North Carolina Christian Advocate, September 20, 2005

“FOLLOW ME!”

by Rev. Paul T. Stallsworth
[What follows was preached, on Easter IV (April 17), at St. Peter’s United Methodist Church of Morehead City, NC.  It is an edited version of the “Homily of His Eminence Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger,” which was preached at the Funeral Mass of Pope John Paul II, at St. Peter’s Square, on April 8.  This is a long-standing Wesleyan practice, for John Wesley himself often edited and employed the works of others, with the attribution required by his times, for the benefit of his people.]

1.  Jesus said: “I am the good shepherd.  The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep...  No one takes it from me, but I lay it down of my own accord...this charge I have received from my Father.” (John 10:11,18, RSV here and following)  Jesus Christ speaks of the Good Shepherd; and the Good Shepherd is Jesus Christ Himself.  Even so, the Good Shepherd needs other, lesser but still important shepherds, for His sheep.  With “Follow me!,” the Good Shepherd calls forth these other shepherds.

2.  “Follow me!” (John 21:22)  The Good Shepherd speaks these words to Peter.  These two words are the last words spoken by the Good Shepherd, on earth, to Peter.  Our Lord chooses Peter to shepherd His flock.  But in shepherding the flock, Peter’s first responsibility is following, following the Good Shepherd Jesus Christ.

     After hearing the Good Shepherd’s command, “Follow me!,” Peter obeys.  In following the Good Shepherd, Peter feeds and tends the flock, the Church, in its earliest years.

3.  Nearly 2,000 years after the Good Shepherd called Peter with “Follow me!,” he called Karol Jozef Wojtyla (voy-TEE-wah) with the same two words.  Christ said “Follow me!” to Karol Wojtyla not once, but many times.  Again and again, Wojtyla heard these words from Jesus Christ.  By God’s grace, Wojtyla obeyed.  And because Wojtyla faithfully followed the Good Shepherd, he became in God’s time a good and a great pope for the Roman Catholic Church, for the Church universal (including The United Methodist Church), and for the world.

4.  “Follow me!”

     At an early age, Karol Wojtyla lost his Christian mother to death.  During his young adulthood, Karol lost his deeply devout father, to death.  Despite these numbing tragedies, this young Polish man gave himself completely to Jesus Christ, as Jesus’ mother Mary had.  Totus tuus.  Totally yours.

5.  “Follow me!”

     As a young student, Karol Wojtyla was thrilled by literature, the theater, and poetry.  Working in a chemical plant, surrounded and threatened by the Nazi terror, he heard the voice of our Lord say, “Follow me!”  In this unusual setting, Karol read books of philosophy and theology, and he entered an underground seminary to prepare for the priesthood.  After World War II, he completed his theological studies.  On November 1, 1946, Karol was ordained into the Roman Catholic priesthood.

     When writing about the priesthood, which he dearly loved, Karol referred often to three passages from The Gospel According to St. John.  In these three verses, we see the heart and soul of John Paul II.

     First verse: “You did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you that you should go and bear fruit and that your fruit should abide...” (John 15:16)  He went untiringly everywhere -- like a latter-day John Wesley -- in order to bear fruit, fruit that lasts.  Rise! Let Us Be on Our Way! is the title of his next-to-last book.  With “Rise, let us be on our way!,” words spoken by Jesus to His disciples in the Garden of Gethsemane, Karol Wojtyla roused others from a lazy faith, from the sleep into which all disciples can fall.  

     Second verse: “The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep.” (John 10:11)  Karol was a priest to the last, for he offered his life to God, for his flock, and for the entire human family, in a daily self-sacrifice -- especially amid the sufferings of his final months.  In this way, he became one with Christ, the Good Shepherd who loves His sheep.

     Third verse: “As the Father has loved me, so have I loved you; abide in my love.” (John 15:9)  Karol Wojtyla tried to meet as many people as possible, to forgive and open his heart to all (even to his attempted murderer), and to tell us that by abiding in the love of Christ we learn, in the school of Christ, the art of true love.

6.  “Follow me!”

     In July of 1958, Father Karol Wojtyla began a new stage in his journey of following the Lord.  Along with a group of young people who loved canoeing, he had gone to the lakes for his annual vacation.  On the trip he took a letter from the Catholic Primate of Poland.  The letter appointed Father Karol Wojtyla an auxiliary Bishop of Krakow.  As a bishop, Wojtyla would have to leave the academic world, leave his beloved ministry with young people, leave his intellectual work of striving to understand and interpret mankind, and leave his project to communicate the Christian view of man to the world.  All this must have seemed to this priest like losing his very self, losing what had become his identity and vocation.

     “Follow me!”  Karol Wojtyla accepted the appointment, for he heard in the Church’s call the voice of Christ.  And he remembered the truth of the Lord’s words: “Whoever seeks to gain his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life will preserve it.” (Luke 17:33)  He never wanted to make his own life secure, to keep it for himself.  He wanted to give of himself unreservedly, to the very last moment, for Christ and for us.  His love of words became an essential part of his episcopal ministry and gave new vitality, new urgency, new attractiveness to the preaching of the Gospel -- even when hard-to-hear truths were served.

7.  “Follow me!”

     In October of 1978, Karol Cardinal Wojtyla once again heard the voice of the Lord.  To the Lord’s question, “Karol, ‘Do you love me?,’ (John 21:17)”  the Archbishop of Krakow, Cardinal Wojtyla, answered from the depths of his heart: “Lord, you know everything; you know that I love you.” (John 21:17)  Cardinal Wojtyla became Pope John Paul II, and the love of Christ remained the dominant force in the new pope’s life.  Anyone who saw him pray, who heard him preach, knows that.  Thanks to following faithfully the Good Shepherd, he was able to bear a burden which is beyond human abilities: that of being the shepherd of Christ’s flock, His universal Church.

8.  “Follow me!”

     Even unto death.  Jesus asked St. Peter to enter into the Paschal Mystery, into death and resurrection.  Jesus warned Peter: “Truly, truly, I say to you, when you were young, you girded yourself and walked where you would; but when you are old, you will stretch out your hands, and another will gird you and carry you where you do not wish to go.” (John 21:18)

     In his earlier years of being pope, John Paul II -- still young, still full of energy -- went to the very ends of the earth: he made 104 trips abroad to 129 countries.  Later in life, he increasingly entered into the communion of Christ’s sufferings.  He understood: “Another will gird [fasten or bind] you...”  In communion with the suffering Lord, tirelessly and with renewed intensity, John Paul II proclaimed the Gospel. 

9.  None of us can ever forget how in that last Easter Sunday of his life, John Paul II, marked by suffering, came once more to the window of the Apostolic Palace.  One last time he gave his blessing urbi et orb (to the city and the world).  We can be sure that our beloved Pope is standing today at the window of the Father’s house, that he sees us and blesses us.

     The soul of John Paul II now sees and blesses the Good Shepherd.  Again and again during his years on this earth, Karol Wojtyla heard the Good Shepherd beckon: “Follow me!”  Jesus Christ led.  Karol Wojtyla followed.  Thanks be to God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit!

     “Follow me!”  Our Lord beckons us, today.

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Rev. Stallsworth is the pastor of St. Peter’s United Methodist Church in Morehead City, NC.

To respond to this article and continue the dialogue, please send your article to: St. Peter’s United Methodist Church/111 Hodges Street/Morehead City, NC 28557.