Acts 2.42-47; 1 Peter 2.19-25; John 10.1-10

If we see pictures of Jesus depicted as a shepherd, they are usually quite namby-pamby, soft and gentle ones. He might have a lamb around his shoulders, but more often than not, he’s also dressed in a white nightie, perhaps with a crook, and usually with a gentle, loving expression on his face.

It’s very much an idealised picture, and quite far from the reality of what being a shepherd would have been like in his time.

A shepherd in those days lived a dangerous life. Shepherds needed to be men of courage. They were usually rough rather than refined; in coarse and dirty clothes, rather than diaphanous white, pure garments.

They lived on society’s margins, were not able to take part in Temple worship since they were considered ritually unclean, and were often considered to be dishonest men.

So, why did Jesus choose to liken himself to a shepherd?

It’s imagery that goes back a long way before Jesus himself. Today’s Psalm reminds us of that. Possibly written by King David, it certainly originated hundreds of years before Jesus. At its purest, shepherding is a good image for leading the people. A shepherd guides, cares for, defends and nurtures the sheep. That too could be seen as the role of a leader.

But the major problem was that the leaders of Israel often didn’t live up to the shepherd-ideal. Their sheep, the people, were often badly treated. If we look through some of the teachings of the prophets, we see their denunciations of these shepherd-leaders.

Zechariah has harsh words from God for the shepherd-leaders who detested the Lord, and talks of a shepherd “who does not care for the perishing, or seek the wandering, or heal the maimed or nourish the healthy, but devours the flesh of the fat ones, tearing off even their hooves”.

Ezekiel complains about the leaders of his time in these words: “Thus says the Lord God: Ah you shepherds of Israel who have been feeding yourselves! Should not the shepherds feed the sheep? You eat the fat, you clothe yourselves with the wool, you slaughter the fatlings: but you do not feed the sheep.

“You have not strengthened the weak, you have not healed the sick, you have not bound up the injured, you have not brought back the strayed, you have not sought the lost, but with force and harshness you have ruled them.”

But this passage, though, is not one without hope. Ezekiel continues his message from God. “Thus says the Lord God: I myself will search out the sheep, and will seek them out. As shepherds seek out their flocks when they are among their scattered sheep, so I will seek out my sheep. I will rescue them from all the places to which they have been scattered on a day of clouds and thick darkness.

“I will bring them out from the peoples and gather them from the countries, and will bring them into their own land; and I will feed them on the mountains of Israel, by the watercourses, and in all the inhabited parts of the land. I will feed them in good pasture, and the mountain heights of Israel shall be their pasture; they shall lie down in good grazing land, and they shall feed on rich pasture on the mountains of Israel.

“I myself will be the shepherd of my sheep, and I will make them lie down, says the Lord. I will seek the lost, and I will bring back the strayed, and I will bind up the injured, and I will strengthen the weak.”

So, when earthly leaders fail, God will be there.

This is what Jesus is fulfilling. Ezekiel’s prophecy is being worked out in the life of the Good Shepherd. The imagery of the passage we heard from John is not straightforward, since Jesus talks about being the gate, rather than the shepherd, though if we were to read on we would see how the imagery changes.  But though the pictures change, one thing is clear - Jesus is making out what makes a good shepherd.

Let us pick up on some of what he says.

First, a Good Shepherd is one who knows his own sheep. To most of us, one sheep looks pretty much like another. Though I’m sure farmers know the differences between their sheep, most people don’t spend enough time with them to know them properly.

I was watching sheep in Dorset last week, and, though I wasn’t taking much notice of individuals, the only differences I could really tell you about were between the lambs, which we small and frisky, and often wandered around in pairs, and the older sheep, who were less full of life and more often than not on their own, unless they had their lambs with them. The other major difference from field to field was the colour of the dye on their backs, marking to whom they belonged.

