back to index2020-4-25 I am the Door, I am the Good Shepherd
00:00:04.640 |
If you've been following us in our worship, we've been in the series of the I Am Statements 00:00:13.280 |
And we talked about Jesus as the bread of life. 00:00:16.840 |
We talked about Jesus as the light of the world. 00:00:19.300 |
And then during Easter, we talked about Jesus as the resurrection and the life. 00:00:23.320 |
So we're going to be covering chapter 10, but it's really connected to chapter 9. 00:00:28.560 |
And it has to be understood together because chapter 10 is spoken of in the context of 00:00:36.340 |
And so we have the two statements of Jesus where he says, "I am the door and I am the 00:00:41.960 |
And so let me read the passage where he states that in John chapter 10, verse 7, and John 00:00:46.680 |
chapter 10, verse 11, and then we'll jump into the text this morning. 00:00:52.760 |
John chapter 10, verse 7, "Jesus said to them, 'Truly, truly, I say to you, I am the door 00:00:59.280 |
Then John chapter 10, 11, "I am the good shepherd. 00:01:02.440 |
The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep." 00:01:07.360 |
Father, we pray that your word would speak to us. 00:01:13.120 |
Help us to have a deepening understanding of Christ and that in light of the surpassing 00:01:17.840 |
knowledge of knowing him better, that all these other things, Lord God, that easily 00:01:23.320 |
entangles us and tempts us would truly become rubbish. 00:01:27.800 |
Help us, Lord, to see a greater vision of the glory of Christ, that our eyes may be 00:01:32.240 |
opened, that we may see the light, and that Christ and Christ alone would be our treasure 00:01:39.120 |
So we ask for your anointing this time, this morning, that our worship may be given to 00:01:49.440 |
So again, as I said, chapter 10, these two statements, the "I am" statements, really 00:01:56.500 |
So if you've read chapter 10 before this morning or you've studied it before, you may have 00:02:01.180 |
noticed that in chapter 10, the "I am the door" and "I am the good shepherd" is really 00:02:07.040 |
So it's hard to dissect, is he talking about the door, is he talking about the shepherd? 00:02:11.520 |
Because again, you'll see better what he means by that by really looking at chapter 9. 00:02:17.400 |
In fact, if you don't look at chapter 9, what Jesus says about the door is really not going 00:02:24.160 |
We can understand Jesus as a good shepherd, right? 00:02:27.000 |
He's a shepherd, we are the sheep, he guides us, he leads us, feeds us, we understand that 00:02:33.040 |
But what is the statement of "I am the door"? 00:02:36.120 |
So again, if you don't understand the context in which he says that, the "I am the door" 00:02:39.800 |
statement, it really is just going to go over your head and say, "Well, Jesus says he's 00:02:46.520 |
How did the first recipients understood this statement? 00:02:51.440 |
In order to do that, we have to look at the event in chapter 9, because that statement 00:03:00.680 |
So what I ask you to do, because there's too many verses, I don't have the text that's 00:03:06.640 |
going to be written on the screen, so if you have your Bibles, I ask that you would open 00:03:11.220 |
up to John chapter 9 and just keep it there, because I'm going to be reading the narrative, 00:03:16.000 |
parts of it together with you, and then when we get to the three-point meaning of "I am 00:03:21.720 |
the door" and "I am the good shepherd," it'll be easier to follow and the text will be coming 00:03:28.000 |
What happens here that sets up for his statement, "I am the door"? 00:03:32.200 |
John chapter 9 verse 1, it says, "As he passed by, he saw a man blind from birth, and his 00:03:37.680 |
disciples asked him, 'Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he would be born 00:03:44.960 |
So the setup of the story is that they run into this blind man, and you can see by the 00:03:49.400 |
attitude of the disciples, the very first question that they ask, which was not unique 00:03:54.440 |
to the disciples, the whole Jewish community believed that if you had any kind of defect 00:03:59.360 |
or if you were struggling, that it must have been because you're being punished by God 00:04:03.880 |
for some kind of sin, and that was their initial first response. 00:04:08.380 |
And you can understand if that was their attitude toward the blind, there was no benevolence 00:04:15.160 |
program for them because they believed you deserved it. 00:04:19.720 |
In fact, you know, in many cultures around the world, unlike the Judeo-Christian culture, 00:04:25.460 |
they believe that if you're suffering, if you're poor, if some affliction happened to 00:04:29.580 |
you, you must have done something maybe in your previous life, and you need to pay off 00:04:33.540 |
your sins in order for you to progress into the next life. 00:04:37.080 |
Many cultures, they actually speak against helping the poor because they must be poor 00:04:44.700 |
Well, the Jewish culture was very similar to that. 00:04:47.800 |
Not only did they have the physical hardship, they believed that if something bad happened 00:04:51.660 |
to you, you must have done something, and that's why they were asking a question, not 00:04:56.340 |
unique to the disciples, but the Jewish culture itself. 00:04:58.640 |
So you can imagine as a blind person, hard enough, your life is hard enough as it is, 00:05:04.640 |
but that the people around you in society, every time you came around, it's like, "Look 00:05:10.880 |
And that's the question that is asked, and Jesus answers in verse 3, "It was neither 00:05:15.200 |
that this man has sinned, nor his parents, but it was so that the works of God might 00:05:22.000 |
Remember, Jesus says the same thing in John chapter 11 about Lazarus' death. 00:05:26.880 |
He said that God allowed to happen because God has a specific plan. 00:05:32.640 |
So Jesus, obviously, you know the story about how he spits on the ground and takes mud and 00:05:38.260 |
