He goes before them, and the sheep follow him, for they know his voice.
How do you know if you are hearing the voice of God? I think we have all asked that question before at one point or another. Or to put it another way, what does God want me to do…who does he want me to be…what does he want me to study…how does he want me to act…or who does he want me to marry. Sound more familiar?
And to an extent, we come here hoping to hear a word from God to help us answer these questions. If we do…that is a good thing because it means that we at least care about what God might have to say about such things.
But this brings me back to the original question: How do we know that we are hearing God’s voice answering our questions among all the other voices that are out there competing for our attention. So many voices out there saying so many different things. And the trap that we often fall into is the mistaken belief that someone’s opinion is just as good as the shepherd’s call.
To give you an illustration of how the two compare, we often hear from others or even from within ourselves that “the grass looks greener on the other side” while the shepherd calls out to us and says “come here and find pasture”. He says come here as opposed to go over there (even though the grass looks greener over there) because this is where he wants you to come. This is where you will find what you need. The trouble with opinion is that just because the grass looks greener on the other side, it doesn’t necessarily mean that it IS
That is why the Lord spends a lot of time talking about knowing his voice and following him and spends absolutely no time talking about how we should follow our own whims and opinions. In fact, scripture speaks very solidly against it when we read in Isaiah,
“All we like sheep have gone astray;
we have turned-every one-to his own way;
And it is for this reason that our wanderings were laid upon Jesus and our iniquities pierced him through on the cross.
But if Jesus is the Good Shepherd and we are his sheep, we are supposed to learn to hear his voice and follow him rather than our own or someone else’s opinions.
How do we do that?
First of all, we need to recognize that, just as Jesus says that he is the Good Shepherd, he also says that he is the very door that we enter through to get to that good pasture.
We hear the voice of the shepherd by listening to what he has already told us. While it is true that you can look through the bible every day for the rest of your life and never find the specific person you are to marry or the specific job you are supposed to have or the answers to your algebra final, the word of God does tell us the type of man or woman we should look for and who we are to be in marriage. It does speak about the gifts that God has given us and how we are to use them. But sorry, it still doesn’t say anything about algebra.
Next, we have to understand that Jesus does not play games with his sheep by changing what he says. That would be like the shepherd changing his voice every once in a while to see if the sheep can tell the difference. To illustrate how important this notion is, I would like for you to consider what would happen if your young child got separated from you in the grocery store. You would immediately start calling out for him or her in hopes that you would find each other again. Why? Because you know each other’s voice and the idea is that your child would hear your voice and come in the direction of it. You would never try to disguise or change your voice because your voice is the very connection that you hope will bring about reunion.
That is a major point that Jesus is trying to convey that God remains constant. We know his voice and it does not change. After all, if the intention of the shepherd is to lead his sheep, the goal is to actually get them to the destination. It is not to see if the sheep can find their own way despite the tricks the shepherd might play on them.
Lastly, we have to understand that God wants us to hear his voice and follow him. I’m reminded of the game that most of us are familiar with called Marco Polo. This is a game in which one person closes their eyes and tries to find the other person by listening to their voice. But of course, the object for the one with their eyes open is to avoid being caught. We can get frustrated with God if it seems that our spiritual life is like that. The person with their eyes closed begins to wonder “Am I ever going to find them?” “Are they playing tricks on me?” “Are they even still in the pool?” But God wants us to follow him. It is certainly not an easy road and not without confusion. But there are no games and no tricks.
The problem that we run into is that we often have it backwards. We do not get answers to our prayers by waiting for them to fall out of the sky. And they certainly don’t come all at once. Instead, answers come along the way by following the shepherd out of obedience. Along the way, we discover what the shepherd wants for us. Along the way, we realize his answers to the questions we have. Along the way, we realize that he is leading us to what we most needed all along…but in order for this to happen we must first be obedient and follow.
The way of obedience is very clearly spelled out. Do you know where to find it? It begins with the words “follow me” without having all the answers first. The result is eternal life. The middle is the process of thinking more highly of Him and what he has to say then about ourselves.
Delivered at Church of the Redeemer
Sarasota, Florida
Fourth Sunday of Easter
Fr. Joseph Scalisi