Are You Smarter Than A Sheep? -- John 10:1-11

It’s happened a lot over the last 21 ½ years.  It happened in Oxford.  It happened in Rich Square.  It happened in Milwaukee.  It has happened a whole lot in Burlington.  It has happened most frequently in that long stretch of hallway that runs from my office to the Fellowship Hall.  I will be walking along the hallway, either deep in thought about something going on, maybe even, on Sunday morning, about the sermon.  Sometimes it happens while I am walking up the hall alongside someone else and we are carrying on a deep conversation.  Maybe we’re at Pilgrimage with the youth group, surrounded by thousands of other youth…I know it has happened there, at least once.  What is happening?  I am walking along and all of a sudden I hear, “Pastor Lee!”  What’s the big deal about that?  Haven’t I told folks to call me either Lee or Pastor Lee?  Yes, I have.  Don’t I hear that repeatedly on Sunday mornings and throughout the week?  Well, yes.  The trouble is, the voices that I heard saying “Pastor Lee” is not a voice that is supposed to be saying Pastor lee.  The voices that I hear saying “Pastor Lee” are supposed to be saying, “Sweetie,” or “Dad,” or “Anpa.”  Coming up that hallway and in other places as well, more that once, I have heard members of my own household calling out “Pastor Lee.”  And while I may have missed hearing them using the other names, that they will claim to have used, I immediately recognize in the midst of all the wonderful fellowshipping or noise going on wherever I am, that there are voices speaking my name, that usually don’t speak it that way.  Somehow, and I don’t know if that is the case for many of the rest of us here, until it is out of the norm, in the midst of chaos, I have a hard time recognizing what should be very familiar voices.  I guess I can forget about meeting Jeff Foxworthy on “Are You Smarter Than A Fifth Grader?” because evidently I am having a hard time “being smarter than a sheep.”
Sheep have a reputation of being dumb, stupid, passive animals, yet as I prepared this sermon, I learned that that might be very far from the truth.  I read through several studies one of which pointed to a great number of factors that would cause us to shift our thinking about sheep from being dumb to being amongst the smarter animals.   Sheep have brains very similar in shape and form to that of human brains.  Sheep are able to distinguish the best plants to consume depending on their life circumstances (I.e. their age, their gender, and whether or not they may be pregnant), they are able to problem solve, they are able to recognize the faces of other sheep, and possibly humans, the rams form long-term friendships with other rams, sheep know how to protect themselves from storms and predators, and they know it is not good to eat in bed (actually it is that they prefer to congregate and sleep in a different location than where they grace).  All of this seems to back up Jesus’ statement that suggests that sheep are smart enough to be able to recognize the shepherd’s voice as distinguishable from all the other voices that might call to a sheep, particularly from the voice of thieves, bandits, or strangers.
So, if sheep are able to distinguish the shepherd’s voice from that of a thief, and I am not able to recognize my family’s voices amongst all the voices clamoring for my attention, does Larry the Cable Guy needs to start a show, “Are You Smarter Than A Sheep?” and so that I could be one of the first to flunk out.
However, in all reality, the situation is a little different.  If the shepherd is around, the thief or stranger is most likely not going to show his or her face.  They will likely try to wait until the sheep are in the pen and the shepherd has gone in for the night, or, if they are out in the field, they might wait until the shepherd’s attention is somewhere else, or maybe until the shepherd lays down to sleep before they try calling to the sheep to try and lure them away.  Jesus, though, insists that the sheep know they shepherd’s voice and aren’t lured away…that the sheep will only follow the shepherd.  To make the point clear to those who were listening, Jesus states, “I am the Good Shepherd.” The question this forces upon us is, “Are You Smarter Than A Sheep?”  (Or at least, “Are We As Smart As A Sheep?”)
Can we recognize the voice of The Good Shepherd?  We live in a world in which the thieves and the strangers don’t wait for the shepherd to go to sleep to try and lure or steal us away from the fold.  They are out there calling constantly.  They are all trying to get us to follow them rather than The Shepherd.  They call with the voice of false religions.  They call with the voice of media marketing.  They call with the voice of superstitions.  They call with the voice of political parties and interest groups.  They call with the voice of athletes, movie stars, and internet icons.  They call in the voices of friends and even family.  Their voices and messages are alluring and attractive.  They promise greener pastures and clearer waters.  They offer promised prosperity…they offer self-gratification…they offer false peace…they offer stay-as-you are lifestyles…They offer larger bank accounts…they offer labor-free living…they offer false privacy…they offer hermit-style living…and they all seek to lure us away from The Good Shepherd…the One True Shepherd…the Only Shepherd that would lay down His life for us, than in the end, like all of these thieves and strangers, demand our lives from us.
So the question is, how do we learn to hear The Good Shepherd’s voice over all the other voices out there calling to us, seeking to lure or steal us away?
The same way the sheep learn the shepherd’s voice.  Lambs are not born automatically knowing the voice of their shepherd.  The shepherd speaks to them…repeatedly…often…even calling them by name…over and over and over again until they learn the sound and tones of his voice.  They learn the voice and then can distinguish it from all other voices so that it becomes the only voice that they respond to…the only voice that they will follow…the only voice that can lead them.
“But Preacher…I’ve never heard God’s voice…I’ve never experienced it once…much less over and over again.  All I hear are these other voices…How am I supposed to hear the voice of The Good Shepherd if He never speaks to me?”
The thing is, my brothers and sisters, God has spoken to each and every one of us.  His voice is readily experienced over and over and over and over.  It is found here…in the written Word of God.  His Voice is here.  How do we hear The Shepherd? We hear Him through reading and studying and meditating on His Word…above all else in God’s Word, looking to Jesus…the Living Word…the Living, Breathing Voice of God.  Jesus is the invisible God made visible.  We look to Jesus…we listen to Jesus as He teaches the disciples and all those around Him…we hear and see all that he does and we hear the voice of God…we hear the voice of the One True, One Good Shepherd.  We hear that voice as we read/study/meditate on our own…but we don’t only hear God’s voice alone…in fact we can never truly hear God’s voice completely if we stay by ourselves…sheep do not live solo lives…they live in flocks…and while the shepherd knows and calls each sheep by name…he brings them together to live together…to hear together…to respond together…  So too does the Good Shepherd.  He calls us to hear His voice together and help one another tune in to His voice, to help one another discern the Shepherd’s voice of the din of all the other noise.  We are the flock that He has gathered to follow Himself…
And so together we listen…we listen for the voice of the shepherd…and we learn to hear His voice.  It is a voice that speaks of love…a voice that speaks of grace…a voice that speaks of welcome…a voice that speaks of transformation…a voice that speaks to all, not just the sheep of this flock…but a voice that beckons to all throughout the world…that they might learn to hear His voice…that they might be drawn back from the thieves and the strangers…
He calls all…by name…that He might lead us into true Life…the Life that He laid down His own that we might have…a life filled with green pastures and still waters…
The true green pastures…the only pure, still waters…are found along the paths that The Good Shepherd, Jesus Christ, Himself, leads us.  Only in hearing the voice of The Good Shepherd calling, and heeding that call over all the other voices calling, all the other noise around us, will we find life.  Let us listen…let us respond…let us follow…The Good Shepherd…and prove that we are at least as smart as a sheep.
In the Name of the Father…and of the Son…and of the Holy Spirit…Amen.