puts it on his eyes and tells him to go and wash at the pool of Siloam. 00:05:46.280 |
And then when people see it, they're obviously surprised. 00:05:51.920 |
Wasn't this man the same guy who used to beg at the temple day in and day out? 00:06:00.160 |
Some people said that maybe it was somebody that looked like him. 00:06:05.580 |
And he says, "I am the one," in verse 9, to confirm. 00:06:09.380 |
So you can imagine he opens his eyes and he's excited to go see people. 00:06:13.600 |
And then people are like, "No, that can't be you. 00:06:17.480 |
So again, all of this is a setup of what's going to happen in chapter 10. 00:06:29.940 |
But look at the response of the Pharisees, the leaders, in verse 13. 00:06:33.960 |
They brought to the Pharisees the man who was formerly blind. 00:06:37.080 |
Now it was a Sabbath on the day when Jesus made this clay and opened his eyes. 00:06:41.200 |
Then the Pharisees also were asking him again how he received the sight. 00:06:44.400 |
And he said to them, "He applied clay to my eyes and I washed it and I see." 00:06:50.640 |
Therefore some of the Pharisees were saying, "This man is not from God because he does 00:06:58.300 |
A man who was blind all his life that was a common figure at the temple gate. 00:07:04.700 |
And there's clear evidence that his eyes are open. 00:07:07.180 |
But their first response is, "Because Jesus doesn't jump through the hoops the way we 00:07:14.780 |
And again, Jesus never broke the Sabbath command of God. 00:07:27.040 |
So if he doesn't abide by us, he can't possibly be from God. 00:07:33.860 |
If he doesn't submit to us, even if he performs a miracle, he's not from God. 00:07:40.340 |
Because clearly I'm the one anointed by God so therefore if you don't submit to me, you 00:07:47.980 |
"The document who is a sinner performed such signs and there was a division among them. 00:07:53.420 |
So they said to the blind man again, 'What do you say about him since he opened your 00:08:00.900 |
"The Jews then did not believe it of him that he had been blind and had received sight until 00:08:06.320 |
they called the parents the very one who had received his sight." 00:08:14.580 |
Jesus doesn't submit to us so therefore he must not be from God. 00:08:17.860 |
So we're going to investigate a little further and we're going to call his parents. 00:08:21.700 |
Now understand the blind man's relationship with the parents. 00:08:27.820 |
Typically at that time if you were blind, there was no social program to take care of 00:08:32.260 |
you and other people would look at the blind man and say, "Remember the question that they 00:08:43.440 |
So to have a blind son in the house would invite ridicule from the society that they 00:08:49.560 |
So the typical practice was to release them to live with other blind people. 00:08:54.800 |
And that's probably why he was begging at the temple gate because his parents weren't 00:09:00.300 |
And his parents show up because they, for the purpose of indicting Jesus, they call 00:09:04.680 |
him, them in and they ask them, "Your son clearly wasn't blind because this sinner, 00:09:12.920 |
Jesus, could not have performed this miracle." 00:09:15.120 |
In verse 20, "His parents answered them and said, 'We know that this is our son and that 00:09:25.280 |
In verse 20, "But how he now sees, we do not know. 00:09:31.880 |
Ask him, he is of age, he will speak for himself." 00:09:36.340 |
Because what they say in the next text is really the setup of what Jesus says in verse 00:09:43.760 |
"His parents said this because they were afraid of the Jews. 00:09:49.280 |
For the Jews had already agreed that if anyone confessed him to be Christ, he was to be put 00:09:59.120 |
The Pharisees were the leaders of the synagogue. 00:10:05.400 |
The temple was God-ordained where people were to come give sacrifices. 00:10:09.400 |
But because of the diaspora of the Jews, they were spread all over the known world at that 00:10:19.200 |
So what they did was, their law was wherever there was 10 men, Jewish men, they were given 00:10:26.340 |
permission to set up a synagogue, sort of a mini-temple. 00:10:30.200 |
And so through that synagogue, they would perform the worships and various things that 00:10:35.600 |
they needed to do, but the major sacrifice, they still needed to come to the temple. 00:10:39.060 |
So the temple was ruled by the Sanhedrin and the high priest. 00:10:45.260 |
But the synagogues were ruled by the Pharisees, and that's where majority of the Jews practiced 00:10:52.360 |
So for the leaders of Israel to say, "If you don't agree with us, if you don't submit to 00:10:58.440 |
us, if you don't agree that this man clearly is a sinner because he's calling us out, so 00:11:04.320 |
If you take his side," he said, "we're going to kick you out of the synagogue." 00:11:09.260 |
And so in fear of being kicked out of the synagogue, they basically were plain dumb. 00:11:14.100 |
"Well, he's our son, we can't deny that he was born blind, but as to how his eyes were 00:11:21.260 |
Now again, it's helpful for us to understand what the synagogue meant for an average Jew. 00:11:27.420 |
Because the synagogue was not just a place where you went to worship. 00:11:33.020 |
Synagogue was where your children were educated. 00:11:37.520 |
Synagogue was where you went and you probably married within that context. 00:11:45.740 |
So if you were kicked out of the synagogue, not only would you have spiritual ramification, 00:11:50.740 |
not only would you have ramification for the education of your children, you wouldn't be 00:11:57.220 |
Because anybody who does business with that person, anybody who supports that person, 00:12:01.360 |
anybody who relates to that person would also be kicked out of the synagogue. 00:12:05.520 |
So they had this tight rein, they had this power over the synagogue, and these men basically 00:12:11.260 |
