[AI translation] My Christian Brothers and Sisters!
Today, all over the country, there is a lovely celebration in honour of mothers, or rather: in honour of parents - for why should we exclude fathers from this grateful commemoration?! It is true that love and respect for parents is not tied to a particular day of the year, just as God is not to be honoured only on a Sunday - but it is right that everyone should express their gratitude today, kissing their mother and father's hand or laying a few flowers on their graves. Let us not let this day in any of our lives pass without praying for our parents and embracing them in this way.
But let us not stop now at the memory of our parents, for parents, wittingly or unwittingly, always go beyond themselves. For the Christian man, everything in this world points to God, but most of all his parents. God's providence, guidance, love, forgiveness and blessing are known to the child through his parents. Calvin has a beautiful saying. So God entrusts a part, a portion, of the dignity of His fatherhood to earthly parents for a time, and through them begins to shepherd us. The parent is the first shepherd of the child, and it is his vocation to prepare the child's soul to receive the Word which Jesus thus spoke: I am the good shepherd. As the child grows, the parent's pastoral, fatherly mandate is more and more passed back to God, and the time comes when the parent's pastoral calling ceases altogether and gives way to the care of the Good Shepherd. Let us now direct our attention, then, to the grateful remembrance of our parents, all the way to the one true Good Shepherd, for this is the parents' chief vocation and destiny in life. Let us see who is our Shepherd, who is the one who cares for us above and beyond all things.
Jesus wants to have a very intimate and intimate relationship with us. To understand this, he compares the shepherd's attitude towards his sheep to that of a hireling. The main difference between the hireling and the shepherd is that the one does not graze his own sheep, while the other owns the flock. The sheep belong to the shepherd, so that means you belong to the risen Christ! Do you know what these simple, trite words mean to you, Brother? The first question of the Heidelberg Catechism is: "What is your only comfort in life and death?" And the answer is: "That I am not my own, both in body and soul, in life and in death, but belong to my faithful Saviour Jesus Christ..." A few days ago, at a conference, I heard an 80-year-old pastor, who was famous for knowing the whole Heidelberg Bible by heart, word for word, now suffering from a great illness, say.
Yes, we too should learn from the inside what great consolation it is to be the property of Jesus Christ! You are Christ's property, simply because He bought you, He paid the price for you that you cost, and I can tell you, you cost a lot, no one in the world could have paid that price except Him. In the Bible, it is precisely calculated what you cost Him: 'You were not redeemed with perishable things, silver or gold, but with precious blood, as of the Lamb of Christ, without blemish and without spot' (1 Peter 1:18-19).
Have we not seen, my brothers and sisters, how our souls are united with what I can say is mine? However much one may love children in general, how incomparably differently one feels towards one's own child, looks at and thinks of one's own child, than one thinks of any one else's! No matter how good one's heart is, he could never lavish so much love and sacrifice on another's child as on his own. Why? Simply because that child is not his own! And in the last analysis, his child is not really his, but is entrusted to him - he is not the owner of his child, he is only a hireling, entrusted with pastoral duties. But the owner is someone else. Jesus alone can say that this man or that man is mine, my property, as he says in verse 29 of the same passage, "My Father has given them to me, and no one can snatch them out of my hand" (John 10:29). Now, then, if even my love is so infinite for my child, who is not mine, what can Jesus' love be for me, who am all His? Do you see how much it means to you that you belong to Christ?! You belong to Him more fully, more truly and more truly than you did to your parents as a child.
There is nothing sadder to see than a little child abandoned by his parents, wandering alone in the world, belonging to no one, with no home anywhere. The tragedy of so many adults today is that they belong to no one, wandering alone. Well Brother, realize that you belong to Christ, you belong to someone, someone is telling you now: You are mine! I won't leave you alone, you can count on me, I'm with you! The basis of all Jesus' faithfulness and love for you is that he feels you as his own, more than you feel your child.
The Good Shepherd's faithfulness and love are especially evident in times of peril. Jesus says that the shepherd, when he sees the wolf coming, runs away, leaving the flock behind - but not so the shepherd. He confronts the wolf and protects the flock. Jesus calls Satan the wolf to give a sense of the reality of the devil's power. What Jesus is trying to express is that just as the wolf goes straight for the life of the lamb, so Satan's goal is the destruction of our lives. By life I mean here, of course, that life which alone deserves the name of life, that is, life at peace with God, eternal life, as it begins for the believer on earth and continues and is completed after death. It is this life that Satan seeks to extinguish in us. It is good, therefore, to know that Satan is never after our wealth, nor our physical health, nor is he an obstacle to our happiness and good fortune, nor jealous of our success. He allows all these things, and is very happy to promote them. He has more far-reaching purposes for us. He is out to get our lives, to prevent our salvation at all costs. He does not harm us here, but over there. "For what profit is it to a man, if he gain the whole world, but hurt his own soul?"
