This Sunday I am worshipping with the people of Clayhidon at St Andrew’s Church. You will be very welcome to join me at 10am.

We have been focusing on the resurrection stories, Jesus appearing to his disciples, and their response: belief, disbelief, thanksgiving, fear, worship… Today though we are looking at sheep. John 10:1-10 is a favourite passage, but it feels as if it would fit better with the greens of ordinary time rather than the whites and golds of Easter, but here we are.

Jesus tells a story. Actually it’s the prelude to one of his ‘I am’ sayings which John is known for. Jesus, though, is not the Good Shepherd in this story, this metaphor, he is ‘The Gate’. Jesus describes himself as an inanimate object, the one who enters by the gate is the shepherd of the sheep. It’s all a tad confusing.

The one who enters by the gate is the shepherd of the sheep. The gatekeeper opens the gate for him, and the sheep hear his voice… I am the gate for the sheep…I am the gate.

John 10: 2,3, 9

This passage is one of those occasions where we cannot simply take the black and white text at face value. There are hues and shades hidden beneath the words which (some) of Jesus’ listeners would have understood, but even then, many were confused. They had the cultural knowledge of the time, we have the hindsight of Jesus’ death and resurrection, and we need to put both together in order to fully understand just what Jesus was trying to say when he claimed that he was ‘The Gate’.

So let’s begin with the contemporary knowledge that Jesus’ listeners had.

Shepherds camped out with their sheep. Hence the shepherds of the Christmas story being on a hillside when the angels came to sing Good News. The pen would keep the sheep safe to a certain extent, but the real security came from the ‘gate’. There was no gate. The gate was the shepherd who would place themselves in the opening to sleep at night: the sheep safely within the pen, danger without. In order for thieves or bandits to enter to steal the sheep they would have to step over the shepherd, for a wolf to come and feast it would need to wake the shepherd. No one entered into the pen without coming through the shepherd.

Yes, Jesus is the Good Shepherd who leads us through the Valley of the Shadow of Death, and on to green pastures, but he is also the shepherd who uses their body to create the gateway to safety. Jesus is both the shepherd and the gate.

As we look back on this passage from the vantage of the resurrection, the words ‘thief’ and ‘bandit’ leap out. We know that Jesus was crucified alongside those convicted of such crimes. We know that Barabbas was released in favour of Jesus despite his guilt. We also know that one of them, one who was crucified alongside Jesus, found his way through the gate with his dying breath.

These, though are not the thieves and bandits which Jesus is warning his listeners about. He is warning them about those who claim to be the gate, we might call them ‘gatekeepers’. There are those, then and still today, who decide who belongs and who doesn’t. There are those who will call out the ‘sin’ in others whilst ignoring or denying (even to themselves) their own sin. We saw it in (some of) the Pharisees and the Sadducees, who created rules impossible to keep, and judged others loudly and without shame. We see it today with more conservative Christians who claim that only they know Scripture and those who question them need to repent. We see it with those who claim women should stay at home and keep silent, those who declare that a church with a woman at the head is ‘not a church’. We see it in the way that racism has been institutionalised, although thankfully we seem to be coming out of that, no longer is the Bible used to defend slavery. We see it with regards to the Queer Community, where the phrase ‘love the sinner, hate the sin’ is churned out (although interestingly never used for any other ‘sin’).

Jesus says all who enter through his gateway will be saved. All who come to Jesus will be loved and welcomed. Jesus does not say, only those who look and act a certain way will be saved.

So as we consider this passage today, we need to reflect upon who or what is the gateway to our place of worship. Do we allow Jesus to be the gate, or do we place stumbling blocks in the way? Do we bar the gate with rules and obligations? Do we act as bouncers blocking entrance to those we don’t like the look of, those who don’t look like us? If we do, that isn’t Biblical, it isn’t Scriptual.

I am reminded of the incident when Jesus rebukes the disciples from sending children away from him. They think they are protecting Jesus from being bothered after a busy day. Jesus tells them to let the children come to him. The disciples are being gatekeepers, denying Jesus’ blessing upon these mums and their babies. ‘Bring them to me’ he said then, and he says now.

The word translated then as ‘little ones’ or ‘children’ didn’t necessarily mean literal infants, but those who were ‘young’, new to faith, those who hadn’t yet earned their position as a follower, a disciple. A lamb, perhaps?

Jesus is both the shepherd and the gate, and we need to allow him to do his job, and get on with doing our own. Jesus is the one who leads to safe pastures, Jesus is the one who allows people in; we are the ones who do as Jesus commands us. We are to welcome, to love, to bring to baptism, all his sheep.

When Jesus died on the cross, he opened the gate to eternal life, and went before us. Not just into life after death, but life in all its fulness now. A life in which we can be truly ourselves, a life in which we can understand who we are as we listen to the shepherd call us by name. The shepherd who will stand for us, the shepherd who has already stood between us and danger. If we wish to truly follow Jesus as he calls us to do, we need to become gateways, not gatekeepers, standing up against the bullies and the false leaders who teach judgement rather than love and life.

You can read the passage from John here and Jesus rebuking his disciples here.