Fourth Sunday of Easter

May 3, 2020

The Gateway to Life Abundant

Saint John 10:1-10

“I am the gate for the sheep.”  St. John 10:7

‘Houston we have a problem!’ 

It is supposed to be Good Shepherd Sunday, but in the gospel reading from John we do not hear “I am the good shepherd” until the next verse – verse 11.  The framers of the lectionary did that on purpose because Jesus is switching metaphors.

‘Houston we have a problem!”

Jesus is the gate this morning.  All our shepherd talk does not need to cease.  We certainly can still take comfort in imagining Jesus as the Good Shepherd who does indeed cares for us, nourish us, protect and guide us.  Those images are worthwhile, part of our corporate memory, and to be affirmed.

But with a ‘What if…” and a word of caution:

The church has had a problem and it has been a problem for centuries.  It gravitates to one image of Jesus while ignoring another.  When we neglect the diversity of images of the Christ we may even find ourselves unintentionally distorting the Christian message.

What if Jesus in not just a destination but a ‘way’?  What do I mean by Jesus as a destination?  I mean if all we are doing here is gathering to worship the Good Shepherd – if Jesus is the end – if all we are doing is praising the one who cares for us – do we have a complete grasp of Jesus and his teachings?

A blunt way of putting it is:  Has the church devolved into a Jesus Club where we ‘Rah! Rah! Jesus!’ and then go on with life in the real world!   “Who’s the leader of the club that’s made for you and me?”

If the church – the gathered community is nothing but a ‘spiritual club’ that’s made for you and me, than we have not really heard the message of the Gospel.

 Of course, Christ is the Good Shepherd, of course, Christ cares for you and me – but if that is all there is – if that is the sole purpose and life of faith – then indeed the faith has been distorted and ‘Houston, we have a problem.’

What if Jesus is not just a destination – a deity to be worshiped, but also a ‘way’?

John in his gospel is telling us that Jesus both ‘Good Shepherd’ and the way – the gateway to life abundant.

Jesus – the gateway:

You’ve heard the expression ‘Come to Jesus.’  Revivalists often taunted the populous with a ‘come to Jesus’ meeting under their revival tents.  A more attentive reading of the New Testament will lead one not simply to come to Jesus – but to come with Jesus.  In fact the call of the first disciples is a call to come and follow Christ.

The Christian faith is not so much about having the right dogma – making sure that one’s propositions about God are all correct.  Rather the Christian faith is a way of life centered in God.  Jesus is that gateway to a life centered in God.  Christ is the decisive revelation of what a life full of God looks like.  The way is a life filled with the ‘Spirit of Christ’ and radically centered in God.

Christ is that gateway to life abundant.

Abundant life is a code word in the Gospel of John.  In fact ‘abundant life’ is the reason John wrote his gospel.  Look at the last verses of the Gospel according to St. John just before the Epilogue:

Now Jesus did many other signs in the presence of his disciples, which are not written in this book.  But these are written so that you may come to believe that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God, and that through believing you may have life in his name.  St. John 20:30-31

There is ‘life’ and there is LIFE.  There is mere existence, a pulse, blood coursing through the veins, and color in the cheek.  And there is life with God – John’s understanding of life – yes, eternal life is a life centered in God – living under, with and for God, the enjoyment and practice of God’s forgiveness and grace.  Life abundant happens here and now through Christ the Gateway.

 It is one thing to praise and admire and take comfort in the Good Shepherd.  It is quite another to walk through the gate to abundant life.  In other words, living the way of Jesus as opposed to simply relishing the spine tingling praises to the gracious Good Shepherd.  Don’t come to Jesus, come with Jesus.

Christ is not a destination, but a way.  The church is not a club but a community of faith – a movement that walks through Jesus the gate into a new way of life.

When the gate is open and we enter life abundant – what is that way?  What does it look like?

A story to illustrate:

Approximately three years ago, Kevin Salwen, and his fourteen year-old daughter, Hannah, were driving home when an event happened that would forever change their lives and the lives of thousands of others across the globe.

They were stopped at a light in suburban Atlanta, a frequent hangout for homeless people looking for handouts….good place because it was a long light. There stood a homeless man nothing unusual about his look - ragged t-shirt & jeans --cardboard sign written with a black Sharpie marker reading –

“HUNGRY, HOMELESS, PLEASE HELP.”

