Date : Fourth Sunday of Easter, April 25, 2010

Text : John 10:22-30

Title : Unsnatchable

Jesus said, "My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me. ... and no one can snatch them out of my hand." Christ is risen! . . . Alleluia! . . .

Just about everything we buy comes with some sort of a guarantee. The money-back guarantee is traced to Richard Sears, of Sears and Roebuck. Sears pioneered many things in the retail industry that we don’t even think about, today. Before Sears’ money-back guarantee, you could return a product to a store, but there was no guarantee that you would get your money back or the product replaced—no guarantee, at all.

Let us not take guarantees for granted. Guarantees give us confidence: if it doesn’t fit, I can take it back; if someone already has one of those, he can take it back; if it breaks, they will replace it; if my wife gives me the evil eye for frivolously spending our money, I can save my hide.

Guarantees give us confidence. Well, dear children of God, does your Savior, Jesus, ever have a guarantee for you! As today’s Gospel lesson takes us to one of the Jews’ festival days, the Feast of Dedication, the Lord does what He always did: He worshiped according to God’s will.

By this time, Jesus had become famous. News of his miracles spread like mayonnaise. Word of His sermons made many ears itch. With Jesus in Jerusalem for the Feast of Dedication, He was easy pickings to place under the hot lights of questioning: "How long will you keep us in suspense? If you are the Christ, tell us plainly."

It was a fair request, except that Jesus had already come clean about His being the Christ. He had met the woman at the well and told her to spread the news, and she did. After He had fed the five thousand, He had proclaimed Himself to be the Bread of Life. He had already declared that He was the Light of the World. And, in the really big one, He had told the Jews that He was God in the flesh, calling Himself Yahweh, and revealing that He had existed before Abraham.

And, after all of that, they want to know when Jesus is going to stop keeping them in suspense? Have they not been listening to Jesus?

The answer, of course, is, no, they had not been listening to Jesus. Oh, they had heard Jesus. They heard Him just fine, thank you. But, they were so offended by everything Jesus said, they didn’t really listen to Him. They didn’t go back and search the Scriptures to see if Jesus could be telling the truth; if He could, indeed, be the Messiah for whom they had been waiting for so many centuries.

Jesus tells them as much. He says, "I told you, and you do not believe." He continues by telling them that they can see the truthfulness of His claims: "The works I do in my Father’s name bear witness about me," and then He nails them, again, "but you do not believe."

Why didn’t they believe? Here comes the shocker. The Jews, who were the descendants of the Israelites, thought they were God’s Chosen People. They thought they had God’s Lifetime Guarantee, and they could not lose their inheritance of the Promised Land. They were sadly mistaken.

God had, in fact, given a guarantee to Israel. He told them that as long as they listened to Him, obeyed His will, and followed Him—and followed Him, alone—they would possess the Promised Land and live prosperous and enjoyable lives.

But, they didn’t follow God; they followed a host of the worthless idols that their neighbors were following. And, they didn’t obey God’s will; they replaced God’s will with their own wishes and pleasures. And, they didn’t listen to God; He sent them prophet after prophet, to get them to turn from their sinful ways so that they would not lose their inheritance, but what did they do with the prophets? They kicked them out of Israel, they abused them, they killed them. Worst of all, they ignored them—they did not listen to the voice of God through His spokesmen.

Now, God’s ultimate spokesman was standing right in front of them, and they were pulling the same old rabbit of rejection out of their worn out hat of skepticism.

Jesus set them straight: "You do not believe because you are not part of my flock." The Jews were sheep that had strayed away so far that the Good Shepherd, Jesus, had to find new sheep to fill up His flock.

The old sheep, the children of Israel, didn’t listen. The new sheep—well, listen to Jesus: "My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me." Here, dear children of God, is the connection to you.

God has called you by the Gospel to be sheep of the Good Shepherd, Jesus Christ. God has washed you in the Baptism of Jesus’ death for your sins and His resurrection for the guarantee of your own resurrection. God has invited you to the Supper of Jesus’ body and blood, which is the veritable green pastures of the Twenty-Third Psalm, and its cup running over with God’s goodness and mercy.

