The Goodness of the Good Shepherd

People would take their Bibles,
turn to John chapter 10. And I would thank God’s people for allowing me,
I guess, an extended time there in Ephesians chapter 4. We did that, I did it really
as kind of a design to address some things, some observations,
some concerns. And I pondered, even this week,
I thought about Ephesians 4 and its significance, and I guess
I would just leave you with one final question in that section. That if the success of the church
depended on you, would it survive? That’s what I meditated on all
week. Of course, the success of the church doesn’t depend
just on any one person. It is a symphony, as we saw in
closing. And I would just urge the saints
to examine their hearts and stir themselves up to service, because
it’s service ultimately to Christ. So thank you for allowing me the time to go there
into Ephesians, but I want to return to the Gospel of John.
We left off in John chapter 9 having concluded that chapter, but even
though we come to a new chapter, chapter 10, the context really
isn’t all that different. The scene is uninterrupted. John provides no real hard break. There’s no change in setting.
There’s no alert to a change in the context. John doesn’t
interject any change of location or time or in the particulars
of the circumstance. And so John’s repeated recording
every time it occurs in his gospel those words, truly, truly, they
never introduce a new section. And I would say that the same
is true here in John chapter 10. Those words always intensify
an argument that is already in progress. Jesus is still countering
the Pharisees, now comparing their shepherding with His own. There’s no break. The scene is
continued and even though the subject or the illustration may
be new, the context remains the same. In order to drive that
point home, I want you to actually pick up in chapter 9 verse 35
where Jesus is once again declaring, confirming, affirming his deity
before his detractors. the Pharisees. And as we pick
up in verse 35 we’ll glide immediately into verse 10 and you’ll see
that these passages do belong together, these chapters, these
thoughts are built one upon another. We pick up in John chapter 9
beginning in verse 35. Jesus heard that they had put
him, the man born blind, put him out and finding him, he said,
do you believe in the Son of Man? He answered, who is he,
Lord, that I may believe in him? Jesus said to him, you have both
seen him and he is the one who is talking with you. And he said,
Lord, I believe. And he worshiped him. And Jesus
said, For judgment I came into this world, so that those who
do not see may see, and those who see may become blind. Those of the Pharisees who were
with Him heard these things and said to Him, We are not blind
too, are we? Jesus said to them, If you were
blind, you would have no sin. But since you say, We see, Your
sin remains. Truly, truly, I say to you, he
who does not enter by the door of the fold of the sheep but
climbs in some other way, he is a thief and a robber. But
he who enters by the door is a shepherd of the sheep. To him,
the doorkeeper opens and the sheep hear his voice, and he
calls his own sheep by name and leads them out. When he puts
forth all his own, he goes ahead of them. And the sheep follow
him because they know his voice. A stranger they simply will not
follow, but will flee from him because they do not know the
voice of strangers. This figure of speech, Jesus
spoke to them, but they did not understand what these things
were which he had been saying to them. So Jesus said to them
again, truly, truly I say to you, I am the door of the sheep. All who came before me are thieves
and robbers, but the sheep did not hear them. I am the door. If anyone enters through me,
he will be saved and will go in and out and find pasture. The thief comes only to steal
and kill and destroy. I came that they may have life
and have it abundantly. I am the good shepherd. The good
shepherd lays down his life for the sheep. 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. He flees because he is
a hired hand and is not concerned about the sheep. I am the good
shepherd and I know my own and my own know me. Even as the Father
knows me and I know the Father, and I lay down my life for the
sheep, 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. For this reason the Father loves
me, because I lay down my life so that I may take it again.
