Andrew Young, former delegate to the United Nations and former mayor of Atlanta, finally published the book he claims he should have written ten years ago. The book, The Way Out of No Way, contains Young's observations about how real change occurs. He notes that changes for the better do not happen simply because we teach people how to work better or harder. Reforms take place when people exert their spirituality to achieve change. In his aristoc_esermonsratic and very intelligent manner, Mr. Young uses both personal and public experiences to make his points. Most certainly, the most obvious to all of us has been the civil rights movement which was inspired and achieved by both white and black churches. It was in that experience that many people learned that the only kind of life worth living is one that one is willing to die for. However, such an achievement also helps us to question seriously our concepts of power for effecting change.

We may imagine that we give or confer power equally. However, the one who moves into the seat of power may understand how that power is to be used in a completely different way from the predecessors in the same office. The marks of power are different for the variety of people on whom the power is conferred. Most generally, the people in power do not reveal openly their strategies for dealing with power. They just act. In direct contrast to that, in the Holy Gospel for today, we hear how our Lord Jesus perceived his role as our Leader, our Good Shepherd, and how he also understood the nature of the power which was given to him by his Father.

An Understanding Shepherd

The first thing that our Lord reveals about his understanding of his role and his authority is that he is highly sensitive to our problems. He indicates that other shepherds are hirelings who think first of self-preservation. They want to save themselves first. They see the wolf coming and run in the other direction. Jesus intimates that he sees the wolves coming also. He is conscious of what attacks are made on our lives. He is aware of the problems that we have to face. He knows what we must endure. He is alert to the many difficulties that we must face. That is important for us to understand.

What Jesus makes clear about his claim to power is that he so completely identifies with our problems that he is perfectly willing to lay down his life for us. What makes Jesus so sensitive to what we must endure is that he had the same enemies and the same problems confronting him. It was not as though Jesus was merely trying to understand what we have to face. He faced all the same difficulties. He was acutely aware of how intense our enemies are. For him they were always first and new temptations. They did not come from within his own being as so many do for us. We need to know that, and we should be especially comforted by that when we feel we are all alone in our temptation.

An Intimate Shepherd

Not only does our Good Shepherd know about our problems, but he also knows us. This knowing is not just acquaintanceship. This is not a casual relationship. He does not just happen to know us by sight. When our Good Shepherd talks about knowing us, he is talking about a unique intimate relationship. Some of us can remember that when we were children our mother or father could figure out what we were doing. It was a puzzle to us when Mom or Dad could anticipate what kind of trouble we were going to get into. It was equally a surprise when they could tell us when we had done something wrong even though they were not there. My mother left me with the distinct impression that she had eyes in the back of her head. She was also expert at reading the body language: a blush, the nervous twitch, the quiet movement. All were dead giveaways by which Mother knew me. And she knew me "inside and out" as she liked to say. It's that intimate kind of "knowing" that our Good Shepherd speaks of.

Jesus says he knows his own. He knows them as his very own. He has lived and died to make them his own. Consequently, his own know him. We know what Jesus the Christ is like, because he did live and die for us. It is by his great sacrificial act that we know what he is like. We know the full extent of his love. There may be some things we do not know about him, but we know what he is like and what a price he had to pay for making us his own. That helps us to read him like a book. He literally lived out the Word for us by suffering and dying. Because we know this about him, we also know the Father. We know him as he knows the Father and the Father knows him. Because we know the Good Shepherd, we know that God is love.

The Loving Shepherd

What makes us absolutely certain of this love which the Father has for us and which we have come to know in his Son is that it is universal. When we feel depressed and blue, when we feel down and out, when we wonder who we are, we feel all alone and we are certain that no one has the same problem as we. Then if it dawns on us that other people do have the same problem, we may find some solace in that. The old saw is "Misery loves company." In reality, however, that is of little help. We may even see that other people have bigger problems than we. When that dawns on us, we may feel a little better, but not necessarily.

What is a source of great comfort and hope for us is that the Lord Jesus says that he loves all within the fold and that he loves others who are not of the fold. This is to say that his love is universal. Because it is universal, there can be absolutely no doubt that he loves us. As his sacrifice was for all, his love is for all. We would always have to worry if God's love was selective. Then we would have to worry if we were included. But because God loves one and all by what he does for us through the Good Shepherd, we know for sure "He loves me!"

The Leading Shepherd

Many new denominational books of worship have rituals for the affirmation of baptism. There are a variety of ways we can affirm our baptism. Confirmation is the confirmands' affirmation of their baptism. However, we can affirm our baptism as we transfer from congregation to congregation or at times when others affirm the baptisms publicly. However, we actually affirm our baptisms when we confess our sins and are absolved or any other way we renew our faith in Christ. What we affirm is not something that we do or that we have done. We affirm that we believe what God has done for us in the Lord Jesus Christ through Holy Baptism. He has done it all to make us his own. That is what this beautiful text from Saint John says to us today. Our Good Shepherd leads us. What he emphasizes in such a rich way is his intimate relationship with us.

Most of us cannot appreciate fully the picture he draws for us here, because we may not be acquainted with shepherding. What we see in our western plains today is also different from what Jesus pictures for us. On our western prairies the shepherds drive huge flocks of sheep with their dogs and from their horses. What Jesus pictures is the more intimate scene of the town shepherd in modest rural areas who may gather the flock in the morning from the homes of townspeople and drive them out into the meadows. Or we see the shepherd who lives with the sheep out in the plain and drives them into the sheepfold at night and lies down at the entrance of the sheepfold to serve as the very door for the sheepfold itself.

All of us have some impression of the Good Shepherd imprinted on our hearts and minds. Commonly, officials have completely different views of the offices to which they are elected. The variety is a result most often from the different perceptions the officials have of themselves. People also have had and have confessed different conceptions and pictures of our Lord Jesus Christ. Some see him at one end as soft as a marshmallow and others at the other extreme picture him as a harsh judge. The variety of Christologies in between is very large.

However, our Lord gives the picture of himself to us. He is no softie, this Lord of ours. He is a heavyweight who drives our foes away from us. At the same time for us he is tender-hearted and full of compassion, love, and grace. He wants us to know how deep his attachment is for us. He says that he has plenty to back up what love he holds for us. He was able to lay down his life for us and take it up again. That is power to be sure. It was also the greatest love ever demonstrated in the world. It is out of that love that he shepherds us. Artists have attempted to paint this for us. Most of them have painted a beautiful, pastoral scene for us. What we need is the picture of the rugged Shepherd who is bloodied in his battle for us, but who also shows the serenity of his confidence and the warmth of his love. That is the Good Shepherd.