Sermon Tone Analysis

submission

NO IMAGE HAS INFLUENCED the practice of pastoral care more than its chief formative metaphor, the good shepherd caring for the vulnerable flock amid a perilous world.

This central matrix of imagery has served as the foundation for other images of the pastor—guardian of tradition, guide through hazard, and physician of the flock.

It is only on the basis of this axial metaphor that the pastor can reflect rightly upon due authorization to ministry and upon diakonia.

It constitutes an important link in the correlation of Christ’s shepherding with contemporary shepherding.

I. THE SHEPHERD OF SOULS

The shepherding metaphor reveals the care-giver in the role of a steady companion and patient guide of the soul, who constantly provides healthy nourishment for the soul.

It is a consoling and refreshing image that combines and integrates diverse elements: nurture, wholesome feeding, leading, protecting and guarding the flock at rest.

Origen painted the metaphor beautifully in his commentary on the Song of Songs, where the Chief Shepherd was understood as Christ himself:

The Good Shepherd makes it His business to seek for the best pastures for His sheep, and to find green and shady groves where they may rest during the noonday heat.…

“He makes me lie down in green pastures, and leads me beside the waters of peace” (Ps.

23:2), thus making it clear that this Shepherd provides His sheep with water that is not only plentiful, but also wholesome and pure and utterly refreshing.

(Origen, The Song of Songs, Bk. 2, ACW 26, pp.

122–123, NEB

The metaphor functions intricately at several levels.

The shepherd does not care for every member of the flock in precisely the same way:

Keep an eye out for all parts of your flock, lest any one stumble by your negligence, and thereby perish.

For the layman watches out only for himself, but you watch out for all.

You carry a burden for all, a heavier load.

For it is written: “The Lord said to Aaron, ‘You, your sons and your father’s family are to bear the responsibility for offenses against the sanctuary, and you and your sons alone are to bear the responsibility for offenses against the priesthood’ ”(Num.

18:1, 2).

Since you are called to give an account of each one of the flock, take care of each one.

Preserve those that are sound, warn those that fall.

When you have assigned them fasting, give them ease by remission.

When with tears the offender begs readmission, receive him, and let the whole Church pray for him.

When by imposition of your hand you have admitted him, permit him to remain afterwards in the flock.

But for the drowsy and the careless, endeavour to convert and confirm, to warn and cure.

(Constitutions of the Holy Apostles, Bk.

II, Ch.

XVIII, Sec.

III, ANF VII, p. 403–404, NIV

The flexibility of the shepherding metaphor permits it to become imaginatively mixed and interwoven with other emergency metaphors and helping images, such as pilot or firefighter, as in Cyprian’s letter to Pomponius:

The Lord speaks and says: “And I will appoint over you shepherds after my own heart, who will shepherd you with instruction.”

(Cf.

Jer.

3.15).…

The ship must vigilantly be delivered from dangerous places lest it be broken among the cliffs and rocks.

The bundle must be drawn out quickly from the fire before it is burned up by the oncoming flames.

No one close to danger is safe for a long time.

Nor will the servant of God who has entangled himself in the snares of the enemy be able to escape.…

Therefore, dearly beloved Brother, take heed that the undisciplined be not consumed and perish, that you rule the brotherhood as far as possible with salutary counsels, and that you counsel each one for his salvation.

Steep and narrow is the way through which we enter into life.

(Cyprian, Letters, 4, sec.

2, 5, FC 51, pp.

11, 14; cf.

ANF V, p. 357f)*

The shepherd is fully responsible for guiding the flock to good pastures.

If the flock is negligently exposed to hazardous situations, the shepherd is fully accountable.

Schismatic teachers seek to divide the flock:

As children of the light (Eph.

5:8) of truth, flee from division and wrong teaching.

Wherever the shepherd goes, follow there as his sheep (John 10:10–12).

For there are many specious wolves who by evil design take captive those who are seeking after God.…

If anyone follows a maker of schism he “will not inherit the kingdom of God” (1 Cor.

