Going Astray Like Sheep
Acts 2:42-27; 1 Peter 2:19-25; John 10:1-10
An elderly lady was waiting to pull into a parking space when a young man in his new red Mercedes sped around her and parked in the space she was waiting for.
The little old lady was so upset that she went up to the man and said, “I was waiting here to park there!”
The man replied with a smirk, “That’s what you can do when you’re young and smart.”
Well, this really upset the lady even more, so she got in her car, backed it up and then she stomped on the gas and plowed right into his Mercedes.
The young man ran back to what was left of his car and exclaimed, “What did you do that for!?”
The little old lady smiled and told him, “That’s what you can do when you’re old and rich!”
This morning’s lesson from the first letter of Peter 2:19-25 starts one verse later than it should. In fact, verse 18 is controversial, so it was left out. But, that verse really sets the stage for the rest of the passage. And what does verse 18 say? It says, “Slaves, submit yourselves to your masters with all respect, not only to those who are good and considerate, but also to those who are harsh.”
Of course, there are many persons who would have trouble paying much attention to these words, since slavery isn’t even legal in most places. None of us would ever tell a slave to submit themselves to their masters. Instead, if we knew someone to be a slave to someone, we’d probably call the police to come and arrest the slave master, whether the master was harsh, or not so harsh. But, the point that 1st Peter is trying to make isn’t about the legality of slavery. Rather, 1st Peter’s statement is about submission to those who have authority and enduring suffering at their hands, even if it seems to be unjust.
And we’ve all had that happen to us at one point or another, haven’t we? I remember, for instance, when I was about eight years old, walking down to the neighborhood market on Flushing Road, in Flint, where I was going to go in and buy some candy with the quarter I had in my sweaty little hand. And, just as I was about to go into the store I met a neighbor lady, named Sally, who was coming out. As she saw me about to go into the store, she reached into her grocery bag and pulled out a nice big strawberry. Handing it to me, she said, “Here, Paul, have a strawberry!” So, taking the strawberry, I started munching on it as I walked into the store. Immediately, a watchful store clerk noticed me munching on the strawberry and started yelling at me for shoplifting a strawberry. I said, “No! Sally gave it to me!” But, the store clerk kept yelling at me, threatening to tell my parents and call the police if I ever did it again.
But, the question is, “How should we respond to being falsely accused and suffering injustice in our lives? And, even more: If we do good for the sake of our faith in the Lord and then suffer injustice as a result of having done good, how should we respond to that?
In today’s world, retaliation and getting even is what most people would do. Teaching someone a good lesson for treating us badly is what many people would think of. Paying an evil doer back with something just as unkind, or even worse, is what many people would fantasize. But, 1st Peter’s teachings go just the other way. What does 1st Peter say? It says, “If you suffer for doing good and you endure it, this is commendable before God. To this you were called, because Christ suffered for you, leaving you an example, that you should follow in his steps: ‘He committed no sin, and no deceit was found in his mouth.’ When they hurled their insults at him, he did not retaliate; when he suffered, he made no threats. Instead, he entrusted himself to him who judges justly. He himself bore our sins in his body on the tree, so that we might die to sins and live for righteousness; by his wounds you have been healed.”
And then 1st Peter summarizes this thought into one very significant conclusion. He says, “For you were like sheep going astray, but now you have returned to the Shepherd and Overseer of your souls.”
Nevertheless, many people live their lives by the rules of the world, rather than by the life of Jesus. In fact, I was reading that electronic devices are now being developed that will help people get back at people they don’t like. For instance, there’s now a $50 device that shuts up other people’s dogs by answering their barks with an electronic squeal that humans can’t hear. You can put it in your backyard and aim it at the dogs in your neighbor’s yard. It’s disguised as a birdhouse and so the dog owners won’t know that you’re silencing their mutts.
Then, for those people who don’t folks who tailgate, there’s a luminescent screen that fits in your vehicle’s rear window that, at your command, will flash any one of five messages, along with matching emoticon faces. The messages include phrases like “Back Off” and “Idiot.” And you can probably think of a few other things that you’ve wanted to say to fellow drivers, but you never had the chance. The company making this product has recently received requests for images of certain hand gestures as well.
Then, there’s now a jacket that, when activated with a controller, delivers a nasty electric shock to anyone who touches the person wearing it. These jackets have drawn interest from women who wish to deliver a painful message to men who try to grope them on the subway.
And, now there’s technology being developed that will allow people to use their iPods to shut down blaring car radios in taxicabs. The passengers simply download a noiseless track to their iPods and broadcast it to the taxi’s FM radio.
And one electronics company is selling a $20 handset that enables you to shut off loud TV sets in public places like bars and doctors’ offices.
And then there’s a $12 doohickey that has a motion sensor in it that you can attach to your glass or bottle of soda pop. If anyone tries to touch your beverage while you step away from the table, for example, the gadget broadcasts a threatening voice, saying, “Keepa da hands off ma pop!”
And, finally, there’s a product called “the Mosquito” that emits high-frequency sounds that particularly irritate teenagers, usually causing them to move along and congregate elsewhere. The rest of us can’t hear the noise because, by the time we reach adulthood, most of us have lost the ability to detect sounds that high.
But, the question is whether Jesus would want us Christians to use devices like that, or even have an attitude where we think we should try to get back at people who annoy us. In fact, Jesus would tell us that what guides us in our relationships with persons fellow Christians and persons who we like should also come into play in our relations with irritating strangers and other people we don’t like. In fact, before reacting to annoying situations, we should always ask ourselves – what would Jesus have done in a situation like this?
One of the things that brought that sharply into view more than a century ago was a novel by Charles Sheldon titled “In His Steps,” which is a phrase right out of verse 21 in this biblical passage. In fact, the book begins with the pastor of a fictional congregation working on a sermon from that very verse. Sheldon’s book was written in 1897, and it became a blockbuster, selling over eight million copies, and it never has really gone out of print since. It tells the story of what happened in the lives of members of a church after they committed themselves to approach the decisions in their workplaces and other arenas of life by asking themselves what Jesus would do and then trying to do that. The results were life-changing for the members of that congregation and also had a positive impact in the community.
That was only a story, of course, but the spark for it came from the author’s personal experience. At the time he wrote the book, he was a minister in Topeka, Kansas. But before that, he had been in social work, and as an experiment, he once disguised himself as an unemployed printer. He then walked the streets of Topeka to see what would happen. What he discovered was indifference among many professing Christians toward those in need. That shocked and saddened him, but it also led him to imagine how different things would be if Christians did not compartmentalize their lives between how they responded to different kinds of people and allowed their Christianity to be equally applied to all situations, instead. The book, “In His Steps” was the result.
Jesus is our Shepherd. We listen to his voice. We follow where he leads us. Jesus came that we may have life, and have it abundantly. Amen.