April 22, 2018
Easter 4
“A fiery horse with the speed of light, a cloud of dust, and a hearty, ‘Hi-yo Silver!’”
For many of us who were children in the 50s and 60s, those stirring words will always callup memories of one of the great TV heroes of that time period. And just who might that be? Anyone? “The Lone Ranger” Yes! After that spine-tingling opening, TV announcer, the late Fred Fay, would proclaim, as Silver reared up on his hind legs and raced down a hill, “Return with us now to those thrilling days of yesteryear . . . The Lone Ranger rides again!”
And while the last episode aired well over a half-century ago, the term “Lone Ranger” has entered our lexicon to refer to anyone who not only believes that he or she can “go it alone,” as the head of a business, a project, or practically anything---but then proceeds to act on that belief. It usually doesn’t turn out well. In fact, this Lone Ranger Syndrome typically leads either to a mercifully quick or, more often, the slow and painful death of whatever group or organization these persons are called to lead.
The irony of this, of course, for anyone who knows the backstory is that the original Lone Ranger was so named not because he chose to go it alone, but because he was the lone survivor of an ambush by outlaw Butch Cavendish and his notorious Hole-in-the-Wall gang. Badly wounded, he was found in a cave by, in those days, an “Indian”; today a “native American” named Tonto. Together with the Lone Ranger, wearing a mask and firing silver bullets, they fought crime in the early west. Each episode would end with someone they had helped holding one of the silver bullets, left behind as a token and wondering out loud, “Who was that masked man, anyway?”
Who knows; had the show’s producers chosen to call it, “The Lone Survivor,” perhaps the phrase wouldn’t have caught on, and thousands of families, businesses, and (especially) churches would have been spared the dysfunction that inevitably accompanies “Lone Ranger” leadership. Maybe, but I doubt it. Whether they have a cool-sounding nickname or not, the Lone Ranger style of leadership has a long and painful history, going all the way back to Moses, who was finally told by his father-in-law Jethro, in Chapter 18 of Exodus, to stop going it alone and to share his duties by getting some help. Thankfully, Moses listened to Jethro and appointed others to help him share the responsibilities of leading the people of Israel. Unfortunately, however, as we look around us today, from families to businesses, both small and large, from the Kremlin to the White House, and of course to churches—we find that the Lone Ranger model of leadership is alive and well in the world—with predictably disastrous results. I suspect that we have all known and probably have suffered under such leadership in our lifetimes; maybe we’ve even modeled such leadership ourselves in the past before realizing the damage we were doing, both to ourselves and others.
And while trying to be a Lone Ranger kind of leader is ultimately harmful to any organization or family, nowhere is it more harmful than in churches—the Body of Christ—where every member of the Body is blessed with unique gifts from God that are meant to be used for the benefit of all.
It is especially harmful when those called to pastor churches see themselves as a Lone Ranger or a Lone Shepherd to the flock they are called to serve. Because, as Jethro so wisely pointed out to his son-in-law Moses thousands of years ago, this style of leadership is the very antithesis of what God envisions for His people. And while that was true back in those Exodus days, nowhere is this more evident than in the ministry of God’s only son, Jesus Christ, whom we often refer to as the Good Shepherd. On this Fourth Sunday of Easter, Episcopal Churches across America and Anglican Churches across the world are celebrating Good Shepherd Sunday.
The Good Shepherd stories of Jesus, primarily in John’s Gospel, find Jesus referring to Himself as the Good Shepherd and then demonstrating just how a good shepherd goes about pastoring his or her flock: by calling each one by name; by enabling and then empowering them to carry on God’s work in the world, and not hovering over them like a “helicopter priest,” or sticking so close to them, like a “velcro” priest, that they hardly feel entrusted or empowered.
Because when this happens, the damage left in the wake of such a Lone Ranger priest is almost incalculable—leaving congregations nearly paralyzed and unable to function; or, as we read in Mark’s Gospel: “When Jesus saw the huge crowd, he had compassion on them, because they were like sheep without a shepherd. So he began teaching them many things.”
