Musings on the Nature of The Gate –

May 15, 2011.

Rev. Sharon James Fazel

“I am the gate. Whoever enters by me will be saved,

 and will come in and go out and find pasture”

“I am the gate” …

What is a gate?

A gate for the sheepfold … the gate is the way in

The gate is protection for the sheep

The gate defines the way in

And the way out.

The gate is the demarcation line, between a place of safety

And a place of peril.

The gate is a pausing place

Where a decision must be made

Do we go in? Or do we turn away to another destination?

Do we follow the sound of the voice we know and trust?

“He calls his own sheep by name and leads them out. 4When he has brought out all his own, he goes ahead of them, and the sheep follow him because they know his voice. 5They will not follow a stranger” …

Christ is the gate …

It was the practice then, in Jesus’ time, that

When the sheep were in the field, and night fell

The shepherd took rocks and laid them in a circle to define the sheepfold.

After the sheep were safely within, and as night encroached,

The shepherd laid himself down on the ground, putting his body across the break in the circle of rocks, where the sheep had entered in.

He laid his body across the break,

And his body became the gate.

There he kept watch over his sheep,

He kept them together, within the fold,

even as he slept.

And so he told them: “I am the gate …”

But they didn’t understand.

And so he told them that he does what the shepherd does.

The shepherd lays down his life, his body, as the gate, to keep guard against the wolf.

“I am the good shepherd,” he told them.

 The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep.

“I know my own and my own know me,” he told them.

Just as we know the presence of Christ ourselves – in so many ways:

In the words of those who testify to their love for one who has passed away from this life…

In the walks of solidarity we recall from years past, where Freedom Riders risked their lives to stand beside their brothers and sisters …

In the songs we sing together here in this place, raising our voices in harmonies, blending the tones of the piano and the bass and the guitar and the drums and the harmonica …

In the creation of graceful, beautiful space, such as that we entered downstairs last night, following the concert

…where loving care and painstaking attention was given to every detail in the placement of candles, and food, and tablecloths and china

And this space is the fold for us every Sunday, when we come together for worship.

We enter, because we hear the sound of the shepherd calling us,

In the still small voice.

We hear that voice in the music.

We hear it in the sound of community.

In the voice of invitation.

It is the voice of the living, indwelling Christ.

And we know we are in sacred space.

Christ is the voice. Christ is the gate. Christ is the way –

And we are the people of the way,

Just as surely as those who followed Jesus and called themselves

“the people of the way…”

So are we.

We know the difference between the voice of the way,

and the voice of an imposter.

When we listen for the sound of the still, small voice

Calling to us from deep within. It is then that we hear the voice of the way.

Let us listen now for that voice …

Let us listen, as we join our hearts in prayer …

Let us listen in the silence, for the voice of the way…

Together. Just now. (Pause) PRAYERS OF THE PEOPLE (Louisiana)

THE LORD/S PRAYER

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