Good Shepherd Sunday
The Reverend Shearon Sykes Williams
Saint George’s Episcopal Church, Arlington, Virginia
Fourth Sunday of Easter
April 21st, 2024
The Fourth Sunday of the Easter season is Good Shepherd Sunday. On the first three Sundays of Easter, we hear accounts of Jesus’ post- resurrection appearances to his disciples. And today, instead of hearing about Jesus showing his hands and feet to astonished disciples, Jesus talks about what kind of relationship he wants with his followers going forward. He describes himself as the Good Shepherd who cares for the sheep, who even lays down his life for the sheep. And, as Jesus says this, we hear psalm 23 in the background.
“The Lord is my shepherd. I shall not be in want. He makes me lie down in green pastures; he leads me beside still waters. He restores my soul. He leads me in right paths for his name’s sake.”
Psalm 23 is the most beloved psalm of all time. If there is only one that people know or have heard snippets of, it is this one. This image of the shepherd leading, guiding, comforting and protecting us is a core part of Christian liturgy and experience, inherited from thousands of years of Jewish tradition. One theologian tells the story of being in the sauna with a group of much older men many years ago, at the Jewish Community Center where he belonged. He had always wondered whether Psalm 23 was as important to Jewish people as it is to Christians, so he asked these men, and they immediately started reciting psalm 23 in Yiddish and they showed him the numbers tattooed on their arms. They talked about how repeating the 23rd psalm had helped them survive the concentration camps and it was obviously still very important to them in their old age.
“The Lord is my shepherd. I shall not be in want. He makes me lie down in green pastures; he leads me beside still waters. He restores my soul. He leads me in right paths for his name’s sake. Even though I walk through the darkest valley, I fear no evil; for you are with me; your rod and your staff—they comfort me.”
All of us need a “go to” passages of Scripture. They center us. They ground us in what is real, what is good and true. We don’t tend to talk too much about memorizing Scripture in the Episcopal Church, but it is a really good spiritual practice to commit passages to memory. You just never know when you might need them. Words from the psalms are especially powerful. In the monastic tradition, they pray through the entire psalter, all 150 psalms, every few months. They recite them together during the liturgy of the hours that they pray throughout the day. The psalms are woven into their consciences, written on their hearts, as a result of chanting them together, over and over and over again. The psalms never grow old. Jesus most likely had the entire psalter memorized. That was a well-established part of Hebrew tradition when he walked the earth. The psalms were his prayer book. And the psalms are very much a part of our tradition today, still giving us life, still sustaining us through thick and thin. Through them, we come to know Jesus more deeply.
Singer, composer, ten- time Grammy award winner and overall musical genius Bobby McFerrin is a huge fan of the psalms. He has written his own Book of Psalms and today (at the 10:30 service) the choir will sing his interpretation of Psalm 23. In an interview with Krista Tippet a few years ago, McFerrin talked about the importance of the psalms in his own spirituality. He is a very committed follower of Jesus and talks about it quite openly. He reads Scripture every day and has a lot of passages memorized. His favorite part of the Bible is the psalter. And when McFerrin writes settings for the psalms, they become his own. As he sings them, they become a part of him. He sang in the choir every Sunday in his Episcopal Church growing up and became familiar with the ancient tradition of chanting the psalms and wanted to become a monk until he realized during his mid-twenties that his true vocation was to be a singer. This imminently talented man is also extremely humble. He was heavily influenced by the example of his father and mother, who were good shepherds for him. They were very faithful people themselves. McFerrin said that his mother was the one who most guided him, day in and day out, and taught him the importance of developing his prayer life. And his father taught him humility, not by telling him that he needed to be humble, but by showing him what it looked like and talking about how he thought of his own amazing musical gifts. His father was Robert McFerrin and he was an operatic baritone who was the first Black man to sing at the Metropolitan Opera in New York City in 1955. He always told Bobby that his talent was not his own, but that God had given it to him to be a good steward of, so that is what he tried to do.
All of us need good examples in our life. Some of us are blessed to have them in our daily lives. But even if we have excellent mentors, we sometimes lose our way. And all of us need a guide who will never forsake us, who will always lead us back, who is ultimately loving, and will even come looking for us when we are lost, who will not rest until we are found.
“The Lord is my shepherd. I shall not be in want. He makes me lie down in green pastures; he leads me beside still waters; he restores my soul. He leads med in right paths for his name’s sake. Even though I walk through the darkest valley, I fear no evil; for you are with me; your rod and your staff—they comfort me. You prepare a table for me in the presence of my enemies; you anoint my head with oil; my cup overflows. Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life, and I shall dwell in the house of the Lord my whole life long.”