No one has taken it from me, but I lay it down on my own initiative. I have authority to lay it down
and I have authority to take it up again. This commandment
I received from my Father.” A division occurred again among the Jews
because of these words. Many of them were saying, he
has a demon and is insane. Why do you listen to him? Others
were saying, these are not the sayings of one demon possessed. demon cannot open the eyes of
a blind man, can he? At that time, the Feast of the
Dedication took place at Jerusalem. It was winter, and Jesus was
walking in the temple in the portico of Solomon. The Jews
then gathered around Him and were saying to Him, How long
will You keep us in suspense? If You are the Christ, tell us
plainly. Jesus answered them, I told you
And you do not believe the works that I do in my father’s name. These testify of me, but you
do not believe because you are not of my sheep. My sheep hear
my voice and I know them and they follow me and I give eternal
life to them that they will never perish and no one will snatch
them out of my hand. My Father, who has given them
to me, is greater than all, and no one is able to snatch them
out of the Father’s hand. I and the Father are one.” The
Jews picked up stones again to stone him. Jesus answered them,
“‘I showed you many good works from the Father. For which of
them are you stoning me?’ The Jews answered him, For a good
work we do not stone you, but for blasphemy. And because you,
being a man, make yourself out to be God.” Jesus answered them,
“‘Has it not been written in your law, I said you are gods? If he called them gods, to whom
the word of God came, and the scripture cannot be broken, do
you say of him whom the Father sanctified and sent into the
world, you are blaspheming? because I said I am the Son of
God? If I do not do the works of my Father, do not believe
me. But if I do them, though you do not believe me, believe
in the works so that you may know and understand that the
Father is in me and I in the Father.” Therefore, they were
seeking again to seize him, and he eluded their grasp. And he
went away again beyond the Jordan to a place where John was first
baptizing, and he was staying there. Many came to him and were
saying, while John performed no sign, yet everything John
said about this man was true. Many believed in him there. John chapter 10 continues, a
debate that had begun much earlier, even earlier than John chapter
9, there were already those There were hating Christ because of
His claims, hating Christ because of His works, hating Christ because
of the things that He was doing and claiming to be. And so this
is really just another intensification of that scene that had already
initiated. The whole image here in John
chapter 10 about shepherds and sheep, that’s essentially what
the chapter is about, but what is the point? We’ll come to the
point as we close this morning. The Old Testament is full of
images of shepherd and sheep and metaphorically of God as
the shepherd and His people as the sheep. And so what you have
in John chapter 10 is really a metaphor. It’s not a parable. It isn’t even called a parable
in the Greek. It’s an interesting fact that
the synoptic writers never used the word that is translated here,
and John never uses the word parable. The word itself that
is used here, paroima, means essentially something that is
beside the way, kind of a wayside saying, a comment that is meant
to be interpreted. One described it in somewhat
lengthy fashion, but I think it’s good enough that we take
it in. He said, the form of the discourse
is remarkable. It resembles the synoptic parables,
but not exactly. The parable is a short narrative
kept wholly separate from the ideal facts which it signifies. And when you back up and look,
at some of the parables, the parable of the soils, for instance,
where the seed was scattered and sown, and it falls into a
variety of soils, those soils representing the variety of human
hearts, some receptive and some not. But this discourse is not a narrative,
and the figure and its applications run side by side and are interwoven
with one another all through. an extended metaphor. An accurate
name would be an allegory. Now, some people get a little
nervous when you begin to refer to Scripture as allegorical. Of course, there was a lengthy
period of interpretation which sought to discover unique meaning
in every ambiguous phrase, every ambiguous statement that is made
in Scripture, and we tend to look with much criticism upon
allegorical interpretation. But if something is given and
stated and provided as an allegory, we must consider it as such and
there’s a way to look at these. It is an allegory, a story about
sheep who recognize their own loving shepherd and insofar as
we look at it like that, The truth lies pretty much right
on the surface, doesn’t it? Jesus is the shepherd. We will
look closer at who are and who are not his sheep. But this allegory, this implied
extended comparison provides us with an interesting picture
about Christ. And what we have to do as we
proceed into considering this allegory is we need to consider
that one main theme, that one strong strand that courses throughout
the entire narrative, and we can’t press ourselves to try
to figure out every detail. There are some things that we
must leave essentially untouched. As I said, the scene is about
shepherds and sheep And it really centers around, if you will,
a day in the life of a flock of sheep. Beginning in the morning,
all the way to overnight in their secure stay. As I mentioned to
you, the scriptures are replete with this image. You know one,
probably as much as you know any scripture in the Bible, Psalm
23. It’s a beautiful image. The Lord
is my shepherd, I shall not want. He makes me lie down in green
pastures. He leads me beside quiet waters. He restores my soul. He guides
me in the paths of righteousness for his name’s sake. Even though
I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I fear no
evil for you are with me. Your rod and thy staff, they
comfort me. You prepare a table before me
in the presence of my enemies. You have anointed my head with
oil. My cup overflows. Surely goodness and lovingkindness
will follow me all the days of my life, and I will dwell in
the house of the Lord forever.” Well, that too is a metaphor,
isn’t it? Jesus has never come and gathered
us and led us out into a literal pasture to feed on the green
grass there. It’s all metaphorical. Those parallels, verbal parallels
at the very minimum are also replete throughout the Gospels.