“Sheep without a shepherd” captures perfectly the state of a congregation following the departure of a Lone Ranger priest. I speak from experience. My very first call as a Rector was at a small parish in Western Pennsylvania. Looking back, I can now see that there were questions I should have asked, signs I should have picked up on during the interview and on-site visits. But I was too inexperienced to ask the right questions or to pick up on the signs, and frankly, in hindsight, probably too focused on just getting the call
So, I got the call and in August of 1991 we moved our family which at that time included then 9-year-old Justin and 3-year-old Gabriela, across country from Berkeley, California to Western Pennsylvania. I got my first glimpse of what lay ahead of me during my first full week on the job when the Treasurer and Senior Warden came to me wondering what I was planning to do for a Stewardship Campaign to fund the 1992 budget. Now, to be honest, my first thought was that they must be playing a practical joke on the new rector from California—some kind of regional Western Pennsylvania humor—bad humor to be sure—but I was willing to be a good sport about it. But, No, they were not kidding, and I soon found out to my growing amazement . . . and frankly terror . . . that the previous rector, “Father Denny,” had apparently planned and carried out, with the assistance of his wife—who, by the way, was still on the Vestry—a little fact the Search Committee failed to mention—had planned and carried out every Stewardship Campaign during his six years as rector. The laity, to the extent they were involved at all, were given the role of go-fers—copying documents, addressing and stuffing envelopes, and the like. With only this model of ministry to go by from their Lone Ranger shepherd, my new flock had apparently been anxiously awaiting my arrival to show up and perform, while they sat on the sidelines. And while we somehow got through the Stewardship crisis together, the repercussions and the damage left in the wake of that Lone Ranger, Father Denny, were far from over. During that first year, and especially the first six months, it seemed that whenever a question would arise—from the trivial, like where the props and costumes for the Christmas Pageant were stored, or the whereabouts of the snow blower—because I learned one Sunday morning in late November that clearing the church sidewalks of snow was also one of those chores that didn’t quite make its way into the job description I had signed up for. Because while our Gospel does say five times that the good shepherd is willing to lay down his life for his sheep, that does not translate into doing everything for them. And while Jesus did literally die for us—the better translation of “lay down,” from the New Testament Greek, says that the good shepherd, “sets aside his or her life for the sheep.” And while Terri and I had certainly set aside our legal careers for this calling, we set them aside and took the path laid before us by God, not to perform on the center stage of whatever parishes we were called to serve, as the parish members sat in the pews offering nods of approval. Because that style of ministry is exactly what results in dysfunctional churches, once the Lone Ranger pastor has ridden off into the sunset to create dysfunction and dependence at yet another church.
My first small parish in Western Pennsylvania was a classic example of just such a church. I actually went along with this, “call Father Denny” silliness for a few months, frankly because I wasn’t sure exactly what to do in order to effectively break this total dependence on an absent rector. I remember very clearly, however, theday I drew the line and put it to a stop. I had gone to the local video store to rent a movie I wanted to reference in Sunday’s sermon. I hadn’t seen it for a while, and I wanted to refresh my recollection. It had come out just a few years earlier and was bathed in controversy. Maybe some of you remember it, “The Last Temptation of Christ,” an adaptation of the 1955 novel of the same name, by Nikos Kazantzakis. Anyway, the owner of the store knew who I was of course . . . small town!—and when I presented this movie to rent, he asked me if I was sure that I wanted to rent that particular movie. I told him that “Yes, I was absolutely sure I wanted the movie,” and then asked him why he would even ask the question. I was then shocked to have him tell me that Father Denny had apparently “forbidden” church members to rent this movie . . . and they had obeyed him!
It was a very small town, and apparently Father Denny was on good terms with the video store owner. That was a turning point in my ministry there. Never again did we “call Father Denny” for anything! We just figured things out—all of us together as co-shepherds laying down or setting aside our individual and collective lives for the good of the Body of Christ—the church.