6:9, 10).

(Ignatius of Antioch, To the Philadelphians, sec.

2–3, AF, pp.

104–105)*

The shepherd, in the ancient metaphor, was also a veterinarian, providing physical remedies for the ailments and sicknesses of the flock, and protecting each one from the risk of illness.

Although pastoral writers employed this dimension of the metaphor, the analogy was admittedly imprecise, as Chrysostom revealed, because human beings cannot be treated like sheep.

The shepherd’s doctoring of sheep is different than the pastor’s spiritual remedies amid personal crises:

Shepherds have full power to compel the sheep to accept the treatment if they do not submit of their own accord.

It is easy to bind them when it is necessary to use cautery or the knife, and to keep them shut up for a long time when that is the right thing, and to introduce different kinds of food one after another, and to keep them away from water.

And all other remedies the shepherds think will promote the animals’ health they apply with perfect ease.

But human diseases in the first place are not easy for a man to see.

“For who among men knows the thoughts of a man except the man’s spirit within him?” (1 Cor.

2:11).

How, then, can anyone provide the specific remedy for a disease if he does not know its character and often cannot tell whether the person is even ill?

When it later becomes apparent, then it has become all the more intractable.

You cannot treat human beings with the same authority with which the shepherd treats a sheep.

Here too it is possible to bind and to forbid food and to apply cautery and the knife, but the decision to receive treatment does not lie with the one who administers the medicine but actually with the patient.

(John Chrysostom, On the Priesthood, Ch.

II, sec.

2, pp.

55–56)*

The tradition was aware of the limits of its lead metaphor—shepherd of souls—since people are not really sheep.

The sheep doctor binds and coerces.

The soul doctor has only the power of persuasion, not coercion.

The metaphor best functions with an awareness of its limits.

II.

ACCOUNTABILITY OF THE SHEPHERD

The shepherd metaphor conflates several helping images: birthing, nurturing, feeding, guiding, and healing.

In all of these it connotes radical responsibility for others.

The assumption underlying this care is that the shepherd is finally accountable to God for whatever level of accountability he is specifically charged in ministry to others.

The pastoral writers reflected deeply upon the unusual extent to which pastors are responsible for others:

As you pipe, so they dance; as you teach, so they believe; as you proceed, so they follow.

Therefore, woe unto you if you teach erroneously; if you destroy and do not gather; if you deceive and do not shepherd; if you corrupt and do not convert!

Receive eyes of wisdom, that you may rightly teach and lead others.

(Menno Simons, Brief and Clear Confession, 1544, CWMS, p. 453)

Unlike other professionals who can flee when danger comes, soul care is committed to sharing the danger of those in its charge.

One cannot walk away from the flock, particularly during a moment under attack.

One of the most critical questions that pastoral writers had to decide in the earliest centuries of Christianity was to what extent it is conscienable for a pastor to abandon a flock when danger comes.

This became an urgent, practical question of soul care during the years of persecution through which Tertullian lived.

He was among a group of pastoral writers that took a rigorous view against “flight in time of persecution”:

When those in authority—I mean deacons, priests, and bishops—take flight, how is the mere layman to understand the sense in which it was said: “Flee from city to city?”

When the leaders run away, who of the common crowd can hope to persuade anyone to stand firm in battle?

Without a doubt, the good shepherd lays down his life for his sheep.…

He is a wicked shepherd who flees when he sees the wolf and leaves the flock to be devoured.…

And against them Ezechiel and Jeremias thunder with similar recriminations, in that they have not merely depended upon their sheep and fattened themselves, but they have themselves dispersed the flock and, without a leader to guide them, left them the prey to all the beasts of the field.

(Cf.

Ezech.

34.2 Jer.

23.1ff).

For, this is what happens when the church is deserted by the clergy in time of persecution.…

Those who have been given charge over the Church cannot flee in time of persecution.

If however, the flock were obliged to flee, then the shepherd would not be obliged to stand his ground.