Wadhams United Church of Christ
2569 County Route 10, Wadhams, NY 12993
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Sermon by Steve Smith          Order of Service

The Shepherd's Keep: Cup-Filler     

March 2, 2008                                             Psalm 23        

         They say the air gets thinner the higher you go. I discovered that truth when we went to Colorado Springs to visit with our daughter: the elevation in town was a lofty 6000 feet plus. But it was especially true during the treacherous hike I had undertaken. At the bottom, the temperature had been warm and balmy, but as I neared the summit, it had plunged below the freezing mark. The wind had picked up, and the snow was swirling ever faster. Each labored step was a hard-fought victory over the hostile elements, each rasping breath another piercing stab to my over-worked lungs.
         Sure, there were plenty of times when I wanted to quit, but keeping my goal firmly fixed before me, I trudged on through soul-numbing weariness. Just when I thought my lungs would burst, and right when my legs refused to take another step, the icy wind took a quick break, the snow stopped for a moment, and I could see the summit. Crawling the last few feet up the slippery peak, I planted my flag, wiped the frosty smear from my goggles, and turned to enjoy the view. It was like I was standing on top of the world. The valleys below tumbled down toward distant vistas, snow-capped peaks loomed below me, and I was the conqueror of my domain.      
         I was quickly becoming lost in my reverie and my oxygen deprivation when a strange, unexpected noise came bursting in upon my consciousness. It sounded like something out of place up here at the top of the world. It clashed with my surroundings and left me feeling disoriented and confused. It sounded as if someone was leaning on a car horn. As I turned to grasp this new and unexpected reality, a jeering voice called out from the wilderness: “Hey! Sir Hilary! Would you mind climbing down off the hood of the car?” It sounded like my wife’s voice. “And while you’re at it, would you take that stupid flag off the antenna? It’s interfering with the radio signal.”
It was my wife’s voice. So much for the power-point slide show I was going to show everyone when I got back home. It was all just a fantasy. How many times have we imagined that we were going to be king or queen of some vast domain? How many of us dreamed that we were going to climb to the peak of our chosen field, only to have our dreams dashed by a bitter cold splash of reality? How often did we stand up to the daunting challenges we were facing, firmly fixed in our belief that we could change the world, or at least some small corner of it, and leave it in better shape than when we arrived? How often did we dare to defy a rarefied atmosphere in our effort to pursue a greater cause, to see justice prevail, to see mercy become a reality in someone else’s life, to embody a sacrificial love so that someone starved for love could have a small sip of that life-giving fountain?
Jesus, our Good Shepherd, dared to climb such a hostile summit. He met with hardship and opposition nearly every step of the way, his lungs were truly at the bursting point with every labored step he took on the pathway to the cross, and he had known the piercing stab of thorn and flog. There was no pregnant pause for him as he was hoisted to the top of a pole on the summit of a hill. The domain he viewed must have been bleaker than the grave. The jeering voices were no fantasy, nor the embarrassment and humiliation to which he had been cruelly subjected.
He had dared to dream that he could be God’s masterful servant in the new realm that God wanted to bring to earth. He had dreamed of climbing to the peak of prophetic glimpses of God’s New Creation. He stood up to the daunting challenges thrown against him, fixed in his belief that by the grace of God, he could bring transformation to this troubled world, and that the entire world could benefit from his having been here. He dared to defy a rarefied religious atmosphere in his effort to pursue a greater cause, to see justice prevail, to see mercy become a reality in someone else’s life, to embody a sacrificial love so that someone starved for love could have a small sip of that life-giving fountain.
And this was his reward: brutal treatment and a cruel death; jeering voices and scattered disciples; wounded flesh and a broken heart. This was his prize for a life poured out in love: enemies gathered round to watch him suffer his just reward. I wonder if these words ever haunted his thoughts: you prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies… He had shared a table with his friends a few short hours before all this. You anoint my head with oil… his head had been anointed, all right, but with blood, not with oil. My cup runneth over… he had asked God to take this cup away, but apparently the answer had been a resounding NO!
King David had known both triumph and defeat. In those seasons of triumph, he had adopted the customs of his time and kept his vanquished foes alive after their capture. In their humiliated state, they would be forced to watch the king and his guests while they ate a sumptuous feast. Their hungry eyes would be focused on the scraps that were tossed or dropped or brushed from the table. Anything that fell on the ground was theirs. From hosting such feasts to scrambling at the feet of guests to scavenge their food, how the mighty had fallen. But Jesus’ foes had appeared to win: the one who had drawn crowds so easily when he was at the peak of his power was now drawing crowds that demanded his death. How the mighty one had fallen, and how his foes voiced their throaty approval for his agonizing death.
