If you have been watching the news
over the course of the last two weeks you will have noticed that a local story
has been on the top of the headlines. It is a story of tragedy, it is a story
of hope, it is a story of faith. You will have heard how a Penticton couple
embarked upon a journey to Las Vegas, and got lost in the wilderness. The GPS system upon which they were relying guided them into
unfamiliar and dangerous territory. Their vehicle was stuck in the mud. Al Chretien left the vehicle on a quest
for help. he has not been found. His wife, Rita, remained behind, to survive
only on water drawn from melted snow, and hard candies. She knew that she was
lost, and realized that death was a
probability. But beneath this dreadful realization was something else—a
confidence and a hope that her destiny was in the hands of God, that God’s will
for her was ultimately good, that though she stuck in the
middle of the valley of death, that the Good Shepherds guiding staff was there.
That God had not forgotten—that she was not truly lost. Her testimony of faith is a
powerful one. It is testimony to the guiding hand of the Good Shepherd, who
finds and guides the lost to safety.
But what
does it mean to be lost? Well, the most obvious way we can be lost, is to be
physically lost. Most of us, at some point in our lives can relate to that. I
remember as a young child getting lost in the shopping mall, separated from my
mother, and being very scared.
anyone that’s gone hiking and has gone off trail, and even for but a
moment, contemplated not finding the way out can relate to the anxiety of being
lost. but what does it mean to be spiritually lost?
I
won’t presume to have a total answer to that question. But here is a thought to
consider. To be spiritually lost, is to be disconnected from the true answer to
the deep and fundamental question of “what is the meaning of life”. The answer
to that question is not simply a matter of the intellect or the head. It as a question which can only be
answered in the heart. If the
heart answers this question with the words, “power”, “domination”, “worldly
success,” “status,” “physical appearance”, “self aggrandizement “and “self-satisfication”,
then it is a lost heart—lost because it is out of touch with the real answer.
And the real answer is the love of God. The love of God, received and
shared—the love we have been given by the Good Shepherd, the author and
finisher of our salvation.
As we look
at our television screens, and through the church window, it is easy to see all
of the lost in the world. It is easy to do that, and shake our heads in dismay.
But when we do that we must also remember that we have not been called just to
see them the Good Shepherd has called us to do the work of his shepherding in
this world.
This is our mission. Our mission is to shephard the lost, so that
they would also have life and have life abundantly. Christians are called to do
this not just within the walls of the church building but also in the spheres
of everyday life. We are called to be ambassadors of the good news—good news of
the great work of the good shepherd, who has promised to transform us into the
people God made us to be.
And
that’s really the bottom line, isn’t it? Being lost means not being the people
God made us to be.
It
is indeed easy to see all of the lost out there in the world. But it is a
reality that the state of being lost does not exist just outside of the church.
Sin does not stop working in the hearts
of believers. And Satan does not stop working to pull the faithful off course.
The
church has been around for roughly two thousand years, and individual members,
congregations, denominations, have been wandering and straying for about as
long.
These
days, there is a lot of anxiety in the western church . Declining numbers,
divisive debates, and uncertainty about the future are realities which threaten
the stability and health of congregations across this land. And the immediate human response to anxiety is to
generate a human answer, engineer a human solution. But human answers to spiritual problems—and make no mistake
what I just mentioned are practical realities but more significantly, they are
spiritual problems—take us further into the wilderness. Anxiety generates
panic, and panic leads to confusion and disorientation. Soon we will forget who
we are. We need to be reminded, and there is only one who can do that. There is
only one who can guide us back—and that is the Good Shepherd. The Good Shepherd is the only one who
can still anxious minds and bring peace to troubled hearts.
There
is only one shepherd of the sheep and that is Jesus Christ. For he is the only one through life in
all its abundance is given. He is the life giver. He is the one who truly orients us to life and what it means
to live as a human being. He is the gate which opens the door to life in its
fullness.
We
hear this we know this, and then, it can happen so quickly. We can start
behaving like lost sheep, determined to move in the wrong direction away from
the shepherd, becoming preoccupied with that patch of grass or that. Or we can begin to listen to voices of
those who are not the shepherd. We can begin to seek other gates into the heart
of God. But there is only one. Christ is the one.
He is the
one because he is real. He is the one because he is love. Indeed he is the one
from whom all love flows.
Some scholars say he has been invented
by the church, that the idea of Christ evolved over history—that he moved from
being the Jesus of history to the Christ of the church. But that Jesus, the Jesus of
historical-critical scholarship is not the Jesus who is Saviour. Jesus who is
saviour was not created. The Jesus who is Saviour is God. He is God for us. He
is God, the Good Shepherd.
And the
good news is that the shepherd’s staff is long, and can lovingly reach us and
bring us back into the fold, out of that anxious field. We need to trust his
guidance. And his guidance has been made known to us. His will for us is not a
secret. It is in plain sight.
But like stubborn sheep human beings so often choose not to see
it. The shepherds will for us is
expressed in his Word, his Word proclaimed verbally on Sunday. His Word proclaimed in the sacraments.
His word proclaimed in the written words of scripture, in the Bible. Here in
plain sight we hear the shepherd calling and speaking and guiding. This isn’t a
complicated matter. But humans bring complication—complication and confusion
born out of our own desire to be in charge.
But there can be only one Shepherd,
one gate, one God, one saviour. And the good news is that he loves us. Loves us
so much that he suffered and died for us. His rod and staff are here, reaching
us and guiding us—even in the darkest of valleys. Indeed He has done it all
already, and we are called to be faithful in his work, and to follow he who has
done all for us, he who has opened the gate, he who is the gate. Now may the
peace which surpasses all understanding guard your hearts and minds in Christ
Jesus. Amen.
