I am the door. If anyone enters in by me, he will be saved, and will go in and go out, and will find pasture. The thief only comes to steal, kill, and destroy. I came that they may have life, and may have it abundantly. I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep.
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John 10:9-11 sits inside this longer paragraph.
Jesus therefore said to them again, “Most certainly, I tell you, I am the sheep’s door. All who came before me are thieves and robbers, but the sheep didn’t listen to them. I am the door. If anyone enters in by me, he will be saved, and will go in and go out, and will find pasture. The thief only comes to steal, kill, and destroy. I came that they may have life, and may 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 doesn’t own the sheep, sees the wolf coming, leaves the sheep, and flees. The wolf snatches the sheep, and scatters them. The hired hand flees because he is a hired hand, and doesn’t care for the sheep. I am the good shepherd. I know my own, and I’m known by my own; even as the Father knows me, and I know the Father. 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. They will become one flock with one shepherd. Therefore the Father loves me, because I lay down my life, that I may take it again. No one takes it away from me, but I lay it down by myself. I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it again. I received this commandment from my Father.”
Parallel Translations
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I am the door. If anyone enters in by me, he will be saved, and will go in and go out, and will find pasture.
The thief only comes to steal, kill, and destroy. I came that they may have life, and may have it abundantly.
I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep.
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I am the dore: by me yf eny man enter in he shalbe safe and shall goo in and out and fynde pasture.
The thefe cometh not but forto steale kyll and destroye. I am come that they myght have lyfe and have it more aboundantly.
I am the good shepeheerd. The good shepeheerd geveth his lyfe for the shepe.
Show all 3 translations
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I am that doore: by me if any man enter in, he shall be saued, and shall go in, and go out, and finde pasture.
The theefe commeth not, but for to steale, and to kill, and to destroy: I am come that they might haue life, and haue it in abundance.
I am that good shepheard: that good shepheard giueth his life for his sheepe.
Examined in Scripture Analysis
Contradictions (2)
Questions where the Bible appears to say two different things, with the passages on each side set together.
Cross-references (59)
- Luke 19:10 (v10) For the Son of Man came to seek and to save that which was lost.”
- John 6:51 (v10) I am the living bread which came down out of heaven. If anyone eats of this bread, he will live forever. Yes, the bread which I will give…
- John 12:47 (v10) If anyone listens to my sayings, and doesn’t believe, I don’t judge him. For I came not to judge the world, but to save the world.
- John 3:17 (v10) For God didn’t send his Son into the world to judge the world, but that the world should be saved through him.
- John 6:33 (v10) For the bread of God is that which comes down out of heaven, and gives life to the world.”
Show all 56 cross-references
- 1 Timothy 1:15 (v10) The saying is faithful and worthy of all acceptance, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners, of whom I am chief.
- Matthew 20:28 (vv10–11) even as the Son of Man came not to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.”
- John 10:1 (vv9–10) “Most certainly, I tell you, one who doesn’t enter by the door into the sheep fold, but climbs up some other way, is a thief and a robber.
- Hebrews 7:25 (v10) Therefore he is also able to save to the uttermost those who draw near to God through him, seeing that he lives forever to make…
- John 14:6 (v9) Jesus said to him, “I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father, except through me.
- Ezekiel 34:2-4 (v10) “Son of man, prophesy against the shepherds of Israel. Prophesy, and tell them, even the shepherds, ‘The Lord Yahweh says: “Woe to the…
- Psalms 23:1 (v11) Yahweh is my shepherd: I shall lack nothing.
- John 10:14-15 (v11) I am the good shepherd. I know my own, and I’m known by my own; even as the Father knows me, and I know the Father. I lay down my life for…
- John 15:13 (v11) Greater love has no one than this, that someone lay down his life for his friends.
- Ephesians 2:18 (v9) For through him we both have our access in one Spirit to the Father.
- 2 Peter 1:11 (v10) For thus you will be richly supplied with the entrance into the eternal Kingdom of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.
