Grace and peace to you from God our Father, and from the risen Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.
Little Bo Peep has lost her sheep,
And doesn’t know where to find them.
Leave them alone, and they’ll come home,
Wagging their tails behind them.
Have you ever given much thought to this little ditty? First off, it’s painfully apparent that no one bothered to check Miss Peep’s references before hiring her to watch the sheep. She has little aptitude for such work—in fact she does a pretty crumby job, all in all. Not only does she manage to loose the whole darn flock—she also has no inkling whatsoever as to where or how to locate them! She’s not likely to be voted “Employee of the Month,” is she?
Of course the advice she gets for solving her dilemma isn’t any more astute. Coming from an unknown source, she is counseled, not to mount a search party to seek them out, not to call 911 and report a missing flock, not even to check the neighbor’s back forty, but instead to wait for them to come home by themselves!
Now that might have worked with my dogs. They often roamed far and wide over the six hundred plus acres of the Lutheran camp we lived on. They’d run off in the morning and come home late in the afternoon, panting and smelling like cow poop, happily wagging their tails and giving us that look that said, “Miss me? When’s dinner?”
But, judging from what I know about sheep, the “wait and see” plan for getting the flock back just won’t cut it. Sheep aren’t dogs, and they aren’t homing pigeons, either. If you leave them alone, they’ll never come hone. They’ll simply follow whatever sheep happens to be in front, wherever that beast leads—which is more likely to be in circles than it is to be home. Sheep need a shepherd to lead them home. And another ting—sheep don’t wag their tails.
At least I think they don’t. Truth is, I know as much about sheep as Little Bo Peep. Growing up, I had a cat and a chameleon as pets. Later on Lisa and I had the dogs. Lisa’s family had horses and raised a few pigs for food and had ducks that unfortunately became food for one wandering neighborhood dog (who, no doubt, went home wagging his tail behind him that night!). And her mother got a goat for a 60th birthday present. That goat is as close to a sheep as I’ve known, not counting lamb chops! So, no, I don’t know sheep.
Jesus seems to know a lot about them, however. I guess in his day, knowledge of sheep was as ubiquitous as is knowledge of cell phones today. Sheep were a given in life—in the economy, in the household, in the language, in the religious symbolism. They were an important part of the web of life that existed in that time and place. Primarily, sheep were to the nomadic tribes people, as well as their counterparts in towns and villages, the difference between survival and beggardom. Thus sheep were very highly valued, watched over vigilantly, protected vigorously, and care for scrupulously. Shepherds, even though they were often children, were charged with a great responsibility—to tend the very livelihood of their families. There was no excuse for not giving one’s all, no reason accepted for failure. So I imagine that if she had had these people as bosses, Little Bo Peep would have been in line at the
So Jesus knew a lot about sheep, that’s a given. It’s such a given, in fact, that Jesus is able, during the course of the gospel of John, to say, not only that he is the shepherd—the good shepherd—but also that he is the gate for the sheep, as well as the Lamb of God. (All right—John the Baptist says that last one, but he’s talking about Jesus!) Point is—Jesus is the Son of God. So why is he even talking about sheep, much less know about them? Why does Jesus care from sheep?
Well, to answer that I remind you of another Bo. Bo Jackson. Bo Jackson was the first athlete in modern times to play both professional baseball and football in the same year. Professional athletes being the darlings of Madison Avenue, Mr. Jackson’s feat (f-e-a-t) soon landed him a lucrative deal for his feet (f-e-e-t). He signed a contract to advertise Nike’s new cross-training sneakers. In the ad, first Bo is shown playing baseball as a fellow player says, “Bo knows baseball.” Cut to Bo running a football play, with a football pro saying, “Bo knows football.” Then on to basketball (Bo knows basketball), tennis (Bo knows tennis), and running (Bo knows running). The last scene shows Bo doing a body check on a hockey rink, with all time hockey great Wayne Gretszky saying, “No.”
I was reminded of “Bo knows…” when I was thinking about Jesus’ I am statements in John’s gospel, of which “I am the gate” is one. For some reason I just got these images in my head—Jesus, trimming a grape vine (Jesus knows vines and branches). Jesus, apron on, baking (Jesus knows bread). Jesus, hand on the bible (Jesus knows truth). Jesus with grave-clothed Lazarus stumbling around in the background (Jesus knows life), Jesus showing Thomas his hands and side (Jesus knows resurrection).
