Easter 4C sermon 2025
I was raised in a very devout Roman Catholic home. At an early age, I had trouble with some of the teachings of the church. When I was six years old, preparing for my first holy communion, the nuns taught me in catechism class that the host and wine at communion became the actual body and blood of our Lord, Jesus. So, week after week, at mass, I diligently stared at the priest as he prepared communion and as hard as I stared, I just couldn’t see any abracadabra moment where this big change occurred. I was full of consternation about my disbelief, asking the nuns too many questions about all this. I spent a TON of time thinking about how to make myself believe something I didn’t believe. I was a skinny, deep thinking, obnoxious six-year-old wrestling with theology. So here I am at my first holy communion, trying to believe.
In my old age, I’ve allowed myself grace to have room for disbelief. I appreciate that the Episcopal church allows for questions and reasoning in living one’s faith. The church is said to rest on a three-legged stool: scripture, faith and reason. Thank God for reason! I still love and worship Jesus and his teachings guide me in my daily life. I’m grateful to have found a church family where I can sit with my doubts and questions.
In today’s Gospel, Jesus addresses the question of belief and disbelief. It’s Hannukah, our Jewish Lord is in the Temple, at the Portico of Soloman, (where the kings of Israel sat to render judgment) and he’s having a chat with some of the Jewish leaders who are judging him and who seem confounded by him. They still want clarification about exactly who he claims to be. Can’t really blame them – if any of us suddenly claimed to be THE MESSIAH, wouldn’t we all have lots of questions? Well, Jesus is losing patience with them:
“Who am I? How many times do I have to tell you? I’ve told you and you don’t believe.”
He points out the works he does in his father’s name as testimony of what he says. He has been healing, feeding, doing miracles, he can even raise the dead. But they don’t see these actions as evidence that he is the messiah. They do not believe. I worry that I’d count myself among the doubters if I had lived in those times. Jesus continues:
“You do not believe because you do not belong to my sheep.”
This always stops me. The gospel of John can feel very exclusionary which always seems to me to make it the least Christlike gospel. But earlier in this discourse Jesus says: “I have other sheep that do not belong to this fold. I must bring them also, and they will listen to my voice. So, there will be one flock, one shepherd.” That’s more inclusive.
Jesus continues: “My sheep hear me. I know them and they follow me. I give them eternal life and they will not perish. No one will snatch them out of my hand. What my Father has given me is greater than all else, and no one can snatch it out of the Father’s hand. The Father and I are one.”
Perhaps Jesus is getting a little tougher with these folks endlessly challenging him but despite this, he keeps talking, he keeps engaging with these people who are in such opposition to him. Our reading ends here but let me read a bit further: “The Jews took up stones again to stone him.” Jesus points out that he’s only been doing good works so why stone him? They reply that they must stone him for blasphemy because he is making himself God. Jesus replies “If I am not doing the works of my father then do not believe me. But if I do them, even though you do not believe me, believe the works, so that you may know and understand that the Father is in me and I am in the Father. Believe the works. Believe what I do. My actions speak louder than words. The path to belief is through the work we do in the world.
Fredrick Buechner gives us a guide to doing God’s work in the world and it is a good guide for us as a congregation at St. Marks. He writes: “There is plenty of work to be done down here, God knows. To struggle each day to walk the paths of righteousness is no pushover, and struggle we must, because just as we are fed like sheep in green pastures, we must also feed his sheep, which are each other. Jesus, our shepherd, tells us that. We must help bear each other's burdens. We must pray for each other. We must nourish each other, weep with each other, rejoice with each other. Sometimes we must just learn to let each other alone. In short, we must love each other. We must never forget that.”
We are living in such an unstable, stressful time. Many of us are looking to uncertain futures which may hold a lot of change. It is so important to remember that none of us is alone in our struggle. In our psalm today and our gospel reading I’m struck by the totality of God’s loving protection. “Though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I shall fear no evil for you are with me.” I love how Jesus says; “My sheep hear my voice. I know them, and they follow me. No one will snatch them out of my hand.” Hear me when I say: God will not abandon you. Jesus holds onto you through all things. No one can snatch you out of God’s loving embrace. Trust in that. Believe in that. Amen.