We have strong evidence that this very style of ministry—everyone working together for the common good—is exactly the way that the early church functioned; until, that is, the 4th century. It was then when Christianity was “legalized” by the Emperor Constantine; and the Church, and especially its leaders, both lay and ordained, began to bear an unsettling resemblance to the secular ruling class—with more and more power being held by the ordained leaders.
This was clearly not the model for church ministry envisioned by Jesus, the Good Shepherd. In Chapter 9 of Matthew’s Gospel we read that as Jesus, “ . . . went through all the towns and villages, teaching in their synagogues, proclaiming the good news . . . and healing every disease, that when he saw the crowds, he had compassion on them, because they were harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd.” What has happened over the centuries is that some clergy who aspire to the Lone Ranger model of ministry have pointed to this very passage to justify their actions, and at least one entire denomination has opted to place ultimate power and control in a single individual. And yet, to extrapolate the comment by Jesus about “sheep without a shepherd,” to the present day either to justify running a parish or an entire denomination as a Lone Ranger is to ignore what Jesus said, just a few sentences later to His disciples: “The harvest is plentiful, but he laborers are few. Therefore ask the Lord of the harvest to send laborers out into the harvest.” And in the Post-Resurrection, Post-Ascension Church, those laborers are all of the baptized who serve God as co-shepherds to each other and to the world His Son died to save. And while some of us co-shepherds have been called to the ordained ministry, we are all equal in the sight of God and in our case, at least, in the sight of the church, as our Catechism makes quite clear on page 855 of the prayer book where, in response to the question, “Who are the ministers of the church?” The answer states quite unequivocally that “The ministers of the church are lay persons, bishops, priests, and deacons.” The Catechism goes on to define that it is the ministry of the laity to “ . . . represent Christ and His church; to bear witness to Him wherever they may be; and, according to the gifts given them, to carry on Christ’s work of reconciliation in the world and to take their places in the life, worship, and governance of the church.”
What I just quoted is your job description. Mine is on the next page and is pretty much the same, except priests are also tasked with being a pastor to the people and sharing with the bishop in the “overseeing,” not the running, of the church, along with preaching, administering the sacraments, blessing, and pardoning sins in God’s name.
The point is that we all have our calling, our “jobs,” if you will, as we labor together in the Lord’s great mission on earth. A mission which, by the way, includes as we heard from Jesus in today’s Gospel, reaching out to those other sheep that do not belong to this fold . . . so that there will be “one flock, one shepherd.” And, while we know that when Jesus spoke these words, those other sheep referred to the Gentiles, or non-Jews, today they refer to anyone who is not in the Christian sheepfold—especially those who may want to be here, serving with us as co-shepherds, but who have experienced discrimination, prejudice, and exclusion from other churches or individuals, calling themselves Christians. These lost and excluded sheep are out there now, milling around in the world as today’s sheep without a shepherd. You probably rub elbows with some of these lost sheep every day, and it is your “catechism call” to represent Christ, the Good Shepherd, to these lost sheep and lead them to this fold at St. Luke’s.
Because Jesus is counting on us, counting on you. He refuses to do it alone. And while we all love that screen hero who rides in on the proverbial white horse, fixes everything, and gets rid of the bad guys before riding off into the sunset, experience and scripture teaches us that such heroes like the Lone Ranger succeed only in the fictional world of darkened theatres, where screenwriters and special effects make sure that there’s always a happy ending. Life is rarely like that, and let’s be honest: While he got top billing, how far, really, would the Lone Ranger have gotten without Tonto? Ours is a shared ministry, and we are co-shepherds in God’s great work. I happen to be an ordained co-shepherd, but we are all of equal status as ministers in carrying out Christ’s Great Commission. And let’s face it, at times each of us has a Lone Ranger inside of us, ready to burst out, and that’s okay, so long as we remember that we are all doing God’s work and that we then rein him or her in, before any damage is done. So long as we remember that real disciples don’t care who gets the credit and that without Tonto, the Lone Ranger would never have lived long enough to “ride again in those thrilling days of yesteryear. ‘Hi-yo Silver. Away!’” Amen.