Sermon nuggets Mon June 16
Theme THE GOOD SHEPHERD John 10:1-21
Verses- John 10:1-6 "I tell you the truth, the man who does not enter the sheep pen by the gate, but climbs in by some other way, is a thief and a robber. The man who enters by the gate is the shepherd of his sheep. The watchman opens the gate for him, and the sheep listen to his voice. He calls his own sheep by name and leads them out.
4 When he has brought out all his own, he goes on ahead of them, and his sheep follow him because they know his voice. But they will never follow a stranger; in fact, they will run away from him because they do not recognize a stranger's voice."
6 Jesus used this figure of speech, but they did not understand what he was telling them.
A GOOD SHEPHERD CALLS HIS SHEEP. v. 1-6
One of the most endearing figures in the Bible of the relationship of God to his people is the figure of being a Shepherd to Sheep. The Jews well knew the allegory of David's 23rd Psalm, and many others also. Now Jesus uses this same figure to describe himself in relationship to his followers. He is the good shepherd. This is another allusion to Jesus divinity. The Church is His sheep.
The New Testament also speaks of leaders of the Church as shepherds and people as flock. It is the duty of the leader to feed the flock of God, to accept the oversight willingly and not by constraint, to do it eagerly and not for the love of money, not to use the position for exercise of power but to be an example to the flock. These teachings are in I Peter 5:2,3.
A shepherd is known by the sheep. They follow his voice. They trust Him. It is not uncommon even today in various parts of the world for flocks to intermingle. Shepherds would get together and visit, eat, socialize, or sleep, and in the morning would call their own flocks and amazingly the sheep would divide up according to the voice of the shepherd. There was a special relationship between good shepherds and sheep.
The relationship is quite different in Palestine because sheep are largely kept for wool and milk, so it was the case that sheep were often with the shepherd for years. The shepherd would often give his sheep special names. He would call them by their names. The shepherd went down a path first to see that it was safe, and there were no dangers. Then call the sheep that would follow his voice. A thief could never get sheep to follow him, because they would not recognize his voice, so he must steal them.
It is clear in the Gospels that the religious rulers of Israel were interested only in providing for themselves and protecting themselves. The Pharisees were covetous, and even took advantage of the poor widows. They turned God's temple into a den of thieves robbing the poor people by requiring them to purchase at inflated prices special blessed animals. They exchanged money at enormous rates. They plotted to kill Jesus so that Rome would not take away their privileges.
Lewis Timberlake wrote when Dr. David Livingstone was working in Africa, "We would like to send other men to you. Have you found a good road into your area yet?"
Dr. Livingstone sent this message in reply: "If you have men who will only come if they know there is a good road, I don't want them. I want men who will come if there is no road at all." It was a pointed reply. We are not looking for the easy road, but rather the road where Jesus calls us for he goes before us and the easy road where he is not will only lead to destruction.
There are others who will call us to follow them and do what they want us to do, but the follower of Jesus will commit himself of listening to the voice of the good shepherd. Any other voice will only mislead us.
Pastor Dale
