Audio Version HERE.
Ezekiel 34:7-31
Is there anything ultimate?
Anything so real, so final, so good, so absolute – that no matter what else happens, it remains true and good?
I recently saw the film, “The Boy in the Striped Pajamas” – set in Nazi Germany – a father who’s promoted to be the commandant of a concentration camp, his wife who knows nothing about it as of yet, and two children: Gretel, a 12-year old girl, and Bruno, an 8-year old boy who, by accident, befriends an 8-year old boy “on the other side of the fence” – Shmuel, a little Jewish boy who wears striped pajamas, because “the soldiers took away our clothes.”
Bruno says, “My father is a soldier, but he wouldn’t take clothes away.”
What we see in this film is a portrait of evil … great evil … systemic evil … evil baked into the fiber of a culture … evil so commonplace, that only a few can recognize it, and fewer still speak out about it.
Tolkien’s masterpiece, “Lord of the Rings” spins an epic tale of evil and the struggle of a white wizard named Gandalf and his motley crew of hobbits, elves and dwarves – to defeat the Lord of the rings and return the earth to goodness.
C. S. Lewis in his wonderful series, “The Chronicles of Narnia” …
S.K. Rowling in her incredible Harry Potter series …
These writers deal with the mystery and power of evil …
Paul the Apostle writes: Our struggle is not against enemies of flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers of this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places (Ephesians 6:12).
The Apostle Peter writes: Like a roaring lion your adversary the devil prowls around, looking for someone to devour (1 Peter 5:8b).
EVIL is real …
Dafur and the Sudan …
Bosnia …
Iraq and Afghanistan …
An economic meltdown of unimaginable proportions … a world of suffering and sorrow for millions … lost jobs, lost homes …
Countless horrors enfolded in the history of humanity …
EVIL is pervasive and real … that we know …
But is there anything beyond the darkness sitting on our doorstep, the monster in our closet, this elephant in the living room?
Is there something so real, so good, so beautiful … so true and right … that no matter what happens, no matter how powerful the present darkness may be …
Is there some Reality, with a capital “R,” which underpins the universe for good?
Psalm 46 says:
We will not fear,
Though the earth should change,
Though the mountains shake in the heart of the sea;
Though its waters roar and foam,
Though the mountains tremble with its tumult.
There is a river whose streams make glad the city of God.
The LORD of hosts is with us;
The God of Jacob is our refuge.
Jesus said to his disciples moments before his ascension: I am with you always.
We say in the Creed, I believe in God the Father Almighty, maker of heaven and earth …
The ancient writers of Israel believed there was a capital “R” Reality, a reality of goodness and light …
The ancient writers of Israel believed in God … the creator of the heavens and the earth … the God who called out to Adam and Eve, Where are you?
Who called out to Cain, Where is your brother?
The God who said to Moses, Go back to Egypt and set my people free.
The ancient writers were not naïve.
The ancient writers knew full-well the horrors of war and natural disaster … slavery, betrayal and murder … war and rumors of war, hopes dashed again and again …
The ancient writers knew full well the dark side of life …
But they said to their children, there is a goodness to life greater than the darkness …
There is a God, just and kind … a God of great love …
A God hard at work in a fierce and dangerous world …
A God who takes a deep and personal interest in the wellbeing of humanity, a God whose love is small enough to fit inside the human heart …
There is an ultimate goodness …
An ultimate love …
Yahweh Elohim Sabaoth … the LORD God of Hosts …
God loves the world …
God loves us personally and intimately …
Rescues, saves, and makes all things new …
The God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob …
The God of Sarah, Rachel and Leah …
The God who called Israel for the sake of the world …
And gave Israel a message:
Good is greater than evil …
Love greater than hatred …
Hope greater than despair …
Life greater than death …
Truth greater than all the lies humankind will ever tell …
Eternity woven into time …
And time headed toward a real future.
The LORD is my shepherd, I shall not want …
Ezekiel’s imagery of the shepherd …
Jesus uses Ezekiel’s imagery to describe his work and purpose: I am the good shepherd, says Jesus.
In the Parable of the Lost Sheep, Jesus tells of a shepherd who leaves 99 sheep in order to find the one lost sheep.
When Jesus restores Peter after Peter’s monumental failure, Jesus says to him: If you love me Peter, feed my lambs, tend my sheep, feed my sheep (John 21:15-17).
The love of God … the Good Shepherd …
Personal and close at hand …
I myself will be the shepherd of my sheep, and I will make them lie down, says the LORD God. I will seek the lost, and I will bring back the strayed, and I will bind up the injured, and I will strengthen the weak.