Just listen briefly, Luke 15, Jesus there challenging his critics
said, what man among you if he had a hundred sheep, and has
lost one of them, does not leave the 99 in open pasture and go
after the one he lost until it is found.” The image there is
of Christ dealing with sinners and that was the criticism. That’s
why they were after Christ on this occasion was that he had
the audacity to be interacting with sinners. And Jesus says,
using this common metaphor of a shepherd and a sheep. Which
one of you, if you had a sheep that went missing, wouldn’t go
looking for that sheep? I’m doing no different than a
shepherd does. Matthew 18, a very similar setting. If a man has a hundred sheep
and one of them has gone astray, does he not leave the 99 in the
mountains and go search for the one that is straying? If it turns
out that he finds it truly, I say to you, he rejoices over it more
than over the 99 which have not gone astray. Over and over again
in the New Testament, there is that image. We think of Christ
looking at the people of Jerusalem where it says that he felt compassion
on them because they were distressed and dispirited like a sheep without
a shepherd. It’s an image that Jesus brings
forward. He wasn’t saying that they’re
nothing but dumb sheep. He wasn’t saying that he was
a literal shepherd. It was an image, a metaphor that
is projected throughout Scripture. But I want to look this morning,
beginning the next several Lord’s days, at the goodness of the
good shepherd. We know just from a basic reading
of this passage that ultimately Jesus is now the shepherd. Jesus is the good shepherd. And what makes Him good? I believe
that as we course through this, we will see that in the course
of the comparison between Christ, the good shepherd, and those
who were anything but good shepherds, they were bad and evil shepherds.
And what John records here in these first 18 verses is this
interplay, consideration, this comparison of Jesus, the good
shepherd, with bad shepherds. In the first observation and
as Jesus opens here in the first nine verses, they are vastly
different in their character. In verses 10 and 11, we will
see that they are vastly different in their desires. And as the
passage closes in verse 12 through 18, we will see that they are
vastly different in their conduct. But first, let’s go back to verse
one, where we see that these shepherds, Jesus, as compared
with other shepherds yet to be identified, they are vastly different
in character. Jesus’ excellence as a good shepherd,
His goodness, if you will, His excellence is revealed as we
hold Him in contrast with these false shepherds. Look at verse
1, where we see the thief’s deceitful tactics. 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. It almost goes without saying,
the conclusion that is drawn there. And the implication here
is that this is a pattern. In other words, that it’s very
possible that there is more than one thief, more than one bad
shepherd, more than one pretender who scales the wall only to harm
the sheep. Here’s the scene, if you will.
Shepherds during this period of time in this particular region
would place their flocks at the end of the day in a walled pen.
That allowed them to be kept safe without the watchful eye
of the shepherd himself. They were penned in, in a walled
enclosure. Sometimes these were the courtyards
next to the homes themselves. Sometimes they were merely on
the property, but they were walled enclosures at least in the confines
of the village, if not even in the confines of, if you will,
the ranch itself. And so several shepherds, and
better yet, several flocks would share one pen. And the shepherd
at the end of the day would migrate his sheep toward the pen, the
door would open, his sheep would go in, and along in time would
come another shepherd with his own flock. And it sounds confusing
to us, but as the sheep went in, they would seemingly blend.