Kevin, the dad, was “consumed with [his] internal dialogue:  “Damn, I’m out of McDonald’s cards. (He kept these in the glove compartment for this purpose)  Should I give him cash? No, just sit tight. I squirmed in my seat, avoiding eye contact.” (p.24)

But over in the passenger seat, something very different was going on. Hannah had opened her eyes and seen something very different.  She had seen homeless people on that corner many times before had even worked for Habitat for Humanity, Food Banks ..; served food at homeless shelters…

This time the situation of the homeless man registered more deeply with her because this time, next to the Salwen’s car, was a man driving a black Mercedes convertible.

Her father writes, “Her head swiveled right and left between the Mercedes and the homeless man, processing the have and have-not. 

She started talking slowly, thinking as she went, ‘Dad,’ she began, ‘if that man’ – she pointed to the Mercedes – ‘had a less nice car, that man there’ – she pointed to the homeless man – ‘could have a meal.’” (pp. 24-25)

That moment was the catalyst for some unbelievable changes in the Salwen household. 

From the book jacket: “Until that day, the Salwens had been caught up like so many of us in the classic American dream – providing a good life for their children, accumulating more and more stuff, doing their part to help others but not quite feeling they had any real impact. 

So when Hannah was stopped in her tracks by this glaring disparity, her parents knew they had to act on her urge to do something.  As a family, they made the extraordinary decision to sell their Atlanta mansion, buy a house half its size, and give half of the sale price to a worthy charity.  At first it seemed outlandish: ‘What, are you crazy?’

Then it became a challenge: ‘We are totally doing this.’  Their plan eventually took them across the globe and well out of their comfort zone.  In the end they learned that they had the power to change a little corner of the world.  And they found themselves changing too.”

So reads the book jacket from the book that Kevin and Hannah Salwen wrote of their adventure, entitled, The Power of Half.

Kevin Salwen [father] writes, “We created a lifestyle; then, just to keep up, we had to stay in motion.  And like the automated treadmill, it had a built-in mechanism to keep it going.  We’d never dream of going from power windows back to hand-cranked ones or leather seats to cloth.  In fact, I couldn’t remember any time we had done that in any facet of our lives – cars, houses, electronics, or musical instruments.  Better, nicer, more became the New Normal.” (p. 13)

“We were losing our core.  As Hannah and Joseph grew older and more independent, they naturally entered their own orbits . . . Conversations rarely reached any significant depth.  Our family was spinning into different galaxies.” (p. 19)

Christ the gateway to life abundant – the way of self-giving – the power of not just half – but whole as Christ gave himself for us!

SO WHAT TO DO?

So what, I know you’re wondering to yourselves, am I suggesting that you do the same: sell your home, like the Salwen family, and give half of the money to charity?

Well, no. Of course, if there are any takers I’m certain that the Realtors in the congregation would be happy to assist you if you go in that direction.

Anyone who decides to sell their house and give half the money away does not need to stay and hear the rest of the sermon!  But seriously, reality would suggest that very few people are in a position to make a gesture like that.  Even the Salwens recognized that not everyone could do what they were doing.

“Some people say to us, ‘I could never sell my house.’ Who expects you to?  Our project was never about size.  We chose to sell our house because it was something that our family could handle from the perspective of giving half.  But, . . . your ‘half’ can be whatever you choose.  You can be creative – a little goes a long way. 

To offer a simple example: if your family watches four hours of television a week, you could jointly decide to halve that, then choose as a family to devote those extra two hours to some unified purpose. 

Care about the elderly? You might work together in a nursing home. . . . Maybe serve meals once a week for those two hours. . . . no matter what your family makeup is, no matter what your version of ‘half’ is, the secret is the process. . .” (p. xii)

Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. once said, “Every man must decide whether he will walk in the creative light of altruism or the darkness of destructive selfishness.  This is the judgment. Life’s persistent and most urgent question is ‘What are you doing for others?’”

Christ invites us into life abundant – life in the power of half.  Hannah Salwen who challenged her family to take this journey reminds us:  “No matter how little you have, it is worth parting with half of something in order to make a difference.”

 It is important that we praise and worship Christ – the Good Shepherd.  Our worship becomes authentic by our lives lived out through the gateway to life abundant –lived out as the body of Christ in the world.

Amen