DOCTRINE AND FAITH....4th Sunday of Easter; Year B

(Acts. 4:8-12; 1Jn. 3:1-2; John 10:11-18; 4^th Sunday of Easter; Year B)

 

The image of the good shepherd painted today’s gospel, forcefully, brings out the profundity of the bond of love with which the son of man freely handed himself over to death in other to redeem mankind.  It was an act inspired, sustained and realized by love.  Love for the sheep finds no better expression than in the shepherd laying down his life for his flock: the good shepherd is one who lays down his life for his sheep.  This love that is ready to give all for the sake of the sheep is sharply contrasted with that of a hired man who offers only a perfunctory care and protection to the sheep. 

 

It was love that made the salvation of man realizable.  When the bond of friendship with God was broken on account of man’s rebellion, the inestimable love of God sought a restoration of this harmony in different ways and through his messengers, the prophets.  In Christ, this love of God found full expression; divinity condescended, became one with humanity and lifted it up!  In today’s second reading, St. John could not help but marvel at this love: “Think of the love that the Father has lavished on us, by letting us be called God’s children”.

 

Today we celebrate the Good shepherd who laid down his life for his sheep.  The depth of self-sacrifice we find in Christ challenges us to a renewed appreciation of the value God placed on man.  The latter’s constant unfaithfulness does not in any way dilute the intensity of this value.  Christ the Good Shepherd willingly paid the ultimate prize for the ransom of the strayed sheep that we are and made us his own.  This singular act makes us one with him, a fact which he makes clear in these words: I know my own and my own know me.

 

The best gratitude we, the sheep, can show to the Good Shepherd for laying down his life for us is to always strive to listen to his voice.  To belong to Christ implies the unconditional readiness to listen to his voice and follow his demands.  The sheep so ransomed with such a high, unequalled price must come to appreciate that the life it lives had been purchased at a high cost and so cannot be lived according to the dictates of personal convenience.  May we therefore, ask Christ the Good Shepherd to open our ears that we may always hear when he calls and follow him with undivided attention. Happy Sunday!
 +John I. Okoye