In the time of Jesus, they didn’t use dye to mark out their sheep. A genuine shepherd knew his sheep well enough to know their personalities, their idiosyncrasies, the qualities that mark one sheep out from the next. And likewise the sheep become able to recognise the voice of their own shepherd.

Second, a Good Shepherd leads their sheep devotedly. They seek out the best grazing land for their flock, they defend them from wild animals, they guide them away from dangerous precipices, and in Jesus’s time, they would lead their sheep from the front. As a shepherd would lead and the flock follow, so Jesus leads those who choose to follow, through narrow paths and safely guides them.

The imagery so far concentrates on what the shepherd does for the sheep. The shepherd provides and cares, and guides.

When Jesus speaks of himself as the gate, the imagery shifts to concentrate on the response of the sheep. The joys of the sheepfold are there for all who enter it by the gate. The fold is where the sheep will find protection and safety. As a sheep that walks through the gate finds itself in the security of the fold, so those who put their trust in God through faith in Jesus find a deep security, far greater than anything worldly could give.

We have hope in these words. But, there is also a warning contained within John’s passage. The warning is that there are others who try to gain our allegiance. The world is full of voices that shout out for us to follow them. I’m sure we can think of some, people or issues that demand our attention, and offer to fulfil us.

Each of us will have different tempting voices, calling us to put our trust in them - for some it’s the lure of celebrity and adulation; for others money; for some it’s power or injustice; laziness or apathy; selfishness or the cult of no-time.

We too are faced with other calls and it can be hard to keep listening for the voice of Jesus, which sometimes seems to be drowned in the noise of the world around. But what Jesus offers, for those who follow, for those who listen to his voice, is an abundance of life that nothing else can bring.

I come that they may have life, and have it abundantly. In this Easter season, we continue to reflect on what that abundant life means.

Irenaeus, who lived in the second century, said that “the glory of God is a human being fully alive.” The resurrection brought Jesus back from the dead, and restored him to abundant life. The resurrection is also about our restoration to abundant life. We do not yet have this fully, but the promise of Christ is that that is what he has come to bring.

To ensure that we receive this abundant life, let us tune into the voice of the Good Shepherd and follow his pathway and leading. Let us be sheep who hear the voice of our shepherd, who do not become distracted with other noisier, demanding calls, and who put our trust fully in Christ, that we too may have life, and have it abundantly. Amen.
(with thanks to Derek Tidball’s Meeting the Saviour BRF 2007)

Acts 7.44-60; 1 Peter 2.2-10; John 14.1-14

I wonder whether you have ever had the experience that I frequently encounter where you are in the car in a place you don’t know, quite happily following signposts to where your destination or a specific place on the journey that acts as a marker from which you want to go on, when suddenly that one place disappears from all the next lots of signs - and the next one. Perhaps you’re at a roundabout and there is no indication at all as to which exit you should take.

And, if you’re anything like me, you pick the wrong one and end up getting lost. And, because you’re lost and don’t know where you are, the map doesn’t make a great deal of sense, either, since in order for a map to work, you need to know where you are starting from.

It reminds me of that old Irish joke, which I’m sure you’ve heard before about a man asking for directions. “Well, if I were you,” comes the response, “I wouldn’t start from here.”

The feeling of being lost, whether we are talking about physically being lost in a place we don’t know or an emotional sense of lostness where we’re not sure where our life is leading, is an unsettling and disconcerting one. It can be quite a frightening experience - I will admit to several occasions where I’ve ended up in tears because I’ve been driving on my own in the dark and have ended up thoroughly lost. Being lost certainly can induce in us a sense of being our of control.

Jesus is talking with his disciples in our Gospel reading about going home. He talks about being in his Father’s house and preparing places for his disciples so that he can take them there too.

It’s a reading that is very often read at funerals - it’s one of the standard ones given in the Common Worship order for the funeral service, and if we look at it carefully we can see why it is appropriate for such a service. The idea that there is place prepared in the Father’s house is a comforting one that gives hope that though there has been a death in human terms, the life of the person who has died still goes on elsewhere.

