A Sermon for the Fourth Sunday of Easter, April 22, 2018

The Reverend J. Michael Strachan

Acts 4:5-12; 1 John 3:16-24; John 10:11-18

I want to start this morning with what Peter says in our reading from the Acts of the Apostles:

This Jesus is “the stone that was rejected by you, the builders, which has become the cornerstone.” And there is salvation in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given among mortals by which we must be saved.

Acts 4:11-12

I take this to mean two things. First, quite apparently it means that he is the hero of the story. He is the one who has fought the fight, won the battle, and secured salvation, and now there is salvation in no other name than his. Second, perhaps as equally apparent although not as well followed, it means that he is the model for those who want to be saved. And this is the far more difficult truth for us to believe and live out. Because we all want a hero who doesn’t ask anything of us. That’s the ideal. At least for me, it is. Go off. Win the battle. Come back. I’ll be here, and I’ll be very grateful for what you’ve done. But that’s not how this works, right?

In our reading from the Gospel of John this morning, Jesus describes himself as the Good Shepherd. A lot is going on here, but Jesus’ main point is simple and straightforward:

I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep.

John 10:11

Furthermore, from the first letter of St. John, we also heard this morning:

By this we know love, that he laid down his life for us, and we ought to lay down our lives for our brothers and sister. But if anyone has the world’s goods and sees his brother or sister in need, yet closes his heart against him, how does God’s love abide in him?1 John 3:16–17

This speaks directly to the existence of our benevolence fund, and let me say that you all have been so incredibly generous and self-giving in support of that fund that it is already at a level that I had hoped we might be at in a year or so. And because of your generosity, we were able to help a family in this church in a time of need, and they asked me to express to the church how very grateful they are that we were able to love them not just in words but in action. So I want to commend you in every sense of that word, and I can’t tell you what it means to me as your next Rector to see that type of generosity and love flowing out of this place.

So one form of this self-giving love, this love that lays its life down for a brother or sister, is to give of the world’s good to those in need. But I think there’s another part to this. You’re going to start hearing three words out of me a lot: Rooted, Compassionate, and Missional. These are our Bishop’s keywords for the diocese, and his vision is for those words to influence everything that we do in this diocese and the churches of this diocese. I want us to be the model for this. I want to show the diocese what it looks like to be a Rooted, Compassionate, and Missional church, so let me give you an example of what I think that looks like based on our readings this morning.

What we are rooted in is nothing other than Jesus Christ, the true vine and the Good Shepherd. The Good Shepherd is the one who out of love and compassion for his sheep, lay down his life for them. So everything we do is going to be about Jesus. But that’s easy to say so, let’s get more specific. We are going to model everything we do off of Jesus’ self-giving and self-emptying. And notice what else Jesus said in John 10:

And I have other sheep that are not of this fold. I must bring them also.”

John 10:16

So this isn’t about just the brothers and sisters here at St. Dunstan’s, the sheep of this fold, because Jesus has other sheep that are not of this fold, and he lays his life down for them as well. So I want us to think about every program we run, every sermon I give, every ministry we support as something rooted in Jesus, specifically in his self-giving and self-emptying love