“Pastor, Prophet, and Priest”

Acts 4:5-12

Verses 15-17 of the 21^st Chapter of John’s recount a dramatic encounter between Peter, the disciple who had denied Jesus three times, and Jesus, the risen Christ. Three times Jesus asks Peter, “Do you love me?” Three times Peter replies, “You know that I do.” Please note that at no time in this conversation does Jesus remind Peter of his pre-crucifixion failure to stand by his Lord. Instead Jesus simply tells Peter three times, “Feed my sheep.”

Feed my sheep. Be a pastor to my flock. Follow the example of the Good Shepherd and be the best shepherd you can be to those people with whom I now entrust you. This is all before Pentecost, before the church came blazing into being. Though he’s not yet empowered to do it, Peter is given a job by Jesus that will consume the rest of his life: displaying his love for Jesus by feeding his sheep.

I have shared this before, but several months after I arrived here, as I was struggling to find an appropriate style of ministry in this post-modern, post-denominational century, my friend Barbara Accord shared with me the advice she had received from her spiritual director: “Feed the sheep.” Don’t get caught up in the flood of literature and conferences dealing with how to lead a missional, transformational, or emergent congregation into the 21^st Century. Feed the sheep; be a loving pastor, fearless prophet, and faithful priest. Do good pastoral care. Preach and teach the Word with integrity. Don’t just administer the sacraments of Baptism and Communion; celebrate them even as you use them as teachable moments.

Liturgically today is Good Shepherd Sunday. Everything in the service directs us toward a celebration of the Good Shepherd Jesus. Well, almost everything. The sermon text from Acts pretty much departs from that theme, showing instead how Peter, empowered by the Spirit, put himself in harm’s way by speaking the prophetic truth about Jesus to people who didn’t want to hear it.

The events of chapter three had stirred up a hornet’s nest. In the name of Jesus Peter and John had healed a man lame from birth. This led to a sermon. The sermon inspired 5,000 people to believe the Good News about Jesus and join an already growing body of believers. This annoyed the powers that be, especially those Sadducees who didn’t believe in the resurrection of the dead. They arrested Peter and John and demanded to know in whose name they had healed the aforementioned man’s lameness.

And then what happened? Peter told them that the man had been healed in the name of Jesus Christ, the same Jesus they had crucified, and by whom God had been raised from the dead. But Peter didn’t stop there. He went a step further and proclaimed a basic truth of our faith: “There is salvation in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given among [humanity] by which we must be saved.”

Jesus doesn’t just heal; he saves. He doesn’t just cure physical and emotional afflictions or cast out demons; he offers us the eternal healing that we need for our souls. In his name and his name alone does humankind have any hope of salvation, any hope of a life beyond this one, any hope of being reconciled with the creating, sustaining Lord God Almighty.

Peter was a prophet that day, faithfully proclaiming the Truth of God; feeding the hearts of those who listened with the satisfying food of the Gospel. He was already a pastor, one who reached out in healing ways. He was already a priest, baptizing new believers in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit and leading those who believed in the sharing of the loaf and cup that we call Communion. One more time he fearlessly took upon himself the prophetic role as he spoke truth to power, as he told people who didn’t want to hear it the truth of a crucified and risen Lord.

And so it seems that Peter was a shepherd that day, feeding the sheep of his Lord, even those sheep that didn’t want to be fed. Thus today’s preaching text fits right in with the theme of the Good Shepherd. Peter, that prophet who was also a priest, practiced pastoral care that day. In doing so he reminded us all that being a pastor can often mean confronting people with their sins and telling them things they don’t want to hear. By the way, the model for that kind of pastoral care is none other than the Good Shepherd Jesus.

Those verses from John’s Gospel in which Jesus instructs Peter to show his love for him by feeding his sheep are very special to me. They remind me of a morning in 1986 a place when I was lovingly confronted by a faithful Presbyterian elder with some ways in which I was denying Jesus in my life and in my ministry. There was no judgment. There was no condemnation. There was only love, grace, and the promise of healing.

In that moment I heard Jesus asking me, “David, do you love me? If you do then do whatever it takes to be the shepherd I have called you to be. Be healed in my name so that you can offer healing to others. Then, go feed my sheep.”

Feed my sheep: lovingly, tenderly, sometimes firmly but always gently. Don’t judge. Never condemn. Listen carefully to what they say. By the power of the Holy Spirit try to comprehend those messages that come from the depths of their hearts. Be a pastor. Be a shepherd: in the classroom, from the pulpit, and at the Communion Table. Feed the sheep on what they need not just what they want. Give them the solid, healthy food that is my Word even when they’d prefer to feast on spiritual junk food. And never forget that before you can feed them you must first be fed. You cannot share what you do not have.

I love being a pastor – most of the time. I have to tell you that I’ve reached a time in my life and point in my ministry where I do most of the required administrative stuff only because I have to. When I retire I’ll miss doing a lot of what I do. I will not miss that. I will gladly leave it to someone else.

But I digress. I love preaching and enjoy teaching. Celebrating Baptisms and Communions never gets old. Since being here I have discovered the joys of mission trips and ministry in a multicultural context.

I have had the privilege of standing with families at the bedside of someone they loved while they watched the respirator being turned off, of standing and praying with them as their loved one breathed his or her last breath. I have had the honor of conducting funeral and memorial services, services in which I could, without any equivocation whatsoever, share the truths of resurrection and heavenly reunions. And as I have walked with the Friemayer family through the horrors and miracles of Daniel’s accident and recovery, I have been reminded over and over again why God led me to this place.

But it’s not all seashells and balloons. Since my ordination on July 17, 1977 there have been days when I wished that God had called me to do something else. There have been people who were not easy to love. And though I take seriously the suggestion of one writer to never call such people jerks, I must admit that I’ve called them things that make jerk sound like a complement. Back in 1985 I even tried to run away from it all: ministry, the church, the whole kit and caboodle. That was a major factor leading to that 1986 breakfast conversation I described earlier in the sermon.

Whatever, here I am, seeking to combine the roles of pastor, prophet, and priest in ways that are healthy and faithful. Here I am, trying to model my ministry after that of our Good Shepherd Jesus. Here I am, sinfully, imperfectly, sometimes going about it in a bumbling and stumbling fashion, answering our Lord’s call to feed his sheep. Here I am wanting with all my heart to be the bold, powerful, and audacious preacher that Peter was in today’s text. Here I am, trying to temper that boldness, power, and audacity with tact, love, and pastoral sensitivity; trying to be honest without being overly blunt; trying to address my theological and political differences with some of you in ways that disagree without being disagreeable; trying to let you know that I love you even as some of the ideas expressed around here make me want to pull out my hair.

I love you guys. More importantly, I like you. I like hangin’ out with you. You make me laugh a whole lot more than you tempt me to cry. I want to be here. I feel a definite call to be here. And in more ways that I can count God has said, “You will be here!” To which I have responded, “Yes sir! As you wish, sir.”

Still there are times when I feel like a square peg trying to fit into a round hole. My fervent prayer is that I will never try to impose my square-ness on you. But you need to know that I cannot faithfully round off my square edges just to make you happy. We are who we are: politically, theologically, and in our definitions of orthodoxy.

What’s important is that none of us ever forget our primary identities as disciples of Jesus Christ. And when push comes to shove, when we are asked who our Savior is we will boldly and audaciously say, “There is salvation in no other name than that of Jesus.” Amen.