SERMON XXVII
THE GOOD SHEPHERD
John x. 11
I am the good shepherd.
Here are blessed words. They are not new words. You find words like these often in the Bible, and even in ancient heathen books. Kings, priests, prophets, judges, are called shepherds of the people. David is called the shepherd of Israel. A prophet complains of the shepherds of Israel who feed themselves, and will not feed the flock.
But the old Hebrew prophets had a vision of a greater and better shepherd than David, or any earthly king or priest—of a heavenly and almighty shepherd. ‘The Lord is my shepherd,’ says one; ‘therefore I shall not want.’ And another says, ‘He shall feed his flock like a shepherd. He shall gather his lambs in his arms, and carry them in his bosom, and shall gently lead those who are with young.’
This was blessed news; good news for all mankind, if there had been no more than this. But there is more blessed news still in the text. In the text, the Lord of whom those old prophets spoke, spoke for himself, with human voice, upon this earth of ours; and declared that all they had said was true; and that more still was true.
I am the good shepherd, he says. And then he adds, The good shepherd giveth his life for the sheep.
Oh, my friends, consider these words. Think what endless depths of wonder there are in them. Is it not wonderful enough that God should care for men; should lead them, guide them, feed them, condescend to call himself their shepherd? Wonderful, indeed; so wonderful, that the old prophets would never have found it out but by the inspiration of Almighty God. But what a wider, deeper, nobler, more wonderful blessing, and more blessed wonder, that the shepherd should give his life for the sheep;—that the master should give his life for the servant, the good for the bad, the wise one for the fools, the pure one for the foul, the loving one for the spiteful, the king for those who had rebelled against him, the Creator for his creatures. That God should give his life for man! Truly, says St. John, ‘Herein is love. Not that we loved him: but that he loved us.’ Herein, indeed, is love. Herein is the beauty of God, and the glory of God; that he spared nothing, shrank from nothing, that he might save man. Because the sheep were lost, the good shepherd would go forth into the rough and dark places of the earth to seek and to save that which was lost. That was enough. That was a thousand times more than we had a right to expect. Had he done only that he would have been for ever glorious, for ever adorable, for ever worthy of the praises and thanks of heaven and earth, and all that therein is. But that seemed little in the eyes of Jesus, little to the greatness of his divine love. He would understand the weakness of his sheep by being weak himself; understand the sorrows of his sheep, by sorrowing himself; understand the sins of his sheep, by bearing all their sins; the temptations of his sheep, by conquering them himself; and lastly, he would understand and conquer the death of his sheep, by dying himself. Because the sheep must die, he would die too, that in all things, and to the uttermost, he might show himself the good shepherd, who shared all sorrow, danger and misery with his sheep, as if they had been his children, bone of his bone and flesh of his flesh. In all things he would show himself the good shepherd, and no hireling, who cared for himself and his own wages. If the wolf came, he would face the wolf, and though the wolf killed him, yet would he kill the wolf, that by his death he might destroy death, and him who had the power of death, that is, the devil. He would go where the sheep went. He would enter into the sheepfold by the same gate as they did, and not climb over into the fold some other way, like a thief and a robber. He would lead them into the fold by the same gate. They had to go into God’s fold through the gate of death; and therefore he would go in through it also, and die with his sheep; that he might claim the gate of death for his own, and declare that it did not belong to the devil, but to him and his heavenly Father; and then having led his sheep in through the gate of death, he would lead them out again by the gate of resurrection, that they might find pasture in the redeemed land of everlasting life, where can enter neither devil, nor wolf, nor robber, evil spirit, evil man, or evil thing. This, and more than this, he would do in the greatness of his love. He would become in all things like his sheep, that he might show himself the good shepherd. Because they died, he would die; that so, because he rose, they might rise also.
Oh, my friends, who is sufficient for these things? Not men, not saints, not angels or archangels can comprehend the love of Christ. How can they? For Christ is God, and God is love; the root and fountain of all love which is in you and me, and angels, and all created beings. And therefore his love is as much greater than ours, or than the love of angels and archangels, as the whole sun is greater than one ray of sun-light. Say rather, as much greater and more glorious as the sun is greater and more glorious than the light which sparkles in the dew-drop on the grass. The love and goodness and holiness of a saint or an angel is the light in that dew-drop, borrowed from the sun. The love of God is the sun himself, which shineth from one part of heaven to the other, and there is nothing hid from the life-giving heat and light thereof. When the dew-drop can take in the sun, then can we take in the love of God, which fills all heaven and earth.
