How many of you have ever been to a big sporting event? Maybe the Master's or the Kentucky Derby, or even a Carolina football game? It's a pretty amazing feeling, being part of something that big. People come from all over to big sporting events. They come from far and wide and descend on one place. They park their cars somewhere and walk, first by two's and three's, then by the dozens, then by the hundreds, and then maybe by the thousands. All these people mill about, trying to find their way into the stadium. They're looking for a way to get in just like a herd of.... SHEEP!
SHEEP! People today sure don't like to be compared to sheep, do we? We find it insulting. Sheep are dull, stupid animals, aren't they? They follow the crowd. They run from the slightest sign of danger. Then they'll just sit quietly while they get sheared. Well, maybe so. But I looked up "sheep" in an encyclopedia, and I learned that they're remarkably intelligent. They can recognize the faces of other sheep and of humans. They can recognize voices. And if you have a herd of sheep of different breeds, they organize themselves into subgroups - first into family groups of related sheep, then groups of the same breed, all within the herd. But if you have two herds in the same pen, the sheep will know which shepherd to follow, and which one to ignore.
I tell you all this because we don't know as much about sheep as the people in Jesus' day did. And the lessons for today are filled with images of shepherds and sheep, so we need to put these stories in context. When Jesus says, I am the good shepherd, he's not trying to insult us by calling us sheep. In his day, it wasn't an insult; it would never have occurred to people that they were not sheeplike. The modern notion of "individuality at all costs" wasn't part of their mind-set. People knew they belonged to other people - that they were part of families, clans, tribes and villages. They raised families, lived, and died within just a few miles of where they were born; they didn't stray very far from home. They lived their entire lives in communities where everybody knew them by name.
But it seems to me that somehow, with our modern obsession for individuality, we've lost something very important. We are more independent, more fiercely concerned with ourselvesandwithwho-I-am-as-a-person. We talk a lot about personal freedoms, which of course is not a bad thing. But we also live in a world where people feel increasingly isolated. For example, many of us live hundreds of miles from our parents. We get married and move for our jobs, visiting home when we can. And we live in a world where some of the most popular uses for new technology make it possible to be even more isolated - personal computers and cell phones let us communicate with people all over the world without leaving our apartment. But it comes at the expense of personal relationships with people in the next room or down the hall. The number of people today who keep in touch with each other through "social networking" websites like Facebook and Twitter is exploding; people clearly want to be in some kind of relationship. And yet, studies show that they rarely share any personal problems or concerns with members of these artificial social groups. We live in more and more crowded cities, and yet we know fewer and fewer people. When I was a boy, my mom and dad would actually visit with our neighbors. Nowadays, hardly anybody even knows who their neighbors are. Instead of being a herd of sheep, we're more like a nation of lone wolves.
But Jesus doesn't want us to live like that. Jesus calls to be part of his flock, because the natural way for us to live is as part of his community. He doesn't want us to live as isolated and anonymous individuals, so he calls us by name into relationship with him - to be known by him, loved by him and led by him. He calls us into a more authentic way for us to live - in relationship with God and with one another through Christ.
And Jesus makes us a promise. He promises us that we who hear his voice and recognize him as our leader will have abundant life. Now, abundant life is not a life full of stuff; it's not about "living the American Dream." It's not a life where we compete to see who has the most possessions; instead, abundant life is about living the Kingdom of God. It is a life where we share both our riches and our burdens with other members of the community. It is a life where we join in fellowship around a meal, just as much as we share the sacrament around the altar. It is a life where you share the joy, as when we share in baptisms or weddings. It is a life where we share the pain, as when a friend calls you in the middle of the night because she is afraid her son is thinking about suicide. It is a life where we can talk with each other, even disagree with each other, and still love and respect one another. It is a life where we support and strengthen one another not just on Sundays, but every day of the week. Abundant life is what one theologian called "life in community."
In ancient times, when people were baptized, they were given a new name. It was the name that the church community called them by. We still sometimes refer to our first names as our "Christian Name." Jesus calls us by name to live in real relationship with one another. He calls us by name so that we know that we will always belong to him. And he calls us by name to share in the abundant life of his resurrection.
Thanks be to God!
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