Sermon Illustrations for Christ The King (Proper 29) (2023)
Illustration
Ezekiel 34:11-16, 20-24
The image of the Lord as a shepherd is repeated throughout scripture. What is also clear is that sheep know the voice of their shepherd. I grew up in the city, so I haven’t seen it in person, but I’ve read it enough times to believe it. Sheep really do know their shepherd.
In his book, Building a Church of Small Groups, Bill Donahue relays a story from his time as a part-time youth pastor while attending seminary. He was visiting a farm where two of his students lived, and their father wanted to give Donahue an object lesson.
He asked if Donahue would help call in the sheep. Donahue notes that he enthusiastically agreed to do it. They went to the fence surrounding the field where about 25 sheep grazed. The man urged Donahue to call them in. When he said he didn’t know how, he told him to simply say, “Hey sheep. Come on in.” Donahue tried two or three times, getting louder each time, but the sheep wouldn’t even turn to look at him. Donahue then looked at the man and told him he didn’t think he could. The man smiled, then put his hand to his mouth and called out for the sheep to come. Immediately, all 25 turned and ambled toward the man. They knew their shepherd.
God is the true shepherd of his people. He knows them and they know him. There is a day coming when he will sort out his sheep. He will provide and care for them. He will protect them. Those who are not his sheep will be separated from those who are. Do you know the voice of your shepherd?
Bill T.
* * *
Ezekiel 34:11-16, 20-24
In the opening of this chapter, the prophet Ezekiel speaks harshly about the false shepherds, the religious and political leaders of God’s people. They don’t feed the sheep, care for the weak ones, or heal the sick ones. They don’t look for the lost ones or protect the sheep against predators. They just eat the fat ones, clothe themselves in the wool, and take advantage of the sheep. This is short-sighted as well as selfish. A good shepherd works for the increase of the flock, and promotes the health of all sheep, because this will lead to greater rewards. The evil shepherds described in the beginning of the chapter are insuring the extinction of the herd, and their own demise as well.
This provides the greater contrast for the Good Shepherd described in the lectionary verses. Ezekiel identifies the Good Shepherd as God. And we, of course, look deeper as see God’s Good Shepherd as God Incarnate, Jesus himself. And Jesus, of course, is inviting us to become good shepherds of the flock as well.
In Ezekiel’s day, as in the days of Jesus, and our own time, there was a great disparity between the very rich and everyone else. Rulers were (are) not shepherds. Religious leaders did not (don’t) act like shepherds either. But though the early church, like the society, consisted of the extremely rich and everyone else going without, we see that everyone cared for each other. They ate together. They didn’t live in other words. They shared the profits from the sale of land. They cared with and for each other. They did this in a radical way, and with passion and with love. They acted as shepherds, not rulers, because they knew the blessing of having a shepherd like the Good Shepherd, and they emulated the shepherd.
We are shepherds — as the Lord is our shepherd. We are called to care for each other, on the ground, up close, and in person. We’re not to phone in our caring. We’re to be there, when things are rough, to provide guidance if necessary, protection for those who feel unsafe, and most of all presence, alongside the still waters, among the green pastures, and through the valley of the shadow of death.
When it comes to the blessing of having a shepherd, do the sheep really know how lucky they are? The shepherd is a fact of life. The caregiver is present with them, not sending signals from a distant hill, but walking with them sleeping near them, sharing their perils, ready to attack rather than to hang back and cut one’s losses in order to protect oneself.
We know we have a shepherd. We know we are blessed. We know there is a valley of the shadow of death. And though we can’t help ourselves — we do fear the very real evil that is around us, I hope we know we are loved and cared for in a way that is astounding — because our shepherd has gone before us, from life into death, and beyond the empty tomb into life.
Frank R.
* * *
Ephesians 1:15-23
Physicists have posited (and may have discovered) a field which holds all matter together, All the sub-atomic particles get stuck together to form matter in what is called the Higgs Field. It is not outlandish, based on this text and the awareness that Christ is King, to think of God in Christ as present in this field. Modern French Catholic theologian Pierre Teilhard de Chardin eloquently describes Christ’s permeation of the cosmos:
In the beginning was the word, supremely capable of mastering and moulding whatever might come into being in the work of matter. In the beginning there were not coldness and darkness: there was fire... once again the fire has penetrated the earth... the flame has lit up the whole world from within. All things individually and collectively are penetrated and flooded by it, from the inmost core of the tiniest atom to the mighty sweep of the most universal laws of being; so naturally as it flooded every element, every energy, every connecting-link in the unity of the cosmos; that one might suppose the cosmos to have burst spontaneously into flame. (Hymn of the Universe, pp.21,23-24)
To these observations Martin Luther adds another helpful insight:
God is wholly present in all creation, in every corner, behind you and before you. Do you think God is sleeping on a pillow in heaven? God is watching over you and protecting you.