were saying, "We've labeled him to be a troublemaker, and he's a sinner. 00:12:17.240 |
So anybody who supports him in any way will be kicked out of the synagogue." 00:12:21.100 |
Now all of that was a setup to verse chapter 10. 00:12:25.000 |
For this reason, verse 23, the parents said, "He's of age, ask him." 00:12:29.540 |
So the second time they called the man who had been blind and said to him, "Give glory 00:12:36.340 |
He then answered, "Whether he's a sinner, I do not know. 00:12:38.740 |
One thing I do know, that though I was blind, now I see." 00:12:43.700 |
Verse 26, "So they said to him, 'What did he do to you? 00:12:50.620 |
You can kind of see he knows that he's not going to get through to them. 00:12:54.300 |
What he's telling them, "I already told you that I was born blind. 00:12:56.660 |
My parents told you I was born blind, and I see. 00:12:59.300 |
Clearly you're not going to accept my answer. 00:13:02.060 |
He said, 'I already told you, and you did not listen. 00:13:06.620 |
You do not want to become his disciples too, do you?'" 00:13:11.380 |
So if you don't know what sarcasm is, right there, lesson one, that's sarcasm. 00:13:21.060 |
He was born blind all his life, and his lot in life was to be a beggar all his life. 00:13:28.280 |
So can you imagine not being able to see and hearing the whole community of people going 00:13:34.960 |
back and forth into the temple with their animals to sacrifice? 00:13:38.700 |
Families, husband and wives, laughing with their children, going back and forth. 00:13:43.820 |
So can you imagine him being forced to be on the side of the street begging all of his 00:13:51.500 |
So for him to open his eyes wasn't simply that, "Now I can see and function like a normal 00:13:59.420 |
For a blind man, a Jewish blind man, to have his eyes open means that he can enter back 00:14:05.660 |
And in order to enter back into society, he needed the approval of these Pharisees. 00:14:15.500 |
Now he's standing against these Pharisees who really hold the key, at least humanly 00:14:23.900 |
He may be able to, he'll always be known as that guy who used to beg and God perform miracle 00:14:28.860 |
He's able to now find a wife possibly, have children, get a normal job, be able to worship 00:14:39.780 |
He must have had all of those thoughts in his head. 00:14:43.660 |
But he's standing before these men who have the key to good life for him, and now he realizes 00:14:53.660 |
Why are you so stubborn and why do you refuse to see this? 00:14:57.900 |
In verse 30, "The man answered and said to them, 'Well, here is an amazing thing that 00:15:02.060 |
you do not know where he is from, and yet he opened my eyes.'" 00:15:06.940 |
We know that God does not hear sinners, but if anyone is God-fearing and does his will, 00:15:13.540 |
"Since the beginning of time, it has never been heard that anyone opened the eyes of 00:15:19.160 |
If this man were not from God, he could do nothing. 00:15:22.240 |
And they answered him, 'You were born entirely in sins, and are you teaching us?' 00:15:30.800 |
Here's a man, if he was blind, he probably had never had any kind of education, never 00:15:37.880 |
He was a beggar all his life since he was a young child, and yet he's the one trying 00:15:45.400 |
So he may have been the one physically blind all his life, but spiritually he was seeing 00:15:50.320 |
And here's these men who had the access to his word, who were the teachers of the law 00:15:55.320 |
at the synagogue, who were the leaders of the spiritual community, and yet they did 00:16:00.780 |
not understand what was plainly in front of them. 00:16:05.140 |
And as a result of challenging these people, they did exactly what everybody was afraid 00:16:15.200 |
And it is in this context that Jesus meets up with this man who's just been put out. 00:16:19.400 |
He now sees, but because he can't participate in society, he may still have to beg. 00:16:27.420 |
He's not going to be able to go to the synagogue. 00:16:33.640 |
Jesus heard that they had put him out, and finding him, he said, "Do you believe in the 00:16:38.980 |
He answered, "Who is he, Lord, that I may believe in him?" 00:16:42.500 |
Jesus said to him, "You have both seen him, and he is the one who is talking with you." 00:16:50.920 |
And Jesus said, "For judgment I came into this world, so that those who do not see may 00:16:55.440 |
see, and those who may see may become blind." 00:17:00.160 |
And then in verse 40, "Those of the Pharisees who were with him heard these things and said 00:17:07.200 |
Jesus said to them, 'If you were blind, you would have no sin. 00:17:11.180 |
But since you say, 'We see,' your sin remains.'" 00:17:19.440 |
Because it's difficult to understand what he says in the next statement without understanding 00:17:27.380 |
When he says he is the door, now I hope you're already thinking, I hope you're already making 00:17:33.440 |
When he's saying, "I am the door," he's saying the Jews are not. 00:17:39.680 |
And that's why chapter 1, chapter 10, verse 1, begins with an indictment of the Jewish 00:17:44.640 |
leaders that they are not the door to eternal life. 00:17:50.800 |
The synagogue is not the door for your refuge and your safety. 00:17:54.600 |
So what I want to do, again, these three observations of what Jesus says in chapter 10 about these 00:18:00.760 |
two statements, about him being the door and the shepherd. 00:18:02.840 |
And I'm using it interchangeably because that's how it's used in chapter 10. 00:18:06.840 |
And it's all as in response to the Jewish leaders kicking out this blind man for stating 00:18:14.720 |
First thing that he says, an indictment against the Jews, "Jesus is the owner and not a hired 00:18:20.640 |
Again, this is an indictment against the leaders. 00:18:24.760 |
Verse 10, chapter 10, verse 1, "Truly, truly, I say to you, he who does not enter by the 00:18:30.200 |
door into the fold of the sheep but climbs up some other way, he is a thief and a robber." 00:18:44.720 |
That they are standing in the position of proclaiming the word of God, but they were 00:18:52.440 |
They were thieves who didn't come through the door and they basically forced their way 00:18:58.640 |
Now, all throughout Israel's history, one of the primary indictments against the nation 00:19:04.520 |
of Israel almost always started with the leaders going astray. 00:19:14.040 |
The people that God did not call self-willed themselves. 00:19:17.720 |
Maybe through some family ties, maybe through some sort of revolt, maybe through education, 00:19:24.120 |
maybe through talent, but it wasn't God-ordained. 00:19:28.600 |
In fact, if you want to read details about that, Jeremiah is a really good book to see 00:19:36.800 |
Because the passage that I'm going to read to you, you can find it in dozens and dozens 00:19:40.680 |
and dozens of other passages, but I'm going to choose only one for the sake of time. 00:19:45.880 |
Jeremiah 14, 14, "Then the Lord said to me, 'The prophets are prophesying falsehood in 00:19:53.200 |
I have neither sent them nor commanded them nor spoken to them. 00:19:57.040 |
They are prophesying to you false visions, divinations, futility, and a deception of 00:20:05.720 |
In other words, they're thinking to themselves, "What should I say? 00:20:11.360 |
Instead of speaking the truth, they're speaking what they think is important, what maybe you 00:20:17.240 |
That's exactly what Paul says to Timothy, that in times that people aren't going to 00:20:23.640 |
Sometimes the truth is encouraging and sometimes the truth is cutting. 00:20:27.000 |
He said, "They're not going to put up with the cutting part and they're going to gather 00:20:31.520 |
around themselves leaders who want to tickle their itching ears." 00:20:34.720 |
And this was not a problem only of the end times. 00:20:36.920 |
We see in the Old Testament, this was a continual problem with the nation of Israel. 00:20:41.920 |
These false teachers were forcing their way into leadership and they weren't speaking 00:20:49.000 |
He says that they have come to rob and to steal. 00:20:52.000 |
In Matthew 7, 15, "Beware of the false prophets who come to you in sheep's clothing, but inwardly 00:21:02.960 |
Well first of all, they're thieves because they rob God of his glory. 00:21:07.120 |
The reason why they jump in and try to be leaders is for self-exaltation, self-glorification. 00:21:15.400 |
Even though they talk about God, ultimately it's about themselves. 00:21:24.760 |
Their primary reason to be leader is so that they can rob God of his glory in the name 00:21:33.520 |
But they also rob people of access to truth and to God's glory. 00:21:37.560 |
So not only do they rob God, they rob the sheep because they stand in a place where 00:21:43.000 |
they supposedly speak for God, but ultimately bring glory to themselves. 00:21:47.960 |
In fact, it goes a bit further in John 10, 12-13. 00:21:50.960 |
It says, "He who is a hired hand and not a shepherd, who is not the owner of the sheep," 00:21:57.120 |
again, the Israel's leaders, "sees the wolf coming and leaves the sheep and flees. 00:22:03.460 |
And the wolf snatches them and scatters them. 00:22:05.780 |
He flees because he is a hired hand and he's not concerned about the sheep." 00:22:10.080 |
In other words, what he is saying is you're not safe under their leadership because they're 00:22:17.600 |
So if you being there helps them, then they might be benevolent. 00:22:26.880 |
But as soon as his life is in danger, as soon as it doesn't benefit him, he packs up and 00:22:34.080 |
So in other words, he's warning them, you're not safe there. 00:22:42.920 |
The nation of Israel was living in fear of being kicked out of the synagogue. 00:22:49.440 |
And so they were jumping over hoops, obeying all of these laws. 00:22:53.880 |
And many of them probably were looking at this and said, "Well, the Sabbath law is ridiculous. 00:23:01.160 |
That we can walk 300 feet, but as soon as we walk 301 feet, we broke the Sabbath? 00:23:07.760 |
That we can feed the donkey, but we can't feed the poor man? 00:23:13.000 |
But if you went against the leadership and you questioned them, you get kicked out of 00:23:17.200 |
the synagogue and basically your life is ruined." 00:23:20.240 |
And that's why the first thing that he does, he brings indictment against the nation of 00:23:27.920 |
See, shepherds who don't have ownership and who are only there for his own glory, when 00:23:41.680 |
They don't cry out for those who are hurting or drifting. 00:23:50.160 |
And it was, you know, one way to bring glory to himself is to go out into the world, make 00:23:57.420 |
Or another way to do that is become a leader in the church, get a good reputation, have 00:24:06.840 |
They're seeking their self-glory, except they're just doing it in the church. 00:24:11.680 |
We have countless, countless examples throughout church history, how the church became corrupt 00:24:21.000 |
In contrast, we see Jesus in Matthew 9, 36, seeing the people, he felt compassion for 00:24:27.500 |
them because they were distressed and dispirited like sheep without a shepherd. 00:24:37.220 |
Jesus had compassion because those sheep were his. 00:24:41.800 |
They weren't just bad news that he was seeing on television. 00:24:46.380 |
You know, like you can hear horrific things and say, "Oh, I feel bad." 00:24:52.140 |
But that's usually where it ends because we don't have a personal connection with that. 00:24:55.580 |
But it's a whole different story when it's our kids, when it's my uncle, when it's my 00:25:02.100 |
So Jesus says he had compassion because he's a true shepherd. 00:25:09.340 |
But he who enters by the door is a shepherd of the sheep. 00:25:18.960 |
And you know that he's the shepherd because God has been preparing for him to come for 00:25:25.340 |
He sent magi, prophets, angels, and even John the Baptist to go ahead of him, prepare, and 00:25:33.500 |
to ordain so that the door that Jesus comes through may be wide open. 00:25:38.020 |
And the reason why he's saying that is you will recognize who the good shepherd is because 00:25:42.680 |
he will come through the door that has been opened by God himself. 00:25:48.340 |
And that's the reason that we see in Matthew 3-15 when John the Baptist, whose whole purpose 00:25:53.580 |
was to prepare the way for the coming of Christ, Jesus comes out. 00:25:57.620 |
And what's the first thing that he does before he enters ministry? 00:26:04.060 |
John the Baptist looks at him and says, "My whole ministry was to prepare for you. 00:26:15.060 |
And he says, "This must be done to fulfill all righteousness." 00:26:19.780 |
In other words, Jesus himself was coming through the front door. 00:26:24.100 |
He was coming through the door that was prepared by the prophets, the magi, the angels, and 00:26:31.160 |
So when you see the Son of Man coming through the door that God had opened, you know that 00:26:35.380 |
that was the good shepherd that God had prepared. 00:26:40.080 |
Number two, not only is he the owner, Jesus knows his sheep and his sheep know him. 00:26:47.580 |
In John 10-5, "To him the doorkeeper opens and the sheep hear his voice and he calls 00:26:57.780 |
Now I have a really, I think, appropriate video that I want you to watch and it's only 00:27:06.940 |
So if we can watch that for a minute before I jump back in. 00:28:05.400 |
For those of you who are here who didn't hear the sound, okay, basically the three children were trying 00:28:11.100 |
to get the attention of the sheep and the sheep don't recognize the voice, so they don't move. 00:28:15.520 |
But you notice when the farmer, the shepherd comes, the owner, and he begins to make sound, 00:28:20.520 |
if you could see it, the sheep all of a sudden perk up. 00:28:24.080 |
As soon as they hear his voice, they perk up and you can see all of them just kind of perking up 00:28:27.820 |
and then he begins to call and they all just kind of swarm at him. 00:28:32.460 |
All right, so Jesus knowing the context of the farmers, the agriculture culture 00:28:38.180 |
that people would have easily understood, he's using that as saying, 00:28:41.940 |
he says when the true shepherd comes, you will be able to recognize his voice. 00:28:48.440 |
In verse 4, when he puts forth all his own, he goes ahead of them 00:28:52.200 |
and the sheep follow him because they know his voice. 00:28:55.500 |
A stranger they simply will not follow but will flee from him 00:28:59.520 |
because they do not know the voice of the stranger. 00:29:02.220 |
And he repeatedly says he knows them, he knows them, they know him, they know him. 00:29:06.420 |
And the word know here isn't talking about knowledge. 00:29:10.360 |
The sheep didn't raise their head and say, huh, he's wearing that same jacket, you know. 00:29:16.880 |
Everything that we know about this man, he seems to fit that knowledge. 00:29:20.380 |
He's not talking about an academic knowledge of the shepherd. 00:29:24.820 |
He's not talking about that he had written bio, a resume of all of his sheep. 00:29:32.100 |
He's talking about an intimate relationship, a personal intimate knowledge of each sheep. 00:29:37.820 |
And so he knows them and they know him and the Bible says that. 00:29:46.600 |
You know, if somebody says something like that to me, if another human being says that to me, 00:29:50.720 |
I know your sentiment but it's a hyperbole, right, it's an exaggeration. 00:29:55.980 |
There's no way you know the number of hair on my head. 00:29:57.940 |
I mean, I don't know how many are going to fall off today. 00:30:02.700 |
But when God says, I know every strand of hair on your head, 00:30:14.640 |
He knows what kind of life we're going to live. 00:30:33.560 |
He knows when we're caught in a trap of our sins. 00:30:38.900 |
That's what he means when he says he knows his sheep. 00:30:44.440 |
He's not some stranger standing far off making loud noises. 00:31:09.080 |
why do the sheep follow the shepherd's voice and not the other children? 00:31:12.160 |
Because that shepherd is the one who feeds them. 00:31:15.100 |
That shepherd is the one who takes care of them. 00:31:17.900 |
In Mark chapter 13, 22, it says, for false cries and false prophets will arise 00:31:23.260 |
and will show signs and wonders in order to lead astray, 00:31:34.480 |
In other words, there's going to be a lot of people who may pose to be the elect, 00:31:39.820 |
but when the true deception comes, they may also fall. 00:31:47.240 |
Because those who are of his, when they hear their savior's voice, they recognize him. 00:32:00.840 |
In some way, in some form, whether it was preaching from the pulpit, 00:32:06.480 |
whether it was somebody who shared with you one on one, 00:32:08.960 |
maybe some of you heard the gospel from somebody out on the street. 00:32:18.920 |
But at some point, all of us heard his voice. 00:32:28.680 |
You didn't go to three, four years of apologetic classes. 00:32:32.760 |
You didn't understand your faith that you do now about how the Bible came to us 00:32:37.840 |
and the fulfilled prophecies and God's inerrant word, his own very breath 00:32:47.040 |
But somehow, you heard his voice and you recognized that he's your maker. 00:32:53.640 |
You recognized the shepherd's voice, and that's why we followed him. 00:32:59.160 |
Even as he told us to pick up our cross, even as hardship came into our lives. 00:33:08.080 |
That's why the primary goal of the church, the primary goal of the under 00:33:16.560 |
If I stand up here for years and years and tell you because I live longer than 00:33:21.680 |
you, that you should listen to me, I'm telling you, don't listen to me. 00:33:28.400 |
If I stand here and say, because I've been a pastor and I've been leading a 00:33:32.320 |
church for almost 30 years, I have much more experience than you, so you need to 00:33:38.760 |
Because there's people who've done ministry 50 years more than I did. 00:33:42.440 |
Maybe not 50 years, that'd be a long time, right? 00:33:53.000 |
Well, somebody has a PhD, then you should listen to him. 00:33:56.760 |
No matter if I put my own personal experience and my own talent, my own 00:34:01.400 |
gift, and my own education as the authority that you ought to follow, you 00:34:05.280 |
should not follow because the primary goal of the church is to make his voice 00:34:11.840 |
clear because the primary goal of every Christian is to follow the shepherd, not 00:34:20.480 |
The goal of the leadership is to point you to the true shepherd Christ. 00:34:25.160 |
If our goal is to have the best organized church, then we should hire MBAs, you 00:34:31.520 |
know, people who've studied and got their masters and how to milk the most 00:34:37.800 |
If the goal of the church is branding, we want people to know who we are and we 00:34:44.120 |
want, when we say Berean, we want the whole world to know who we are, then we 00:34:48.840 |
should consult Coca-Cola, you know, in our generation, they did the best job, right? 00:34:53.600 |
Or Facebook, we should get people who are experts in branding. 00:34:57.000 |
If we want to make the greatest impact in our society to influence people by what 00:35:04.280 |
we think is important, then we should get influencers, right? 00:35:09.160 |
So if they have 30,000 followers or a million followers, we should recruit some 00:35:12.600 |
of these people and spend some of our money asking them to help us be a better 00:35:16.080 |
influence because somehow they figured it out. 00:35:19.800 |
But if our goal is to get to God, the most important thing that the church needs to 00:35:25.400 |
do is to make his voice clear so that his sheep will hear his voice and continue to 00:35:36.600 |
So even if all other parts of the church isn't running well, and I'm not saying 00:35:42.600 |
that we shouldn't run it well, I'm not saying we shouldn't have influence, but 00:35:46.600 |
the primary and the most important and the greatest task that we need to give all our 00:35:51.320 |
energy to, our finance to, is to make sure that our shepherd's voice is made clear. 00:35:56.760 |
All the more, as you and I are in a situation in a world pandemic, you know, I 00:36:04.000 |
lived over 50 years and I never experienced anything. 00:36:06.920 |
Of course, I've never gone through the war physically. 00:36:08.760 |
You know, my parents' generation and that generation went through all kinds of 00:36:16.200 |
This is probably the craziest thing, at least most people, you know, my age or 00:36:19.920 |
younger would say that they've ever seen, unless you've been to some kind of war. 00:36:23.880 |
In this time of darkness and uncertainty, whose voice are we looking to? 00:36:30.520 |
A lot of people are hanging on to every word of the governor, every word of the 00:36:36.080 |
president or the doctors, or maybe even the lawyers, or sometimes the movie stars, 00:36:59.040 |
Do we pay attention to our shepherd's voice as much as we pay attention to the 00:37:04.720 |
Because all leaders ultimately are his under shepherds. 00:37:11.560 |
Third and finally, Jesus, the door, the good shepherd, leads us to green pastures 00:37:18.960 |
The reason why they hear his voice and they follow him is because they know that 00:37:24.040 |
the shepherd is going to lead them to green pastures. 00:37:27.360 |
Now, if the shepherd says something and they all run and every time they run, he 00:37:33.200 |
They're going to hear his voice and they're going to run the opposite direction. 00:37:40.360 |
But when the shepherd says something and the sheep perk up and they go, they run to 00:37:45.280 |
him because they know that he's going to lead them to green pastures. 00:37:51.120 |
Sometimes the green pastures may be a path that you have to go through the valley to 00:37:58.160 |
Sometimes you have to go through wolves because the green pastures is on the other 00:38:05.400 |
And that's why they cling to the shepherd because they know that the shepherd knows 00:38:10.640 |
They know that the shepherd is going to protect them. 00:38:13.040 |
They know that if they stick with the shepherd, they're going to green pastures. 00:38:17.040 |
And that's what he says in chapter 10, verse 9 through 12. 00:38:21.880 |
If anyone enters through me, he will be saved. 00:38:25.800 |
You see the door that they're trying to get into the synagogue. 00:38:28.480 |
You're trying so hard and you're so afraid of being kicked out of the synagogue. 00:38:33.160 |
But once you get in there, it's actually more dangerous because they're thieves. 00:38:38.760 |
And when danger actually comes, they're going to leave. 00:38:40.720 |
But if you come through me, he said, you will be saved. 00:38:48.040 |
The thief comes only to steal and kill and to destroy. 00:38:56.520 |
I came that they may have life and have life and have it abundantly. 00:39:02.960 |
The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep. 00:39:06.880 |
You see the distinction between the shepherds, the fake shepherds and the real shepherd. 00:39:11.800 |
The fake shepherd will lay your life down to protect himself. 00:39:15.560 |
The good shepherd lays down his life to protect us. 00:39:19.400 |
You know, one of my favorite passages and favorite parts of the gospel message is this part 00:39:28.000 |
where he says that I have come to give life and to give it abundantly. 00:39:36.280 |
He didn't just get people who are going to die and go to hell and be punished forever. 00:39:41.200 |
And then he just kind of like reluctantly saved us and said, OK, now you don't have to go. 00:39:47.720 |
He says, I have come to give life and to give this life abundantly. 00:39:51.920 |
So sometimes we focus on the life and we miss the whole part of being abundant. 00:39:57.640 |
Because the part of life, the point of life is the abundant life, not just life. 00:40:04.800 |
Because sometimes we think of life as just not dying. 00:40:07.680 |
Sometimes we think of life as just not being punished, not going to hell. 00:40:12.600 |
He said the whole point of why he came and why his sheep hears his voice and they follow him 00:40:20.600 |
is so that he may lead them to green pasture so they may have life abundant. 00:40:24.920 |
In 2 Peter 1 11, it says, for in this way, the entrance into the eternal kingdom of the Lord 00:40:30.760 |
and Savior Jesus Christ will be abundantly supplied to you. 00:40:35.680 |
In other words, it's going to be crystal clear. 00:40:37.760 |
Everything that you need for a life of godliness has been given to you. 00:40:41.800 |
God did not give you bits and pieces and tease us. 00:40:46.600 |
That if you find me under the rock, if you find me in certain places that that I'll come out and I'll bless you. 00:40:51.840 |
He says, no, he said he will abundantly supply it to you. 00:40:57.160 |
And that's why if you guys ever studied the cities of refuge, that's where people ran 00:41:04.000 |
when they when they by accident killed somebody. 00:41:06.760 |
And the avenger of blood, their nearest kin basically wants to kill you because you killed their relative. 00:41:12.000 |
So out of fear, they begin to run to the run to the city of refuge, six cities scattered around Israel 00:41:19.240 |
in the highest plains so that anyone anywhere in Israel can see. 00:41:24.000 |
And there was a constant reminder that if I'm in danger, I go to the city, I go to the city of refuge. 00:41:30.600 |
All the best roads in Israel were roads that were that led them to the city of refuge because God commanded them 00:41:37.240 |
to lower the the mountains or the hills and raise the valleys. 00:41:42.600 |
In other words, make the path that runs to the city of refuge the easiest path that they can take 00:41:49.560 |
so that the one who is running will not have to go through the valleys. 00:41:53.280 |
They don't have to go climb the hills that they just run a straight path to the city of refuge. 00:42:01.320 |
He was trying to protect somebody who accidentally killed somebody. 00:42:04.920 |
But ultimately, all of that pointed to Christ. 00:42:12.400 |
For his sheep, he prepared for us, and he says he abundantly prepared for us. 00:42:18.120 |
Isaiah 55, 7, let the wicked forsake his way and the unrighteous man his thoughts 00:42:24.120 |
and let him return to the Lord and he will have compassion on him and to our God. 00:42:32.480 |
Do you sometimes feel like when you repent that God reluctantly forgave you? 00:42:39.000 |
Oh, my gosh, again, OK, just one more time, you do it again, I'll kill you. 00:42:51.000 |
And we are forgiven, but just barely, you know, just barely. 00:42:57.600 |
You know, there's some there's some, you know, like lovable, cute people. 00:43:01.360 |
They embrace, they sit on his lap and say, oh, you know, Heavenly Father, we love you. 00:43:06.000 |
There's a lot of us who think that our pardon was reluctant. 00:43:16.120 |
He says not only did he make the way to salvation abundantly clear, 00:43:25.720 |
And that's why the Bible describes when a sinner repents. 00:43:33.600 |
That's why he gave the picture in Luke chapter 15. 00:43:38.240 |
He said when a sheep goes astray, he's like, oh, my gosh, he went astray again. 00:43:42.680 |
He says he left them behind, he went after him. 00:43:47.720 |
Every sinner, everyone, every one of those sheep matters to him. 00:44:08.400 |
And then when they find the coin, they have a huge celebration. 00:44:12.480 |
Those of us who are anals will look at that and say, well, that kind of defeats the purpose 00:44:16.200 |
of finding the coin if you spend all of that to celebrate finding the coin. 00:44:36.400 |
When the son leaves and he comes back, his father is a, okay, you screwed up. 00:44:45.680 |
Even that, you're going to have to earn that. 00:44:49.720 |
And if you do good for the next two years, we'll consider. 00:44:54.480 |
The parable that Jesus gave was the father was eagerly waiting for him to return. 00:45:00.680 |
And when he came back, even before he said, I'm sorry, he knew. 00:45:07.960 |
The father runs out, puts a cloak on, puts a cipolla on him, brings him back home and says, 00:45:12.520 |
we're going to have the biggest party we've ever had. 00:45:17.040 |
So when he says he will lead us to green pastures, that we may have life, not just life, 00:45:31.520 |
Exodus 34, 6, "Then the Lord passed by in front of him and proclaimed, 00:45:36.960 |
'The Lord, the Lord God, compassionate and gracious, slow to anger, 00:45:45.480 |
You and I, no matter where we are in our walk with God, maybe even this week, we failed. 00:45:51.280 |
Maybe even this week, as we are worshipping God sitting wherever we are, 00:45:56.920 |
we may be thinking, I better do better this week. 00:45:59.440 |
And maybe we should, you know, we should try harder. 00:46:03.760 |
But in the end, in the end, the Bible says we are where we are because he is abounding in compassion. 00:46:13.400 |
He didn't bring us into his kingdom reluctantly. 00:46:17.360 |
He didn't turn the other way and say, you know what, that one, I'll let him squeeze in. 00:46:21.320 |
Every single one of us with the lost sheep, the lost coin and the prodigal son. 00:46:33.200 |
Psalm 36, 7-9, "How precious is your loving kindness, O God, 00:46:38.680 |
and the children of men take refuge in the shadow of your wings. 00:46:42.920 |
They drink their fill of abundance of your house. 00:46:46.080 |
For with you, and you give them to drink the river of your delight. 00:46:51.840 |
For with you is the fountain of life and in your light we see light." 00:46:56.600 |
You see how the description of our salvation, of our life, is not just you will not die. 00:47:01.840 |
It's abundance in your house, river that's filled with delight, fountain of light. 00:47:10.360 |
When he saved us, he saved us so that you and I can have life and have this life abundant. 00:47:15.360 |
That's why one of the greatest evidence of somebody who has encountered Christ is joy. 00:47:23.040 |
I mean, you ever see somebody who accept, genuinely accept Christ? 00:47:34.400 |
But you ever meet somebody who met Christ, like, you know, like just immediately met Christ? 00:47:40.920 |
You ever meet somebody who met Christ and they're kind of like, "Oh, I'm so depressed." 00:47:47.640 |
But I've never met anybody who just met Christ and their immediate reaction is depression. 00:47:52.640 |
Right? You know, part of the reason why so many are discontent is 00:48:00.760 |
because they have strayed from the well of Christ. 00:48:09.080 |
Maybe at one point you experienced it, but you drifted from that. 00:48:14.400 |
They're not being guided by the Father of light. 00:48:18.240 |
They're not running toward Christ as life and resurrection. 00:48:24.000 |
That we want certain doors to open that may lead us to more heartache. 00:48:31.200 |
We're looking to shepherds that's going to guide us, that ultimately is going to hurt us. 00:48:38.920 |
Let me finish with this, this favorite psalm of so many people, Psalm 23. 00:48:44.560 |
Because this relationship basically summarizes our relationship with Christ. 00:49:08.920 |
There's no other shepherd that I'm looking for. 00:49:17.400 |
Not the leaders, not my education, not my business, not opportunities, not my friends. 00:49:38.520 |
Now I know some people are getting furloughed. 00:49:41.280 |
There's some anxiety, especially the healthcare workers going into work. 00:49:44.760 |
There's anxiousness of possibly you're being exposed and you're going to get it 00:49:48.360 |
and bring it home and there's a lot of anxiousness. 00:50:05.760 |
For his namesake, even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death. 00:50:13.040 |
When you see the shadow, it means the reality is coming. 00:50:20.520 |
And again, I think, you know, at least in my lifetime where the whole world was locked 00:50:27.200 |
down because of fear of death, I mean, a good way to put that is a shadow of death. 00:50:33.160 |
I think the reality of death has caused all of us to be more sober. 00:50:37.480 |
Whether that happens or doesn't happen during this period, 00:50:49.920 |
That because of the sin of mankind, the bondage and the fear of death has gripped the whole world. 00:50:58.680 |
But he says, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I fear no evil. 00:51:03.080 |
You know, you notice how he said he doesn't fear death. 00:51:09.720 |
Because even as sheep at times will go through suffering, we're going to have to go through the valleys, dryness, wolves. 00:51:27.400 |
So in other words, he says, because he's taken away the sting of death, I fear no evil. 00:51:40.040 |
The reason why the shepherd holds the staff is to fight off the wolves who come to. 00:51:50.880 |
But he said when he sees his strength, his rod, they comfort me because that rod is to protect them. 00:51:58.880 |
His judgment, his righteousness, even at time discipline in the church, he said it comforts them because it's for their own good. 00:52:06.240 |
You prepare a table, table before me in the presence of my enemies. 00:52:10.680 |
I do not need to fear those who want to hurt me because my shepherd is with me. 00:52:17.120 |
In other words, I have been set apart for his service. 00:52:26.320 |
I pray that as we meditate and think about Christ as our door and him as our shepherd. 00:52:31.520 |
And we ask ourselves, is my cup truly overflowing? 00:52:36.080 |
Do I catch myself day to day overflowing gratitude for what I have? 00:52:41.280 |
Or am I constantly thinking that only if I had this, only if I had that, only if I could get out, only if I can get a promotion. 00:52:55.120 |
And I think, again, with all the horrible things that may be going on around the world. 00:52:59.840 |
That this time is God ordained for us to maybe take a step back to refocus our attention on our shepherd. 00:53:06.880 |
And ask ourselves, am I going to the green pastures that he is leading me to? 00:53:16.680 |
And let me leave you with this, and I've shared this so many times, I think some of you may have memorized it. 00:53:24.960 |
When I was younger, my parents had this little clock in our living room and on it had a little proverb, not from the Bible. 00:53:35.640 |
And on that it said, happiness is wanting what you have and not having what you want. 00:53:41.280 |
Let me say that again. Happiness is wanting what you have and not having what you want. 00:53:46.480 |
And I remember so many days sitting on my couch, angry about something, discontent about something. 00:53:55.160 |
Maybe I got in a fight with my brothers or my mom punished me for something. 00:53:59.200 |
And I'm just sitting there pouting and I'm looking at this clock and I would just, happiness is having what you want, not wanting what you have. 00:54:07.640 |
Now, it got embedded into my psyche, not because I understood it, not because I was applying it, but because it was just right there. 00:54:19.360 |
Looking back at it now, and I think so much about how, where my discontent comes from. 00:54:25.720 |
So much of my discontent comes from wanting to think that if I have what I want, that that's when I'm going to have abundant life. 00:54:36.360 |
But the salvation that he gave us, every sheep of his already has. 00:54:42.040 |
And when we recognize the value of what God has already given us, that's when we find life. 00:54:50.840 |
So I pray that again, there's all the distractions and everything else that again, not that you're not distracted, there's a lot of stuff to distract us even at home. 00:54:59.960 |
But in the midst of this pandemic and when our normal life is not happening right now, that it'd be an opportunity for us to focus. 00:55:09.720 |
What is it that I should be rejoicing in that I've kind of drifted from? 00:55:13.800 |
And learn to restore that abundant life that God intended for us.