- Isaiah 56:11 (v10) Yes, the dogs are greedy. They can never have enough. They are shepherds who can’t understand. They have all turned to their own way, each…
- Romans 5:13-21 (v10) For until the law, sin was in the world; but sin is not charged when there is no law. Nevertheless death reigned from Adam until Moses,…
- Hebrews 6:17 (v10) In this way God, being determined to show more abundantly to the heirs of the promise the immutability of his counsel, interposed with an…
- Revelation 7:17 (v11) for the Lamb who is in the middle of the throne shepherds them and leads them to springs of life-giving waters. And God will wipe away…
- Matthew 23:13 (v10) “Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you devour widows’ houses, and as a pretense you make long prayers. Therefore you will…
- Romans 2:21 (v10) You therefore who teach another, don’t you teach yourself? You who preach that a man shouldn’t steal, do you steal?
- Hosea 7:1 (v10) When I would heal Israel, then the iniquity of Ephraim is uncovered, also the wickedness of Samaria; for they commit falsehood, and the…
- Isaiah 40:11 (vv9, 11) He will feed his flock like a shepherd. He will gather the lambs in his arm, and carry them in his bosom. He will gently lead those who…
- John 10:7 (v9) Jesus therefore said to them again, “Most certainly, I tell you, I am the sheep’s door.
- 1 Peter 2:24-25 (v11) He himself bore our sins in his body on the tree, that we, having died to sins, might live to righteousness. You were healed by his wounds.…
- 2 Peter 2:1-3 (v10) But false prophets also arose among the people, as false teachers will also be among you, who will secretly bring in destructive heresies,…
- Matthew 18:10 (v10) See that you don’t despise one of these little ones, for I tell you that in heaven their angels always see the face of my Father who is in…
- Romans 5:1-2 (v9) Being therefore justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ; through whom we also have our access by faith…
- Mark 11:17 (v10) He taught, saying to them, “Isn’t it written, ‘My house will be called a house of prayer for all the nations?’ But you have made it a den…
- Psalms 100:3-4 (v9) Know that Yahweh, he is God. It is he who has made us, and we are his. We are his people, and the sheep of his pasture. Enter into his…
- Psalms 95:7 (v9) for he is our God. We are the people of his pasture, and the sheep in his care. Today, oh that you would hear his voice!
- Matthew 21:13 (v10) He said to them, “It is written, ‘My house shall be called a house of prayer,’ but you have made it a den of robbers!”
- 1 John 3:16 (v11) By this we know love, because he laid down his life for us. And we ought to lay down our lives for the brothers.
- John 12:6 (v10) Now he said this, not because he cared for the poor, but because he was a thief, and having the money box, used to steal what was put into…
- Hebrews 13:20 (v11) Now may the God of peace, who brought again from the dead the great shepherd of the sheep with the blood of an eternal covenant, our Lord…
- 2 Samuel 24:17 (v11) David spoke to Yahweh when he saw the angel who struck the people, and said, “Behold, I have sinned, and I have done perversely; but these…
- Psalms 23:1-6 (v9) Yahweh is my shepherd: I shall lack nothing. He makes me lie down in green pastures. He leads me beside still waters. He restores my soul.…
- Ezekiel 34:23 (v11) I will set up one shepherd over them, and he will feed them, even my servant David. He will feed them, and he will be their shepherd.
- 1 Peter 5:4 (v11) When the chief Shepherd is revealed, you will receive the crown of glory that doesn’t fade away.
- Ezekiel 37:24 (v11) “ ‘ “My servant David will be king over them. They all will have one shepherd. They will also walk in my ordinances, and observe my…
- Isaiah 49:9-10 (v9) saying to those who are bound, ‘Come out!’; to those who are in darkness, ‘Show yourselves!’ “They shall feed along the paths, and their…
- Ezekiel 34:12-16 (v9) As a shepherd seeks out his flock in the day that he is among his sheep that are scattered abroad, so I will seek out my sheep. I will…
- Ezekiel 34:11-16 (v11) “ ‘For the Lord Yahweh says: “Behold, I myself, even I, will search for my sheep, and will seek them out. As a shepherd seeks out his flock…
- Zechariah 13:7 (v11) “Awake, sword, against my shepherd, and against the man who is close to me,” says Yahweh of Armies. “Strike the shepherd, and the sheep…
- Titus 2:14 (v11) who gave himself for us, that he might redeem us from all iniquity, and purify for himself a people for his own possession, zealous for…
- Micah 5:4 (v11) He shall stand, and shall shepherd in the strength of Yahweh, in the majesty of the name of Yahweh his God: and they will live, for then he…
- 1 Samuel 17:34-35 (v11) David said to Saul, “Your servant was keeping his father’s sheep; and when a lion or a bear came, and took a lamb out of the flock, I went…
- Psalms 80:1 (v11) Hear us, Shepherd of Israel, you who lead Joseph like a flock, you who sit above the cherubim, shine out.