But there is, if possible, better news still behind—‘I am the good shepherd; and know my sheep, and am known of mine.’
‘I know my sheep.’ Surely some of the words which I have just spoken may help to explain that to you. ‘I know my sheep.’ Not merely, I know who are my sheep, and who are not. Of course, the Lord does that. We might have guessed that for ourselves. What comfort is there in that? No, he does not say merely, ‘I know who my sheep are; but I know what my sheep are. I know them; their inmost hearts. I know their sins and their follies: but I know, too, their longing after good. I know their temptations, their excuses, their natural weaknesses, their infirmities, which they brought into the world with them. I know their inmost hearts for good and for evil. True, I think some of them often miserable, and poor, and blind, when they fancy themselves strong, and wise, and rich in grace, and having need of nothing. But I know some of them, too, to be longing after what is good, to be hungering and thirsting after righteousness, when they can see nothing but their own sin and weakness, and are utterly ashamed and tired of themselves, and are ready to lie down in despair, and give up all struggling after God. I know their weakness—and of me it is written, ‘I will carry the lambs in mine arms.’ Those who are innocent and inexperienced in the ways of this world, I will see that they are not led into temptation; and I will gently lead those that are with young: those who are weary with the burden of their own thoughts, those who are yearning and labouring after some higher, better, more free, more orderly, more useful life; those who long to find out the truth, and to speak it, and give birth to the noble thoughts and the good plans which they have conceived: I have inspired their good desires, and I will bring them to good effect; I will gently lead them,’ says the Lord, ‘for I know them better than they know themselves.’
Yes. Christ knows us better than we know ourselves: and better, too, than we know him. Thanks be to God that it is so. Or the last words of the text would crush us into despair—‘I know my sheep, and am known of mine.’
Is it so? We trust that we are Christ’s sheep. We trust that he knows us: but do we know him? What answer shall we make to that question, Do you know Christ? I do not mean, Do you know about Christ? You may know about a person without knowing the person himself when you see him. I do not mean, Do you know doctrines about Christ? though that is good and necessary. Nor, Do you know what Christ has done for your soul? though that is good and necessary also. But, Do you know Christ himself? You have never seen him. True: but have you never seen any one like him—even in part? Do you know his likeness when you see it in any of your neighbours? That is a question worth thinking over. Again—Do you know what Christ is like? What his character is—what his way of dealing with your soul, and all souls, is? Are you accustomed to speak to him in your prayers as to one who can and will hear you; and do you know his voice when he speaks to you, and puts into your heart good desires, and longings after what is right and true, and fair and noble, and loving and patient, as he himself is? Do you know Christ?
Alas! my friends, what a poor answer we can make to that question? How little do we know Christ?
What would become of us, if he were like us?—If he were one who bargained with us, and said—‘Unless you know me, I will not take the trouble to know you. Unless you care for me, you cannot expect me to care for you.’ What would become of us, if God said, ‘As you do to me, so will I do to you?’
But our only hope lies in this, that in Christ the Lord is no spirit of bargaining, no pride, no spite, no rendering evil for evil. In this is our hope; that he is the likeness of his Father’s glory, and the express image of his person; perfect as his Father is perfect; that like his Father, he causeth his rain to fall on the evil and the good; and his sun to shine on the just and on the unjust; and is good to the unthankful and the evil—to you and me—and knows us, though we know him not; and cares for us, though we care not for him; and leads us his way, like a good shepherd, when we fancy in our conceit that we are going in our own way. This is our hope, that his love is greater than our stupidity; that he will not tire of us, and our fancies, and our self-will, and our laziness, in spite of all our peevish tempers, and our mean and fruitless suspicions of his goodness. No! He will not tire of us, but will seek us, and save us when we go astray. And some day, somewhere, somehow, he will open our eyes, and let us see him as he is, and thank him as he deserves. Some day, when the veil is taken off our eyes, we shall see like those disciples at Emmaus, that Jesus has been walking with us, and breaking our bread for us, and blessing us, all our lives long; and that when our hearts burned within us at noble thoughts, and stories of noble and righteous men and women, and at the hope that some day good would conquer evil, and heaven come down on earth, then—so we shall find—God had been dwelling among men all along—even Jesus, who was dead, and is alive for evermore, and has the keys of death and hell, and knows his sheep in this world, and in all worlds, past, present, and to come, and leads them, and will lead them for ever, and none can pluck them out of his hand. Amen.