Hopelessly, we might think that God has a plan. So several shepherds
would share these pens several flocks under different shepherds
all bringing their sheep at the end of the day. And then each
morning they would come to the pen or to this sheepfold to retrieve
their flocks and to lead them back out to pasture. And that’s
why I said this is a, if you will, a day in the life of a
flock. These pens usually had only one
door that had a purpose. One door, one gate, and it was
guarded by a doorkeeper. That meant that one doorkeeper
could keep watch over many, many sheep, many flocks while the
other shepherds went to eat and to rest. As a legitimate shepherd
approached in the morning, the doorkeeper would open the door,
see him coming. The shepherd would call his sheep. who instinctively knew their
master’s voice and they would naturally follow him out of the
pen and into the pasture. Only a legitimate shepherd would
come to the gate. Many times these were alarmed
with bells, little noisemakers. Sometimes there was a latch that
had to be unlocked by the doorkeeper himself. But only a legitimate
shepherd would come to the gate. He would know that the doorkeeper,
there’s no way that the doorkeeper would open the gate to an imposter. And only a thief would attempt
to scale the wall. Only a thief would attempt to
climb the wall and usually at night. Such an individual by
his behavior would immediately identify himself as a ne’er-do-well,
a suspicious person, really a thief or a robber. Sneaking over the
wall indicates that he’s only trying to do one thing, that
is, steal sheep. You say, what’s the difference
between a thief and a robber? It’s really pretty simple. I’ve
said before that I tend to respect robbers much more, because a
thief is a coward, right? A thief comes when no one’s around,
no one’s looking, nobody’s there to protect their property, and
he takes what isn’t his when no one is looking. A robber,
on the other hand, and when I say respect, I use a small r to identify
this respect, A robber, on the other hand, comes face-to-face
with his victims. He’s much more bold. He comes
face-to-face with his victims, and he takes what isn’t his by
force, whether he has a weapon or whether he uses his fists
or what have you. But a robber is considered to
be more violent. So in this particular scene,
as it unfolds, whether this individual stealthily scales the wall and
steals a sheep undetected or whether he climbs the wall and
could care less who confronts him, meets up with the doorkeeper,
does him violence and steals the sheep anyway. I would pose a question too.
Who do the thieves and the robbers represent in this little metaphor? That’s the first piece of the
puzzle that we need to unlock. We’ll do that in a minute. Look at verse 2. And here begins
the comparison. Jesus has already laid out what
a bad shepherd looks like, and now he begins to discuss what
a good shepherd looks like. What are the good shepherd’s
methods? Verse 2 says, he who enters by
the door is a shepherd of the sheep. To him, the doorkeeper
opens and the sheep hear his voice and he calls his own sheep
by name and leads them out. When he puts forth all his own,
he goes ahead of them and the sheep follow him because they
know his voice. We’ve already indicated the nature
of this pen. The pen is there to keep the
sheep in and to keep them together and safe. And so this door, the
doorkeeper sits at the door at this gate on one side, one wall
of the pen, and he allows only the shepherds to come and go,
also the sheep when they’re accompanied by a shepherd, this door has
a function. The door allows the sheep to
come in for protection at night and to go out into pasture in
the morning. Here I would identify as one
of the danger zones, if you will, of this particular metaphor.
Because there have been many people that have looked to this
doorkeeper and tried to come up with and distill down exactly
his identity. Who is this doorkeeper? Is it
John the Baptist? Is it Jesus Himself who sits
at the door allowing various shepherds of the church to come
and go with their flocks? I don’t think either of those
is even necessary. One of the things that we have
to do is that in a metaphor, we have to let the metaphor have
some background, if you will, things that we don’t try to press.
uncover every element of the allegory itself. One said it
this way, it does not appear that in the allegory the doorkeeper
is significant. It is just an honorable mention,
if you will, of this individual that was very commonly known
in the society. The one suggestion that kind
of resonates, but I still think is unreasonable, is to suggest
that the doorkeeper is the Holy Spirit. I understand the argument. I just don’t think that it’s
necessary. I don’t think we have to press that far to determine
who is and who isn’t the doorkeeper. It would have been a common enough
image for any to hear it to know that there are good shepherds
and there are bad shepherds. There are thieves and robbers
and there is a contrast between the two. The doorkeeper is kind
of in the background. Each morning they would come
to the pen of the sheepfold to retrieve their flocks. The doorkeeper
would see the shepherd coming. He would open the door. The sheep
would hear the call of the master’s voice and they would follow.
It’s a simple image. We’re told here that not only do the shepherds
know their own sheep, and I did enough reading to determine that
Shepherds have this uncanny knack of being able to look and recognize,
even though they look, we would see them as, you know, so many
bundles of fur. But the shepherds, they would
look and they would go, there’s notched ear and there’s a dotty,
you know, the dotted colored sheep. There’s the puny one. There’s the ornery one. They
would know different characteristics about their sheep, but not only
did the shepherd know their sheep, and if they had dogs, their dogs
even know their own sheep, probably in the case of the dogs, by scent. But the sheep know their shepherds. Now, in any circles you’ve ever
traveled in this realm, Anybody who’s ever talked to somebody
who has owned sheep or known somebody who has owned sheep
know them to be incredibly ignorant creatures. That’s why they need
so and depend so greatly on a shepherd for feeding and for protection. So the question becomes, who
is this good shepherd and where does he lead? One thing that
we will find out about this shepherd is he doesn’t miss any of his
sheep. His sheep know him and he knows
his sheep. And he doesn’t lose a one. And
he takes them out into pasture. Having collected his own flock
from the fold, he goes out and leads them in front of him. And he returns to the other shepherds. Look at verse 5. A stranger they
simply will not follow, but will flee from him because they do
not know the voice of the stranger. Now you have not just a thief
or a robber, you have an imposter showing up at the gate, giving
a call into the fold, hoping to draw out sheep to himself. It just says that they simply
will not follow. They don’t know him. He doesn’t
know them. They don’t know His voice. They
don’t recognize it. They don’t heed His call. He’s
not necessarily a thief or a robber, although that is His intent.
