• Another Look,  Psalm 23, by Rev. Cindy Weber (see below)

• The Eyes Have It, John 9:1-41, by Rev. Steven Loftis

• Double Exposure,  Ephesians 5:8-14 , by Rev. Randy L. Quinn

• Sight and Insight, John 9:1-41, by Rev. Randy L Quinn 

• Oh Say, Can You See?,  John 9:1-41 by Rev. Thomas Hall 

• The Good Shepherd, Psalm 23,  by Rev. Thomas Hall 

• Jesus the Loving Shepherd, Psalm 23,  by Rev. Thomas Hall

• We all Like Sheep, Psalm 23,  by HW in HI

• Telling the Christmas Story, Psalm 23, by DP in DL

• Rise'n Shine, Sleepyhead! Eph. 5:8-14,  by D. Dobberstein

• New Sight, John 9:1-41, by MH in Austin

• Willful Blindness vs the Desire to See, John 9:1-41, by Jim from BC

• Reader's Theater: A Man Born Blind Receives Sight, John 9:1-41, by Anne in Providence

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Another Look
a sermon based on Psalm 23
by Rev. Cindy Weber

(This sermon borrows from Walter Brueggemann’s sermon: “Trusting in the Water-Oil-Food Supply” from The Threat of Life, pp.90-96.)

I heard a story once about these prisoners who had been together so long that whenever they told jokes, instead of actually telling the whole joke, they would just call out the number of the joke, and everyone would crack up. One day a new guy came in, and experienced this for the first time. One of the inmates said, “Joke number 3,” and everyone just laughed and laughed. Then another one of them said, “Joke number 12,” and that one was even funnier, evidently, because they laughed until they cried. Then another one of them said, “Joke number 9,” but this time no one laughed at all, not one bit. The new guy said, “What happened? Why didn’t anyone laugh?” One of the other prisoners replied, “Aw, that guy never could tell a joke.”

For those of us who have been brought up in the church, we could probably, like those prisoners, instead of actually reading scripture, or quoting scripture, just say the book, chapter and verse, and the others of us would be able to respond accordingly. For example, if I said to you, “John 3:16,” you would know what I meant. Or if I said, “Genesis 1:1,” you’d know that, too. But perhaps the one that you would be able to respond to best of all is Psalm 23, or as we usually call it, The 23rd Psalm.

I recently read a sermon of Walter Brueggemann’s based on this psalm, and with some of that in mind, I’d like to walk us through this beloved Psalm, or poem, because that’s what a psalm is, this morning.

“The Lord is my shepherd,” begins the Psalmist. Perhaps one of the reasons that we love this Psalm so much is that it begins and ends with the Lord…The Lord, or Yahweh, which Brueggemann uses, and which I like because it connects us to the God of the Israelites, to the God of Moses, I Am Who I Am…Yahweh…Yahweh is my shepherd.

There’s a painting that Robert and I have in our house of green hills, a stream, some sheep. It is a peaceful scene, somewhere that I’d often like to be. And that’s probably what comes to most of our minds when we hear the first line of this Psalm. But Brueggemann points out that in the Bible, the word “shepherd” is a political one. “It means king, sovereign, lord, authority, the one who directs, to whom I am answerable, whom I trust and serve.” And so this psalm begins, not with some warm and fuzzy statement, but rather with a very strong, very clear statement of allegiance. [continue]