SERMON XXVIII
DARK TIMES
1 John iv. 16–18
We have known and believed the love that God hath to us. God is love; and he that dwelleth in love dwelleth in God, and God in him. Herein is our love made perfect, that we may have boldness in the day of judgment; because as he is, so are we in this world. There is no fear in love but perfect love casteth out fear; because fear hath torment. He that feareth is not made perfect in love.
Have we learnt this lesson? Our reading, and thinking, and praying, have been in vain, unless they have helped us to believe and know the love which God has to us. But, indeed, no reading, or thinking, or praying will teach us that perfectly. God must teach it us himself. It is easy to say that God is love; easy to say that Christ died for us; easy to say that God’s Spirit is with us; easy to say all manner of true doctrines, and run them off our tongues at second-hand; easy for me to stand up here and preach them to you, just as I find them written in a book. But do I believe what I say? Do you believe what you say? There is an awful question. We believe it all now, or think we believe it, while we are easy and comfortable: but should we have boldness in the day of judgment?—Should we believe it all, if God visited us, to judge us, and try us, and pierce asunder the very joints and marrow of our heart with fearful sorrow and temptation? O Lord, who shall stand in that day?
Suppose, for instance, God were to take away the desire of our eyes, with a stroke. Suppose we were to lose a wife, a darling child; suppose we were struck blind, or paralytic; suppose some unspeakable, unbearable shame fell on us to-morrow: could we say then, God is love, and this horrible misery is a sign of it? He loves me, for he chastens me? Or should we say, like Job’s wife, and one of the foolish women, ‘Curse God and die?’ God knows.
Ah, when that dark day seems coming on us, and bringing some misery which looks to us beforehand quite unbearable—then how our lip-belief and book-faith is tried, and burnt up in the fire of God, and in the fire of our own proud, angry hearts, too! How we struggle and rage at first at the very thought of the coming misery; and are ready to say, God will not do this! He cannot—cannot be so unjust, so cruel, as to bring this misery on me. What have I done to deserve it? Or, if I have deserved it, what have these innocents done? Why should they be punished for my sins? After all my prayers, too, and my church-goings, and my tryings to be good. Is this God’s reward for all my trouble to please him? Then how vain all our old prayers seem; how empty and dry all ordinances. We cry, I have cleansed my hands in vain, and in vain washed my heart in innocency. We have no heart to pray to God. If he has not heard our past prayers, why should we pray anymore? Let us lie down and die; let us bear his heavy hand, if we must bear it, sullenly, desperately: but, as for saying that God is love, or to say that we know the love which God has for us, we say in our hearts, Let the clergyman talk of that; it is his business to speak about it; or comfortable, easy people, who are not watering their pillow with bitter tears all night long. But if they were in my place (says the unhappy man), they would know a little more of what poor souls have to go through: they would talk somewhat less freely about its being a sin to doubt God’s love. He has sent this great misery on me. How can I tell what more he may not send? How can I help being afraid of God, and looking up to him with tormenting fear?
Yes, my friends. These are very terrible thoughts—very wrong thoughts some of them, very foolish thoughts some of them, though pardonable enough; for God pardons them, as we shall see. But they are real thoughts. They are what really come into people’s minds every day; and I am here to talk to you about what is really going on in your soul, and mine; not to repeat to you doctrines at second-hand out of a book, and say, There, that is what you have to believe and do; and, if you do not, you will go to hell: but to speak to you as men of like passions with myself; as sinning, sorrowing, doubting, struggling human beings; and to talk to you of what is in my own heart, and will be in your hearts too, some day, if it has not been already. This is the experience of all real men, all honest men, who ever struggled to know and to do what is right. David felt it all. You find it all through those glorious Psalms of his. He was no comfortable, book-read, second-hand Christian, who had an answer ready for every trouble, because he had never had any real trouble at all. David was not one of them. He had to go through a very rough training—very terrible and fiery trials, year after year; and had to say, again and again, ‘I am weary of crying; my heart is dry; my heart faileth me for waiting so long upon my God. All thy billows and storms are gone over me. Thou hast laid me in a place of darkness, and in the lowest deep.’—
Not by sitting comfortably reading his book, but by such terrible trials as that, was David taught to trust God to the uttermost; and to learn that God’s love was so perfect that he need never dread him, or torment himself with anxiety lest God should leave him to perish.
