Everyone, it seems, is interested in my numbers. I go to the grocery store to buy some groceries. After the checkout woman rings up my bill, I pull out my checkbook and write out the check. She takes it from me. She looks at the information. Numbers tell her where I live. Numbers tell her how to reach me on the telephone. "Is this information correct?" she asks.

"Yes, it is," I reply.

"May I see your driver’s license?" she asks. She looks at my driver’s license and writes some more numbers on my check. Finally, I am approved. The numbers are all there. I can eat for another week.

Each year we file our income taxes. That is the numbers game to end all numbers games. Pages and pages of numbers. When it is finally prepared, off it goes to the Internal Revenue Service. It would be nice to think that someone there knew you, someone who handled your returns personally every year. No such luck. They just send your numbers into the computer and the computer decides on the basis of these numbers and last year’s numbers, and the numbers they expect to see, whether we are honest or not. It is a necessary process. One could wish it were a bit more human and personal.

So the IRS knows me by my tax number. My state knows me by my driver’s license number. My bank knows me by my bank account number. My employer knows me by my social security number. On and on it goes for you, for me, for everybody. Everybody knows my numbers. I am not sure that anyone knows me!

The numbers game that is played in our culture is one symptom of loneliness and alienation that surrounds us today. It takes many other forms as well. "All the lonely people, where do they all come from?" That is a line from an early song by the Beatles. Loneliness. Isolation. Alienation. These are the realities of contemporary civilized life. We just do not know people the way we used to know them. That is true in rural America. That is true in urban America. The pace of life is so swift that we do not know, and we are not known by others, in a way that satisfies our human longing.

"I am the good shepherd." Those were Jesus’ words in our reading from John’s gospel text for this sermon. "I am the good shepherd; I know my own and my own know me ..." These words come gently to our ears. "I know my own and my own know me ..." There is someone who knows us after all. We often feel alone. We often feel more like a number than a person. We feel like no one really knows us; no one really cares. But it is not true. We are not unknown. We are known and known intimately by the very God who created us. "... even the hairs of your head are numbered," Jesus once said. (See Matthew 10:30.)

It is great good news to be known and loved by the God who created the universe. And when God knows and loves us, God never leaves us alone. That old word from the book of Genesis remains true for us today. "It is not good that we should be alone ..." (Genesis 2:18). It is not good to be unknown people. It is not good to be merely a number in someone else’s counting process.

"I have other sheep," Jesus tells us. "Those sheep are not of your flock. I must bring them also, and they will heed my voice. So there shall be one flock, one shepherd." It is clear, of course, that Jesus is not literally speaking of sheep here. He is speaking of people. We are the sheep. We are the sheep that Jesus knows. We are those who are to be gathered into one worldwide flock. When we are known by Jesus, we are no longer alone. We belong to the great company of those people throughout this world who know the same shepherd that we know.

"Red and yellow, black and white, all are precious in God’s sight," a popular Sunday school song states. Red and yellow, black and white. That is what God’s grand family looks like. That is the flock we belong to when the good shepherd knows us. That means that each one of us who is known by the shepherd belongs to a great worldwide community. It means that we need to be in mission to all those who are not yet part of the flock. It means that we need to learn our place in the shepherd’s technicolor flock. It means that we need to be in the vanguard of breaking down the barriers that exist between people in our world.

"I am the good shepherd; I know my own and my own know me ..." So we are not just a number. We are not unknown people. The good shepherd, Jesus Christ, knows us and calls us by name. That is a great comfort to us. It is also a great challenge that is laid before us. As sheep of the good shepherd’s fold, we are called upon to be in fellowship with all the sheep of God’s flock. "So shall there be one flock, one shepherd."

A recent movie by Woody Allen was titled, "Hannah and Her Sisters." The movie deals precisely with that theme. It is about Hannah and her sisters and how family life gives some sense of stability to life in a fractured world. The part played by Woody Allen in the movie is the part of a man who is constantly afraid that he will get some terrible disease. He is what we call a hypochondriac. As he comes into the movie, we see him on his way to the doctor. The doctor assures him that nothing seems to be terribly wrong, though some additional tests need to be made. Woody cannot calm himself over these additional tests. He is sure they will find something terrible. "What are you afraid of" - one of his friends asks him, "cancer?"

"Don’t say that," Woody responds with a look of terror.

More tests are performed. A cat scan is prescribed for his head. He is sure they will find a brain tumor. But his fears are unfounded. The doctor announces to him that all is well. In the next scene we see Woody coming out of the hospital, kicking up his heels, and running joyfully down the street. He is celebrating. But suddenly he stops. We know instinctively why he stops. He tells us in the next scene. "All this means," he says, "is that I am all right this time. Next time it will probably be serious. What is the meaning of life anyway?"

The whole scene is funny in the movie the way Woody plays it. We laugh. And yet, we know what he is pointing to. Our lives are lived in constant danger. Woody Allen’s character overplays the danger. But the danger is there. There are all kinds of realities that imperil our lives nearly every day. Accidents might befall us. Natural disasters strike. Oppressive structures of life weigh us down. Disease stalks us and death awaits. That is the way life is. We live our lives in constant peril. Woody Allen might have exaggerated a bit, but he has his finger on a reality that all of us know and feel deep in our being.

"I am the good shepherd," Jesus says. "The good shepherd days down his life for the sheep." Jesus, as a good shepherd, does for us, does for his flock, what a good shepherd should do for his flock. He is alert and ready to deliver us from peril. A lot of people claim to be on our side in life, in league with us against the perils. I suspect, however, that we each recognize that many of those who claim to protect us in life are more like the hireling than like the good shepherd. When they see us in real danger, when they see the wolves attack us, they flee. They flee bacause they are hirelings whose main interest is their hire. They offer us help for our lives as long as times aren’t too bad and as long as we pay our bills. Finally, however, human saviors are more interested in their own gain. They are hirelings. When the wolves come, they disappear. The good shepherd, however, will not disappear. He is ready to lay down his life for us if he must.

"I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep." That is the marvelous savior we have in Jesus Christ. He knows that our lives are endangered and imperiled on every side. He sees that death is the greatest enemy that confronts us. As the good shepherd, therefore, he lays down his life for his sheep. No one takes his life from him. He gives his life freely, lovingly. "I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it again ..." Thus Jesus speaks of himself.

Jesus Christ is the one who holds the power of life and death in his hands. When Jesus comes to us, when Jesus comes to people whose lives are imperiled by death, he comes as the one who has conquered death. Each one of us faces death. That is a perilous reality. We might just go to pieces or give up on the meaning of life in light of death’s stark reality. But there is this word of hope for imperiled people. The good shepherd has laid down his life for our lives. The good shepherd has claimed victory over death also for us. Life’s greatest peril, therefore, can only win a limited victory over us. Peril and danger are never the last words about our lives. Life and victory are offered to us as the last words about our lives. The good shepherd has made it happen. The good shepherd has laid down his life. The good shepherd wraps our lives in his life and invites us to live with him in eternal pastures.

It is hard to be just a number. It hurts to feel unknown and alone in life. "I am the good shepherd," Jesus says, "I know my own and my own know me."

Woody Allen is right. Human life is an endangered species. Death calls a halt to every human life. "I am the good shepherd," Jesus says. "The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep."