The Unusual Way

John 10:1-10

“Very truly, I tell you, anyone who does not enter the sheepfold by the gate but climbs in by another way is a thief and a bandit. The one who enters by the gate is the shepherd of the sheep. The gatekeeper opens the gate for him, and the sheep hear his voice. He calls his own sheep by name and leads them out. When he has brought out all his own, he goes ahead of them, and the sheep follow him because they know his voice. They will not follow a stranger, but they will run from him because they do not know the voice of strangers.” Jesus used this figure of speech with them, but they did not understand what he was saying to them.

So again Jesus said to them, “Very truly, I tell you, I am the gate for the sheep. All who came before me are thieves and bandits, but the sheep did not listen to them. I am the gate. Whoever enters by me will be saved and will come in and go out and find pasture. The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy. I came that they may have life and have it abundantly.

Very truly I tell you, the lectionary has done us dirty.  Very truly I tell you, in John’s Gospel, Jesus only says “Very Truly I tell you” when he’s connecting something that just happened… to something that immediately follows.  So Very Truly I tell you, “Very Truly” lets us know that today’s Gospel is not the beginning of a new story, but is picking up in the middle of a story the lectionary left half told seven weeks ago!  The Story of the Man Born Blind!  

In that story the disciples saw a man who had been blind since birth.  They didn’t say to Jesus, “Jesus, there’s a guy whose been blind since birth!  How can we help?”  No.  They couldn’t SEE the man because their heads were buried too far up their theology!  So talking out of their theology they asked, “Whose sin made this man blind?  His own sin or his parent’s sin?”  Jesus stopped them right there.  He told them to stop talking out of their theology, and really SEE the human being standing there in front of them!  With that, Jesus made some mud with spit and squished it into the man’s eyes and told him to go wash.  When the man washed, he could see.  

Eventually the man was marched to the Pharisees.  They too could not SEE the human being (who at this point was a walking miracle) because their heads too, were buried deeply up their theology.  Stuck up there, they could only see that the rules of the Sabbath had been broken and because they could not see the HUMAN BEING standing right there in front of them, Jesus told them, they were completely blind.

I heard this quote from a George Bernard Shaw play, used in a lovely little podcast this week, which sums up this fight between Jesus and the Pharisees brilliantly.  It goes, “I may be doing wrong, but I’m doing it in a proper and customary manner.  You may be doing all right, but you’re doing it in an unusual and questionable manner.”  

That, in essence, was the fight.  The Pharisees were focused on doing all things in the proper and customary manner.  The rules were followed religiously.  The affect that way of living had on their neighbors was irrelevant.  Jesus, on the other hand, was focused on his neighbor!  This neighborly focus led Jesus to live his life at times in an unusual and questionable manner, doing things like squishing mud into blind people’s eyes on the Sabbath.  For Jesus though, the thing to do religiously was to care for his neighbor!  If the rules got in the way, it was the rules, not the person, that needed to become irrelevant.  

Today’s Gospel starts with Jesus’ very next breath after telling the Pharisees they were blind.  With that next breath he escalated the fight because calling out their blindness didn’t get them to change.  He said, “ACTUALLY, I was wrong.  It turns out you aren’t blind.  You see exactly what you’re doing!  You’re being cruel because you like the feeling of power being cruel gives you.  That’s not blindness.  That’s thievery!  And not just petty larceny but open rebellion against God!  You’re not blind… you’re BANDITS, trying to cover your stealing, killing, and destroying by invoking God’s Holy name! 

Throughout this entire lesson, which started seven weeks ago and finishes up today, Jesus is telling us that LIVING… really, genuinely, fully… living this life we’ve been given will never happen as long as our heads are fully stuck up our theology.  Living a life of purpose, meaning, dignity and wholeness will never happen as long as we fail to SEE… really, fully, genuinely SEE our neighbors.  Genuinely LIVING this precious, wonder-filled life we’ve been given will never happen as long as we sell our souls exclusively to what the world deems as “proper and customary.”

Living ONLY happens when each and every day, we head out into the world and do all we can to live the Jesus Way.  Not TALK some Jesus TALK, but LIVE the Jesus Way by SEEING… genuinely SEEING… and LOVING… genuinely LOVING our neighbors by doing what is in their best interest.  If they are hungry… we feed them.  If they are sick, we make them well.  If they are drowning, we pull them up and if they are blind, even if it requires the using an unusual and questionable method like squishing mud in their eyes on the Sabbath, we do what is right SO THEY CAN SEE!

If that means breaking the rules… then the rules be damned.  If that means ruffling some feathers… then those feathers needed ruffling!  If that means not being politically careful or cautious or correct, so be it!  If that requires standing up to a bully and speaking God’s truth to power bluntly and directly, then by God, we must stand up and speak out!  

This lesson, begun seven weeks ago and finished today, contrasts two VERY different ways of being in this world.  A way that is wrong but is usual and customary on the one hand, and a way that is right, but is often accused of being unusual and questionable on the other.  One way makes the usual and customary show of public prayer and waving the Bible, even while taking food from the hungry and threatening death to entire civilizations.  The other Way… the Jesus Way… does all it can do to SEE each person on this planet as a neighbor and care for them with selfless love, even when that means using unusual and questionable methods, so they too might have life, and have it abundantly.  

These times in which we now find ourselves living demand we make an unambiguous and public choice between the way of the Bandit and the Way of Jesus.  Let us help one another courageously choose the Way of Jesus, no matter how unusual or questionable the world may find the Jesus Way.  May we help one another choose to live the Way of love, compassion, generosity, and peace as Jesus did… right in the faces of the tyrants, thieves, and bandits ravaging our world.  Amen.