Hezekiah felt it, too, good man as he was, when he was sick, and like to die. And it was not for many a day that he found out the truth about these dark hours of misery, that by all these things men live, and in all these things is the life of the Spirit.
And this was Jacob’s experience, too, on that most fearful night of all his life, when he waited by the ford of Jabbok, expecting that with the morning light the punishment of his past sins would come on him; and not only on him, but on all his family, and his innocent children; when he stood there alone by the dark river, not knowing whether Esau and his wild Arabs would not sweep off the earth all he had and all he loved; and knowing, too, that it was his own fault, that he had brought it all upon them by his own deceit and treachery. Then, when his sins stared him in the face, and God rose up to judgment against him, he learnt to pray as he had never prayed before—a prayer too deep for words.
‘And Jacob was left alone: and there wrestled a man with him till the breaking of the day. And when he saw that he prevailed not against him, he touched the hollow of Jacob’s thigh; and the hollow of his thigh was out of joint as he wrestled with him. And he said, Let me go, for the day breaketh. And he said, I will not let thee go, till thou bless me. And he blessed him there. And Jacob called the name of that place Peniel: for I have seen God face to face, and my life is preserved.’
So it may be with us. So it must be with us, in the dark day when our faith is really tried by terrible affliction.
We must begin as Jacob did. Plead God’s promises, confess the mercies we have received already. ‘I am not worthy of the least of all the mercies which thou hast showed to thy servant.’
Ask for God’s help, as Jacob did: ‘Deliver me, I pray thee, out of the hand of Esau my brother.’ Plead his written promises, and the covenant of our baptism, which tell us that we are God’s children, and God our Father, as Jacob did according to his light—‘And thou saidst, I will surely do thee good.’
So the proud angry heart will perhaps pass out of us, and we shall set ourselves more calmly to face the worst, and to try if God’s promises be indeed true, and God be indeed as he has said, ‘Love.’
But do not be astonished, do not be disheartened, if, when the trouble comes, there comes with it, as to Jacob, a more terrible struggle far, a struggle too deep for words; if you find out that fine words and set prayers are nothing in the hour of need, and that you will not be heard for your much speaking. Ah! the darkness of that time, which perhaps goes on for days, for months, all alone between you and God himself. Clergymen and good people may come in with kind words and true words: but they give no comfort; your heart is still dark, still full of doubt; you want God himself to speak to your heart, and tell you that he is love. And you have no words to pray with at last; you have used them all up; and you can only cling humbly to God, and hold fast. One moment you feel like a poor slave clinging to his stern master’s arm, and entreating him not to kill him outright. The next you feel like a child clinging to its father, and entreating him to save him from some horrible monster which is going to devour it: but you have no words to pray with, only sighs, and tears, and groans; you feel that you know not what to pray for as you ought, know not what is good for you; dare ask for nothing, lest it should be the wrong thing. And the longer you struggle, the weaker you become, as Jacob did, till your very bones seem out of joint, your very heart broken within you, and life seems not worth having, or death either.
Only hold fast by God. Only do not despair. Only be sure that God cannot lie; be sure that he who cared for you from your birth hour cares for you still; that he who loved you enough to give his own Son for you hundreds of years before you were born, cannot but love you still; do not despair, I say; and at last, when you are fallen so low that you can fall no lower, and so weak that you are past struggling, you may hear through the darkness of your heart the still small voice of God. Only hold fast, and let him not go until he bless you, and you shall find with Jacob of old, that as a prince you have power with God and with man, and have prevailed. And so God will answer you, as he answered Elijah, at first out of the whirlwind and the blinding storm: but at last, doubt it not, with the still small voice which cannot be mistaken, which no earthly ear can hear, but which is more precious to the broken heart than all which this world gives, the peace which passes understanding, and yet is the surest and the only lasting peace.