You anoint my head with oil… When David had been anointed king, the elders of the town had met the prophet Samuel with fear and trembling. When Jesus was crowned “King of the Jews” with a crown made of piercing thorns, his followers were filled with fear and trembling. When a woman with a questionable background anointed his feet, the guests were insulted and the host questioned Jesus’ integrity. No, Jesus had spent his adult life trying to make the point that he was no ordinary king, no common leader who had gone into kingdom-making for personal gain and profit. His body of work would be heaped with condemnation and rejection, not with praise and commendation.
But was there some deeper truth that had inspired his sacrificial lifestyle? It was a good many years before I came across the connection of this phrase about anointing to the pastoral world of the common shepherd. It came into play during the birthing season, when the ewes would bring their young into the world under the watchful eyes of their shepherd. The shepherds had discovered that they could reduce infection and disease among the new-born lambs by administering a medicinal mix of oil and herbs. As the little lambs came into the world, they were anointed with an elixir that would protect their eyes, their ears, their mouths, and nostrils from a toxic world.
Even as Jesus had been anointed with sacred water as he was baptized into his ministry as Messiah, would he know the anointing touch of his Shepherd as he was pushed from this world into the next? Would that anointing into eternal life and eternal love bring about the changes he and his God had wanted to bring into this world? Would he be able to accomplish in death that which had been denied him in mortal life here on earth? Could the entire world benefit from his having been here? Scoffers and cynics still want to dismiss him as a deluded fool with a messiah complex, and as evidence they point to the horrors that people have perpetrated in the name of Jesus.
It’s interesting to me that these same folks want to ignore the body of work that has been amassed since that fateful day when Jesus was King of the Hill. They don’t seem to want to admit that it was the followers of Jesus who established medical centers for people who couldn’t afford to pay for the care, or who have ministered to hundreds of millions of the hungry, or who provided homes for orphans, or widows who had no place else to go. People who have been inspired by his life and death have gone on to create schools and community centers and programs to help people overcome their addictions. Some of the most moving music in history was inspired by Jesus, along with some of the world’s greatest literary works.
As Jesus laid his life down for his flock, he anointed them with a royal power to go out into our confused and disoriented world with a message of hope and grace, peace and mercy. The anointing touch of our Shepherd lingers still on all the lambs being ushered into this toxic world of scoffing cynics. Like  lambs heeding the voice of their unseen Shepherd, these masterful servants have fanned out across the peaks and valleys of the entire world to bring a taste of God’s life-giving love to those who have been told by circumstance and cynic that they are unlovable, unworthy of the life that millions of others seem to enjoy. In the very presence of the taunting, sneering cynics who said it couldn’t and shouldn’t be done, these anointed lambs have brought praise and commendation to the name of the lamb slaughtered for the sake of the flock.
My cup runneth over… The overflowing cup was a symbol of blessedness and prosperity. The average person would have to carefully measure the amount of wine they used each day so that there would be enough to last until the next harvest season. Only the wealthy and those who’d had an exceptionally good growing season could afford to fill and refill their cups. On special occasions, however, such as weddings, even the subsistence farmers would make sure that their guests had as much wine as they wanted. To do anything less would be an insult to the invited guests.
But when Jesus had shared his final meal with his disciples, they had passed a single cup around the room. His years in ministry had not made him an especially wealthy or powerful man. In fact, quite the opposite had been true. The purse-keeper had to be stingy in order to make their limited funds last until the next big gift. They had been seen out in a field scavenging through the unharvested stalks of grain in order to put something into their starving bellies. They depended on the largesse of others as they traveled from town to town, and Jesus’ instructions to his leaders clearly indicated that he wanted them to continue in this new tradition.
Jesus had drained his cup to its bitter bottom, and the cup he was handing over to his disciples was decidedly empty, not flowing over. In fact, his parting image of that empty cup to his bewildered followers was a distinctly distasteful one, so repugnant that people today are still turned off by its cannibalistic overtones. This cup would only be filled as a result of his suffering, and its contents, he told them, would be his very blood. In order for the blessing cup to be filled to overflowing, he was telling them, he would need to suffer and die.
How many of us have had dreams of being the king or queen of our domains? Probably all of us. How many of us dreamed that we were going to climb to the peak of our chosen field, only to have our dreams dashed by a bitter cold splash of reality? Quite a few of us. How often have we believed that we could change the world, or at least some small corner of it, and leave it in better shape than when we arrived? I daresay all of us have been there. And as our fantasies came crashing in around us, we became painfully aware of how empty our cups were.

