Gospel for us today is to understand the deeply contradictory metaphors of Christ as Shepherd and Lamb. The Good News is that we can learn to be realistic about the fact of innocent suffering in our world, even as we work to prevent suffering. The Good News is that we can with faith have our innocent suffering transform us into becoming good shepherds, because as people who have been acquainted with grief and sorrow we attain a genuine credibility in knowing how to be present to shepherd and care for those in need.
Jesus as Shepherd and Lamb may be a literal scientific impossibility, but Jesus as lamb and shepherd are truthfully meaningful to us to live in a world of innocent suffering and hope to surpass the events of suffering by become helpful shepherds.
May the Jesus who was Lamb of God and Good Shepherd, inspire us in the time innocent suffering and help us to become good shepherds with full resumes of credible empathy for others. Amen.
The metaphors of Christ can be contradictory and still have meaningful signification in our lives. Our readings today on Good Shepherd Sunday highlights two of the contradictory metaphors used for Jesus. Jesus is called the Good Shepherd but Jesus is also called the lamb. A crass scientific literalist might say, "Get your metaphorical act together...how can Jesus be both shepherd and sheep."
But we use a different part of our brain for poetry than what we use to ponder the brute facts of scientific empirically verified data. And we do not say scientific facts are untrue, just as we don't say that poetry is untrue.
The confusion has arisen because biblical interpreters often known by the pejorative designation of fundamental literalists, try to defend metaphors of poetry as scientific truth. And when they do this some scientists immediately consign such people of faith to the loony bin. The majority of popular atheists of our time, Richard Dawkins, Christopher Hitchens and Bill Maher, essentially base their atheism on the bad behaviors of religious people and their really bad thinking in how they present their faith. Atheism becomes the unfortunate response of many when people of faith do not live and practice lives of love and justice and when they use really confused thinking to present their faith.
The truths and meaning of our faith are matters of beauty; more akin to aesthetic meanings. We do not see atheists arguing against the truth and meaning of beauty as it is known in the sublime encounters with art. An atheist would not deny being profoundly moved hearing the performance of a symphony or being moved to tears in the theatrical productions of stage and cinema. But in the case of people of faith, they dismiss the truth of the meanings of faith and the statements of faith. Why?
Probably because people of faith have felt inferior in the face the overwhelming success of modern science and what scientific knowing has been able to bring to industry and technology. In the Middle Ages theology was the queen of the science but with the rise of the Enlightenment, and the rise of the expansive application of the scientific method, theology was dethroned and became regarded to be less of a practical and useful area of knowledge than science. Science is dealing with the visible or at least reasonable theories about causal unseen forces which have visible consequences. Theology became relegated to the arcane school of the irrelevant or the few specialists who speculate about things which cannot be seen or tested using the scientific method. A scientist would say, "I would believe in heaven and hell, if we could have regular and consistent reports of people who travelled there and back with experiences which could be proven by any observer." It is also true to say that the majority of people who have meaningful religious and faith experiences are not very adept in how they present those meanings in ways which could be appreciated by scientists and skeptics. It is easy to think that the narrative about events in the life of Jesus are historical reporting and not the theological metaphors of the early church. When people of faith present the root events of faith as literal scientific events, they have lost their credibility because it defies the notion of a uniformity of natural causes in a "closed system." If gravity isn't a consistent force present always and everywhere on earth and can be over ridden by outside, exterior, intervention of divinity, then there is something irrational about the structure of our world. However if people of faith understand that the Divine is an intervention from within the lives of people in the uncanny ways of inspiring transformation, then divine causality has a different and poignant meaning.
The Gospel for us today is not just about the content of the Gospel words, it is also an affirmation that we are users of metaphors. We are poetic people. We have profound experiences of love and faith and we wax eloquent with language which is not necessarily a mathematical equation or a scientific law. So Jesus is both lamb and shepherd in our Christian poetics. This can be meaningful poetics and transformative truth for us even as it defies actual truth status in science. Jesus was not a literal shepherd. He was not a literal lamb. But in poetic metaphor, he is both in true meaningful ways.
