The word, “pastor,” comes from the Latin language in which it stands for “shepherd,” one who keeps watch over a flock of sheep. My grandfather was a shepherd boy in Europe. He would leave with the flock as soon as springtime sunshine brought new green growth to the mountain meadows. Up there he would spend the summers, fattening the flock on the alpine grasses, guarding them against attack by wolves. A pastor is like this, an “under-shepherd,” as it were, of the one truly Good Shepherd who is Jesus Christ. Jesus is the good shepherd because he laid down his life for the sheep to keep them from the wolves and lead them every day into the verdant pastures of his self-giving love. Jesus’ compassion is the key to how we should regard the work and office of a pastor, how a pastor is to tend a flock of God’s people.
For good or for ill, a pastor is a living symbol of the Good Shepherd whom he or she proclaims, just as is said in the liturgy of confession and forgiveness of sin, “As a called and ordained servant of Christ and by his authority I declare to you the entire forgiveness of all your sins.” Representing Christ, the pastor says the words, but it is the risen Christ himself who truly is speaking. Someone might take offense at this: By what right do you claim to speak for Christ and represent him to us?
How glad I am that you asked! How delighted I am to tell you how it is that pastors speak with a definite and certain authority as a living re-presentation: in the stead and by the command of our Lord Jesus Christ.
But first a concession. There can be bad pastors, bad shepherds who lead the flock of God astray, just like there can be bad symbols which mislead us more than lead us, or dead symbols which communicate nothing. That is what the OT text from Jeremiah says, Woe to the shepherds who destroy and scatter the sheep of my pasture! Jeremiah’s announcement of God’s judgement falls especially upon the religious leadership of his day and age who were guilty of scattering rather than uniting God’s people. What makes them bad pastors? Ther failure to care for the flock with loving compassion based on the teaching of God’s Word incarnate as Jesus Christ. The Lord therefore announces through Jeremiah that he will replace these bad pastors with new pastors, who will care for the people, so that they fear no more and not a single one will be lost through neglect or apathy. In promising this new kind of pastor, the Lord above all promises to send a new and truly Good Shepherd from the line of David, who will be our righteousness. Thus the text points forward to Christ, One who will be our righteousness, our Good Shepherd, who laid down his life for the sheep and in doing so became the very righteousness ove loving compassion that they lacked.
In this light we see that no pastor can be good enough -- unless Christ is his righteousness too. No relation of pastor and people can be good -- unless Jesus Christ is our common righteousness. Only by overlooking our own very real faults and failures, both pastor’s and people’s, and looking together upon Christ the Good Shepherd can we live together and flourish together as a caring community of Christ’s people, a flock of God’s people in a world apathetic, if not hostile and hateful.
On this common ground, however, a pastor has the special responsibility to represent Christ precisely this way, to see to it that his Word and Sacraments are faithfully communicated. The new kind of shepherd Jeremiah promises will always preach, teach, counsel and embody Christ’s self-sacrificing, righteousness-bestowing love. They will be moved with Christ’s own compassion for the people, as the Gospel text from Mark depicts, totally engrossed in the ministry of healing people by teaching the gospel word of God, the word concerning Jesus. They will not be on their own ego trip, they will not seek their own glory. Least of all will they imagine they can in and of themselves save anybody. But they will lead the people in glorifying God for all his rich mercy in Christ.
So here we have a scriptural criterion for distinguishing good and bad pastors. Bad pastors divide the people because, like politicians playing favorites and factions, they have no compassion for household of God. They neglect the teaching of God’s Word and instead try to make themselves the center of attention, preaching their own wisdom, experience or pet agenda. But good pastors unite otherwise diverse people. Visibly moved by Christ’s own loving compassion, physically communicating Christ’s own love in their very personal bearing, in this way living icons or symbols of Christ, they constantly teach Christ as God’s Word incarnate in our human flesh. Pastors have the particular duty and office so to make Christ the center of attention. For when Christ is the center of attention, we are all united and drawn together in him. That is how it should be in the church!
