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Reflection for Good Shepherd Sunday 2021

The Lord is my…

Jesus said: “I am the good shepherd. A good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep. A hired man, who is not a shepherd sees a wolf coming and leaves the sheep and runs away. I am the good shepherd, and I know mine and mine know me, and I will lay down my life for the sheep.”

Today is a good day to recall the words of our esteemed English teachers. Recall when they used to ask us to compare and contrast works by different authors, poems by different poets.

Jesus breaks right into a compare and contrast with His listeners today. Compare the good shepherd and the hired worker. He cites their motivations, one of concern, love, and sacrifice versus a pecuniary motivation – getting paid and not really caring. He cites their reactions – defense of the flock or running away.

Beyond that immediate compare and contrast, Jesus speaks of those listening as belonging to a fold and another group of people who do not currently belong to that fold. While they were of different folds at that time, Jesus tells His listeners that they will all be brought into one fold, one flock, with one Shepherd.

What Jesus was trying to impress upon those listening is that there is an ideal – a way of being that is unique to followship with Him. 

In this new reality – in the Kingdom and the gospel way of life – we need not worry about who might care for us. We have a Chief Shepherd Who is I AM – God Himself among us – watching over, guiding, guarding, and caring for us. We need not worry about what tribe, nation, people, or party we belong to for that is all worldly death. Instead, we belong to the one fold, the one flock of Jesus.

Peter, on trial with the other disciples, clearly tells the court of the old Israel, “There is no salvation through anyone else, nor is there any other name under heaven given to the human race by which we are to be saved.” There is no other fold, or flock, or Shepherd. There is one, only one, for salvation and it is the flock of Jesus, the Good Shepherd. 

St. John expounds: See what love the Father has bestowed on us that we may be called the children of God. Children of One Father, brothers and sisters of the One Lord, no longer separate and apart from God and each other. One flock.

Brothers and sisters, we have a new reality in Christ Jesus. Our esteemed English teachers called us rightly to compare and contrast, and so we should. What was I before Jesus (apart, alone, afraid, without hope beyond today) and what am I now (an heir to eternal life and a member of the eternal family of God)? Who was God to me before Jesus (judge, accuser, punisher) and Who is He now (Good Shepherd)?

As we go forth from this blessed day, let us continually reflect on who the Lord is in our lives. Let us give thanks that we are in Him, the Good Shepherd, the cornerstone, where we together lack nothing. 

Christian Witness, Homilies, , ,

Reflection for the 3rd Sunday of Easter 2021

Membership.

But whoever keeps his word, the love of God is truly perfected in him.

The words membership and identity are hot terms in these days. That said, they have been terms used throughout history to impose or self-impose a sense of communal belonging. 

In some cases, membership and identity were imposed upon others as a result of prejudices – in an accusatory manner – to differ the other from self, to reduce people’s humanity. In other cases, we have taken on our own memberships and definitions of identity.

If we took a moment to pull out our wallets and purses, we could quickly list some of our memberships. Here are some of mine: SEFCU member, NY driver, PACC member, AARP member (how did that happen?), BJ’s Club member, and others. A quick look at someone’s Facebook – memberships and identity markers abound. Where in all of that is our Jesus card?

The most significant sign of our belonging to Christ is that we bear markers that cannot be reduced to a card or social profile.

Our communal membership, our mutuality, our identity as Christians starts with that which was written on our souls at Baptism-Confirmation, our regeneration, from which our membership and identity as family, as brothers and sisters permeates our entire being and way of living.

Jesus, joined with His disciples as recounted today, told them that repentance, for the forgiveness of sins, would be preached in His name to all the nations. This statement directed His disciples to go out and bear witness throughout the world. With the gifts of the Holy Spirit and, as St. John’s letter describes, the keeping of His word, they grew the family of faith. Out of people of every nation, class, status, color, and gender the Church grew as family.

Faithfulness to Jesus does not make us individuals, separate from each other. Rather, we are defined by our belonging, our obligation to God and each other.

We, the people of the Church, are not a separate people, each on his or her own path who just happen to get together for a moment. Instead, our getting together in worship is sign and symbol that we belong to God, that He belongs to us, and that we belong to each other. God infuses us with a grace to see beyond self to the family. He causes us to share with the Body of Christ as a symbol – a sacrament – of our love and of each person’s dignity.

In today’s Psalm we hear, for you alone, O LORD, bring security to my dwelling. This is not just our home, a physical structure in which we reside. Rather, the term my dwelling refers to our house, the place we reside together. He secures us in the family of faith and calls us to show our Jesus card by being “witnesses of these things” and bearing perfected love.