The good news is that our emptiness brings us over and over again to the source of replenishment. The good news is that our neediness drives us again and again into the arms of the good shepherd, for it is there that we can sip again from the life-giving fountain of love, and be filled to overflowing so that we in turn can go out to fill the cups of others. There can be no greater recourse to our disappointment than to go out in turn to fill the cups of others who have known heartbreak, tragedy, or disappointment.

Order of Service     March 2, 2008          Back to Sermon
"NC" refers to The New Century Hymnal, The Pilgrim Press (1995)

Welcome, Announcements & Prayer Requests

A Candle for Peace NC #575, verse 5
Call to Worship  
Leader: God of light and life, open our eyes & hearts.
People: Open our ears and our minds. Open our lives to your ways.
Leader: Shepherding God, guide us on this Lenten journey.
People: Reveal your pathways of love and justice, that we may walk as your children.
Leader: May our vision be your vision.
People: Help us to see your vision for the world, that we may work as your disciples and live as your people.
Leader: Fill us with your Holy Spirit, that we may worship you in the Spirit of your love.
Hymn NC #4             Joyful, Joyful
Responsive Prayer    
Leader: God of amazing grace, forgive our blind spots that keep us from seeing you; forgive our blind spots that keep us from seeing others as you see them.
People: Forgive our avoidance of your healing presence and your revealing spirit.
Leader: Touch us now with your love. Help us to overcome our fear. Help us to praise you for your healing touch as you repair the damaged parts of our lives.
People: Help us to know your amazing grace, trusting that we who were once lost are now forever found by your love.
Leader: God of the seasons, encourage us in this time when winter seems so long and dark. We pray for all the areas in our country that have been hit by winter storms.
People: We thank you for the people who care for the elderly and those who are alone. We thank you for the workers who plow the roads and restore power to our homes.
Leader: We thank you for the shelters who take in the homeless, the cold, those whose homes have been damaged or destroyed.
People: We pray for our country. Be merciful to us. Show us how to be salt and light in a culture that is becoming less open to direct expressions of faith.
Leader: We pray for our families. You know what their needs are. Show us how to meet those needs.
Pastoral Prayer, Lord’s Prayer       
Hymn NC #25            O God Our Help in Ages Past
Psalm 89:19-33, 1 Samuel 16:1-13, John 12:1-11
Sermon                    The Shepherds’ Keep: Cup-Filler
Offering, Doxology, Dedication
Hymn NC #190              Beneath the Cross of Jesus
Benediction (from Psalm 121)
Leader: Send us forth, Gracious God, with the words of the Psalmist: You, O Lord, are our keeper.
People: You, O Lord, are the shade at our right hand.
Leader: The sun will not strike us by day, nor the moon by night.
People: You, O Lord, will keep us from evil. God will keep our lives.
Leader: The blessing of God go with you. The Lord will keep your going out and your coming in from this time forth and forever more.

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