- John 10:17-18 (v11) Therefore the Father loves me, because I lay down my life, that I may take it again. No one takes it away from me, but I lay it down by…
- Isaiah 53:6 (v11) All we like sheep have gone astray. Everyone has turned to his own way; and Yahweh has laid on him the iniquity of us all.
- Ephesians 5:2 (v11) Walk in love, even as Christ also loved us and gave himself up for us, an offering and a sacrifice to God for a sweet-smelling fragrance.
- Hebrews 10:19-22 (v9) Having therefore, brothers, boldness to enter into the holy place by the blood of Jesus, by the way which he dedicated for us, a new and…
- Genesis 31:39-40 (v11) That which was torn of animals, I didn’t bring to you. I bore its loss. Of my hand you required it, whether stolen by day or stolen by…
- Zechariah 10:12 (v9) I will strengthen them in Yahweh; and they will walk up and down in his name,” says Yahweh.
- Psalms 80:1-3 (v9) Hear us, Shepherd of Israel, you who lead Joseph like a flock, you who sit above the cherubim, shine out. Before Ephraim and Benjamin and…
56 distinct cross-references across this passage (59 total citations).
Cross-references from openbible.info (CC BY 4.0)
Explain this passage (23 sources)
Historical commentary, presented as a primary source — not an endorsement.
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John Calvin 1540 · Public Domain On vv9–11 9. If any man enter by me. The highest…
9. If any man enter by me. The highest consolation of believers is, that when they have once embraced Christ, they learn that they are out of danger; for Christ promises to them salvation and happiness. He afterwards divides it into two parts.
He shall go in and out, and find pasture. First, they shall go safely wherever they find necessary; and, next, they shall be fed to the full. By going in and out, Scripture often denotes all the actions of the life, as we say in French, aller et venir, (to go and come,) which means, to dwell These words, therefore, present to us a twofold advantage of the Gospel, that our souls shall find pasture in it, which otherwise become faint and famished, and are fed with nothing but wind; and, next, because he will faithfully protect and guard us against the attacks of wolves and robbers.
John Calvin's Commentaries (1540-1563) — public domain. Text from the Calvin Translation Society English edition (1840s-50s) via the Christian Classics Ethereal Library (ccel.org). Calvin's coverage is partial (roughly two-thirds of the Bible); uncommented books and verses are honest gaps, never fabricated. The 19th-century editor's footnotes and remarks are omitted so the notes are faithfully Calvin's own voice.
Geneva Bible translators 1599 · Public Domain On v9 Only Christ is the true Pastor, and that only…
Only Christ is the true Pastor, and that only is the true Church, which acknowledgeth him to be properly their only Pastor: To him are opposite thieves which feed not the sheep, but kill them: and hirelings also, which forsake the flock in time of danger, because they feed it only for their own profit and gains.
That is, shall live safely: so use the Jews to speak, as Deut. 26:6, and yet there is a peculiar alluding to the shepherd’s office.
Geneva Bible (1599) marginal notes — public domain.
John Trapp 1656 · Public Domain On vv9–11 9 I am the door: by me if any…
9 I am the door: by me if any man enter in, he shall be saved, and shall go in and out, and find pasture.
Ver. 9. And shall go in and out, &c.] That is, shall live securely, and be fed daily and daintily, as David shows, Psa 23:1-6, where he sweetly strikes upon the whole string through the whole hymn.
John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Matthew Poole 1685 · Public Domain On vv9–11 Our Saviour here lets us know, that he meant…
Our Saviour here lets us know, that he meant by the door, in the former verse, the door of salvation; the way by which every man must enter into life that findeth life; not the door only by which every true pastor must enter into the church, but by which every soul that shall be saved must enter into heaven; which is the doctrine which he before taught, Joh 3:16,18,36. And he, who so believeth in me, shall be so guided, and governed, and taught, that he shall be secure, and want nothing for the management of his whole conversation in the world. Under the notion of pasture here, are signified all good things that the soul can stand in need of: it is much the same promise with that Joh 6:35, He that cometh to me shall never hunger; and he that believeth on me shall never thirst; and with that Psa 84:11; as also with the Psa 23:1-6; to which Psalm our Saviour is thought in this parable to have a special reference.
Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
William Burkitt 1703 · Public Domain On v11 In these verses our Saviour evidently proves himself to…
In these verses our Saviour evidently proves himself to be the true Shepherd of his church, by the marks and signs, by the properties and characters, of a good shepherd; which were eminently found with him; namely, to know all his flock, to take care of them, and to lay down his life for them.
1. Jesus Christ, the great shepherd of his church, hath an exact and distinct knowledge of all his flock: I know my sheep, with a three-fold knowledge, with a knowledge of intelligence and observation: he knows them so as to observe and take notice of them, with a knowledge of care and protection; he knows them so as to defend and keep them. Thus Christ knows his sheep, and is also known of them; that is, he is believed on, beloved, and obeyed by them.
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2. He lays down his life for his flock. And for this doth he eminently deserve the title of the good shepherd. (As for his power, he is stiled the great shepherd.) A good shepherd indeed, who not only gives life to his sheep, but gives his own life by way of ransom for his sheep! This example of Christ, the great and good shepherd, in laying down his life for his sheep, teacheth all subordinate and inferior shepherds, to prefer the good of their flock, even before their own lives.
William Burkitt's Expository Notes on the New Testament (1700–1703) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
John Gill 1763 · Public Domain On vv9–11 I am the door,.... Of the sheep, as before,…
I am the door,.... Of the sheep, as before, see Joh 10:7. The Ethiopic version reads, "I am the true door of the sheep"; which is repeated for further confirmation, and for the sake of introducing what follows:
by me if any man enter in; into the sheepfold, the church,
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he shall be saved; not that being in a church, and having submitted to ordinances, will save any, but entering into these, at the right door, or through faith in Christ, such will be saved, according to Mar 16:16; such shall be saved from sin, the dominion of it, the guilt and condemning power of it, and at last from the being of it; and from the law, its curse and condemnation, and from wrath to come, and from every evil, and every enemy; such are, and for ever shall be, in a safe state, being in Christ, and in his hands, out of which none can pluck them:
and shall go in and out; in allusion to the sheep going in and out of the fold: not that those who come in at the right door, shall go out of the church, or from among the saints again; but this phrase rather denotes the exercises of faith in going unto Christ, and acting upon him, and in coming forth in the outward confession of him, and the performance of good works; or in going unto him, and dealing with his blood, righteousness, and sacrifice, and coming out of themselves, and all dependence on their own righteousness; or it may regard the conversation of the saints in the church, their attendance on ordinances, their safety there, their free and open communion one with another, and with Christ, in whose name and strength they do all they do, coming in and out at this door:
and find pasture; green and good pasture; pasture for their souls; the words of faith, and good doctrine; the wholesome words of Christ Jesus; the ordinances, the breasts of consolation; yea, Christ himself, whose flesh is meat indeed, and whose blood is drink indeed: the Persic version renders it, "and shall a pastor", or "shepherd"; see Jer 3:15.
John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
John Wesley 1765 · Public Domain On vv9–10 If any one - As a sheep, enter in…
If any one - As a sheep, enter in by me - Through faith, he shall be safe - From the wolf, and from those murdering shepherds. And shall go in and out - Shall continually attend on the shepherds whom I have sent; and shall find pasture - Food for his soul in all circumstances.
John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the Whole Bible (1754–1765) — public domain. Text via the GEBible commentary corpus.
Adam Clarke 1810 · Public Domain On vv9–11 Verse 9. I am the door: by me if…
Verse 9. I am the door: by me if any man enter, c.] Those who come for salvation to God, through Christ, shall obtain it: he shall be saved-he shall have his sins blotted out, his soul purified, and himself preserved unto eternal life. This the scribes and Pharisees could neither promise nor impart.
Go in and out] This phrase, in the style of the Hebrews, points out all the actions of a man's life, and the liberty he has of acting, or not acting. A good shepherd conducts his flock to the fields where good pasturage is to be found watches over them while there, and brings them back again and secures them in the fold. So he that is taught and called of God feeds the flock of Christ with those truths of his word of grace which nourish them unto eternal life; and God blesses together both the shepherd and the sheep, so that going out and coming in they find pasture: every occurrence is made useful to them; and all things work together for their good.
Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible (1810–1826) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Joseph Benson 1811 · Public Domain On vv9, 11 Joh 10:9-10. I am the door — I therefore…
Joh 10:9-10. I am the door — I therefore repeat it again, as a most important truth, that I myself am the only right door of entrance into the church of God; if any one, as a sheep, enter in — By me, through faith; he shall be saved — Now and hereafter; or rather, he shall be safe, like a sheep in its fold, safe from the wolf, and from those murdering shepherds; and shall go in and out — Under my care and guidance, and that of the shepherds whom I have sent, whose instructive voice he shall hear, and whose holy example he shall follow; and shall find pasture — Food for his soul in all circumstances: in consequence of his regard to me, his waiting upon me in mine ordinances, and his attendance on the ministry of those whom I appoint to dispense to him the word of life, he shall be fed and nourished with true doctrine, and shall obtain substantial happiness. The thief cometh not but for to kill, &c. — That is, nothing else can be the consequence of a shepherd’s coming, who does not enter in by me. Such assume the character of teachers divinely commissioned, for no other reason but to promote their own interest at the expense of men’s salvation; I am come that they might have life — Life spiritual and eternal; the life of grace and the life of glory. Christ came to quicken his church in general, which was rather like a valley filled with dry bones, than a pasture filled with grazing flocks. He came to vindicate divine truths, to purify divine ordinances, to correct men’s errors, to renew their hearts, to reform their lives, to redress their grievances, to sanctify and support them under their trials and troubles, to seek that which was lost, bind up that which was broken, strengthen that which was weak; and this, to his church, was as life from the dead. He came, that men might have life, as a criminal has when he is pardoned; a sick man when he is cured; a dead man when he is raised; that we might be justified, sanctified, and at last glorified. And that they might have it more abundantly — A life more abundant than that which was lost and forfeited by sin; more abundant than that which was promised by the law of Moses; more abundant than could have been reasonably expected, or than we are able to ask or think; that whatever measure of spiritual life in union with God, through Christ, of conformity to his image, or participation of his nature, we may have received, we may still desire and expect larger measures thereof; or to whatever degrees of holiness and usefulness we may have attained and manifested, we may still proceed to higher degrees, preparing and qualifying us for still higher degrees of future glory.
Joseph Benson's Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1811–1818) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Albert Barnes 1834 · Public Domain On vv9–11 By me - By my instruction and merits.
By me - By my instruction and merits.
Shall be saved - See Joh 5:24.
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Shall go in and out ... - This is language applied, commonly to flocks. It meant that he shall be well supplied, and defended, and led “beside the still waters of salvation.”
Albert Barnes' Notes on the Bible (1834–1885) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Haydock's Catholic Bible Commentary 1859 · Public Domain On v11 How happy are we in having such a shepherd,…
How happy are we in having such a shepherd, so great, so good, so loving, so careful of our true welfare! O he is the true shepherd indeed, that came down from heaven to seek the poor sheep that was lost; and when he found it, took it upon his own shoulders to carry it home with joy to his heavenly fold. How dearly have his sheep cost him, for truly has he made good in himself sentence, that the good shepherd giveth his life for his sheep. Let us then ever follow and obey, love and embrace this true shepherd of our souls. (Meditations for every Day, vol. ii. p. 417.) The good pastor gives his life for his sheep; he exposes himself to every danger to save them, no inclemency of the weather, no frost or cold, no rains or tempests, can drive him from looking over his sheep, to defend them from the attacks of wolves, &c. and like Jacob he might say, day and night was I parched with heat, and with cold, and sleep departed from my eyes. (Genesis xl.) Or, like David speaking to Saul: "Thy servant kept his father’s sheep, and there came a lion or a bear, and took a ram out of the midst of the flock; and I pursued after them, and struck them, and delivered it out of their mouths; and they arose up against me, and I caught them by the throat, and I strangled them, and killed them." (1 Kings xvii.) This is a model of a true pastor. But Jesus Christ has done more than this for us. He has exposed his life and his repose, he has spilled his blood, he delivered himself to the fury of his enemies, and has offered himself as a victim on the cross to his eternal Father, to free us, his lost sheep, from the most cruel wolf, the devil. And ever since his death he has always protected his Church, assisted and consoled his distressed flock under all their sufferings, pouring into their hearts the consolations of the holy Spirit, and sending to them holy teachers, to govern and lead them in the holy path of salvation. Such were the apostles and their successors, the bishops and priests of the holy Catholic Church, whom he has sent, and will continue to send, to govern his flock to the end of time. (Calmet.)
