![]() Having more than enough of whatever we need.Being fully known and being known by name.Life, even as we hear in the words of Jesus now, which is marked by: I have not always listened well to the voice of the Shepherd which means for us only abundant life. Now I know that I, for one, have too often listened too long to those voices of ‘thieves and bandits,’ both for myself and in my capacity as leader in the church. ![]() Indeed, each one of them would rob us of all that God intends. And collectively, in our congregations, each one, once followed, surely does not open the way for others to experience that abundant life meant for them either. For each one leads us in directions which do not offer the abundant life which has been intended for us all along. I do know that each one of these voices of ‘thieves and bandits’ would and do rob from us what the Shepherd intends. But I do know that it sounds like none of these nor like any number of others you and I could name today. I do not always know what the voice of the Shepherd sounds like or what it means to say. It can surely be just as true of congregations as well. Or which have us wanting to be like someone else instead of living into the unique gifts and callings which have marked our lives each one.Or which would want us to believe that it all rests on us.Or that tell us that if we just work harder, if we just do more, it will all work out.I wonder if the ‘thieves and bandits’ are those voices which encourage us to just move on and not deal with the losses which run deep.Or at least not as our too often faulty memory would have us believe. Or nostalgia for a time that likely never really existed at all.(Of who knows what, but fear nonetheless…) I wonder if the ‘thieves and bandits’ have been voices of fear.Indeed, I find myself considering now the voices of those ‘thieves and bandits’ which too much threaten to drown out the voice of the Shepherd, whether within the church or not: Something we, perhaps, to often fall prey to as well. ![]() Or at least if those were the voices they were heeding. I wonder if the Pharisees were the thieves and bandits of whom Jesus speaks. Perhaps in actual number, far, far more, than those of us who may have known our own ‘coming and going’ to be a way of being fed by the ‘green pastures’ of which Jesus speaks today. And maybe now more than ever.įor in the account immediately preceding Jesus’ reflections on the shepherd and the sheep, we hear about the one blind from birth whose sight was restored, a healing which was at the very least, not understood by the Pharisees, the religious leaders, whose protests are woven through the whole telling of that remarkable story.Īnd so, I do wonder now if the institution which, while nurturing some of us well, has not necessarily been a place of sustenance for far more than we will ever even know. I imagine that at one point or another, you have wondered this as well. Lately, though, I have begun to wonder if this very human institution even comes close to being an adequate conduit for the ‘abundant life’ which Jesus offers now. And for the most part, I write as one who has experienced deeply and consistently the kindness and care and encouragement of those who call the church home as well. I write today as one who has always loved the church.
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