So our epistle lesson from Ephesians says powerfully today. Christ is our peace –notice not merely or primarily my private peace or your personal tranquility of soul—but our peace, the public peace of our church life together. Christ has made us –Jews and Gentiles, but also workers and bosses, Americans and foreigners, black and white, Christ has made us all one, since on the cross he once and for all broke down the dividing wall of hostility erected by our self-justifying “identities,” as we say nowadays. He is healing us, not only as individual bodies, but also together as the flock, the congregation, the assembly, the new covenant people of God. For us sin no longer erects a dividing wall of hostility, since we are reconciled to God and to one another by the unique and saving sacrifice of the only Son of God on the cross. Christ is our Good Shepherd who unites us by self-sacrificing love. For in the very moment I in faith realize and grasp that Christ laid down his life for me, dear brother and sister, in that very moment I am forever bound to every other one for whom Christ lived and died and now lives and reigns. Since Christ is our peace, pastors are appointed to Christ’s peace-makers: conveying this good news, extending this compassion, awakening this faith, realizing this new covenant unity.
So in light of all this wonderful scripture, let me answer the objection,
“By what right does a pastor represent Christ?” Answer: nothing less than Christ’s own real, concrete and divine-human love for us, which takes an ordinary person from among us, like you and me, and makes of him or her his own voice and presence in the midst of the flock of God. So we are to receive a pastor as representing Christ for us. We are to honor his work and his office as Christ’s own. We are to ignore all irrelevant considerations and focus with him or her on Christ, who must be the center of attention. Do you imagine for a moment that all this makes the pastors somehow better or holier than you? No, of course not. But in precisely this way of the ordained pastoral ministry of Word and Sacrament God makes all of us truly better people, truly holy, truly enthralled with the compassion of Christ, each living it out in his or her own way.
Look at how the people respond to Jesus and the disciples in our gospel lesson. Can you think yourselves into this scriptural scene? Do you see where you come into the story today? Here is the model of how you should be welcoming this new pastor into your midst. Get excited about that. Rejoice! Anticipate! Listen to these words again, Wherever he came, in villages, cities or country, they laid the sick in the market places and besought him that they might touch even the fringe of his garment; and as many as touched it were made well. This is what the church of Jesus Christ should be like, a place in the world radiating with the knowledge of God and the healing compassion of Christ, which draws all who are troubled into its bosom where they find peace and healing.
This collective responsibility to honor your pastor as a representative of Christ falls upon each of you individually. Pastors are very vulnerable people because everything depends on their good name and reputation. How can they represent Christ when their person is besmirched? One little evil word of gossip or hearsay or badmouthing or innuendocan alienate someone from the ministry of Christ which they so desperately need. Pastors are very vulnerable, of course, because they are indeed merely human, mere earthen vessels of gospel treasures. Nothing is easier than to point out their flaws and failings.
But if you have an issue, dear Christian, have the courage, have the decency to go face to face and work it out. Otherwise be silent and bear your cross in faith for the good of the ministry. Pastors are very vulnerable, because every Tom, Dick and Mary has his or her private, usually unscriptural idea of what a pastor should be. Well, put your individual prejudices aside and be instructed by Christ himself about what a pastor is and does. Even if the pastor’s personality doesn’t turn you on, respect the work and the office which he or she does for the sake of community, respect Christ who wants to work through him or her. Pastors, like Christ, are very vulnerable and can get crucified, abandoned, betrayed and denied by their very own people. Wow! Don’t you be the Judas who betrays your pastor, the Peter who denies him, the cowards who flee from him in time of trouble! Stand by your pastor with your constant prayers, sincere and articulate good will, faithful friendship and willingness to learn what he has from God to teach you. Pastors may be very vulnerable, but I tell you what. When they are welcomed in Christ’s name and loved and honored for what they truly are, Christ’s own under-shepherds, the happiness, love, joy, peace, and fulfillment of that unique and special relationship between pastor and people is unexcelled in human experience. Let that be the collective goal for which each one of you takes personal responsibility. Receive your pastor as a gift from God; welcome him as the representative of Christ in your midst, join with him in Christian ministry until the light of Christ in this place radiates love and healing to all around. Amen.