At the end of the Gospel of John, in the famous scene where Jesus is speaking with Peter at the sea of Tiberius after his resurrection; Jesus asks Peter three times, “Simon, son of John, do you love me?” Each time he responds, “Yes, Lord, you know that I love you.” Jesus then says to Simon Peter, “Feed my lambs.” “Tend my sheep.” Feed my sheep.”
And then we hear at the beginning of today’s Gospel reading, Jesus says, “I am the good shepherd. A good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep.” So what is going on here? Who are his sheep, and what does Jesus mean when he says “I am the good shepherd?” And not just a good shepherd, but the good shepherd.
On this Fourth Sunday of Easter, which we call “Good Shepherd Sunday,” the Church shifts its focus in the Gospel readings from the resurrection appearances of Jesus, to earlier in John’s Gospel to the discourses or sayings of Jesus that help reveal his identity, and his relationship with his Father, his disciples, and with the Church. He is speaking in the Temple, and he is drawing a comparison between himself and the wicked shepherds that were described by the prophet Ezekiel about 600 years before. A shepherd wasn’t just someone who watched over a herd of sheep. The king was also considered a shepherd, and his flock was the people under his charge. Remember the greatest king in the history of Israel, David, was anointed as he was tending the flocks of sheep as a youth. He was considered the greatest king, not because he was a mighty warrior, and defeated the Philistines, but because he was a man after God’s own heart. Despite his faults, he had the faith, trust, and love of God that no other king would possess. And because of this, he loved God’s people, and would “shepherd” them not for himself, but for God.
In the time of Ezekiel, before the destruction of the Temple in 586 B.C., Ezekiel prophesied against the wicked leaders of Jerusalem and the priests of the Temple, and compared them to wicked shepherds who didn’t care for the sheep, but only used them for their own good. And so what Jesus is doing in today’s Gospel passage is contrasting himself with those wicked leaders from the time of Ezekiel, and letting the people know that he is the true shepherd, the good shepherd, who won’t just protect his sheep, but will actually lay down his life for them. And at the same time he is letting the current leaders in Jerusalem (the scribes, Pharisees, Sadducees, and priests) that they are just like those wicked leaders whose treatment of their “sheep” led to the destruction of the Temple.
But Jesus takes this comparison to a shepherd to a much deeper level than someone who is simply protecting his flock. Jesus says that “I know mine and mine know me, just as the Father knows me and I know the Father.” He is talking about a relationship that is much more than a watchman or a hired hand has for the sheep. Jesus is revealing that the knowledge he has for his sheep is to be like the knowledge he has for his Father—a deep, intimate knowledge and love that is self-giving; self-sacrificing; the kind of knowledge that he desires his disciples to have with him. This is the ultimate goal he has as a shepherd: to draw us into the same relationship that he has with the Father and the Father has with the Son. The Catechism of the Catholic Church states it so beautifully, “The ultimate end of the whole divine economy is the entry of God’s creatures into the perfect unity of the Blessed Trinity” (CCC 260).
As the Good Shepherd, he doesn’t just take care of us, he wants to share his divine life with us. This is the essence of salvation. Salvation, according to the Church, is not an eternal garden of sensual delights. It’s not an everlasting amusement park. It’s to share the divine life of God, to become a “child” or “son” of God. As Saint Peter says in his Second Letter, “he has bestowed on us the precious and very great promises, so that through them you may come to share in the divine nature” (2 Pt 1:4). This is what Saint John means when he says in the second reading for today, “Beloved: See what love the Father has bestowed on us that we may be called the children of God.”
And he is able to share his divine life with us because he laid down his life for his sheep. Because of the Paschal Mystery—the Passion, Death, and Resurrection of Jesus—Peter is able to proclaim to the leaders of the people and the elders, that “There is no salvation through anyone else, nor is there any other name under heaven given to the human race by which we are to be saved.” And it’s why Jesus can claim later on the Gospel of John that “I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me” (Jn 14:6).
These can be scandalous statements, especially in a culture that doesn’t recognize the possibility of one religious truth meant for all humanity. And to this type of worldview, these statements made by Peter and Jesus can be taken as arrogant and self-serving. But it’s not arrogant at all when we look at what salvation is from the Christian perspective.
As one scholar puts it, “Jesus is the only founder of a world religion who even claims to offer a way to be a child of the God who created the universe. Jesus is the only way to the Father, because he’s the only one who even teaches us that God the Creator is our Father” (John Bergsma, The Word of the Lord: Reflections on the Sunday Readings for Year B, Emmaus Road Publishing, 2021, pg 126).
As I mentioned earlier, Jesus is able to share his divine life with us because he laid down his life for his sheep. He said, “I lay down my life in order to take it up again. No one takes it from me, but I lay it down on my own” (John 10:17-18). This can be a difficult saying, because it sets an example for us. Remember that Jesus says elsewhere in the Gospels, “If anyone wishes to come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me” (Luke 9:23). The way to salvation is the way of the cross—a life of self-gift and self-sacrifice. It takes great faith to believe that self-sacrifice is the one and only way to eternal life—sharing in the divine nature with Jesus and His Father—to enter into the perfect unity of the Blessed Trinity.
Not only is today Good Shepherd Sunday, but it’s also the World Day of Prayer for Vocations. Vocation means a call. It is God’s invitation, His call to each person to know, love, and serve Him and His Church in a particular state or way of life.
Each person’s vocation flows from the grace of Baptism. So if you’ve been baptized, you have a vocation. And we have to listen, hear his voice, and respond in the appropriate way to live out our vocation. But unless we are informed with the Sacred Scriptures and the teachings of the Church, it’s difficult to discern what our vocation might be.
It’s not necessarily the priesthood or the consecrated religious life as a monk, brother, nun, or sister. Marriage is a vocation. Teaching is a vocation.
In his message for the World Day of Prayer for Vocations, Pope Francis “invites us to reflect on the precious gift of the Lord’s call to each of us, as members of his faithful pilgrim people, to participate in his loving plan and to embody the beauty of the Gospel in different states of life. Hearing that divine call, which is far from being an imposed duty … is the surest way for us to fulfil our deepest desire for happiness. Our life finds fulfilment when we discover who we are, what our gifts are, where we can make them bear fruit, and what path we can follow in order to become signs and instruments of love, generous acceptance, beauty and peace, wherever we find ourselves.”
But this is not for our benefit. Pope Francis goes on to say that “This Day is dedicated in a particular way to imploring from the Father the gift of holy vocations for the building up of his Kingdom” (Message of His Holiness Pope Francis for the 61st World Day of Prayer for Vocations, 21 April 2024).
Don’t discourage vocations, especially if it is someone becoming a priest or religious. Encourage it. We need it desperately in our society today.
No matter what our vocation, Christ has to be the focal point in all that we do. And we can be assured that when we live out our vocation in self-sacrifice and self-gift, we conform ourselves to Christ’s self-gift of himself. And to become like him in his suffering is to become like him in his glory. Our whole life—our vocation—is meant to be a preparation for that act of spiritual surrender at the end of our life. When live out our vocation for the love of God and for the sake of building up the Kingdom, we have the sure and certain hope of sharing in His divine life.