The Second Sunday After Easter

We’ve all heard the proverb “If you want something done right, do it yourself.” I sometimes struggle with this principle in our home now that Jude is getting old enough to help me with certain things. I can employ his help with cleaning up, organizing, or whatever else. But we’re still at that age where, if I want it done right, it’s probably safer for me to do it myself.

This principle is true in more areas than just that, though: in your professional life, you don’t want to delegate your responsibilities to someone who is unqualified or might have their own responsibilities to worry about because your tasks are more likely to fall through the cracks. Outsourcing work may be less of a headache in the short term but, over time, it might cause you more trouble. So, if you want it done right, do it yourself.

The point is that when we are personally invested in something we do it better than if we delegate it to someone who isn’t as personally invested as we are.

This principle is at the heart of our Gospel lesson for what is commonly called “Good Shepherd Sunday.” In John 10, Jesus makes the claim that he is the Good Shepherd. To illustrate his claim, he contrasts what it means to be a Good Shepherd against being a hired hand. What can be expected of a hired hand, after all, when a dangerous situation arises than involves a predator? The hired hand is going to run away to save their own lives because they’re not as personally invested in the outcome of the sheep. “The hired hand runs away because a hired hand does not care for the sheep.” They can use their saved lives to go get another job. He’s just there for the paycheck.

On the contrary, the Good Shepherd understands his livelihood to be wrapped up with the wellbeing of his sheep — there is a mutual bond between them that doesn’t exist between the sheep and the hired hand. Where the hired hand doesn’t care for the sheep and runs away at the sign of trouble, the Good Shepherd is willing to lay down his life for the sheep. The shepherd also intimately knows his sheep and they know his voice and they listen to it. It brings them comfort.

The Good Shepherd metaphor is there to point us to important spiritual truths about our Lord who is our Good Shepherd. Namely, it highlights his love for his Church — this is a shepherd who knows us intimately. The comparison for how he knows us is the relationship between the Son and the Father: Jesus knows us the way the Son and Father know each other. In John, one of the major themes is the relationship between Son and Father which can be summarized by John 10:30: “I and the Father are one.” In some ways, this intimacy with our Good Shepherd is scary. He knows us — all our flaws, all our short comings. This might fill us with trepidation; if he really knows us won’t he push us away? But, we’re assured here that he won’t because “I lay down my life for the sheep.”

This connects to our reading from I St. Peter: “He committed no sin, and no deceit was found in his mouth. When he was abused, he did not return abuse; when he suffered, he did not threaten; but he entrusted himself to the one who judges justly. He himself bore our sins in his body on the cross, so that, free from sins, we might live for righteousness; by his wounds you have been healed. For you were going astray like sheep, but now you have returned to the shepherd and guardian of your souls.” In his death, Christ makes a way for us to journey back to him. He offers himself as the payment for our debt and the cross becomes a balm for our wounds.

Now, there is a cryptic point at the end of the Gospel reading in John 10:16: “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 flack, one shepherd.” In the Old Testament, Israel was depicted as a flock. Ezekiel 34:11-12 is a good example of this: “For thus says the Lord God: I myself will search for my sheep, and will seek them out. As shepherds seek out their flocks when they are among their scattered sheep, so I will seek out my sheep.” But here, our Lord speaks of other sheep, by which he means non-Jewish Gentiles. He speaks of a day when all his sheep are integrated into the same flock, with the same Shepherd. He’s speaking of his Church which is a direct result of the Cross. St. Athanasius speaks of how the Cross is a fitting death for our Lord because both his arms are extended to bring all into his loving embrace: one arm extended for the Jews and the other for the Gentiles.

They say that all analogies break down at some point and I think it’s here that we see the limits of the sheep analogy. Because taken together, our readings and collect for today are telling us that our shepherd doesn’t leave us as he finds us. or, put a different way, that we, as sheep, begin to emulate our shepherd. I’ve not spend much time around sheep but I’m pretty sure the sheep don’t start to walk upright, begin to copy the speech patterns of their shepherd, or act like him in other ways. Yet this is what we are called to do: “For to this you have been called, because Christ also suffered for you, leaving you an example, so that you should follow in his steps” (1 Pet 2:21).

What does this mean? For us today, it means living in a way contrary to how our culture shapes us. It means not to insist on our own rights, not to complain about injustices and insults suffered but to endure those pains, understanding that’s what it means to pick up our cross and follow him. In so doing, we we learn to identify our sufferings with his Passion. And, if we really, truly love the way our Good Shepherd does, this kind of suffering will be inevitable.

We have a Good Shepherd who loves us, so much so that he gave himself for us. In response to that love, we become rather anthropomorphic sheep — we are sheep slowly evolving into images of our shepherd. The forge in which this change occurs is the cross as we encounter it when we receive the benefits of our Lord’s passion and sacrifice here in the Mass, but also when we emulate his sacrifice in our lives when we give of ourselves for others.

Psalm 95:7: “For he is our God, and we are the people of his pasture, and the sheep of his hand. O that today you would listen to his voice!”

In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Amen.