He doesn’t scale the wall. He’s even more brash than that.
He shows up in the morning in broad daylight and calls out
to a certain portion of the flock. Yet these sheep, because it’s
not their shepherd, because perhaps a shepherd of another flock,
or an imposter, or just someone looking to make trouble, it says
that they flee from Him. They run away from Him. They
know that He’s up to no good. They’re not the brightest creatures
on the planet, but they know enough to know that this is not
their shepherd. This past week I read of an account
where a visitor came and they wanted to do a test. And so he
put on the shepherd’s clothes and he went out into the flock
and tried to lead the sheep out and they wanted nothing to do
with him, even though he wore the clothes of the shepherd. He looked the part. He acted
the part. Sheep wanted nothing to do with
him. But when the shepherd stepped
out, even though he was wearing the stranger’s clothes, he gave
one call, and the sheep came. You see, the sheep know the shepherd’s
voice. Who are these strangers? Perhaps it’s no wonder that the
Pharisees, as they listened to this account, were somewhat bewildered. It’s a difficult metaphor, not
difficult in their day and age, given the fact of the popularity
of this trade in their day. Sheep were a vital part of that
community, even a vital part of their worship. But look at
verse six, it says, the figure of speech Jesus spoke to them,
they did not understand. They did not understand what
those things were which he had been saying to them.” This presents a little bit of
an interesting contrast, doesn’t it? A.W. Pink in his commentary noted
a very fascinating turn here. He said, this is the very reverse
of what was before us in the previous verse. There we learn
of the spirit of discernment possessed by all of Christ’s
sheep. Here we see illustrated the solemn
fact that those who are not His sheep are quite unable to understand
the truth even when it is plainly presented to them. They were absolutely bewildered
at this metaphor. They could not make even basic
sense of this allegory about shepherds and sheep. And so Jesus
brings the cookies down to the lower shelf, doesn’t He? And
He says, let me explain this. Look at verse 7. So Jesus said
to them again, what an act of mercy on Christ’s part. He wants
to correct them. He wants these hardened religious
professors. He wants them to deal with their
sin. He wants to call them to salvation. And he says, truly, truly, I
say to you, I am the door of the sheep. No longer just the
shepherd. Not the doorkeeper, mind you.
I am the door of the sheep. All who came before me are thieves
and robbers. But the sheep did not hear them.
I am the door. If anyone enters through me,
he will be saved and will go out and find pasture. So Jesus
declares again the main thrust of His story. He doesn’t change
the nature of the story. He doesn’t add any new material
here. But he starts with this phrase,
I am the door. I’m the one door. I’m the one
access point that sheep have both for protection and in the
morning for sustenance. I am the door. All who came before
me are thieves and robbers. And now he begins to identify.
And yet these words, they have to be limited, don’t they? You can’t say that the prophets
that came before Christ were thieves and robbers because they
were speaking God’s message. They were saying what God wanted
them to say. They were doing so for the sake
of God’s people, His flock, His sheep. John the Baptist can’t
possibly be considered a thief or a robber. Moses cannot be
considered a thief or a robber, Abraham, Joshua, David, Nehemiah. There have to be exceptions to
this and so the all has to be qualified. As one said, the patriarchs,
the prophets cannot be meant. It refers to the ravening wolves
in sheep’s clothing who had been and still were the ruin of the
nation. who devoured widows’ houses,
who were full of ravening and wickedness, and who were, in
very truth, thieves and robbers.” What Jesus begins to do here,
He begins to zero in on the Pharisees and to point to them as false
shepherds and to rebuke them in their sin, to call them away
from their sinful conduct. One shepherd said it this way,
the Pharisees were thieves in as much as they seized positions
which they had no right to occupy. They were essentially sitting
as judges of men’s souls. There are many religions in this
day and age that do that. They keep raising the bar and
no matter what people do in their particular flocks and congregations,
no matter what they do, no matter what level they achieve, they
only raise the bar higher. It’s works righteousness. It’s
works-oriented salvation. And that’s exactly what the Pharisees
were piling on the people. The Pharisees were thieves inasmuch
as they seized positions which they had no right to occupy.