Then it is said in the Word that the wolf wants to spread the sheep, to scatter the flock. Satan knows very well what is the greatest strength of the people of God: that they pray together and listen to the Word together, that is, in brotherly fellowship. It is to such fellowship that Jesus promised his presence when he said, "Where two or three of you are gathered together in my name, there am I among you" (Mt 18,20). Satan has already scattered the flock of Christ's family: there are hardly any families left where the members of the family still pray together, where they have a house service, where they still take out the Bible and the old Sikhs and read from it in the quiet evenings. Satan also tries to draw the sheep away from the church Bible study. The last time we had a Bible study, there was only one participant. It is a tragic thing when members of a Bible study fellowship are scattered. This turn of events is always Satan's doing, his attempt to scatter the flock.
Let us be prepared for this church-dividing, church-shattering work of Satan to intensify in the time to come. As weak and fallen as the Christian churches are in the world, the churches of Christ are still the greatest obstacle to Satan's efforts, to Satan's work. Therefore, it is in Satan's interest to make the church redundant in the lives of people, to undermine the authority and discredit of the churches. It is therefore in the interest of this world and in the interest of all of us that the mother church of Christ should flourish and be strengthened, because it was to the church community of believers that Jesus said that the gates of hell shall not prevail against it. And now the gates of hell are closing in on this world. So do not help to scatter the flock yourself, do not break away from the brotherly fellowship, but seek to belong as closely as possible to the unity of the saints, to the mother church of Christ, the flock of the Good Shepherd.
Jesus speaks of wolves and sheep in order to give a sense of the magnitude of the danger and the invincible power of the enemy that is lurking over His Church and over all believers in it. Jesus also told His disciples that He would send them as sheep into the midst of the wolves. The situation of Christ's followers in this world is like sending sheep to the wolves. Oh, how hopeless would be the position of Christianity and the fate of every single Christian man in this Satanic world if only hirelings were to watch over them, that is, if only human help, armed force, laws were to be relied upon against the evil potentate. How good it is that our Shepherd is with us, and that He Himself fights the wolves to the death for us. "The Good Shepherd gives his life for the sheep," Jesus assures us in the Word. We already know that this has indeed happened: the Good Shepherd has indeed given his life for the sheep, demonstrating his self-sacrificing love and loyalty. But the wonderful thing is that Jesus' love for us did not end with Good Friday, with his death, but the faithfulness, love and help of the risen Christ continues to accompany us today, every day, in the midst of all the changes in our lives. There are very few true sheep of Christ in this world, and many wolves. But a single lamb and Christ together: they already constitute the more and represent the greater power. Let not the soul who belongs to the flock of Christ fear all the wolves of the world. Remember, Brother: the Good Shepherd gave His life for His sheep!
Finally, Jesus says: "I know my own, and my own know me". Have you ever thought how blessed it is for you that Jesus says that He knows you? Parents often complain that they don't know their children well enough, that they are hiding secrets from them, that they can't see into the depths of their souls. But how much better parents would be able to help their children with all sorts of problems if they knew them well. Well, my brother, Jesus knows you perfectly; and in this, too, His infinite love is manifested, so that, although He knows us perfectly, He does not turn away from us in disgust. Yet He knows all our weaknesses, all our wickedness, which, if men knew us, they would turn their backs on us and hate us. He would not! He loves us with all these things. He knows all your worries, all your troubles, He knows well what hurts, what burdens you carry. He knows your nature, reads your thoughts, obviously you have secrets from Him. Would He not understand you, could He not help you?! Why then do you not trust Him? In silent, intimate prayer, talk to Him about everything, He waits with an open heart for those who turn to Him.
It is only important that you know Him, because His sheep know Him! They know His voice, they know His words. Know His word, the Bible! The more you know Him, the more you will love Him. By praying, reading the Bible, and serving Him, you can come to know the risen, living Jesus Christ personally. In this way you can know His power to strengthen you day by day; His wisdom to counsel and guide you; His undeniable reality, His reality that decisively empowers and influences your life.
Behold, the Good Shepherd, who claims us as His own, who protects us even at the cost of His life, and who knows us to the depths of our souls. As you remember today, Brother, your mother and father, in whom the traits of the Good Shepherd first began to emerge before your child-self, remember that they fulfilled their vocation in your life when you came to know Jesus Christ through them, but beyond them.
Happy is the parent whose child can say with all the fullness of his heart the happy confession of faith, "The Lord is my shepherd, my keeper!"
In this sense, make your parents happy today!
Amen.
Date: 9 May 1943.