I was told by a funeral director of a clergyman who had three funeral sermons. The first involved a train. When we leave a station on a train, the people on the platform wave us goodbye and we disappear from their sight. They know we are still there, but they cannot see us. His second sermon made the same point, though the image was a boat sailing over the horizon. And I’m sorry to say that I can’t remember what the third was except that it involved a dog - don’t ask me - but also relayed the same message as the boat and the train. What that cleric was trying to do, of course, was to get across the message that, though death is a separation, life goes on elsewhere.

Jesus went home so that we also have a home to go to. What is a home? A home is a place in which we belong; a place of security and freedom; a place, if we’re lucky that we share with those whom we love.

A home is a resting-place, a place to which we can retreat from the busy-ness of life. Now some of those boundaries become muddled, because our lives are so complicated and many of us these days work from home, which confuses the boundaries. But at heart, a home is a resting-place.

Our heavenly home is something to which we can look forward. We know that Jesus has gone before us. Thomas is worried about getting there - he hasn’t got a map, he doesn’t know even really where the destination is.
And Jesus responds with those famous words: I am the way, the truth and the life.

Our map for the journey is Jesus. If we continue to follow Jesus, we will reach our destination without fail.

Death is something that none of us can avoid. But we can have some say about how we approach death. None of us knows the time or the date when we will die. But we can do everything in our power to ensure that we are prepared for it.

And the way to prepare for death is through prayer and relationship with God and living out the Christian life.

Stephen, in our first reading, was facing death. It was not a death he sought, but a death that was imposed on him because of his witness to Christ. He was willing to give up his life for his God. I wonder whether we would ever make that sacrifice, if we were required to.

It’s very different from the idea of the suicide bomber. Stephen accepted his death but it wasn’t sought, it was a consequence of his living for God.

Similarly with Jesus - he faced his death with courage but he didn’t kill himself as the suicide bombers do. And people continue to give up their lives for God because they know that their home awaits, the home where Jesus has already made a place for them. The Great West Door at Westminster Abbey depicts ten of these.

Many of us do not think about death until it stares us in the face. But part of the Christian life is about preparing for a good death and for the life beyond. I suspect if we knew that we were going to meet our Maker next week, we would sharpen up our discipleship. Being a Christian is not just about going to church on a Sunday or  being nice to our neighbour. The decision to follow Christ is a life-changing decision, since it should involve the whole of our lives.

Being a Christian means we always have before us the path and pattern of Jesus, and our destination - that place that he has prepared for us.

That destination is a great and wonderful one. Death is something that people try to avoid, except in extreme circumstances - either through suicide when life gets too much or similarly through euthanasia. We try to stop the ageing process - just think how many pills and potions are out there that claim to arrest that process.

We try not to think about our own mortality too much. We live so much of our lives in there here and now. But in the same way that Jesus’s life led constantly towards his death, so ours do too. Every day we live is a day nearer to the time when we shall find ourselves in that place prepared for us by Jesus.

Somehow we have to embrace the fact of death rather than to flee from it. For through death comes freedom and peace.

Some words of Dietrich Bonhoeffer:

Come now, highest feast on the way to everlasting freedom, death.
Lay waste the burdens of chains and walls
which confine our earthly bodies and blinded souls,
that we see at last what here we could not see.
Freedom, we sought you long in discipline, action and suffering.
Dying, we recognise you now in the face of God.

Death brings freedom. Our deaths will bring us life in its full abundance and glory. That’s one of the great paradoxes of Christianity that in order to receive life in all its fullness, we need to die.

And, before our physical death, we need too to die to self, to put on Christ’s clothing of love and care and compassion, of loving God above all else, of making everything in our lives secondary to our love for God. And when we love God with all our heart and soul and mind and being, we discover that the fulfilment of Christ’s second commandment - to love our neighbour as ourselves - follows naturally on.

