Sermon on the Good Shepherd
Ancient shepherds were pretty bad-ass, when you think about it, even though they held a very low status in society. Imagine being all by yourself with a hundred head of pretty foolish livestock to protect. Imagine you don’t have a gun, just a rod and a staff—basically a couple of big sticks—and your flock is in constant danger from wolves, and lions, and rustlers who try to jump the portable fence you’ve put up for the night. Imagine there’s no closing gate to this temporary enclosure, just you with your two sticks, sleeping in the opening, so anything coming to trouble the sheep will have to go through you. And then when day comes, your job is to call each sheep by its name—and every one of them has a name—and lead them all to good pasture, walking in front, where you’re the first to face any hazard. Very truly, I tell you, I am the gate for the sheep. All who came before me are thieves and bandits, but the sheep did not listen to them. I am the gate. When Jesus calls himse