Justin Appel

Dear Friends,

This morning’s Gospel lesson comes from John chapter 10, in which Jesus discusses his identity with the Pharisees.

Jesus has just healed a man who was blind from his birth, and the Pharisees respond to Jesus with incredulity, undoubtedly because he claims openly to be the Son of God as the story unfolds. In fact, the healed blind man expresses faith in Jesus and even worships him in response to his healing, and for this the Pharisees revile the man and cast him out.

In response to all of this, Jesus holds forth in today’s passage, explaining in richly symbolic terms that he is (echoing the ‘I AM’ of Exodus):

I am the Door of the Sheepfold

and

I am the Good Shepherd

The richness of these images is evident in their recapitulation in several NT Epistles, but also in the growing tradition of Christian art and sculpture, which often depicts Christ with a Shepherd motif, even inhabiting and transforming the earlier Classical topic of Hermes and his sheep—a theme found underground in the Catacombs of Priscilla in Rome or later in the great 5th-century mosaics in Ravenna.

Jesus intends to show that, unlike the Pharisees, he is a Shepherd who for his sheep leads, sacrifices, and serves as the true entrance to the sheepfold—to God’s kingdom.

The absolute centrality of these symbolic themes, their relation to the Old Testament Scriptures, and the unpacking of Christ’s divinity and humanity in the Church are the stuff of our faith.

They inform our basic understanding of creation, fall, and salvation. They teach us that Christ is the Word of God (who St. John Chrysostom identifies with the Door of the Sheepfold): both at the creation of the world, and the One the Scriptures (also called God’s Word) proclaim. Through the story, we have deep story elements through which we understand our place in God’s economy, his role with us, how we relate to him.

Along with this passage, I would like to share two poems by the incomparable Malcolm Guite:

‘I AM the Door of the Sheepfold’, Malcom Guite

‘I AM the Good Shepherd’, Malcolm Guite

Yours in Christ,

—Justin