We have just heard from a very annoyed Jesus. What I hear in Jesus’s voice this morning is that he is exasperated. We see that by what is said in verse 6, “This figure of speech Jesus used with them, but they did not understand what he was saying to them.” I’ve been on both sides of conversations like the one Jesus is having right now. I’ve been so frustrated by the thick skulls of others that it’s all I can do not to pull my hair out. There have also been times that I am so hardheaded that I’ve been the person who has caused an excessive amount of frustration for someone else. Being thickheaded might be the eighth deadly sin, because it causes us not to be able to hear God’s voice, just like those to whom Jesus is speaking to today.
What has upset Jesus, is that his audience has shown a total lack of inclusiveness. Now before you hear something else, I want to be clear. The inclusiveness I am speaking about is not exactly what a modern ear hears when someone says inclusiveness. I will come back to that, but first, let me explain what has happened to get Jesus so irked. In chapter 9 of the Gospel, according to John, Jesus meets a blind beggar. Jesus heals the blind man, and then the blind man is brought before the Pharisees, and they question him. After extensive questioning and ignoring the obvious evidence that God healed this man, the Pharisees, continue to challenge him. The blind man answers their question with childlike innocence, and the Pharisees get mad at him, and they cast him out. Jesus then says this to the blind man, “For judgment, I came into this world, that those who do not see may see, and those who see may become blind.” The Pharisees ask Jesus if they are blind, and Jesus responds with what we have read today.
In his response, Jesus uses two unique forms of speech, that would send chills down the spines of the Pharisees as they heard. Jesus begins by saying Truly Truly, or a more literal translation Amen Amen. Why do we say amen at the end of a prayer? We do so because it means I affirm; I agree with what you have just said. When we say amen, we are saying we are all in agreement. To begin a statement saying Amen Amen, is to explain to those listening that what is about to be said is of dire importance and is the TRUTH. In all caps, the TRUTH like a text message yelling at you! Jesus is speaking with the caps lock firmly pressed down for the entire reading today.
The second unique form of speech is the I AM statements Jesus makes. Jesus purposefully uses the phrase Ego Emi, as he says I am the door of the sheep. And I am the door. Jesus is using the same phrase that God uses when Moses asks God, who shall I tell the people you are? God responds to Moses; I AM who I AM, ego EMI. In his second attempt to get through to his stubborn audience, Jesus is directly connecting himself to God. He is intentionally using the words God spoke to Moses to describe himself.
Throughout chapter ten in John’s account, Jesus continues to use the I am statements and declares, I am the good shepherd. Jesus has healed a man blind from birth, and the Pharisees decided to kick that man out of the community for speaking the truth. This aggravates Jesus, causing him to spell out in plain words who he is. Jesus’s speech has two consequences; it causes some of the religious leaders to become even more passionate about getting rid of Jesus. And it causes others to say, “These are not the words of one who is oppressed by a demon. Can a demon open the eyes of the blind?”[1]
This dichotomy of responses is what happens when we preach the truth. Some hear it and are so convicted they attack the messenger because that is easier than amendment of life. Others hear the truth, and they realize the missteps they have made, and they track back and get back on the path of love, the path of grace, the way of faith leading to God. I said earlier, the thing that had upset Jesus is that his audience had shown a total lack of inclusiveness. Those who were witness to the healing of the blind man failed to allow the power of God to be included in their religious life. Their life failed to be about the grace and love of God and was about self and their own perceptions of who God is and how he is active. They put God in a box and believed they controlled how God could act. This attitude caused them to ignore the truth, ignore plain evidence right in front of their eyes, and they worshiped something else instead of God.
When we fail to include God, and we preach or believe in a “truth” we invent, and not the truth revealed to us in Scripture, we repeat the mistakes of the Pharisees. When we do that, we reject the work of God and the power of God’s infinite love for his creation. Amen amen I say to you, when we invent a new Gospel not rooted in the truth of Jesus, not based on the foundation of Scripture, tradition, and reason, we ignore our Good Shepherd. We turn God’s Church into a den of thieves and robbers. The truth is life-giving, and Jesus’s purpose was to provide for all of us abundant life. Abundant life is found in Scripture, in the Sacraments of the Church, in the creeds, and in the historic teachings of the Church. I pray that we never trade cultural, or man-made idols for the truth of Jesus. The ultimate truth that God gave himself, to defeat death, so that all of us may choose to have eternal abundant life with God, simply by listening to, and believing in, the message of Jesus: what we call today the good news.
[1] John 10:21
Sermon preached by the Rev. Christian M. Wood
Church of the Redeemer
Sarasota Florida
4th Sunday of Easter
3 May 2020