Mark E.
* * *
Ephesians 1:15-23
We pastors are taught to love our congregations, to lead them spiritually and engage in intimate spiritual relationships with them. This is important relational work for pastors and for church leaders. And we are taught to have good boundaries. When we are called or assigned to serve a new congregation, we are required to sever those relationships. It is a part of our responsibility so that another can come to serve them. None of this is easy. Letting go is difficult but we pledge to do so. Our service of farewell offers these words, “
(L) Do you, the members and friends of the church release your pastor from the duties of pastor?
(P) We do, with the help of God.
(L) Do you offer your encouragement for her ministry as it unfolds in new ways?
(P) We do, with the help of God.
(L) Do you, pastor, release this church from turning to you and depending on you?
(Pastor) I do, with the help of God.
(L) Do you offer your encouragement for continued ministry here and the relationship with another who will come to serve?
(Pastor) I do, with the help of God.
These words remind us that we serve, but that the church belongs to Jesus. We continue to pray for those congregations we have left, and we still feel love for them, but God knows the right pastor will be called to serve them in the days ahead and we need to move out of the way and let God do God’s work.
Bonnie B.
* * *
Matthew 25:31-46
When the Son of Man speaks to those designated as sheep, he says, “Come, you who are blessed by my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world….” Now sheep can’t help being sheep and goats are goats. This borders on predestination, because, after all, if the sheep are the good guys, they’re gonna be sheep.
But sheep and goats don’t make a choice about visiting those in prison, clothing the naked, looking after the sick, and feeding the hungry. They are preprogrammed to look after their young and to act as a herding creature. This is a parable — a story — that illustrates a truth about us — we do have free will and choose to be sheep or goats. (And apologies to all my 4-H friends who know that goats are wonderful animals worthy of care for their utility and their personalities. In this they will find support from the poet the late Carl Sandburg, who in retirement became something of an expert in goat husbandry.)
Therefore, it’s important to note that the kingdom is prepared from the foundation for us, but our choices are what make us worthy of that kingdom.
Frank R.
* * *
Matthew 25:31-46
Puritan leader Jonathan Edwards did a nice job explaining what to make of this text and its stress on God’s expectation that the faithful do works:
Hereby the saints will be made the more sensible how great their salvation is. When they shall see how great the misery is from which God hath saved them, and how great a difference he hath made between their state, and the state of others, who were by nature, and perhaps for a time by practice, no more sinful and ill-deserving than any, it will give them a greater sense of the wonderfulness of God’s grace to them. (Works, Vol.2, p.87)
John Calvin also noted the text’s reference to caring for the poor. On that subject he noted:
So then, whenever we are reluctant to assist the poor, let us place before our eyes the Son of God to whom it would be base sacrilege to refuse anything. (Calvin’s Commentaries, Vol.XVII/1, p.181)
Like Edwards, the Genevan reformer was committed to making clear that grace and forgiveness are at the center of Christ’s kingdom, that there are no works without grace. On that matter he wrote:
But before speaking of the reward of good works, He [Christ] points out, in passing, that the commencement of salvation flows from a high source; for by calling them blessed of the Father, He reminds them, that their salvation proceeded from the undeserved favour of God. (Calvin’s Commentaries, Vol.XVII/1, pp.176-177)
Mark E.
* * *
Matthew 25:31-46
The April 30, 1910, edition of The Young Lutheran’s Companion shares this story. It was also found in the February 7, 1909, edition of The San Francisco Call. Around Christmas in 1908, an Italian comic paper “Il Telefono,” located in Messina, published a satirical poem called “The Little Child Jesus.” The paper regularly had anti-Christian views and this poem was no different. One of the stanzas of that poem mocked the Lord, “Since we the living, know thee well, Do thou send an earthquake fell.”
It was interesting that three days after Christmas and the publication of that poem, Messina was rocked with the most powerful earthquake in Europe to that time. It would have measured a 7.5 on today’s Richter scale. The death toll was listed at nearly 200,000 people.
Was there a connection between the mocking article in the newspaper and the earthquake? I don’t know. We do know that God will not be mocked. Whatever a man sows, he will reap. (Galatians 6:7). The text from Matthew also makes it clear. When Jesus returns in his glory, he will separate people as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats. The sheep, at his right hand, will inherit the kingdom. The goats, on his left, will be told to depart into eternal fire. It is a vivid visual reminder that either people are with Jesus, or they are not. Where will you stand?
