Counting the Cost
John 10:11–18
University Christian Church, Seattle, WA
May 7, 2006
Rev. Sandy Messick

• Deal or no deal. Do these words ring a bell? They would if you’ve been watching the new hit game show. Deal or no deal. Kind of like the old “Let’s make a deal” but with a new twist. A contestant begins with 30 little suitcases spread across the stage. In those cases are dollar amounts ranging from $1 to $1million. The contestant begins by choosing a case to keep. Then he or she gets to open the other cases one by one revealing the amounts they didn’t pick. Every so often, the mystery man in the booth above the stage calls down to the host to offer a deal. Depending on how many cases have been opened, and how many large amounts are still left in play, the mystery man will offer to buy the contestant’s case on the spot for a certain amount. The contestant then needs to figure the odds, what are the chances that the amount in my case is more than the amount I’m being offered. What’s the risk if I say yes. What’s the risk if I say no. Deal or no deal.
• It’s all about counting the cost. Figuring out the cost effectiveness to know whether something is a good deal…or not. And we do it all the time.
• We do it in the grocery story as we’re trying to figure out whether to buy the small size that costs less, or the bigger size that’s cheaper per ounce. I mean, sure the regular size of spaghetti sauce costs a little more, but would I ever need a two gallon can of spaghetti sauce, even if it is cheaper per ounce. Cost effectiveness. Counting the cost.
• We do it when we’re buying insurance, health or life or home or car. Weighing the amount of the deductible versus the cost of the premium. How much do we really need? What are the chances we’ll really need it at all? Cost effectiveness. Deal or no deal.
• And make no mistake, the insurance companies are doing the same thing. They take into account whether you’re overweight, or a smoker or in a high risk profession. They ask what kind of car you drive, does it have air bags, anti-lock brakes. When we moved to Seattle from Spokane and had to get home owner’s insurance for our new home, the agent wanted to know not only how old and how big and was it in a flood zone, but whether or not we had a trampoline in the back yard or a pit bull or Doberman dog in the house. Greater risks you know. Counting the costs. What are the risks they’ll have to pay out on a claim? It’s all about cost effectiveness.
• Interestingly there was a study by a tobacco company in the Czech Republic that claimed to show that smoking was cost effective for the government. It seemed the more smokers a country had the better, because it meant the less the government would have to pay out in elder care and housing for the elderly. Counting the costs. Deal or no deal.

• Somehow though, Jesus seemed to have missed that lecture. Jesus doesn’t seem to know much about counting costs or cost effectiveness.
• This passage from John portrays Jesus as the good shepherd who lays down his life for his sheep. Now how impractical is that? What good is a dead shepherd anyway? And Jesus seems to know how impractical that sounds because he goes on to say how the hired hands wouldn’t do the same. The hired hands would count the cost when they saw the wolf coming and decide that retreat was the better part of valor. The hired hands would leave the sheep unprotected and save themselves. But not so the shepherd. The good shepherd, the image we see in scripture, is one who loves the sheep even more than his own life.
• Jesus didn’t make up this image of the good shepherd. He’d heard it before. It’s found in the other scripture for this morning, the 23 rd Psalm. The Lord is my shepherd, I have everything I need. And it’s found in Isaiah 40:Like a shepherd he will care for his flock, gathering the lambs in his arms. Hugging them as he carries them.
• And then there’s the parable Jesus told about the shepherd. Remember the one about the 99 sheep, but one was lost. Remember how the shepherd left the 99 and went after the one and didn’t stop looking until the missing one was found.
• Now that’s impractical! That doesn’t make any sense at all. The shepherd still had 99 sheep. Only one was missing. Only 1%. Certainly that’s an acceptable level of loss. The shepherd clearly wasn’t a very good business person. But he was a very good shepherd. Because even one in 100 is too many to lose. Even the one out of 100 is worth saving.
• I preached a sermon on that parable once. Back in my early years of ministry when I actually thought I knew something. But I made a mistake. I made the mistake of preaching that sermon in Penfield, Illinois, a little town in the middle of nowhere. I preached that sermon in a tiny church in this tiny town that actually had a sheep farmer as a member and she was in church that day. I preached about how impractical that shepherd was to leave the 99 to go after just 1. How it wasn’t cost effective. How it didn’t make sense. After the sermon she approached me, shaking her head. “ Sandy,” she said, “You just don’t understand. You just don’t understand how it is with us shepherds. We love our sheep. We’d do anything to protect them.”

• And that’s the point isn’t it. That’s the point of the parable of the lost sheep. That’s the point of Psalm 23 and Isaiah 40 and John chapter 10. The shepherd loves the sheep. The shepherd knows each sheep by name and calls each one out of the wilderness and into God’s fold. The shepherd gathers all of the sheep from all of the folds in all of the world and leads them to still waters and through valleys of the shadow of death and into good pastures. And the good shepherd is not content to lose even one, even if the price of being a good shepherd is one’s very own life.
• It’s not very cost effective. It’s not very practical. It doesn’t make much sense, at least to us city folk. But to a shepherd….
• A few years back a terrible wildfire swept through Yellowstone leaving behind death and destruction and a wide swath of scorched trees. After the fire, some park rangers set off up the hillside to investigate the damage. As they went they couldn’t help but be stunned by the scorched and dead trees. At the base of one of those trees, one of the rangers found the petrified ashes of a dead bird. Feeling sick at the sight, the ranger knocked over the bird with a stick. To his surprise, from beneath the dead, three baby chicks came running out. The mother bird, apparently sensing impending disaster, had taken her chicks to the base of the tree, covered them with her wings and sheltered them through the firestorm. She could have saved herself. She could have flown away. But she didn’t. She stayed with her babies through the worst of the storm. Even giving up her life for theirs. Not content to lose even one.
• Now that’s love. A mother’s love. A shepherd’s love. God’s love. Thanks be to God for such impractical but ultimately gracious love.