But what is the secret of this strange awful struggle? Can you or I change God’s will by any prayers of ours? God forbid that we should, my friends, even if we could; for his will is a good will to us, and his name is Love.
Do not be afraid of him. If you do, you are not made perfect in love; you have not yet learnt perfect the lesson of his great love to you. But what is the secret of this struggle? Why has any poor soul to wrestle thus with God who made him, before he can get peace and hope? Why is the trouble sent him at all? It looks at first sight a strange sort of token of God’s love, to bring the creatures whom he has made into utter misery.
My friends, these are deep questions. There are plenty of answers for them ready written: but no answers like the Bible ones, which tell us that ‘whom the Lord loveth he chasteneth; that these sorrows come on us, and heaviness, and manifold temptations, in order that the trial of our faith, being much more precious than that of gold, which perishes though it be tried with fire, may be found to praise, and honour, and glory at the appearance of Jesus Christ.’ This is the only answer but it does not explain the reason. It only gives us hope under it. We do not know that these dreadful troubles come from God. The Bible tells us ‘that God tempts no man; that he does not afflict willingly, nor grieve the children of men.’ The Bible speaks at times as if these dark troubles came from the devil himself; and as if God turned them into good for us by making them part of our training, part of our education; and so making some devil’s attempt to ruin us only a great means of our improvement. I do not know: but this I do know, the troubles are here, and God is love. At least this is comfortable, that God will let no man be tempted beyond what he is able: but will with the temptation make a way for us to escape, that we may be able to bear it. At least this is comfortable, that our prayers are not needed to change God’s will, because his will is already that we should be saved; because we are on his side in the battle against the devil, or the flesh, or the world, or whatever it is which makes poor souls and bodies miserable, and he on ours: and all we have to do in our prayers, is to ask advice and orders and strength and courage from the great Captain of our salvation; that we may fight his battle and ours aright and to the end. And, my friends, if you be in trouble, if your heart be brought low within you, remember, only remember, who the Captain of our salvation is. Who but Jesus who died on the cross—Jesus who was made perfect by sufferings, Jesus who cried out, ‘My God! my God! why hast thou forsaken me?’
If Christ had to be made perfect by sufferings, much more must we. If he needed to learn obedience by sorrow, much more must we. If he needed in the days of his flesh, to make supplication to God his Father with strong crying and tears, so do we. And if he was heard in that he feared, so, I trust, we shall be heard likewise. If he needed to taste even the most horrible misery of all; to feel for a moment that God had forsaken him; surely we must expect, if we are to be made like him, to have to drink at least one drop out of his bitter cup. It is very wonderful: but yet it is full of hope and comfort. Full of hope and comfort to be able, in our darkest and bitterest sorrow, to look up to heaven, and say, At least there is one who has been through all this. As Christ was, so are we in this world; and the disciple cannot be above his master. Yes, we are in this world as he was, and he was once in this world as we are, he has been through all this, and more. He knows all this and more. ‘We have a High Priest above us who can be touched with the feeling of our infirmities, because he has been tempted in all things like as we are. yet without sin.’
Yes, my friends. Nothing like one honest look, one honest thought, of Christ upon his cross. That tells us how much he has been through, how much he endured, how much he conquered, how much God loved us, who spared not his only-begotten Son, but freely gave him for us. Dare we doubt such a God? Dare we murmur against such a God? Dare we lay the blame of our sorrows on such a God—our Father? No; let us believe the blessed message of our confirmation, which tells us that it is his Fatherly hand which is ever over us, and that even though that hand may seem heavy for awhile, it is the hand of him whose very being and substance is love, who made the world by love, by love redeemed man, by love sustains him still. Though we went down into hell, says David, he is there; though we took the wings of the morning, and fled into the uttermost part of the sea, yet there his hand would hold us, and his right hand guide us still. It is holding and guiding every one of us now, through storm as well as through sunshine, through grief as well as through joy; let us humble ourselves under that mighty hand, and it will exalt us in due time. He knows, and must know, when that due time is, and, till then, he is still love, and his mercy is over all his works.