But the love of God is more than sunshine and light …
The love of God is just and right …
The love of God restores balance and equity …
The LORD lifts up valleys … and brings down mountains …
The love of God addresses crimes committed … crimes of inequity and power … crimes of exclusion and manipulation …
Fat sheep feed on good pasture and trample the rest of it …
Fat sheep drink clear water and foul it for others …
Fat sheep push with flank and shoulder … butting the weak until the flock is scattered far and wide.
God says: I will set things right … I will feed justice to the fat sheep who didn’t care about the weak.
God’s justice sets things right … God’s love addresses the crimes …
Never directed to the lonely and the weak …
Never directed to the lost and the lame …
But to the powerful … priests and politicians of Israel …
Well-fed and the comfortable …
Who have received much but will not give …
Blind to the needs of others because they’re too busy taking care of themselves …
Jesus takes up this image of judgment in (Matthew 25) …
Sheep separated from goats …
And the goats protest: LORD, if we had only known you were the hungry man by the road … if we had only known you were the thirsty little girl dying in her mother’s arms … LORD, if we had only you were stranger we feared and hated … if we had only known you were the naked prisoner we humiliated … we would have done something about it.
But Jesus says:
You had your chance …
You knew better …
You’re a human being … and you treated your fellow human being with cruelty and harshness …
You were given so much and you gave so little …
You knew the Golden Rule … but you choose to do unto others what you would never allow anyone to do to you …
Where there was need, you took even more …
Where there was pain, you added to it …
Where there was hatred, you joined the chorus …
Where there was little, you took what was left …
Where there never enough, you took all the more …
And just like Cain, you claim innocence …
You deny any responsibility …
You have earned your wages well …
You have your reward …
Be gone from me …
To a place of fire and regret …
A place created by your own ingenuity and pride …
A place well suited to a hard heart and a self-serving will.
“Preacher, enough of this,” you say!
We don’t want to hear about judgment.
We don’t want to hear about such hard things.
Let’s get on with the love of God.
Well, yes, let’s get on with the love of God.
But the ancient writers would have us hear the whole counsel of God … all of God’s love …
Jesus would have us hear the rest of the story.
It’s not about the sins so often decried by some Christians …
Sin isn’t a pregnant young girl who gets an abortion …
Sin isn’t about gays or lesbians who fall in love and want to marry …
Sin isn’t about not believing in Jesus …
Sin isn’t about movies and books that offend our sensibilities …
I wish sin were that easy!
The real sins of the world are sins of power and control – fat sheep butting the weak out of the way …
Sins of manipulation for personal gain – wealth without conscience, commerce without kindness, worship without sacrifice, and politics in service of the fat sheep.
Sin is a world upside down …
W world where children die before the age of 5 from simple diseases so easily cured if we but had the will to do it.
Sin is always the sin of Cain who denies knowing where his brother is, and shuns responsibility - “Am I my brother’s keeper?”
The answer is clear: Yes, you are your brother’s keeper!
Real love is just!
A love that rights what’s wrong … and rescues the lost!
God has rescued US … that’s why we’re here this morning … we’re the rescued ones …
We were lost and injured, but the Good Shepherd came to OUR wilderness and found us … shouldered us when we were unable to make the journey ourselves … bandaged our wounds and fed us …
We are the rescued ones!
And now God wants the rescued to become rescuers for others.
We have to ask Ezekiel’s questions …
Who are the injured in our world today?
Who are the weak?
Who are the wounded?
Who are the lost?
Who needs to be rescued?
A 12-year old girl in a third-world factory sewing shirts 12 hours a day for a pittance?
A family in Flint, Michigan facing the loss of everything?
Who needs to be rescued?
A man of power who wears a $25,000 wristwatch and still doesn’t have the time of day to think beyond his own prestige and power?
Who doesn’t need to be rescued?
But let’s be clear about one thing:
To those to whom much has been given, much is required.
The 12-year old girl has no choice and no chance …
The man with the wristwatch should know better!
We might look at God and ask, “Where are YOU in all of this?”
And God looks at us and asks, “Where are YOU in all of this?”
Can you be my rescuers as I have rescued you?
Will you keep the pastures green and the water clear?
God has told us what’s required:
To do justice, to love kindness and to walk humbly with God (Micah 6:8).
Can we do this? Of course we can! We are the Church of Jesus Christ!
Amen and Amen!
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