So let us pray for the courage and strength to face the fact of death, not to run from it, but to keep in mind always the promises of Christ, that he has prepared a dwelling place for us. Let us live each day as if it were our last. Let us know deep within our hearts that we have a map and a guide in Jesus - Jesus the Way, the Truth and the Life.

Stephen faced his death with courage - his final words were active words “Lord, receive my spirit.” Words addressed to God; words that echo Jesus’s self-giving: “Lord, into your hands I commend my spirit.”

May we too be prepared by following Christ with all our being for that moment when our death brings us the true freedom of eternal life. Amen.

Acts 7.22-31; 1 Peter 3.13-22; John 14.15-21

I expect most of you are familiar with the phrase separation anxiety - something that most young children experience at some point. They become anxious when their mother leaves them with someone else, and usually end up screaming their heads off.

I remember not long ago holding my friend Helen’s baby daughter so that Helen could go to the loo - we were in a pub at the time - and whatever I did I couldn’t stop Sophie crying. I have to say I was becoming rather self-conscious and embarrassed. Nothing would stop her crying - we sat, we walked around, we tried different positions of cuddle, and so on.

But the minute Helen returned, Sophie was all smiles again. It wasn’t me doing anything wrong; it’s just that I was not Sophie’s mother.

Jesus’s disciples are experiencing a different type of separation anxiety. Today’s passage from John comes as part of his Last Supper story. Jesus is talking to the disciples about the fact that he is going away.

Those of us in church last week we heard him say how he needed to do that in order to prepare dwelling places for them so that he could then return and take them with him. We heard Thomas wonder about this, expressing his uncertainty about where Jesus would be going, and Jesus responding with those wonderful words “I am the Way, the Truth and the Life.”

Jesus also reminded them that when he had gone they would be able to do works greater than those he had done.
Today’s reading follows directly on from last week’s. The disciples are having to face the truth that Jesus will not be with them for ever and are worrying about how to cope with that. As a mother provides continuing reassurance for the baby suffering from separation anxiety, Jesus is providing his disciples with the reassurance they need.

A good mother will always be around for her child. Though she may temporarily disappear, she will return. In earlier life, the child is obviously more dependent on her than in later years, but a good mother will always be there for her children, however old they become.

And Jesus is promising that he will always be around. His presence will have a different form. He won’t be with them in person - but he will send his Spirit. The word used in the Greek literally means one called alongside but this involves difficulties in interpretation.

Some theologians prefer to use more of a transliteration than a translation and refer to the Spirit as the Paraclete so that they don’t have to define exactly its meaning, and thus risk limiting it. Others translate this word as Comforter, Counsellor, Advocate, Consoler, Helper.

It is important to notice too that Jesus says he will send Another Paraclete - that implies that he too is one and highlights that the Spirit will represent the Father in the same way as he himself has done.

Tom Wright in his John for Everyone explains how some of these different interpretations can explain the different roles of the Holy Spirit.

The word “helper” he says, “doesn’t simply mean someone who comes to lend assistance in our various tasks.

“It certainly does mean that as well: the Spirit comes to give God’s people the strength and energy to do what they have to do, to live for God and witness to his love in the world.”

The other two interpretations that he picks out are “comforter” and “advocate”.

Firstly, comforter - literally - someone who comes with strength. This is what he says: “Comfort is a strange and wonderful thing. Have you noticed how, when someone is deeply distressed, after a bereavement or a tragedy, the fact of having other people with them, hugging them and being alongside them gives them strength for the next moment, then the one after that, then the one after that?

“Outwardly nothing has changed, The tragedy is still a tragedy. The dead person won’t be coming back. But other human support changes our ability to cope with disaster. It gives us strength.

“When the spirit is spoken of as the comforter, this kind of extra strength to meet special need is in mind.”

And then he moves to the advocate - a term derived from the Latin word to call. He says this: “An advocate stands up in a court of law and explains to the judge or jury how things are from his or her client’s point of view. The advocate pleads the case.