They had no right to occupy the seat of judge. They exerted an
authority which did not justly belong to them. They made claims
which exempted themselves from the very laws that they piled
on the people. They not only seized positions
that they had no right to occupy, exerting an authority which did
not justly belong to them, but they unlawfully demanded submission
and subjection to which They could not establish a valid claim. They heaped all of these things
on the people, and they just kept them coming. They kept them
coming. Even this poor man in the particular
context in which we’re faced, he was born blind. They provided
him no help. He had to beg for His sustenance. They gave Him no mercy. Even when He was healed, all
He got from them was criticism, harshness. And ultimately, when
He stood before them and answered their questions and simply told
His story, truth by truth, it kicked Him out. It kicked Him
out. So when Jesus begins to call
these Pharisees, false shepherds, bad shepherds, evil shepherds. It’s a well-deserved rebuke that
they receive. And it’s no different from what
Jesus levied on other occasions. You think of Matthew chapter
23 when Jesus confronts them again and says, you serpents,
you brood of vipers, how will you escape the sentence of hell?
You know, there are times where a rebuke like this is so shocking, but it’s designed with a divine
purpose. God had a reason in mind in calling
these people to repentance. If you will, look at verse 9
as Jesus continues unfolding this narrative. I am the door. If anyone enters through me,
he will be saved and will go in and out and find pasture.
Do you understand what he’s doing here? He’s not only rebuking
them, he is holding out his merciful hand to the very people that
he’s rebuking. And he’s offering them salvation.
If anyone enters, If anyone comes through the door, which is none
other than Christ Himself, he will be saved. What a merciful
call. Jesus presents Himself as the
door into what can only be a spiritual fold. It’s not talking, just
like Psalm 23, not talking about a literal pasture. What good
would that be for us? Jesus Christ is not only the
door, He will go on to say that He is the way, the only way. He is the door, He is the only
door of access to the Heavenly Father. There is no other way. There is no other access to Almighty
God. As one commentator said, this
is the door into the presence of God. By nature we are separated,
alienated from God. Sin as a barrier comes between
us and bars us out of His holy presence. We’re outside the pen
and the sheep are vulnerable and the wolves are coming. But there’s a door. The Lord
Jesus has bridged that awful gulf. by taking our place, by
being made a curse in our stead as the exercised soul bows and
receives by faith the marvelous provision by which His grace
has made, we learn that in Christ Jesus, we who were far off have
been brought near by the blood of Christ. He’s the door. What
He is telling here is no different than what He has been announcing
throughout the entirety of His gospel and what He’ll continue
to proclaim throughout. It’s justification by faith. It is the door of entrance into
eternity itself with God and there’s only one way. There’s
only one door and the door is Jesus Christ. When it says, I
love how it says this, He will go in and out and find pasture. He’ll come in when he needs protection.
He’ll go out when he needs sustenance. And all the while, the shepherd
will be there. All the while, he will be protecting
him. That pastor, I would say, you
can get as grandiose as you want to here. What does the pastor
represent? Well, to begin with, salvation.
saved from our sins. We’ve received forgiveness from
God Almighty. Like I said, justification by
faith. We now have the privilege to
be part of God’s flock. Heaven is open to us. The Holy
Spirit is given to us. God’s Word becomes illuminated
to us. Things that we couldn’t make
sense of before now jump off the page we understand it. Grace
is given to us. Divine enablement is given to
us. Fellowship with God’s people,
like-minded people, is provided for us. Oh, Jesus begins to unfold
this, and now it begins to come into focus. What is the meaning?
The Shepherd is Christ. Jesus Christ is the Good Shepherd.