But, wait. You’re no different than were the children of Israel. God provided His goodness and mercy to them. In fact, God had King David write the Twenty-Third Psalm back in the heyday of Israel—back in the day when they were still listening to the voice of their Good Shepherd.

What happened? The children of Israel conformed to the world. They listened to other religions. They thought their ideas were better than God’s. They wanted to do their own thing.

What happens to you and your fellow Christians so that you stop hearing the voice of your Good Shepherd? You think your ideas are better than God’s. You like doing your own thing. You listen to other religions, philosophies, and ideas.

It’s a story that’s as old as Adam and Eve. What do you hear from this pulpit, week after month after year? It’s all of the ways in which you are sucked into conforming with the world and serving your sinful nature. It’s wasting your money on your heart’s desires. It’s ignoring your wedding vows. It’s acting like God never gave commandments about adultery and fornication, or watching your mouth with gossiping and lying. It’s treating this hour of holy worship as if it were no more important than sleeping in, going hunting, or eating out for breakfast. It’s listening to other religions, philosophies, and ideas about life.

I haven’t yet gotten to Jesus’ guarantee. But, as I now do, remember what happened to Israel. God had given them a Lifetime Guarantee. It was clear and straightforward. Israel didn’t give a hoot about it and lost it all—they lost the land, they lost their nation, they lost their eternal lives.

Here is Jesus’ promise to you, whom He has gathered into His sheepfold: "I give them eternal life, and they will never perish, and no one will snatch them out of my hand." And, as if that guarantee were not enough, the Lord intensifies it: "My Father, who has given them to me, is greater than all, and no one is able to snatch them out of the Father’s hand. I and the Father are one."

No one can snatch you out of God’s hand. Now, that’s some guarantee! More than a Lifetime Guarantee, Jesus gives you an Eternal Lifetime Guarantee.

Well, then, what’s the worry? If God has such a guarantee for you, why do you even need to be in church? Why sit through the same old sermons, week after month after year? Why bother with Communion? Why the instruction that the youngsters received, who are getting confirmed, today? Why not just take God’s guarantee and enjoy life?

Remember Israel. God gave them the same guarantee. What happened? Did anyone snatch their salvation from their hands? Nope. Then, what happened? They let go of it. They took God’s guarantee and enjoyed life . . . as they saw fit.

They stopped listening to God. They listened to other gods, which are no gods at all. They didn’t feed on God’s Word, but on the junk food of human ideas which lead nowhere but the grave. They turned their backs on God and put Him in the rearview mirror.

They left God; God didn’t leave them. The devil didn’t snatch them. No one snatched them. They left God. They had no one to blame, but themselves.

Do you see why your pastor, at times, almost drives you nuts with the preaching of faithfulness to worship and hearing the Word of God? Jesus says, "My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me."

If you aren’t following Jesus’ voice, whose voice are you following? If you are following Jesus’ voice, only once in awhile, you’re following other voices the rest of the time.

Are you keeping your little sheep self safely in Jesus’ green pastures where He can shepherd you, or are you out wandering around where it is possible for you to get lost and never find your way back?

We have a whole lot of members who need to stop taking God’s Lifetime Guarantee so lightly. A whole lot of you are awful cocky, living life how you want, treating worship as if it’s no more important than changing the oil in your car, living life according to your own list of commandments.

The good news is: God is faithful. You have His guarantee. But, He will never force you to belong to Him. Jesus, the Good Shepherd, calls you, feeds you, tends to you. Jesus, the Good Shepherd, does not scream at you, force you to do anything, or tie you down.

God is faithful. You have His guarantee written in the blood of His Son, spoken to you in the Gospel, poured out upon you in Baptism, and fed to you in Jesus’ Holy Communion.

Out there in the world, outside of Jesus’ sheepfold, there are no guarantees past this life. Only Jesus has and gives the Eternal Lifetime Guarantee—and it’s all because of the Easter good news: Christ is risen! . . . Alleluia! . . . Amen.