George Leo Haydock (1774–1849), Haydock's Catholic Family Bible and Commentary, 1859 edition — public domain. Excludes Psalms (Douay-Rheims chapter numbering differs from Protestant) and Deuterocanonical books (Catholic canon only).
Robert Jamieson, A. R. Fausset & David Brown 1871 · Public Domain On vv9–11 by me if any man enter in--whether shepherd or…
by me if any man enter in--whether shepherd or sheep.
shall be saved--the great object of the pastoral office, as of all the divine arrangements towards mankind.
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and shall go in and out and find pasture--in, as to a place of safety and repose; out, as to "green pastures and still waters" (Psa 23:2) for nourishment and refreshing, and all this only transferred to another clime, and enjoyed in another manner, at the close of this earthly scene (Rev 7:17).
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown — Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
Daniel D. Whedon 1874 · Public Domain On vv9–11 9. The door—The way of access to the fold…
9. The door—The way of access to the fold of the justified; and so the way, access, or mediator between man and God. The Pharisees rejected this way; and yet, undertaking to play the shepherd by a false route, became interlopers, usurpers, persecutors, and destroyers. If any man…saved—For even the under shepherds are, under another view, sheep of the great Shepherd, and need to enter in and be saved.
Pasture—See note on Joh_10:3.
Daniel D. Whedon (gen. ed.), Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1874–1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges 1878 · Public Domain On vv9–11 9. by me] Placed first for emphasis; ‘through Me…
9. by me] Placed first for emphasis; ‘through Me and in no other way.’ The main point is iterated again and again, each time with great simplicity, and yet most emphatically. “The simplicity, the directness, the particularity, the emphasis of S. John’s style give his writings a marvellous power, which is not perhaps felt at first. Yet his words seem to hang about the reader till he is forced to remember them. Each great truth sounds like the burden of a strain, ever falling upon the ear with a calm persistency which secures attention.” Westcott, Introduction to the Study of the Gospels, p. 250.
he shall be saved] These words and ‘shall find pasture’ seem to shew that this verse does not refer to the shepherds only, but to the sheep also. Although ‘find pasture’ may refer to the shepherd’s work for the flock, yet one is inclined to think that if the words do not refer to both, they refer to the sheep only.
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With the verse as a whole should be compared ‘the strait gate and narrow way which leadeth unto life’ (Mat_7:14). In the Clementine Homilies (iii. lii.) we have ‘He, being a true prophet, said, I am the gate of life; he that entereth in through Me entereth into life.’ See on Joh_9:3.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers 1878 · Public Domain On vv9–11 (9) By me if any man enter in.—He returns…
(9) By me if any man enter in.—He returns to the thought of the door, through which every true shepherd must himself enter the fold. The thought is parallel to that of the “strait gate” and “narrow way,” in Mat_7:13-14, and with St. Paul’s thought in Rom_5:2, and Eph_2:18. No one can really enter the fold and become a shepherd of the flock who does not seek to do so through the character and life and death of Christ—i.e., to devote himself in entire self-sacrifice to the sheep whom he seeks to lead; to live in unfailing prayer to and communion with God, whose the sheep are; to find for himself as for them “the access through Christ Jesus by one Spirit unto the Father.” We may not narrow the door to the fold, nor yet may we widen it. He is the Door. No shepherd may enter unless through Him.
He shall be saved.—The words refer primarily to the dangers without the fold from which he shall be delivered. (See the striking parallel in 1Co_3:15, and Note there.) But in the wider thought they include the salvation from sin which is in this life to be realised, and is a necessary qualification for the pastor’s work.
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And shall go in and out, and find pasture.—The fold will ever be open to him who enters by the Door. He will have perfect freedom to enter, whenever storm or danger or night approaches. He will lead out and find pasture for his flock. In the devotion of his service, and in communion with God, he will daily have an increasing knowledge of truths new and old, and the truths which he learns he will give as food for the souls of men.