And the fold is a picture Not of, as some people strangely
said, Jerusalem or Judaism or Israel. It doesn’t picture heaven because
heaven doesn’t have thieves and robbers. It isn’t a picture of
the church. The picture here is of Christ. It’s of the Lord Jesus Christ
as the good shepherd. And then that makes the thieves
and robbers begin to jump right off the page, doesn’t it? We
know immediately who the thieves and robbers are. They’re the
Jewish leaders who have been touting salvation by law-keeping. And Jesus says, you’re stealing
sheep for the purpose of killing them. You don’t want to save
them. You don’t have the capacity to
save them. It was the entire hierarchy of
Jewish leadership of Christ’s day that he’s talking about,
but not just them. This whole thing that had developed,
this law keeping, this system of works, that if they only lived
according to a certain standard or according to the leaders of
the day, then they would be saved. These religious leaders were
hostile to Christ. because he brought a new and
different way. He brought in salvation by faith. He brought
in salvation simply by placing one’s faith in the Lord Jesus
Christ. And in that sense, any false
way is an attempt to gain mastery over the people and steal them
away for no good purpose. So Jesus, in pointing out the
thieves and the robbers, He wanted to show how unfit these shepherds
were. He wanted to reveal to them just
how wrong they were. And you know what’s interesting?
They knew. They had to have known. If they
knew their Old Testament Scriptures, they knew. Would God’s people
turn to Jeremiah chapter 23 briefly? These words had to have echoed
in the ears of these Pharisaic leaders. It had to have echoed
because they knew these passages backwards and forwards. Jeremiah
23 verses 1 through 4, look at this. Woe to the shepherds who
are destroying and scattering the sheep of my pasture, declares
the Lord. Now there, he’s directly speaking
to the leaders of the Jewish system. Therefore, thus says
the Lord God of Israel concerning the shepherds who are tending
my people, you have scattered my flock and driven them away
and have not attended to them. Behold, I am about to attend
to you for the evil of your deeds, declares the Lord. then I myself
will gather the remnant of my flock out of all the countries
where I have driven them and bring them back to their pasture
and they will be fruitful and multiply.” What a beautiful image. God says, I’m going to step up.
I am going to shepherd my people because these false shepherds
have scattered the flock. Same image is carried forth in
Jeremiah chapter 25. As you’re turning to Ezekiel
chapter 34, it’ll take you a moment to find it likely. Ezekiel chapter
34, I want you to just listen to Isaiah 56. We just preached, by God’s grace,
we just preached Isaiah 54 and 55. God’s prescription for the
response to the suffering servant of Isaiah 53. This is a portion
of the passage. we haven’t gotten to yet. Isaiah
56 verse 9, just listen. All you beasts of the field,
all you beasts in the forest come to eat. His watchmen are
blind. The shepherds are blind. All
of them know nothing. All of them are mute dogs, unable
to bark, dreamers lying down who love to slumber. And the
dogs are greedy, not satisfied. They are shepherds who have no
understanding. They have all turned to their
own way, each to his unjust gain to the last one. It’s the same
image. It’s the same exact image. And if you’re in Ezekiel 34,
listen to this. Look at verse 1. Then the word
of the Lord came to me, saying, 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? You eat the fat and clothe yourselves
with wool. You slaughter the fat sheep without
feeding the flock. Those who are sickly, you have
not strengthened. The diseased, you have not healed.
The broken, you have not bound up. The scattered, you have not
brought back. Nor have you sought for the lost,
but with force, with severity, you have dominated them.” He
goes on and on with this continued metaphor, one so common to the
Scriptures. They knew. They knew exactly
what Christ was talking about when He pointed at them and labeled
them as thieves and robbers. They knew. Back, if you would, to the Gospel
of John. If that’s the case, if they’re
thieves and robbers, what then is the fold? It isn’t heaven. As I said, thieves and robbers
can’t access heaven. Nobody can ever be snatched out
of God’s hands in heaven. It isn’t the church. The Good
Shepherd wouldn’t lead people out of the church. It isn’t Judaism
or Israel because Jewish shepherds are rebuked over the expectation
of leading them out of the fold. What is the fold? What is this
pen? I would suggest to you that it’s
the world. It’s the world into which Jesus comes and issues
forth His call, and He begins to beckon, and only His sheep
respond. It’s the world. It’s the world
out of which they’re called, from which Christ, the Good Shepherd,
leads, whereas other shepherds fail to do so. They have their
flocks, but they’re not leading them to any place good. And it says that Jesus enters
by the door, the Good Shepherd enters by the door, the flock
comes and goes out of the door. The simple point here is that
Jesus Christ came and He did it the right way. He did it exactly
as God prescribed. He did it legally. He did it
in perfect alignment with the Holy Scriptures. Jesus Christ
fulfilled all the conditions that God had established for
what was a good shepherd. Everything that was prescribed
about the Messiah, that He would be born of a virgin, that He
would come, that He would take on human flesh, that He would
be born in a particular place, Jesus Christ fulfilled it all.
