SERMON
at
Christ Church, Watertown, Connecticut
Easter IV
April 25, 2010
by
The Rev. Stanley C. Kemmerer, AHC

“Jesus Christ. Superstar. Are you who people say you are?” The root question. All depends on the answer. And not just that. It would be oh so easy if it were just that. Beyond the answer to the question we need the answer to the question that follows from the first question: How can we know and trust the answer you give to that first question, Jesus Christ, Superstar?

The Jews demand---we get the sense not altogether nicely---“If you are the Christ, tell us plainly.”

He does tell them plainly, but in a confrontational way:

I have told you, but you do not believe.
The works I do in my Father’s name are my witness;
but you do not believe
because…you…are…no…sheep…of…mine

“Because you are not ‘psychologically available.’ “Because,” to use the common usage of the Hebrew Scriptures, ‘your hearts are hardened.’ You can’t let it in that I am the Christ, the Son of God.”

But others do let it in. Others are psychologically available.

The sheep that belong to me listen to my voice;
I know them and they follow me.

And they benefit from knowing and following him, he says:

I give them eternal life;
they will never be lost
and no one will ever steal them from me.

The Lesson from the Acts of the Apostles we just heard records Tabitha/Dorcas benefitting from the disciples’ being “sheep that belong to me.” They, aware one of the Apostles was near when one of their number became ill and died, “one who was such a “sheep that belong to me” that she “never tired of doing good or giving in charity, sent for him. And he brings her back to life.

The lesson from the Revelation to St. John the Evangelist describes the reward of “the sheep that belong to me”:

These are the people who have been through the great persecution,
and because they have washed their robes white again in the blood
of the Lamb, they now stand in front of God’s throne and serve him
day and night in his sanctuary; and the One who sits on the throne
will spread his tent over them.

Revelation is a code book. It was written as a message of hope to the Christian community during the days of Roman persecution. The sacrifices of those for whom it was written were extreme because they insisted on observing their religion when it wasn’t popular to do so.

Today they would probably be the ones not joining in the bullying, the binge drinking in the frat house, the conspicuous consumption, the lifestyle that makes tithing impossible, the busyness that makes doing the work of the church and time for prayer and meditation way down the line in the competition for disposable time. They would probably be the ones standing up for those of other faiths, faiths not as dominant as their own, whose dress codes or religious observances were being forbidden by the government. They would probably be the ones who “couldn’t make” activities because of competing religious obligations. They would be the ones bearing the social cost, the modern version of persecution, for not “fitting in.”

But it won’t matter because: They will never hunger or thirst again; neither the sun nor scorching wind will ever plague them, because the Lamb who is at the throne will be their shepherd and will lead them to springs of living water; and God will wipe away all tears from their eyes.

How do the sheep come to know the Shepherd? How do they come to know his voice? How do they come to serve him?

Experience. Just as Jesus says. They witness the works He and his followers do in the Father’s Name. The same way an infant learns, ideally, from the experience it has with a loving, dependable parent. It forms an “attachment” based on experience.

It’s primal. The British psychologist John Bowlby developed in the 1950’s and ‘60s what has come to be known as Attachment Theory, based on his observation of animal behavior in “families.”

He argued that nature (St. Thomas Aquinas might call it Natural Law) has programmed parents and children to attach to each other (or bond) in order to provide security and protection for the young while they are at vulnerable stages of development. When the child successfully looks to the parent to meet its security and protection needs a “secure attachment” is formed. When the needs are not consistently met an “ambivalent attachment” is formed, and when the needs are not met or met in a negative manner, an “avoidant attachment” is formed.

The Christian “sheep” or disciple or church member forms this secure attachment to the Good Shepherd in this manner, just as he forms secure attachments with his car, his job, his life partner, you name it---by seeing these things, persons or relationships perform dependably. And, like the infant-parent relationship, these other relationships, when undependable or negative, result in ambivalent or avoidant attachments.

These facts make it incumbent upon us:

To maximize our exposure to the experiences that result in the formation of the secure attachment, if we want the rewards described in the lessons. It has been wisely said Christianity is not a spectator religion. We’ve also heard it said, usually negatively, about those probably best assured of forming secure attachments and receiving the rewards that they “live at the church” or that “their whole life is the Church.”

Well, sports fans, that’s exactly what Jesus had in mind! It’s what has made the Black church so vital. It’s what makes many mosques as vital as they often are. It’s what’s contributed to the growth of those churches that are growing. They are the community centers for their people. What activities their people engage in are almost exclusively with other members of their church and through the organizations of their church. Total immersion. It’s been said communities either go forward or backward; those who stay the same are on the way to dying. If one’s religious faith is going to work, one can’t practice it halfway.

We’re not talking here about the hereafter. We’re talking about the “now.”

I once participated in an entity we referred to as the Grief Resources Group. We met before work, at a local hospital. We were clergy, nurses, doctors, social workers, funeral directors, lawyers, anyone who dealt with loss. The idea was to contribute our various experiences and perspectives to one another, form a synergy among our disciplines, the better to serve those with whom we dealt.

We quickly learned physical death was a very small part of what we dealt with. There was divorce, unemployment, amputation, mastectomies and other medical losses, demotions, even aging (which one person has called “relinquishment,” the serial “giving up” of things one used to be able to do). We also quickly learned that the clients we had who practiced---not just professed, as in “Oh, I believe….---but actually practiced their religious faith, handled the rocks in the road of life better, in direct proportion to how much they practiced their religious faith.

We spend considerable sums of money on insurance to protect against medical and physical loss. Whyever would we not invest like money and energy in protecting against spiritual loss???

These facts also make it incumbent upon us to do what we can to assure that those who seek to form their attachments in our fellowship find in us the dependability that fosters secure attachments, rather than the undependability that creates ambivalent attachments or the negative experiences that create avoidant attachments.

May the works we do in the Father’s Name be our witness that we listen to the Good Shepherd’s voice and follow Him.

Amen.