It is time to dig in the dirt. If you have ever done much gardening around old houses or buildings you find all sorts of stuff buried in the ground. Mostly old garbage and bottles, lots of burned up coal trash. My pocket knife, that I always carry, is an old Barlow, Queen Steel #22 from the early 1960’s. I dug it up years ago. Sometimes you find wonderful things in the dirt, sometimes just garbage, sometimes something toxic and forgotten that ruins the soil.
Archeology. Digging up old stuff.
When we dig through all the ruins and crypts, all the attics and basements, all the dirt and rocks of the long history of the Church there is one thing that we consistently dig up, the image of the shepherd.
The most popular biblical images that we find are of Jonah and the whale, of Noah and the Ark, of Daniel in the Lion’s Den and of the Good Shepherd.
The interesting thing is that for every ten ancient images that we dig up, six of them will be of the Good Shepherd.
It is an abiding and enduring image of God that has consistently taken root in the hearts of believers for both ancient Israel and the early Church.
And it remains true today. The Good Shepherd is still the most common and popular image in houses of worship, especially in the window above the altar, an image that we go to great lengths and expense to preserve.
Why is that?
In the archeology of the soul, what do we find? What do we dig up about our love affair with the Shepherd? Why do we perpetuate it? Why do we contemplate it? Why do we love it?
Today is the fourth Sunday of Easter, Good Shepherd Sunday. The readings and collect for this day every year call our attention to the rich and ancient roots of this image of God, and this image of Jesus revealing God.
It is comforting, one who cares for the sheep, who knows the sheep. We are known, we are cared for by the Holy One, we are held.
It is intimidating. The shepherd will go to any length to recover the lost sheep, there is no escape. Even through death and hell, the Shepherd pursues and finds.
It is threatening. Woe to the wolves that prey on the sheep. The Shepherd’s justice is swift and fatal.
It is challenging. We are challenged to care for the weak and the vulnerable, to always remember, to never forget. To love the shepherd is to follow in his way.
It is a mature image of both nurture and challenge, of gentleness and power. Our affair with the shepherd is not surprising.
When we do the archeology of history and faith other things persist through out time. Other things endure as well. We dig up other things over and over. We find the inescapable and inexplicable presence of sin, and the persistent predation of evil, poisoning the earth.
One of the interesting things about our faith is that it offers no explanation for the presence of not only suffering in general but also willful affliction which is something altogether different. What we are given is the cross of Christ and the witness of suffering and enduring evil, of absorbing it with out in turn becoming evil. Sin and evil are highly infectious and they cannot be stopped until at some point they are endured, the cheek is turned, and the cycle is broken.
Flannery O’Conner wrote that “Evil is not a problem to be solved but a mystery to be endured.” It cannot be fixed. Scripture shows us that God doesn’t explain or justify the presence and persistence of willful affliction, there is no interest in that. What we are given, is a question and challenge regarding how we respond to suffering and willful affliction. Will we respond? How will we respond? That is what God is interested in, how we respond. We are shown that God’s response is the suffering of the cross and the hope of resurrection on the other side.
At times like this, when the ancient presence of evil raises its ugly in such a blatant and belligerent fashion, it is good to be reminded of the ancient image of God as Shepherd, as the Shepherd who is good, who comforts, who protects, who threatens and who challenges.
The way of the shepherd shows us how to endure, how to respond and how to continue.
Archeology. Digging up old stuff. It’s amazing what we find.