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Okay Here! Now. This reading from John's Gospel , chapter 10 Jesus Said I am the good shepherd . The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep. The hired hand who is not the shepherd

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and does not own the sheep, sees the wolf coming and leaves the sheep and runs away, and the wolf snatches them and scatters them. The hired hand runs away because the hired hand does not care

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for the sheep. I am the good shepherd. I know my own and my own know me, just as the father knows me, and I know the father and I lay down my life for the

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sheep, I have other sheep that do not belong to this fold. I must bring them also and they will listen to my voice. So there will be one flock, one Shepherd. For this reason

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the father loves me because I lay down my life in order to take it up again. No one takes it from me, but I lay it down of my own accord. I have power to lay

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it down and I have power to take it up again. I have received this command from my father . Holy wisdom! Holy word! Thanks be to God! Yeah. Let us pray, May the

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words of my mouth and the meditation of our hearts be acceptable in your side. Oh Lord, Our rock and our Redeemer. I'm in I grew up back in the day, back in the day when

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saturday morning meant watching cartoons on television for hours and hours and hours. Now that was the only day cartoons were on and that was the only opportunity we had to watch them. As I said, this

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was back in the day, so we would lie around on the couch and on the floor eating cereal and watching cartoons. And one of my favorites was the Bugs bunny, Roadrunner show. It was an

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hour and a half of the antics of bugs bunny and Elmer fudd, Daffy duck, Yosemite, Sam the Road Runner and Wile E. Coyote. Some of these cartoons were so memorable that I can still

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see them and hear them playing on the television screen of my mind. One episode that was a favorite of mine didn't feature any of the big stars of Warner Brothers animated studio, but I remember it nonetheless

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. It started out as the sun rose over a verdant pasture, sheep grazing music playing a sheep dog hair down over his eyes and a coyote, a piece of straw in his jaws, walked with lunch

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boxes in hand to a time clock near the pasture . Now, time clock is what we used to use to track when you go to work and when you leave, and as they clocked in, they

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spoke to one another morning, sam morning ralph and they wandered to their spots at opposite ends of the pasture and they set down their lunch boxes and they waited and soon a whistle blew and the action of

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the day began. The coyotes spent his time trying to sneak up and steal away the sheep one by one, and each time, miraculously the sheepdog would show up and thwart the coyotes attempts. Once the

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coyote draped himself in a sheepskin and snuck up to grab an unsuspecting sheep, only to discover that it was really the sheep dog disguised in a sheep's costume . Well, halfway through the day, the lunch

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whistle blew and the two antagonists took time out from their activities to open their lunch pails, but soon it was back to work. The coyote trying to poach sheep from the flock and the sheep dog protecting

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them. The s the the antics escalated until the sheepdog and the coyote were at each other's throats, growling and fighting, and then suddenly the whistle blew to signal the end of the workday, and immediately

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the fighting stopped. The coyote and the sheepdog gathered their belongings and clocked out, and as they left they offered their salutations. Night, sam, night ralph, see you tomorrow, yep. And the

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sun set over the pasture as the music swelled and the in credits rolled. As I reflected on the scripture readings for today, I recalled this cartoon, not just because it has sheep in it, not

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just because it has green pastures and still waters, not just because the sheep dog could be considered an image of the good shepherd who protects us in the coyote, an image of all the things that threaten

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us. I recalled the cartoon because of the really radical elements of this familiar passage from john's Gospel, the elements in which jesus tells his disciples I am the good shepherd. You see, while there are

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certainly pastoral images of care protection, safety that we have come to associate with this passage and with psalm 23 there are also images that challenge and disturb. If we clearly hear what Jesus is saying, he

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tells his disciples, I know my sheep and my sheep know me. It sounds comforting this image of intimacy. What could be more comforting than to know that our savior knows his own flock and that those

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of us who are part of his flock recognized the savior and look to him for protection from harm, for safety from danger for salvation. And yet with that word of intimacy is also an implied word of

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privilege that rightly disturbs us. Jesus says he knows his sheep and his sheep know him. Does that mean only those who know Jesus can be saved? Do only christians of a certain flock come under the

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umbrella of a safety offered by jesus? Is our savior only our savior? Or is he the savior of the entire world? We tend to think of privilege as a good thing. That the words of

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Jesus that he knows his sheep and his sheep know him, should be a word of comfort to us . And yet what assurance do we have you and I sitting here today that we are his sheep?

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What if we are sheep of a different flock? Is there no hope for us? Can we then not be saved? Did he mean only the Children of Israel? Did he mean you had to be

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jewish to be one of his flock? What if we aren't in the flock at all? Do you see the troubling side of privilege? If someone is in, that means someone else is out and maybe

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we are that someone else? Mhm Jesus also tells his disciples, I have other sheep who are not part of this fold. Well, this claim is even more troubling than the first. It sounds like

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a corrective statement of inclusion. It seems like it it opens the gate to let in all those others who have been left out by that first claim of intimate relationship and privilege. And yet, who exactly

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are these other sheep? Was jesus referring to the gentiles in Rome and Corinth and Ephesus, to whom Paul and Silas would eventually carry the gospel? Was he referring to as yet unborn generations of believers?