A Bible Commentary for English Readers, edited by Charles John Ellicott (1878–1897) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Pulpit Commentary 1880 · Public Domain On vv9–11 I am the Door: by me by living relation…
I am the Door: by me by living relation to meif any man; i.e. either shepherd or sheep, for in this part of the interpretation they are not distinguished, and they alike need "salvation" and "pasture." By me if any man enter, he shall be saved, and shall go in and out, and find pasture. "Salvation" here spoken of refers primarily to deliverance from dangers, protection from the ravenous wolves without the fold, and from false shepherds within. "Go in and out" is a phrase frequently used "to denote the free use of an abode by one who is at home in the honey". (Deu_28:6 Deu_31:2 Act_1:21) The believer who enters into fellowship with God, and is "saved," does not "go in and out" of that state, but can as a child share by turns the Divine repose of the home, and the high privilege of his sonship in the world. "He claims his share in the inheritance of the world, secure of his home" (Westcott).
Christ the Door.
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A homely and simple metaphor; yet how full of meaning, how precious, how suggestive, to every hearer of the gospel! There may be a door to a sheepfold, to a house, to a palace, to a fortress. There may be a door to a dungeon, to a church, to a torture-chamber, to a royal treasury. A door may be of material as weak as wicker, or as strong as oak, iron, or brass. The door may be opened by a latch which a child may lift, or it may be secured by bolts and bars that may resist the blow of a battering-ram. It may stand always open, so that every passer-by may enter by it; or it may be locked, so that only such as have the key or the password can gain entrance.
I MAN"S SPIRITUAL CONDITION IS SUCH AS TO MAKE A DOOR LIKE THIS MOST DESIRABLE, A door presumes a "within" and a "without." If those on the outside are exposed to want, to danger, to misery; and if those within enjoy all the advantages which the excluded wanderers lack in such a case, the interest attaching to the door of ingress is manifest. Now, the spiritual state of sinful men is pitiable and distressing. In God is all good; apart from God no true good is accessible to man. The way to God is, then, to us a matter of vital importance. Christ declares himself to be such a Way. He is the Door; by which, translating the language from that of poetry to that of theology, we understand he is the "one Mediator between God and man.
II CHRIST IS THE DOOR BY WHICH MEN MAY ENTER IN AND ENJOY THE GREATEST BLESSINGS PROVIDED BY GOD.
1. The door of the fold admits the sheep to Divine pasture; and they who accept Christ"s mediation find at their disposal all the provision of God"s spiritual bounty. That the soul as well as the body needs food, is plain. The knowledge of God, the favor of God, the gracious help of God, without such provision the soul is starved. The way by which these blessings may be attained is that pointed out in the text. Christ is the Door, by which if any man enter in he shall find pasture.
2. The door of the fold admits the sheep to Divine security; and they who shelter themselves in Christ are safe from every harm and every foe. If the flock are left unprotected, they are exposed to dangers of two kinds; they are likely to wander among the precipices of the dark mountains, and they are liable to be attacked by ravening wolves and other beasts of prey, or to become the spoil of robbers and marauders. Similarly, it should be impressed upon the minds, especially of the inexperienced, that this life is full of perils to all the children of men, that temptations and spiritual enemies abound. There is no security out of Christ. But whilst those without the door are exposed to death, Christ secures to his flock the blessing of life, and that in abundance.
3. The door of the fold admits the sheep to Divine society; and through Christ his people partake the hallowed and happy fellowship of all who are his. Without are the enemies; within are the friends. The fellowship of the flock is among the choicest privileges to which Christians are introduced; but it is Christ himself who introduces them. Only through the door can this society be reached and enjoyed. Those who gather within the fold are together partakers of the love and care of the Shepherd. Theirs is the congenial companionship of God"s blessed home.
III CHRIST, AS A DOOR, HAS CERTAIN QUALITIES WHICH MAY AWAKEN OUR GRATITUDE.
1. He is a strong Door. His strength is used to resist the incursion of any invader or foe, and thus to protect the members of the fold. Christ is to his people a bulwark against every, evil.
2. He is to those who wish to enter into the enjoyment of spiritual blessings an open Door. Sometimes a door is used for excluding those without, in a spirit of churlishness. There is nothing like this in the posture, the bearing, of the Lord Jesus. This door is indeed shut to unbelief and hardness of heart, but is ever open to the lowly, faithful, and contrite.
3. He is the only Door. Those who seek another entrance are like such as climb over the wall. There is none other Name whereby we can be saved.
IV FOR WHOSE ADMISSION CHRIST, THE DOOR, IS INTENDED. Two classes are mentioned in the context, as contemplated in the benefits of this Door.
