[Jesus said:]\u00a011<\/sup>\u201cI am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep.\u00a012<\/sup>The hired hand, who is not the shepherd and does not own the sheep, sees the wolf coming and leaves the sheep and runs away\u2014and the wolf snatches them and scatters them.\u00a013<\/sup>The hired hand runs away because a hired hand does not care for the sheep.\u00a014<\/sup>I am the good shepherd. I know my own and my own know me,\u00a015<\/sup>just as the Father knows me and I know the Father. And I lay down my life for the sheep.\u00a016<\/sup>I have other sheep that do not belong to this fold. I must bring them also, and they will listen to my voice. So there will be one flock, one shepherd.\u00a017<\/sup>For this reason the Father loves me, because I lay down my life in order to take it up again.\u00a018<\/sup>No one takes it from me, but I lay it down of my own accord. I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it up again. I have received this command from my Father\u201d (John 10:11-18, NRSV).<\/p>\n In the Name of the Father, and of the Son +, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.<\/p>\n Alleluia!\u00a0 Christ is Risen!\u00a0 He is Risen Indeed, Alleluia!<\/em><\/p>\n Today is the Sunday that every year we celebrate as Good Shepherd Sunday, exulting in the Lord who is our shepherd, who makes us lay down in green pastures, and leads us beside still waters. But every year it seems a little odd to celebrate our God as a shepherd\u2014after all, Shepherd Avenue in Hamden is the closest most of us will get, isn\u2019t it? Several years ago on a snow winter night, I got a call from a friend of mine and of this congregation, Pastor Tom Drobena. Pastor Tom had been given two little Nigerian pygmy goats by a well-meaning church member, but these two little goats both turned out to be pregnant, and now on this cold, dark, snowy night, they both proceeded to give birth. So Pastor Tom sat freezing in his newly-built shed, now repurposed for goats, while one goat delivered triplets, and the other quadruplets, quickly going from zero goats to nine! He cleaned their newborn noses, and helped keep them warm, gave a bottle to those that wouldn\u2019t nurse, and otherwise stayed up all night long in the winter wind and snow, with his unexpected new flock\u2014truly, being a shepherd of the flock is not for the weary or faint of heart! Soon, over his new shed turned goat pen, he had nailed up an icon of Christ, carrying a sheep over his shoulders, with an inscription and promise from today\u2019s Gospel reading: \u201cI Am the Good Shepherd.\u201d<\/p>\n This is how Jesus begins describing himself today, \u201cI am the Good Shepherd, THE GOOD one, for the Good Shepherd lays down his life for the sheep.\u201d Christ, in his goodness, gives himself for his flock. On the Cross he gave himself away, he was slain and torn apart, so that we might be brought near to God, so that our broken lives might be put back together and made whole. For we don\u2019t exist to take care of him\u2014instead he lives and dies to take care of us, to make us good. When we his people were in danger by our sins, when we were lost and could not get home, when we were under attack, when we were cold and defenseless, when we had fallen into death and could not get out, he gave himself, he laid down his life for us. The shepherd cares for the flock, taking them in his arms, feeding them with good things, bringing them safely home. There on the Cross our Good Shepherd gave himself for us, the Shepherd sacrificed for the sheep, the Master dying for the servants, the Creator laying down his life for his creatures.<\/p>\n My mother\u2019s family is from out West, and her parents started out their married life in the 1930s as sheepherders\u2014shepherds\u2014of several hundred sheep in Montana, bred for their wool used in military uniforms. My grandparents actually lived out in the fields with the sheep, in a kind of wagon, they gave up a fixed address and any modern comforts to take care of their sheep, to protect them from the danger of bears and coyotes, to make sure they were in good grass and near clean water. One day in the spring there was a flood, the creeks overran with water, and the pastures were flooded, it became dangerous and all their workers quit and left to dry off in town. The older sheep huddled together on high ground, but the little ones got cut off, stranded on little islands that were disappearing fast, and began to be washed away into the flood. My grandfather, John Dale, the story goes, ran his horse from one island to the next, through the rushing water, putting himself and his horse in danger to pick up these stranded lambs, to snatch them from the dangerous water, and to carry them safely back to the flock. \u201cI am the Good Shepherd, who lays down his life for the sheep.\u201d<\/p>\n The hired hand, Jesus says, does not own the sheep and when he sees the wolf coming leaves the sheep and runs away. There is One Good Shepherd, but there are many hired hands, many people and institutions and powers who pretend to own the sheep, who say they\u2019ll take care of them and then when the going gets tough just abandon the sheep to fend for themselves. Think about things in your life that pretend to own you\u2014they say, \u201cI\u2019m in charge of you, I\u2019ll take care of you, I\u2019ll be there for you,\u201d but when push comes to shove, when the water rises, when the wolves start circling around, when trouble comes they\u2019ll leave you in a second, they\u2019re out only for themselves, when the going gets tough you\u2019re on your own! But not for your Good Shepherd\u2014\u201cYea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, thou art with me,\u201d the Good Shepherd is with you, especially when the chips are down, especially when you feel like you\u2019re drowning, especially when it all hits the fan, that\u2019s his specialty, not to run away but to be with you, to snatch you from danger, and to prepare a table before you, overflowing, right there in the presence of your enemies!