So who cares? Why is this important? What’s the big deal about these I am statements? Well, they were considered to be highly provocative for the ears of the ones who first heard Jesus say them. Why? Because of the two little words “I am.” Extra credit for a confirmand—whose name is “I am?” Yahweh, the God of Abraham, Jacob, and Moses, the one who raised up a nation called Israel and delivered her from slavery, the one who spoke through the prophets, the one who sent his only Son, Jesus—Yaweh—LORD—I am who I am, I will be who I will be. Jesus says “I am”—which is provocative enough as is, since it is the name of God, not to be uttered by unclean lips, not to be said at all, really. Jesus says I am, and then he couples that name of the Lord of Hosts, El Shaddai , Elohim, Elyon—Almighty God—he couples that divine and sacred name with something lowly, earthly, common. Bread, a vines, door, light, gate, shepherd, and not least of all—a man called Jesus of Nazareth.
Not only do these statements illustrate that the infinite can be borne by the finite, the holy by the common, but I believe they each have something very unique to say about our relationship with God and Jesus.
Which brings me to the point of my ramblings (hooray!), that what Jesus both implies and says flat out when he uses the metaphor of shepherd and gate, is that we are the sheep. Which means two things, I think. First, speaking from a great cloud of witnesses and using the traditional interpretation, we are sheep because we are easily led astray by false doctrine, we are vulnerable to attack from evil, and we are in need of a shepherd to provide that guidance and protection.
Thus Jesus is the shepherd for us, because not only does he lead us to green pastures besides still waters, and use that rod and staff to protect us little lambies, but he is also the gate (because, Jesus, knowing things sheep, would have obviously known that sheep folds had no gate back then—the shepherd formed the gate, sitting by the opening in the fence by day and sleeping across it by night—keeping sheep in and wolves out). The message: LAW—we like sheep have gone astray, GOSPEL—but Jesus, the good shepherd calls us by name, and lays down his life for us, so that we might enter the gates of heaven through him.
Now, a new and non-traditional interpretation that I’d have you just roll around in your heads this week, considering its implications for you and your relationship with God and Jesus. Here it is…
In some way, shape, or form—God needs us. “Us” meaning us human beings as well as all of creation. Now, the traditional approach to this is that God has no need of us—that God is totally “other” to us, but deems it right to create the universe and mankind within it, and then loves and cares for all of creation. Which is all fine and dandy, except that it doesn’t capture a key element of the sheep and shepherd imagery—that being the shepherd’s dependence on the sheep. The shepherd and sheep are in a mutually beneficial relationship. The shepherd provides protection and the sheep food and wool.
Now I’m not reading the metaphor literally here—I’m not saying we provide God with food and clothing and so God defends and delivers us, tit for tat. That would be a misreading of this passage when compared to the rest of scripture. Instead I want you to focus in on the relationship itself as being mutually beneficial. God could and did exist before us, relating to Godself in the triune nature of Father, Son, and Spirit. But somehow that wasn’t enough for God. So God created the heavens and the earth, the birds of the air, the fish on the deep, and all creatures great and small that inhabited the ground. And God loved what he had created. But even all that was somehow not enough. So God created man and woman. And God created them in God’s image—so they could love him back.
And that’s where God “benefits” from our existence. God knows loved returned, thanks to us. Now granted, God doesn’t force us to love him—we learn to love God through experience and from hearing the stories of faith over and over. And we mess up time and time again—even to the point of killing God’ son, Jesus, the one God sent to be a sheep—so that God would know what it is to be a sheep. No, love forced is not love, so God proved his love for us by being a good shepherd.
What does it mean that we are in a mutually beneficial relationship with God? One, it means that God really, really loves us to allow such a relationship. Two it means that, even though God’s love for us is unconditional and not dependent on our loving God back, still our loving God back has inherent meaning because it benefits God. Three, that God rigorously protects us, as a shepherd does the sheep, because God has a stake in us. Fourth, that God loves us so much, and loves our loving him back so much, that he removes the natural, physical limit to such love—death. God makes our relationship permanent.
So, LAW – we must learn to love God, GOSPEL – God loves us enough to wait—not for us to come home wagging our tails behind us. But rather, to wait for the Holy Spirit to awaken in us the knowledge of God’s love, to gather us together by the Word that describes and is that love, and enlighten us so that we may respond to our shepherd and enter his fold.
So…
Little Bo Peep didn’t know her sheep
And so didn’t know how to find them
She left them alone, but they stayed gone
Leaving Bo Peep behind them.
However…
Jesus the sheep, know his peeps
And exactly how to find them
Gathers them in, forgives them their sin
And gives bread and wine to remind them
And that’s no nursery rhyme! Amen
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