Bill T.
The image of the Lord as a shepherd is repeated throughout scripture. What is also clear is that sheep know the voice of their shepherd. I grew up in the city, so I haven’t seen it in person, but I’ve read it enough times to believe it. Sheep really do know their shepherd.
In his book, Building a Church of Small Groups, Bill Donahue relays a story from his time as a part-time youth pastor while attending seminary. He was visiting a farm where two of his students lived, and their father wanted to give Donahue an object lesson.
He asked if Donahue would help call in the sheep. Donahue notes that he enthusiastically agreed to do it. They went to the fence surrounding the field where about 25 sheep grazed. The man urged Donahue to call them in. When he said he didn’t know how, he told him to simply say, “Hey sheep. Come on in.” Donahue tried two or three times, getting louder each time, but the sheep wouldn’t even turn to look at him. Donahue then looked at the man and told him he didn’t think he could. The man smiled, then put his hand to his mouth and called out for the sheep to come. Immediately, all 25 turned and ambled toward the man. They knew their shepherd.
God is the true shepherd of his people. He knows them and they know him. There is a day coming when he will sort out his sheep. He will provide and care for them. He will protect them. Those who are not his sheep will be separated from those who are. Do you know the voice of your shepherd?
Bill T.
* * *
Ezekiel 34:11-16, 20-24
In the opening of this chapter, the prophet Ezekiel speaks harshly about the false shepherds, the religious and political leaders of God’s people. They don’t feed the sheep, care for the weak ones, or heal the sick ones. They don’t look for the lost ones or protect the sheep against predators. They just eat the fat ones, clothe themselves in the wool, and take advantage of the sheep. This is short-sighted as well as selfish. A good shepherd works for the increase of the flock, and promotes the health of all sheep, because this will lead to greater rewards. The evil shepherds described in the beginning of the chapter are insuring the extinction of the herd, and their own demise as well.
This provides the greater contrast for the Good Shepherd described in the lectionary verses. Ezekiel identifies the Good Shepherd as God. And we, of course, look deeper as see God’s Good Shepherd as God Incarnate, Jesus himself. And Jesus, of course, is inviting us to become good shepherds of the flock as well.
In Ezekiel’s day, as in the days of Jesus, and our own time, there was a great disparity between the very rich and everyone else. Rulers were (are) not shepherds. Religious leaders did not (don’t) act like shepherds either. But though the early church, like the society, consisted of the extremely rich and everyone else going without, we see that everyone cared for each other. They ate together. They didn’t live in other words. They shared the profits from the sale of land. They cared with and for each other. They did this in a radical way, and with passion and with love. They acted as shepherds, not rulers, because they knew the blessing of having a shepherd like the Good Shepherd, and they emulated the shepherd.
We are shepherds — as the Lord is our shepherd. We are called to care for each other, on the ground, up close, and in person. We’re not to phone in our caring. We’re to be there, when things are rough, to provide guidance if necessary, protection for those who feel unsafe, and most of all presence, alongside the still waters, among the green pastures, and through the valley of the shadow of death.
When it comes to the blessing of having a shepherd, do the sheep really know how lucky they are? The shepherd is a fact of life. The caregiver is present with them, not sending signals from a distant hill, but walking with them sleeping near them, sharing their perils, ready to attack rather than to hang back and cut one’s losses in order to protect oneself.
We know we have a shepherd. We know we are blessed. We know there is a valley of the shadow of death. And though we can’t help ourselves — we do fear the very real evil that is around us, I hope we know we are loved and cared for in a way that is astounding — because our shepherd has gone before us, from life into death, and beyond the empty tomb into life.
Frank R.
* * *
Ephesians 1:15-23
Physicists have posited (and may have discovered) a field which holds all matter together, All the sub-atomic particles get stuck together to form matter in what is called the Higgs Field. It is not outlandish, based on this text and the awareness that Christ is King, to think of God in Christ as present in this field. Modern French Catholic theologian Pierre Teilhard de Chardin eloquently describes Christ’s permeation of the cosmos:
In the beginning was the word, supremely capable of mastering and moulding whatever might come into being in the work of matter. In the beginning there were not coldness and darkness: there was fire... once again the fire has penetrated the earth... the flame has lit up the whole world from within. All things individually and collectively are penetrated and flooded by it, from the inmost core of the tiniest atom to the mighty sweep of the most universal laws of being; so naturally as it flooded every element, every energy, every connecting-link in the unity of the cosmos; that one might suppose the cosmos to have burst spontaneously into flame. (Hymn of the Universe, pp.21,23-24)
To these observations Martin Luther adds another helpful insight:
God is wholly present in all creation, in every corner, behind you and before you. Do you think God is sleeping on a pillow in heaven? God is watching over you and protecting you.
