4th Sunday of Easter - Year A - Good Shepherd Sunday and “The Lord Is My Shepherd”
The Fourth Sunday of Easter is consecrated to the image of Jesus as the Good Shepherd. Just as a shepherd guides his sheep to the sheepfold after they have found fresh grass to eat in green pastures, Jesus is the guide of faithful souls. In this Sunday’s Gospel (John 10:1-10), Jesus leaves us a wonderful metaphor to work with when he tells us that he is the “Good Shepherd” and that his sheep will recognize his voice among all other voices.
In sharing this metaphor, he is drawing upon a practice that was common among shepherds at the time. At night, for protection and companionship, shepherds would put their flocks together into a common enclosure. They would then separate the sheep in the morning by using their voices. Each shepherd had trained his sheep to be attuned to his voice and his voice only. The shepherd would walk away from the enclosure calling his sheep, often times by their individual names, and they would follow him. Each sheep recognized intimately the voice that was safeguarding them and would not follow another voice.
So too with us: among all the voices that surround and beckon us, how do we discern the unique cadence of God’s voice? Which is the voice of the Good Shepherd? There’s no easy answer and sometimes the best we can do is to trust our gut-feeling about right and wrong. But we have a number of principles that come to us from Jesus, from scripture, and from the deep wells of our Christian tradition that can help us. One thing is for certain; that the voice of God is most often found where it is least expected.
In honour of Good Shepherd Sunday, we would like to share our latest video, "The Lord Is My Shepherd", a setting of Psalm 23 composed by Howard Goodall as the theme to the TV series ‘The Vicar of Dibley’. Howard’s intention in writing the theme had always been to write a piece of church music which could have a life of its own, beyond the series, and this has certainly been fulfilled in Psalm 23.
Video can be watched by clicking here or on the picture below:
