Two men were called on, in a large classroom, to recite the Twenty-third Psalm.
One was an orator trained in speech technique and drama. He repeated the psalm in a powerful way.
When he finished, the audience cheered and asked for an encore that they might hear his wonderful voice again.
Then the other man repeated the same words--’The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want...’ but when he finished, no sound came from the class. Instead, people sat in a mood of deep devotion and prayer.
Then the first man stood to his feet. “I have a confession to make,” he said. “The difference between what you have just heard from my friend, and what you heard from me is this: I know the Psalm, but my friend knows the Shepherd.”
It is interesting that the image of Shepherd is used throughout the Old Testament and the New Testament.
As a matter of fact one of the main image that is used for Christ and the leadership of the early church is shepherd.
There was a time in the Old Testament that the shepherds of Israel and God’s people were derelict in their duty to Israel.
They had not done what God had called them to do.
The people are going into Babylonian exile and God is calling their spiritual leaders into account because they didn’t do their job.
Ezekiel 34: 1,2,5,6,10
1 Then the word of the LORD came to me saying, 2 "Son of man, prophesy against the shepherds of Israel. Prophesy and say to those shepherds, 'Thus says the Lord GOD, "Woe, shepherds of Israel who have been feeding themselves! Should not the shepherds feed the flock ?
5 "They were scattered for lack of a shepherd, and they became food for every beast of the field and were scattered. 6 "My flock wandered through all the mountains and on every high hill ; My flock was scattered over all the surface of the earth, and there was no one to search or seek for them.
10 'Thus says the Lord GOD, "Behold, I am against the shepherds, and I will demand My sheep from them and make them cease from feeding sheep. So the shepherds will not feed themselves anymore, but I will deliver My flock from their mouth, so that they will not be food for them."
This is a vivid image of the rage of God against the Shepherds of Israel that had not done their job.
The flock was in confusion because of the lack of leadership in Israel.
In the time of Jesus things were much worse. The leaders of the Jews were divided.
Those that sat in the seat of Moses as the teachers of the law were confused and were making the people of Israel twice the child of Hell as themselves.
The Priestly class of the Temple was compromised with the Romans and had become rich off of the money changers and the temple tax.
The shepherds were not doing their duty and because of this their hour of visitation had come. God had taken on flesh and came to see how the sheep were doing in person.
Jesus the true shepherd will come to show how it should be done.
There was a time of expectation that Ezekiel spoke of when God would set things right.
Imagine if you were a Jew in the time of Jesus and Messianic hopes are whipped to a frenzy and think of what Ezekiel tells us in Ezekiel 34
Ezekiel 34: 11-12
11 For thus says the Lord GOD, "Behold, I Myself will search for My sheep and seek them out. 12 "As a shepherd cares for his herd in the day when he is among his scattered sheep, so I will care for My sheep and will deliver them from all the places to which they were scattered on a cloudy and gloomy day.
The sovereign God will come and seek out the sheep. God will care for his flock. If the leaders that he left in place couldn’t do it, He would do it Himself.
Now turn to John 10 and imagine what would be in the background of the listeners of Jesus’s audience when he told this story.
In John’s gospel there are seven I AM statements.
We have read two so far in our study.
In John 6 I AM THE BREAD OF LIFE
JOHN 8 I AM THE LIGHT OF THE WORLD
IN TODAY’S READING WE WILL SEE TWO MORE NEW I AM STATEMENTS
Backgrounds:
To understand this story we need to understand shepherding in ancient Palestine.
A shepherd would live in the wilderness with his sheep. If he owned the sheep he would take great care of his sheep.
A shepherd would be the type to leave 99 sheep behind to go find the one lost lamb that needed to be saved.
His flock was usually anywhere from 10-20 sheep. Many ancient sources tell us that they named their sheep and knew each sheep by their name.
The sheep pen was usually a rock enclosure with one gate. There would be one person hired to open the gate only for the known shepherds.
When people in Palestine became rich they started hiring people to watch over their family flocks. These people were literally called hired hands.
These hired hands were not as good as the shepherd because they did not own the sheep.
The shepherds would sleep outside the sheep fold at night to protect the sheep from predators like wolves.
John 10: 1-16
1 "Truly, truly, I say to you, he who does not enter by the door into the fold of the sheep, but climbs up some other way, he is a thief and a robber. 2 "But he who enters by the door is a shepherd of the sheep. 3 "To him the doorkeeper opens, and the sheep hear his voice, and he calls his own sheep by name and leads them out. 4 "When he puts forth all his own, he goes ahead of them, and the sheep follow him because they know his voice. 5 "A stranger they simply will not follow, but will flee from him, because they do not know the voice of strangers." 6 This figure of speech Jesus spoke to them, but they did not understand what those things were which He had been saying to them. 7 So Jesus said to them again, "Truly, truly, I say to you, I am the door of the sheep. 8 "All who came before Me are thieves and robbers, but the sheep did not hear them. 9 "I am the door ; if anyone enters through Me, he will be saved, and will go in and out and find pasture. 10 "The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy ; I came that they may have life, and have it abundantly. 11 "I am the good shepherd ; the good shepherd lays down His life for the sheep. 12 "He who is a hired hand, and not a shepherd, who is not the owner of the sheep, sees the wolf coming, and leaves the sheep and flees, and the wolf snatches them and scatters them. 13 "He flees because he is a hired hand and is not concerned about the sheep. 14 "I am the good shepherd, and I know My own and My own know Me, 15 even as the Father knows Me and I know the Father ; and I lay down My life for the sheep. 16 "I have other sheep, which are not of this fold ; I must bring them also, and they will hear My voice ; and they will become one flock with one shepherd.
I. The Shepherd has a relationship with His sheep
The doorkeeper knows the true Shepherd Jesus and lets him in.
Jesus is our shepherd – this is as close a relationship as you can imagine.
I find it fascinating that God chose the image of a Shepherd to show his care for us.
The shepherd called his sheep by name, spent a great deal of time with them and there was a total dependence on the sheep to the Shepherd.
The shepherd would carry a staff made of Achaia wood that would be used to fight off predators.
The staff was never used to hit the sheep or hurt them.
When the sheep would return to the sheep fold the shepherd would check the sheep for cuts. If they were cut or injured he would anoint them with oil so they would heal fasters.
The shepherd had a loving relationship with His sheep and never yelled at them or hit them. He gently lead them.
The shepherd would walk ahead of his sheep to lead them and would call out to them and they would follow.
It is said that the shepherd could go 50 yards from the sheep fold, call out to his sheep and they would come running.
How comforting to know that we have such a close relationship with Jesus – we need to foster that relationship with prayer and devotion.
II. The sheep only heed the voice of the Shepherd
In John 10: 4-5 Jesus makes it clear that the sheep only hear the voice of the Shepherd and nothing else. The sheep only have allegiance to that voice.
A man in Australia was arrested and charged with stealing a sheep.
But he vigorously protested that it was one of his own that had been missing for many days. When the case went to court, the judge didn’t know how to decide the matter.
Finally he asked that the sheep be brought into the courtroom. Then he ordered the plaintiff to step outside and call the animal. The sheep made no response except to raise its head and look frightened.
The judge then instructed the defendant to go to the courtyard and call the sheep. When the accused man began to make his distinctive call, the sheep ran toward the door and that voice. It was obvious that he recognized the familiar voice of his master. "His sheep knows him," said the judge. "Case dismissed!"
What we can learn from this is that only to Christ do we give our spiritual allegiance. If something violates the word the Christ gave us then that word trumps anything else.
But also life style goes with that hand in hand. WE have to look to Jesus as to how to live our lives.
What do we learn from this?
First of all, what is your number one source of information? Who do you listen to? Where do you get your information?
Is your life based on truth?
You have to wake up and get your information from the right source.
There are only three times that we hear God the Father speak in the New Testament.
The first is at Jesus’ baptism, when he declares that Jesus is his Son in whom he is well-pleased.
The last is during the Last Supper, when Jesus asks him to glorify his name and the Father responds “I have glorified it, and I will glorify it again.”
The only other time we hear him speak is during the account of the Transfiguration, which St. Mark gives us today.
God the Father first repeats what he had said about Jesus at his baptism, “This is my Son, my beloved.”
But then this eternal Father of so few words basically zeroes in on Peter, James and John and says something to them that is really quite remarkable when you consider its context: “Listen to him!”
This is interesting – we are to listen to Christ – He is our good Shepherd – he has the words of life
Only the sheep heed the words of the Shepherd.
Over all the competing voices in this world we need to hear the words of Jesus over the noise.
III. The shepherd comes to give us life more abundantly.
In John 10:10 Jesus makes it clear that He came to give life and not just life but abundant life.
How does this life look like and how does it work?
When I think of the life that Jesus had called to give us I think of the apostle Peter. I need to explain to clarify this point.
True life begins with Christ brining forgiveness of our sins.
In the story of Peter we see one of the most heinous denials of Jesus ever recorded in the Bible. In John chapter 18 we see that Peter denies Jesus three times.
John 18 18 gives us another detail that Peter was warming himself around a charcoal fire when this occurred.
So etched in Peter’s memory is this standing around a charcoal fire and denying Jesus.
Right after this Jesus is crucified and it would be later after Jesus resurrection that John records the use of another charcoal fire.
I believe this is intentional Jesus makes a charcoal fire for the disciples to cook their breakfast.
In John 21 we read this story of Jesus having this charcoal fire.
Imagine if you are Peter, with the risen Christ, smelling the charcoal fire, what would you be thinking? It had to be tough to face Jesus.
But what happens next is fascinating.
Jesus asks Peter three times if he loves him. Peter replies yes the first time and Jesus tells him to feed his sheep.
The second time Jesus asks Jesus tells him to Shepherd his sheep.
The third time he tells him toe tend the flock
What we see Jesus do is give Peter forgiveness and commission. That is the life that we have been called to – salvation and vocation.
Jesus saves us and then gives us our vocation. That calling could be Church leadership, a deaconate, or teaching a Bible class. All of us have a vocation and a calling in Christ’s Kingdom. We need to be open to what that might be.
That is life to the abundant – life forgiven in Christ and life with purpose or vocation.
IV. The sheep are united into one flock
In John 10:16 Jesus speaks of other sheep that will be added to the sheepfold. This is specifically speaking of the Gentiles.
Later in Romans Paul will explain that Israel is the root of the olive tree and the Gentiles are grafted in to that tree.
The true Israelites were the ones that recognized Jesus as the Messiah of Israel.
If you remember Peter was the apostle to the Jews and Paul was the apostle to the Gentiles. God would take these two groups that were separated and put them together in the Church.
General Robert E. Lee was a devout follower of Jesus Christ. Although he was raised in the south where prejudice was a daily way of life, Lee seldom practiced it or revealed it in his life.
Although his family owned slaves at one juncture, the slaves were always treated with respect and dignity.
It is said that soon after the end of the Civil War, he visited a church in Washington, D.C., a city that had often heaped scorn on Lee throughout the war for his loyalty to the slave-owning states of the Confederacy.
During the communion service Lee slowly made his way to the front of the church where he knelt beside a black man.
After the service had ended, an onlooker approached Lee and said to him, “How could you do that?” Lee replied, “My friend, all ground is level beneath the cross.”
Paul explains to us that in Christ there is neither Jew nor Greek, nor male and female, free or slave. We are all one in Christ.
Christ came to unify all mankind. The only place the true unity of mankind will ever happen is the church.
We sign peace, treaties, we can try to build democracies in the Middle East but true human unity will come when the world bends the knee to Jesus Christ.
There is no place for airs or division in the Church, when we have the one good Shepherd we are one in Him.
V. The Shepherd lays down his life for his sheep.
In the book Chicken Soup for the Soul, Eric Butterworth tells the story of a college professor who had his sociology class go into the Baltimore slums to get case histories of 200 young boys.
The students were asked to write an evaluation of each boy’s future. In every case the students wrote, "He hasn’t got a chance."
Twenty-five years later another sociology professor came across this earlier study.
He had his students do follow up on the same 200 boys who were now men.
With the exception of 20 boys who had moved away or died, the students learned that 176 of the remaining 180 had achieved more than ordinary success as lawyers, doctors, and businessmen.
The professor was astounded and decided to pursue the matter further. Fortunately, all the men were in the area and he was able to ask each one, "How do you account for your success?" In each case the reply came with feeling, "There was a teacher."
The teacher was still alive, so he sought her out and asked the old but still alert lady what magic formula she had used to pull these boys out of the slums into successful achievement.
The teacher’s eyes sparkled and her lips broke into a gentle smile. "It’s really very simple," she said. "I loved those boys."
In the same way that this lady love those boys enough to pull them up out of the slums, Jesus loved us enough to pull us up out of sin.
In the Old Testament time the sheep would always die for the Shepherd. The shepherd would raise them up and then have them slaughtered but our Shepherd is different. He has flipped the tables and now He lays his life down for us.
Our Shepherd dies for His sheep.
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