Mark E.
* * *
Ephesians 1:15-23
We pastors are taught to love our congregations, to lead them spiritually and engage in intimate spiritual relationships with them. This is important relational work for pastors and for church leaders. And we are taught to have good boundaries. When we are called or assigned to serve a new congregation, we are required to sever those relationships. It is a part of our responsibility so that another can come to serve them. None of this is easy. Letting go is difficult but we pledge to do so. Our service of farewell offers these words, “
(L) Do you, the members and friends of the church release your pastor from the duties of pastor?
(P) We do, with the help of God.
(L) Do you offer your encouragement for her ministry as it unfolds in new ways?
(P) We do, with the help of God.
(L) Do you, pastor, release this church from turning to you and depending on you?
(Pastor) I do, with the help of God.
(L) Do you offer your encouragement for continued ministry here and the relationship with another who will come to serve?
(Pastor) I do, with the help of God.
These words remind us that we serve, but that the church belongs to Jesus. We continue to pray for those congregations we have left, and we still feel love for them, but God knows the right pastor will be called to serve them in the days ahead and we need to move out of the way and let God do God’s work.
Bonnie B.
* * *
Matthew 25:31-46
When the Son of Man speaks to those designated as sheep, he says, “Come, you who are blessed by my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world….” Now sheep can’t help being sheep and goats are goats. This borders on predestination, because, after all, if the sheep are the good guys, they’re gonna be sheep.
But sheep and goats don’t make a choice about visiting those in prison, clothing the naked, looking after the sick, and feeding the hungry. They are preprogrammed to look after their young and to act as a herding creature. This is a parable — a story — that illustrates a truth about us — we do have free will and choose to be sheep or goats. (And apologies to all my 4-H friends who know that goats are wonderful animals worthy of care for their utility and their personalities. In this they will find support from the poet the late Carl Sandburg, who in retirement became something of an expert in goat husbandry.)
Therefore, it’s important to note that the kingdom is prepared from the foundation for us, but our choices are what make us worthy of that kingdom.
Frank R.
* * *
Matthew 25:31-46
Puritan leader Jonathan Edwards did a nice job explaining what to make of this text and its stress on God’s expectation that the faithful do works:
Hereby the saints will be made the more sensible how great their salvation is. When they shall see how great the misery is from which God hath saved them, and how great a difference he hath made between their state, and the state of others, who were by nature, and perhaps for a time by practice, no more sinful and ill-deserving than any, it will give them a greater sense of the wonderfulness of God’s grace to them. (Works, Vol.2, p.87)
John Calvin also noted the text’s reference to caring for the poor. On that subject he noted:
So then, whenever we are reluctant to assist the poor, let us place before our eyes the Son of God to whom it would be base sacrilege to refuse anything. (Calvin’s Commentaries, Vol.XVII/1, p.181)
Like Edwards, the Genevan reformer was committed to making clear that grace and forgiveness are at the center of Christ’s kingdom, that there are no works without grace. On that matter he wrote:
But before speaking of the reward of good works, He [Christ] points out, in passing, that the commencement of salvation flows from a high source; for by calling them blessed of the Father, He reminds them, that their salvation proceeded from the undeserved favour of God. (Calvin’s Commentaries, Vol.XVII/1, pp.176-177)
Mark E.
* * *
Matthew 25:31-46
The April 30, 1910, edition of The Young Lutheran’s Companion shares this story. It was also found in the February 7, 1909, edition of The San Francisco Call. Around Christmas in 1908, an Italian comic paper “Il Telefono,” located in Messina, published a satirical poem called “The Little Child Jesus.” The paper regularly had anti-Christian views and this poem was no different. One of the stanzas of that poem mocked the Lord, “Since we the living, know thee well, Do thou send an earthquake fell.”
It was interesting that three days after Christmas and the publication of that poem, Messina was rocked with the most powerful earthquake in Europe to that time. It would have measured a 7.5 on today’s Richter scale. The death toll was listed at nearly 200,000 people.
Was there a connection between the mocking article in the newspaper and the earthquake? I don’t know. We do know that God will not be mocked. Whatever a man sows, he will reap. (Galatians 6:7). The text from Matthew also makes it clear. When Jesus returns in his glory, he will separate people as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats. The sheep, at his right hand, will inherit the kingdom. The goats, on his left, will be told to depart into eternal fire. It is a vivid visual reminder that either people are with Jesus, or they are not. Where will you stand?
Bill T.