“Jesus assumes that his followers will often find themselves, as he found himself, ion the wrong side of official persecution. He saw the situation, as centuries of Jewish tradition had done before him, in terms of the heavenly law court with God as the judge. In that court, his people can rest assured that their case will be heard, that God will constantly be reminded of their plight, because the Spirit will pleased on their behalf.”

The disciples need not be anxious about separation from Jesus, because he will still be with them through the Holy Spirit. The Trinity cannot be divided up, so if the Spirit is with them, so also is the Father and the Son, living in that eternal dance with one another.

And the astounding thing is that the disciples, then, and us, now, can be a part of that eternal dance. Jesus said: “on that day you will now that I am in my Father, and you are in me, and I in you.” There will be no separation. For John, believers don’t just copy Jesus, they participate in him and his work. He becomes part of them. Christ removes the distance between us and God.

At the heart of that participation is love. Not just love as a feeling such as those feelings you experience when you first fall in love with someone and can’t stop thinking about them and long to be with them all the time, but also love that is about action and attitude and the well-being and concern of the other.

In the marriage service the questions that is put to bride and groom is “will you love?” not “do you love?” Will you love - will you love unconditionally:

“from this day forward;
for better, for worse,
for richer, for poorer,
in sickness and in health.”

Jesus’s love is unconditional. Jesus’s love remains whether we are aware of it or not. Jesus’s love draws us to himself and incorporates us into the life of the godhead.

It is not dependent on whether we have sinned or not - the love is always there. And our response to that love is to keep the commandments. For that is what those who love Jesus do - their love for Jesus is defined by the fact that they keep the commandments. And what are those commandments? To love God and to love others.

Sometimes people when they first become Christians have a similar experience to when we first fall in love with a person - that longing and desire to be with them, that deep joy, that all-consuming love that makes it hard to focus on anything else.

But most of us are now at the “will you love” stage. Will we love Jesus? How do we show that love - we live it out by loving God and loving others.

That means striving to love at all times, striving to love and forgive rather than to seek revenge, striving to let God and others be themselves rather than becoming bitter because they are not what we want them to be, striving to make God and others the focus of our attentions even when we are sidetracked and distracted by other things.

Christians need to be honest with themselves about their love for God. We need to look at our lives and see where we lack love for God or for others. And we can do that in utter security because Jesus is with us through the Spirit - and his love never fails. We are never rejected by God or pushed away because we don’t live up to the standards of love.

And now we are back where we started. Jesus reassures his disciples that his love for the means he’s not deserting them, his love remains; and the Spirit of God will dwell within them so not only is his love with them, it becomes a part of them.

And, for us, the most wonderful part of all of this is that these are promises for us too. Jesus, through the Spirit, dwells with us too. We too become caught up in the eternal dance of love.

Sunday 27th April
9.00 a.m. Parish Communion, St Margaret of Antioch, Barley
10.30 a.m. Parish Communion with baptism opf Henry Hall, St Mary Magdalene, Barkway

Monday 28th April
8.15 a.m. Morning Prayer, St Mary Magdalene, Barkway
10 a.m. Discover Sunday planning group, The Rectory
2.30 p.m. Funeral of Edna Burr, St Mary Magdalene, Barkway

Tuesday 29th April
8.15 a.m. Morning Prayer, St Mary Magdalene, Barkway
8.00 p.m Deanery Standing/Pastoral Committee, Therfield Rectory

Wednesday 30th April
8.15 a.m Morning Prayer, St Margaret of Antioch, Barley

Thursday 1st May - Ascension Day
8.15 a.m. Morning Prayer, St Mary’s, Reed
10.45 a.m. Holy Communion, Wheatsheaf Meadow House, Barkway
3.30 p.m. Interment of Maisie Gilham’s ashes, Barkway churchyard
8.00 p.m. Holy Communion, St Mary’s, Reed