Christian Witness, Homilies, ,

Reflection for the 24th Sunday in Ordinary Time 2017 – Back to Church Sunday

You
BELONG!

Bless the LORD, O my soul; and all my being, bless his holy name. Bless the LORD, O my soul, and forget not all his benefits.

Everyone needs a place to belong. A place that fits you like a favorite pair of jeans or that comfortable sweater. A place where you feel welcome. A place that makes you strong, that supports you, that stirs you up. That’s the way we’re made – to be together — experiencing life with others. And yet, Vance Packard calls America “a nation of strangers” and studies show that 4 out of 10 people experience feeling of intense loneliness. Peek behind the curtain and you’ll find people hungering for fellowship, community, and family.

The Bible uses a lot of metaphors to describe the Church, but the most persistent is that of belonging to a family. In the New Testament, believers call each other brothers and sisters and, in his letter to the Church at Ephesus, Paul writes: “Now you…are not foreigners or strangers any longer, but are citizens together with God’s holy people. You belong to God’s family.”

Maybe there’s a pew here that fits you just right. Maybe you’re as comfortable here as you are in your favorite pajamas. On the other hand, maybe you’re here for the first time or for the first time in a long time. Maybe you never felt like you really belong somewhere. Maybe you’ve never known the blessing of being a part of something as big as the family of God! Either way, I’d like to share with you something that Solomon wrote about the benefits of belonging:

Two are better than one, because they have a good return for their labor: If either of them falls down, one can help the other up. But pity anyone who falls and has no one to help them up. Also, if two lay down together, they will keep warm. But how can one keep warm alone? Though one may be overpowered, two can defend themselves. A cord of three strands is not quickly broken. In his unparalleled wisdom, King Solomon says, “Two people are better than one…” He then goes on to describe three benefits of belonging: strength, support, and warmth.

Strength – Solomon saw a principle that holds — none of us can do alone what all of us can do together. There is strength in numbers. You know how it is when church has events. There never seems to be volunteers to go around, but when a few people join together, miracles start happening. None of us can do everything, but all of us can do something. We are strong together.

The Jerusalem church was a hodgepodge of believers from a lot of backgrounds, with different personalities, and sometimes conflicting opinions, yet they found a way to work together. They understood there is strength in numbers. And because they did, lives were changed — history was changed. Our belonging here, our joining ourselves to Christ, makes the same miracles happen today.

Support – belonging to a church family provides support. Solomon anticipated the “I’ve fallen and I cannot get up” commercial. “Two are better off than one, because… If one of them falls down, the other can help him up. But if someone is alone and falls, it’s just too bad, because there is no one to help him.”

Jesus is all about helping people up, isn’t He? He helped the dead to rise, He helped Peter when he was sinking. He helped the woman caught in adultery and publically humiliated to stand again. Jesus set the example and asked us to live it. That’s what we’re supposed to do for one another. Belonging to God’s family provides us with the strength to get more done and the support we need to get through troubled times.

Warmth – Belonging to a church family provides spiritual warmth. “Two people are better off than one, for… two people lying close together can keep each other warm. But how can one be warm alone?” While this is practical advice for a nomadic people living in the desert, it also serves as spiritual metaphor. You don’t have to live in a tent in the tundra to feel cold and alone. When someone is separated, alone, apart from family, our fire starts to go out and our spirits grow cold.

A pastor went to visit a man who had been absent from church for some time. When the pastor arrived at the house, his parishioner was sitting by a fire of glowing coals. The man fully expected his pastor lecture him about church. But instead the pastor drew up a chair alongside the fireplace where the man was sitting just peering into the fire. With the tongs the pastor reached into the fire and took one of the red hot glowing coals and placed it by itself out on the hearth. In no time at all the coal began to lose its glow and in a few minutes it was cold and black. The man looked up into the face of his pastor who hadn’t said a word and he said “I’ll be there next Sunday.”

That warmth you feel as we worship together here today — that’s your coals being stirred. That’s your passion for Jesus, your love for God and for people being rekindled. Belonging to a church family that you worship with and fellowship with fans the flames and keeps you spiritually warm and truly alive.

Everyone needs a place where they belong, where people smile when you arrive and say, “See you soon!” when you leave. Maybe your family is far away, maybe you’re feeling alone, or maybe you could just use a new friend or two. God doesn’t just call us to believe; he calls us to belong.

The entire Bible is the story of God building a family that will support, strengthen, and stir one another up to love — and he created you to belong to it. Belonging, we can say together Bless the LORD, O my soul!

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