Today is the fifth week of our ecumenical midweek Lenten series in Greene. For 2022,, we are using the series “Shepherd Me, O God” from Luther Seminary’s Rolf Jacobson and Church Anew. Since I alternate weeks with Pastor Joan Thomas from the UMC-Presbyterian-Brethren Yoke of Greene, this is my third sermon in the series. (No audio or video recordings for this Lent series, but you can read my sermons from Ash Wednesday and from two weeks ago.)
This week, the focus text is Psalm 23:6a, and to go with that, I’ve chosen the texts Luke 15:1-7, Psalm 139, and John 15:9-17. We might think that we have to find God or get right with God. But the honest answer that Psalm 23 offers is that God finds us. God seeks us out to provide us unending grace, love, and mercy. Whether you are at a mountaintop of life or in a deep valley, may you know and trust God is still pursuing you with grace.
Grace to you and peace from God our Father and our Good Shepherd, Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen
This weekend in worship, we heard the parable of the prodigal son. It’s a story Jesus tells about a man who asked his dad for his share of the family money, left home, wasted all the money, and eventually came back home begging to be allowed back into the family as a servant.
But instead of being upset at him, the father rejoices and throws a party, welcoming the son back. It’s a great picture of how God rejoices when we repent, when we return to God.
Right at the beginning of the same chapter as the prodigal son story, Jesus tells another parable on the same topic, the one we just heard. This time it’s about a sheep that wanders away from the flock, and how a good shepherd will leave the rest of the flock in safety to go out and look for the one that’s missing. Then, when he finds it, he lays it on his shoulders and carries it back to safety, back home, back to the flock.
I picked this reading for tonight not just because it has sheep in it and our Lenten theme is God shepherding us, but because in this story, God—you know that’s who the shepherd in the story is, right?—God goes out looking for the sheep.
In the prodigal son story, the son, after wasting all his money, comes back home. The father comes running down the road to meet him, but the son had made the decision to come home.
Sometimes, that’s our experience, where we have a moment of deciding to repent, a moment of choosing to follow Jesus, deciding to turn our lives around. Sometimes we go look for God.
But this story about the lost sheep tells us God doesn’t necessarily wait for us. God calls us to come home, and God also comes looking for us.
There’s actually a third parable Jesus tells in this chapter, where a woman loses a coin and sweeps her house until she finds it, and that one might be even better, because a coin is an inanimate object that can’t even call for help when it’s lost. But tonight we’re sticking with our theme and focusing on the sheep story.
In our verse for tonight, Psalm 23:6, it says “Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life.”
(By the way, if anyone asks who you the good shepherd’s sheep are, you know the answer, right? Shirley, goodness, and mercy. Sorry!)
“Surely, goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life.” I’ve said before I don’t read Hebrew, but Dr. Rolf Jacobson says that’s one of the top 10 worst English translations in the Bible, because the word in Hebrew is not “follow”, the word is “pursue.” God pursues us with goodness and mercy. The shepherd chases down the lost sheep.
The word “mercy” there is the Hebrew word “chesed.” “Chesed” is the quality it takes to endure in a relationship and be faithful to the person you’re in a relationship with. It’s choosing to be faithful, choosing to value the other, kind of “loving fidelity.” Sometimes it’s translated “lovingkindness.”
God’s goodness and lovingkindness don’t just follow us, they pursue us. If you read the Psalms, David talks all the time about his enemies pursuing him, chasing him day and night.
But in Psalm 23, it’s God who pursues us. God takes the initiative to love us. That’s how committed God is to being in a loving relationship with us.
And we can’t get away. In Psalm 139, the Psalmist says, “Lord, you have searched me and know me.” You know me when I sit down, when I rise up, even before I speak, God, you know what I’m going to say. Where could I go to get away from you? Up to heaven? You’re there. Down to the grave, to Sheol? You’re there too. If I go to the farthest place across the sea, even there your hand shall lead me. Even before you were born, God was at work, forming your inward parts, knitting you together in your mother’s womb.
If God wasn’t loving, this would be a terrifying thought, right? God’s chasing you and you can’t escape!
Sometimes we make that mistake – think about Adam and Eve in the garden of Eden after they sinned. They hid from God, hoping God wouldn’t notice them. But it turns out God is really, really good at hide and seek.
And God’s not looking for you to punish you, to see what you’ve been up to recently. God knows all of that already! God pursuing us is good news, the best news ever, because God knows all about who you are and what you’ve done, and God choose to love you, chooses to forgive you.
God is pursuing you with mercy and love, seeking to be in relationship with you, seeking to find you and carry you back home.
Jesus’ call is for us to abide in his love, to live your life secure in the confident hope that you are a beloved child of God, trusting that the Good Shepherd is watching over you, leading you, seeking you out when you go astray.
Live knowing you are forgiven, knowing you are set free from the captivity to sin and death, released from your shame.
Sometimes people ask, “Have you found Jesus?” My favorite answer is “Wait, was he missing?” But the most accurate answer to that question is “No, he found me.” Jesus says, “You did not choose me, but I chose you.” We love because God first loved us. That’s grace. God pursues us when we get lost, when we forget where we’re going, even when we run away.
When we think we’ve messed up too much to come home, God forgives and welcomes us back. When we don’t even know we’re lost, God finds us. When we go astray, God comes looking for us and carries us home. God pursues you with grace.
Beloved of God, may you know the love of the Good Shepherd, who seeks you out and finds you, and rejoices to bring you home.
Amen