Friday 2nd May

Saturday 3rd May
9.00 a.m. Morning Prayer, St Margaret of Antioch, Barley

Sunday 4th May - Easter 7
9.00 a.m. Parish Communion (said), St Mary’s, Reed
10.30 a.m. Parish Communion baptism of Libby Hills + Junior Church, St Margaret of Antioch, Barley
11.30 a.m. Blessing of John Pattison’s grave, Barley churchyard
6.00 p.m. BCP Evensong, St Mary Magdalene, Barkway

THE COMING MONTH
(Morning Prayer usually takes place each day: Monday and Tuesday in Barkway; Wednesday and Saturday in Barley and Thursday in Reed)

Wednesday 7th May
10.30 a.m. Holy Communion, Margaret House, Barley

Thursday 8th May
8.00 p.m. ICES Worship and Psalms, The Rectory

Saturday 10th May
all day Barkway Street Market
evening Concert by Ros Holbrow, John Witchell and friends, St Mary’s, Reed

Sunday 11th May - Pentecost
10.30 a.m. United Benefice Holy Communion, St Mary’s, Reed, with sermon by Christina Rees
5.00 p.m. Discover Sunday - Happy Birthday, Church - St Mary Magdalene, Barkway

Tuesday 13th May
10.15 a.m. First Incumbents’ meeting, North Mymms
8.00 p.m. Barkway VA School governors meeting
8.00 p.m. Deanery Chapter, Great Hormead church

Thursday 15th May
7.45 p.m. Reed VCC

Sunday 18th May - Trinity Sunday
9.00 a.m. Parish Communion, St Mary Magdalene, Barkway
10.30 a.m. Parish Communion, St Mary’s, Reed
5.00 p.m. Spring Sing Service, with Royston Town Band, St Margaret of Antioch, Barley

Sunday 13th April - Easter 4
10.30 a.m. United Benefice Holy Communion, St Mary’s, Reed, followed by Annual Parochial Church Meeting (Barkway/Reed) and bring-and-share lunch

Monday 14th April
8.15 a.m. Morning Prayer, St Mary Magdalene, Barkway

Tuesday 15th April
8.15 a.m. Morning Prayer, St Mary Magdalene, Barkway
12 noon Deanery Chapter, Cottered Vicarage

Wednesday 16th April
8.15 a.m Morning Prayer, St Margaret of Antioch, Barley
8 p.m. North Buntingford Prayer Group, Aylwins, Roe Green

Thursday 17th April
8.15 a.m. Morning Prayer, St Mary’s, Reed
11.30 a.m. Women in Theology Group, The Board Room, Holywell Lodge

Friday 18th April

Saturday 19th April
9.00 a.m. Morning Prayer, St Margaret of Antioch, Barley
10.00 a.m. - 12 noon Friends of Barkway Church Plant Sale, Barkway House
7.30 p.m. The Romance of Spring, Concert by Rebecca Starling, St Margaret of Antioch, Barley

Sunday 20th April - Easter 5
9.00 a.m. Parish Communion, St Mary Magdalene, Barkway
10.30 a.m. Parish Communion, St Margaret of Antioch, Barley followed by Annual Parochial Church meeting and bring-and-share lunch
2.30 p.m. St George’s Day Parade service, St Mary Magdalene, Barkway
5.00 p.m. Discover Sunday all-age worship - Edible Eden (the story of creation) - St Mary Magdalene, Barkway

THE COMING MONTH
(Morning Prayer usually takes place each day: Monday and Tuesday in Barkway; Wednesday and Saturday in Barley and Thursday in Reed)

Monday 21st April
8.00 p.m. ICES Worship and Psalms, The Rectory

Tuesday 22nd April
12 noon North Buntingford Group Clergy meeting, Barkway Rectory

Wednesday 23rd April
8 p.m. Barkway VCC, The Manor

Sunday 27th April
9.00 a.m. Parish Communion, St Margaret of Antioch, Barley
10.30 a.m. Parish Communion with baptism opf Henry Hall, St Mary Magdalene, Barkway