<\/p>\n Jesus says, \u201cI know my own, my own know me, just as I know the Father and the Father knows me,\u201d Jesus brings us as our Good Shepherd into the life of God, into the love of the Father, he knows you, he knows what you need, he knows how to take care of you, he knows how to be your Good Shepherd, he knows how to feed you with eternal life, and you know him, you know his voice, knowing like a lover knows the beloved. Some of you may have seen a famous video of children blindfolded trying to find their mothers in a room full of people who could not speak to them, but by touch, by sense, by the knowledge born of love they find each other, they are united with each other. And it\u2019s the same for us, he knows us, and by faith we know him, and he seeks you out, he calls to you, and he takes you to himself this morning.<\/p>\n \u201cI have other sheep, too,\u201d Jesus says, \u201cI must bring them also together.\u201d Jesus has this fold called Trinity, but he has other sheep to bring here too, for us to help bring in as his under-assistant shepherds. Sheep that you know, sheep that are stumbling, sheep that are wandering, sheep that are hungry, sheep that are cold and alone, Christ says, \u201cI must bring them to myself, I am your Good Shepherd and their Good Shepherd, and when I am lifted up I will bring all people to myself\u201d\u2014Christ gathers right here people of every race and tongue and nation and language, and brings us together in this fold, and so there will be one flock, and one shepherd, God is taking the all people of the earth and of New Haven divided and broken along so many lines, and uniting us, unifying us, joining us together under the gentle care of the One Good Shepherd, of our one Lord, as part of his one flock. For Christ knows his own, he knows you, and he calls you back to himself today, by his laying down his life and taking it up again on Easter morning he has brought you and me back to himself, on his shoulder gently laid, and home rejoicing brought me.<\/p>\n When I was in the Holy Land now a decade ago, we were told the story about a flock of sheep that wandered over a security dividing line and were confiscated by the authorities, put into a big pen with all sorts of lost sheep. The shepherd boy who had been watching them came to claim them, but the army official told them, \u201cNo way, not unless you can prove they\u2019re yours.\u201d So he took out a little flute from his pocket played some notes and sang to them, and out of this mass of animals came this flock of sheep straight to their Shepherd: \u201cI know my own, and my own know me.\u201d This morning your Shepherd who owns you, comes and calls to you, sings to you, for he calls you to the place where he prepares a table before you, right here at the altar this morning. Here the Shepherd gives himself for the Sheep, here he knows you, and brings you again to know and trust in him. Here he feeds you with himself, here your cup runneth over, for \u201cI am your <\/em>Good Shepherd,\u201d he promises! Yes, the Lord is<\/em> our shepherd, and we shall not want.<\/p>\n For Alleliua, Christ is Risen! He is risen indeed, Alleluia!<\/em><\/p>\n And the Peace of God which passes all understanding guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus, Amen.<\/p>\n —<\/p>\n The Rev. Dr. Ryan Mills<\/p>\n New Haven, Connecticut<\/p>\n Pastor@TrinityLutheranNH.org<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The Fourth Sunday of Easter | April 21, 2024 | Psalm 23 and John 10:11-18 | Ryan D. Mills | [Jesus said:]\u00a011\u201cI am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep.\u00a012The hired hand, who is not the shepherd and does not own the sheep, sees the wolf coming and leaves […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":7907,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[39,18,2,157,853,108,110,350,346,337,349,3,109,212],"tags":[],"beitragende":[],"predigtform":[],"predigtreihe":[],"bibelstelle":[],"class_list":["post-19789","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-johannes","category-psalmen","category-at","category-beitragende","category-bibel","category-current","category-engl","category-jubilate","category-kapitel-023-chapter-023","category-kapitel-10-chapter-10","category-kasus","category-nt","category-predigten","category-ryan-mills"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19789","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=19789"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19789\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":19790,"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19789\/revisions\/19790"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/7907"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=19789"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=19789"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=19789"},{"taxonomy":"beitragende","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/beitragende?post=19789"},{"taxonomy":"predigtform","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/predigtform?post=19789"},{"taxonomy":"predigtreihe","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/predigtreihe?post=19789"},{"taxonomy":"bibelstelle","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/bibelstelle?post=19789"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}