So how is Jesus a lamb, how is he the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world? How is he the Paschal or Passover Lamb? The lamb is the metaphor for the fact that everyone in life can become the innocent victim of innocent suffering in this world. For many events in the lives of people, we can never find the one-to-one corresponding cause of why such things happen. We try to give answers to health issues, disease and sickness. Genetics, stress, diet, environmental pollution. We would like to think we can gain some control by trying to explain why innocent suffering happens. We use a strategy of regress; "well, if this had happened then this wouldn't have happened." But this eventually just "wishes us out of existence" and is an attempt to escape our conditions of suffering. Ultimately, we just have to admit that innocent suffering occurs in the interaction of all of the free agents in the universe in full play with each other. Innocent victimhood is created because of the tremendous freedom which means some collateral effects are experienced as being very inconvenient and harsh to those who suffer.
In carnivorous humanity, people have gone to the sheep fold and picked a lamb. The lamb becomes the innocent victim who then is used to feed the family and give protein and other live giving substance to keep people alive. Why did this lamb get taken and not another? The lamb did not choose to become a victim, but in being the victim the lamb provides life for people.
As vegans we may want to dispute the carnivorous way of life, but the metaphor of lamb for Jesus was the meaning which Christians came to have regarding the value of Christ in giving them new and transformative life. Jesus was the lamb who was an innocent victim and the result of his victimhood meant that the church was born and fed into existence. The incredible impact of knowing the Risen Christ and the Holy Spirit meant that Christians have done the miraculous; they have transformed innocent victimhood into giving life to world. What you and I pray for when we experience innocent victimhood is that our experience will be able to be used to minister and help others who find themselves in the state of innocent victimhood. Innocent victimhood is not going to go away in a world that has genuine freedom, so in our experience of faith we need make our situations of innocent victimhood serve for the comfort and survival of others who find themselves in the throes of innocent suffering and need someone to be with them as their shepherd and guide. Jesus as the Lamb of God is the faithful way to transform the condition of innocent suffering into future ministry. We survive and we integrate the suffering to minister to people who are in the state of innocent or not so innocent suffering. We may want to protest, but the fact of faith is that in a free world, innocent suffering is a high probability.
We celebrate and know Jesus as the Good Shepherd, because we also have known him to be completely identified with the human condition of innocent suffering. Jesus was the ultimate innocent sufferer upon the Cross from which the church has heard him to proclaim forgiveness even to his tormentors. "Father forgive them for they do not know...they are ignorant." And to the thief he said, "Today you will be with me in Paradise."
The early Christians believed that Jesus was sacrificial Lamb and Shepherd even from the Cross of his suffering. From the cross he declared forgiveness and he promised Paradise. You and I do not rise immediately in the middle of our innocent suffering to be such confident shepherds. We often spend days and years of going through the grief process towards acceptance of what actually happens to us. Jesus as the Good Shepherd gives us the only vision of the meaning of our innocent suffering; we suffer because of the free conditions in the world in the probability roulette wheel of the spin of what can happen. The meaning of our suffering is to become a good shepherd like Jesus and to rise and recover from everything which happens to us and use it as a way to come along side of others as a ministering and comforting presence to others still stuck in the middle of innocent suffering.
The Gospel for us today is to understand the deeply contradictory metaphors of Christ as Shepherd and Lamb. The Good News is that we can learn to be realistic about the fact of innocent suffering in our world, even as we work to prevent suffering. The Good News is that we can with faith have our innocent suffering transform us into becoming good shepherds, because as people who have been acquainted with grief and sorrow we attain a genuine credibility in knowing how to be present to shepherd and care for those in need.
Jesus as Shepherd and Lamb may be a literal scientific impossibility, but Jesus as lamb and shepherd are truthfully meaningful to us to live in a world of innocent suffering and hope to surpass the events of suffering by become helpful shepherds.
May the Jesus who was Lamb of God and Good Shepherd, inspire us in the time innocent suffering and help us to become good shepherds with full resumes of credible empathy for others. Amen.
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