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Was he referring to the indigenous peoples of other continents to whom he would appear during his 40 days of resurrection, to carry his message of salvation across the ocean to a foreign shore that would not be discovered

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by European explorers for another 15 centuries? Was he referring to the Samaritans, those cousins of Israel who worshipped in places other than Jerusalem? Was he referring to the descendants of Hagar and Ishmael, making good

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on God's promise that they too would be included in the ancient blessing given to Abraham. Was he referring to all the people we fear or hate or simply dislike? Do you see the problems with this seemingly

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welcoming statement? If jesus has other sheep who are not of this fold, maybe we will be expected to welcome them into our midst. At some point , maybe we will have to make room for them

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in our pews and in our worship services, in our classrooms, sitting beside us. Maybe someday we will lose our status and privilege as the frozen chosen people of God and have to join hands with those

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other sheep from other folds who don't look like us at all. Thank you. I think that's exactly what Jesus wanted his disciples to wonder when he made these claims. I think he wanted them to be

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comforted and strengthened by his words of protection. Surely , I think he wanted them to rejoice in the intimacy of knowing and being known by the good shepherd . I think he wanted those who had been outcast

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and marginalized and overlooked to feel the privilege of finally being included. But I think he also wanted them to imagine the radical nature of that inclusion, to imagine his grace extending to the sheep that they were

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yet to meet the strangers who were yet to be known by name, The Lost who were yet to be found, The wanderers who were yet to be welcomed into the fold. To imagine a vision bigger

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than their own flock, to see beyond the horizons of their own pasture, to dare to welcome those they had not yet included and to come to know them by name. Living under the watchful care of

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their good shepherd, no matter what and believe it or not, that's what made me think of the cartoon because the sheepdog and the coyote, despite being adversaries still know each other by name. In the

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morning they greet each other by name. During the middle of the day, they offer each other the respect of time to rest and reflect. And at the end of the day, when all is said

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and done, they put aside their conflicts and offer each other the benediction of knowing and being known. There are no strangers in this flock, Even the sheepdog and the coyote call each other by name.

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Yeah. In the presbyterian Church, usA is our denomination continues to fragment into affinity groups around issues of privilege or sexual orientation or race or class or idols of biblical authority and interpretation. It is important for

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us to be reminded that we are not the ones who get to define who is part of God's flock and who is not. We don't get to say who is in and who is out. Just because

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I don't know the name of the person who disagrees with me. That doesn't mean she is unknown to God. And as our country's political process ramps up as extremists of party politics try to force us to

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choose which flock we belong to and which sheep we will agree to pasture alongside of. We need to be reminded that it is we who build fences and burnish branding irons and insist on pedigrees to prove who

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is in and who is out. Yeah, God's pasture has no fence in God's flock. Every name is known and every wayward lamb is brought home. Mhm and LaMotte, that winsome writer and presbyterian tells

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in an essay why she used to make her son sam go to church even though he was the only child he knew who had to spend his Sundays in worship. The main reason I make him go to

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church and rights is that I want to give him what I found in the world, which is to say a path and a little light to see by . When I was at the end of my rope

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, the people at ST Andrew tied a knot in it for me and helped me hold on the church became my home in the old meaning of home. That it's where when you show up, they have

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to let you in. They let me in. They even said you come back now. I think she was saying that she wanted her son to know that he's one of the sheep who is known by

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name by the good shepherd. She wants him to know that he's part of a flock in which there are no strangers. A flock in which at the end of the day conflicts are laid aside and salutations

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are offered and meals are shared and all are welcome . In a few moments after we share a common meal together and before we leave this fold and wander about in the big, wide world, We will

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sing a ham that paraphrases psalm, I hope I pray that we will be able to sing with conviction . The final line of that. Him there would I find a settled rest while others go and come

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no more a stranger or a guest, but like a child at home. I guess I remember that cartoon from decades ago really, ultimately because I long for that vision of a world in which there are

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no strangers in the flock, even as we recognize the struggles and the conflicts that rage all around us . I long for a world in which we diligently work to overcome the forces that threaten those who are

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most vulnerable among us. I long for a world in which we surround with warmth and welcome all those who live in community with us. And I even long for a world in which we welcome the stranger

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into our midst, knowing that those who are strangers to us are still known by name to the good shepherd. And I long for a world in which at the end of the day, we can lay

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aside our differences, my conflicts, our struggles, and we can call each other by name and offer each other the benediction of knowing and being known I long for a day in which there are no strangers

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in this flock. Mhm. Yeah, that's all