1 John 3:16-24; John
10:11-18
Milwaukee Mennonite Church
April 29, 2018
© 2018
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| The Good Shepherd was a most popular way of portraying Jesus in the first three centuries of the Church. These come from the 2nd and 3rd centuries in the Roman Catacombs. I am impressed with how young Jesus appears and how his Mediterranean ethnicity is so obvious. |
Jesus calls
himself “the Good Shepherd.” I am going to begin and close today by telling you
about two men whose examples of following the Good Shepherd have spoken to me
as I walk with Candy on her Alzheimer’s journey. She knows I am telling you
about these men, though she doesn’t know them.
In 1990 Robertson McQuilkin resigned as the president of Columbia
Bible College and Seminary in South Carolina, a position he had held since
1968. He retired at 62 years old to care for his wife Muriel whose Alzheimer’s
had progressed in five years to the point she needed round the clock care. The
school’s regents offered to pay for the best in home or residential
professional care so he could continue as president.
In 1987, they tried using in-home nursing care, but Dr. McQuilkin
realized that as competent as the nurses were, Muriel was distressed and even
terror stricken when she couldn’t find him. She began to walk the mile round
trip from their home to the school as many as ten times a day. When helping her
undress for bed at night, he often found her feet bloody. “What love!” their
family doctor said. “The characteristics developed across the years come out at
times like these.” Dr. McQuilkin responded, “I wish I loved God like that, desperate
to be near God at all times. Thus she teaches me, day by day.”
Determining that caring for his wife was his next ministry, Dr.
McQuilkin observed, “This was no grim duty to which I stoically resigned,
however. It was only fair. She had, after all, cared for
me for almost
four decades with marvelous devotion; now it was my turn. And such a partner
she was! If I took care of her for 40 years, I would never be out of her debt.”
Muriel died
in 2003, and when Dr. McQuilkin died in 2016, their story was retold in Christianity Today and other places.
Though Dr. McQuilkin and I would certainly have had some theological
differences, I have retold their story several times as a model of following
the Good Shepherd, well before Candy’s Alzheimer’s diagnosis. I would not come
close to putting myself in Dr. McQuilkin’s league, but when we got Candy’s
diagnosis, I have found him to be both inspiring and instructive. I retell it
again for you to ponder as we consider Jesus as the Good Shepherd.
John 9 reports
Jesus healing a blind man that brought down the wrath of the Pharisees on the
man who has been healed, his parents, and of course, Jesus. In response Jesus
identified himself as the Good Shepherd of God’s people and labeled the
religious leaders as hired hands who do not really care for the sheep.
The metaphor of
God’s people as a flock of sheep recurs repeatedly in the Hebrew Scriptures. So
Jesus’ audience was familiar with the analogy and could easily read between the
lines. The hired hands are interested in the income they earn by tending the
sheep, but they are not interested in the sheep themselves. When danger comes,
the hired hands abandon the sheep to the wolves. Ezekiel 34:17-22 examines this
same image from within the flock and how the different animals treat each
other.
As for you,
my flock, thus says the Lord God: I shall judge between sheep and sheep,
between rams and goats: Is it not enough for you to feed on the good
pasture, but you must tread down with your feet the rest of your pasture? When
you drink of clear water, must you foul the rest with your feet? And must
my sheep eat what you have trodden with your feet, and drink what you have
fouled with your feet? Therefore, thus says the Lord God to
them: I myself will judge between the fat sheep and the lean
sheep. Because you pushed with flank and shoulder, and butted at all the
weak animals with your horns until you scattered them far and wide, I will
save my flock, and they shall no longer be ravaged; and I will judge between
sheep and sheep.
By contrast, the
Good Shepherd lays down his life for the sheep. The Good Shepherd knows the
sheep and the sheep know him. The Good Shepherd gathers sheep that are far away
and welcomes them into the one flock. The sheep know and follow the voice of
the Good Shepherd. The Good Shepherd does not value the sheep as a commodity
but loves them together and individually.
As sheep of the
Good Shepherd, we bring his life and presence with us wherever we go. We bring
the Good Shepherd to everyone in our network of relationships. We are not hired
hands nor are we the fat sheep who push and butt the lean sheep.
I don’t want to
dwell on the hired hands so much that I distract us from the Good Shepherd.
However, think we all know plenty of hired hands are masquerading and expecting
to be revered as though they are good shepherds. Investors buy up companies
they can split up and sell off in pieces of debt while paying themselves huge
dividends. Politicians peddle their influence to cultivate power and wealth.
Even pastors distort the Gospel to manipulate people to give so they can enjoy
lavish lifestyles.
I think John may
have been remembering Jesus as the Good Shepherd when he wrote in his first
Epistle (3:16-24) how we are to shape our lives after Jesus.
We know love
by this, that he laid down his life for us—and we ought to lay down our lives
for one another. How does God’s love abide in anyone who has the world’s
goods and sees a brother or sister in need and yet refuses help?
Little
children, let us love, not in word or speech, but in truth and action. And
by this we will know that we are from the truth and will reassure our hearts
before him whenever our hearts condemn us; for God is greater than our hearts,
and he knows everything. Beloved, if our hearts do not condemn us, we have
boldness before God; and we receive from him whatever we ask, because we
obey his commandments and do what pleases him.
And this is
his commandment, that we should believe in the name of his Son Jesus Christ and
love one another, just as he has commanded us. All who obey his
commandments abide in him, and he abides in them. And by this we know that he
abides in us, by the Spirit that he has given us.
I never met
Robertson and Muriel McQuilkin. I only know their story from what I have read.
I told their story as an illustration in one of my first sermons of my interim
pastorate with First Christian Church of Albany, Texas. Albany is the county
seat, a town of about 2,000 and First Christian Church has about 150 members. Besides
the ranching and oil you would expect in West Texas, Albany has a wonderful art
museum and a very active artists’ community. Of course, I did not realize that
in just a few weeks, I would be called back to Dallas to start the journey in
which Candy’s Alzheimer’s would be diagnosed. Nor on that Sunday did I realize
that Jon Rex and Ann Jones had already been on that journey for several years. I
don’t pretend to explain God’s role in some of these things, but I do recognize
that God was present in this convergence that headed our lives in a new
direction.
Jon Rex Jones
is the choir director for First Christian Church of Albany, Texas. Ann sits on
the chancel with the choir, though she does not sing. When Jon Rex would sing
in an ensemble or teach the congregation a new hymn, Ann would stand silently
beside him behind the pulpit. Jon Rex taught an adult Sunday school class with
Ann at his side. She always accompanied Jon Rex when he attended committee or
board meetings.
When I was
there, the Albany High School basketball team qualified for playoffs at their
last game of the season. I was in the stands with several folk from the
congregation along with Jon Rex and Ann Jones. They were part of a small group
of couples who went together to Dairy Queen for ice cream cones faithfully one
night a week.
Though they
have in-home health care for Ann, Jon Rex takes her along on his business and
errands whenever possible. They are recognized as an item around town.
Everyone, including me, is impressed with Jon Rex’s gentle guidance and effort
to include Ann in as much of the life of the community as possible. Though
“famous” in Albany, Texas, Jon Rex and Ann Jones are unlikely to get the
national recognition that came to the McQuilkins, but getting to know them
first hand, albeit briefly, has been a gift to me and Candy and I walk our
Alzheimer’s journey. Jon Rex lived the life of the Good Shepherd before my
eyes.