He entered by the door. He did exactly what God would
have Him to do. He calls Himself the Good Shepherd. He’s the Good Shepherd in contrast
to all the other shepherds. And there is no conundrum here.
There’s no difficulty when we hear that Jesus Christ is also
the door. Jesus isn’t changing the metaphor. He’s just saying there that in
a very real way, not only is He the shepherd, He is that narrow
passageway. He is that access point. He is
the mediator, the mediator between men and God. And that’s why I
say that once again, John here is just recording Christ declaring
the whole theme of justification by faith. That is the gospel. It’s what we heard in John 3.16,
wasn’t it? That by faith in Christ, by faith
in what Christ has accomplished on the cross, that is the only
door, that is the only entrance. There is no other way. Well, if we know who the shepherd
is, we know what the door is, we know what the pen is. Who
are the sheep? The sheep are none other than
believers who follow the Lord Jesus Christ. It’s the entirety of His people.
It’s the church, if you will, with a capital C. It’s God’s
flock. It’s all true believers. And
remember in John chapter 6, Jesus said it this way, all that the
Father gives me will come to me. The one who comes to me I
will certainly not cast out. I’ve come down from heaven not
to do my own will, but the will of Him who sent me. This is the
will of Him who sent me, that of all He has given me, I lose
nothing, but I raise it up on the last day.” It’s every last
sheep are in God’s possession. There’s an important point here
that shouldn’t be overlooked when it says a stranger they
will not follow. The sad truth is that it certainly seems that,
especially in our day and age, many follow all kinds of, they
buy all kinds of books and listen to all kinds of so-called teachers
and follow, seemingly so, all kinds of different ideas. It is a danger. But it really proves the point
that only a true sheep of Christ We’ll hear his voice and we’ll
tune his ears to that voice and we’ll reject all others. The
very fact that people are running fast pace after all kinds of
different teachers is proof of the point. One pastor said this can hardly
mean that they will never respond. to the call of false shepherds.
There are many people who get sidelined for a season. Many
of us have read books that we hadn’t ought to read, did as
much trouble, took some time to sift through that, sort through
that, return to the shepherd, tune our ear once again to his
voice. This can hardly mean they will
never respond to the call of false shepherds. Otherwise, why
all the warnings in Scripture about false teachers and the
need to hold a sound doctrine? The problem is that many people
do succumb for a time. The point is that the redeemed
of Christ will not absolutely or unreservedly, completely give
themselves over to a false teacher. They won’t capitulate into false
doctrine. So this story This metaphor is
a story of salvation by Christ alone. Christ in his character
is the good shepherd. And the good shepherd is the
one that cares for the sheep and ultimately leads those sheep
to salvation. Jesus Christ is the only good
shepherd. Where the sheep come, and are
freed of the guilt of their sin. They’re freed of their waywardness.
They’re freed of their lost estate because they’ve come to the shepherd
and guardian of their souls, as Peter calls them. It’s the
Lord Jesus Christ. He is the good shepherd. He’s
good in his character and as we’ll take up next Lord’s Day,
He’s good in His desires. Let’s pray. Our merciful God,
we humble ourselves before You. All who have placed their faith
in Christ know this well. Lord, many of us were subjected
to so many evil shepherds in the past. Even our own heart
wanted to shepherd us away from Christ. We knew many, we heard
many, we followed many that were empty, utterly void of anything
good. Yet, once we saw Christ for who He
was, we sensed that He was a good shepherd, a kind master, a loving
Savior. And Lord, as we placed our faith
in Him and began to walk in Him, we knew that we had found the
Good Shepherd. There were no others. We knew
that we had found the only way of salvation. We know that Jesus
Christ has our best in mind. He’s already dealt with the worst
part of our nature and has begun to infuse us again with righteousness
and grace and bestow upon us that same righteousness and salvation. Lord, we thank You and praise
You for the Good Shepherd. We thank You for sending Him
to us. We thank You for tuning our ears
to His precious voice. Lord, call Your sheep. It’s in
Jesus’ name we pray.