1. The under-shepherds, or those who are engaged in the spiritual tuition and guidance of their fellow-men. These are bound to enter in by the Door into the sheepfold. Spiritual pastors must find Christ before they can truly feed the sheep.
2. The sheep themselves enter by this Door, and by this only, into the fold of God. These are they whom the good Shepherd came to seek and find, when they were lost in the wilderness. These are they for whom the Shepherd laid down his precious life.
APPLICATION. Those who have entered by the Door, and are within the fold, should rejoice with gratitude. Those who are without should seek at once to enter by this Door. T.
HOMILIES BY GEORGE BROWN Ver. 9. The Portal of safety and promise.
"I am the Door: by me if any man enter in, he shall be saved, and shall go in and out, and find pasture." During long ages Israel was God"s flock; her system of life and worship, fenced round with laws and ordinances, was his fold; her prophets and righteous rulers were his shepherds. It was in many respects a strange and unique spectacle. "A people that dwelt alone, and was not reckoned among the nations." What was the key to this historic problem? One key to it at least was the hope of a Messiah. To see and in some measure grasp this hope was essential to every true Israelite. Whether such a one was a shepherd or a sheep of the flock, his faith in a present God embraced at the same time the promise of a Redeemer to come. Hence our Lord says (vers. 7, 8), "I am the Door of the sheep. All that ever came before me irrespective of me were thieves and robbers: but the sheep did not hear them." But now that the Messiah had come, his mission was not to destroy, but to fulfill; not to disappoint, but to expand, to exceed the hopes of God"s ancient people. And so, lifting up his eyes, Jesus sees before him a wider horizon, a richer pasture, and room for a larger flock than any Israelite had thought of. He even drops the image of a fold for the moment, or rather widens it out indefinitely, and speaks of himself as the Door the one way of entrance into the blessings of his own kingdom. "I am the Door," etc. Thus, by means of a simple image, Christ places himself between the whole human race and true blessedness. This is one of his world-wide, universal claims which at once distinguish him from all other prophets and teachers whom God has ever sent. They could point out to their fellows more or less clearly the path of life; Christ alone said, "I am the Way." In moments of rapture they could sing themselves, or teach others to sing," Open to me the gates of righteousness, and I will enter into them." Christ said, "I am the Door: let every man enter in by me." He said this calmly at the first, amid the captious Pharisees who surrounded him; and wherever his gospel is preached or his Name made known, he says it still. To the happy and to the miserable, to the virtuous and to the vicious, to young and old, to the great ones of the earth and to men of low estate, to every class of character and to each isolated individual, he says, "If you would know what true life is, if you would escape from imminent peril into a land of peace, "I am the Door. The text divides itself. In the first part of it
I CHRIST CLAIMS TO BE THE PORTAL OF SAFETY, THE DOOR OF DELIVERANCE FROM SPIRITUAL DEATH. "By me if any man enter in, he shall be saved." And he says this with perfect insight into our condition here. He knows what is in man; if some of us under a calm exterior are carrying about with us a bad conscience, or if, reckless and gay to outward appearance, we are afraid to be alone with ourselves or with God. He knows what is around man the evil examples, the strong temptations that enslave so many wills, the false lights and the delusive hopes that blind so many understandings. And he knows what is before man; for the veil that hides the future from our view is perfectly transparent to his eyes; and he spoke more solemnly of human destiny than any of the ancient prophets or of his own apostles ever spoke. So that no man, however profoundly dissatisfied with himself, remorseful for the past, despondent or anxious about the future, can complain that this word of Christ is not for him. He knows you, brother, better than you know yourself as thoroughly as if there was no other wanderer in this wide wilderness but you. He has followed you step by step; has witnessed your most secret sins, however little you thought of his piercing eye; has seen through every excuse you have made for yourself, and beneath every mask you have worn so bravely before the world; and now that you are weary in the greatness of your way, instead of despising you, or upbraiding you with your folly, he gives you a personal invitation, definite and distinct, to a blessedness that you have never known; and instead of tantalizing you with vague or impracticable counsels, such as bidding you first save yourselves and then look up for his blessing, first undo the bitter past and then consult him about the future, he bids you come to him just as you are, with your burden on your back. "I am the Door," etc. Ah! many a prodigal has trembled to enter the door of his old home; but surely when Christ, the sinner"s Friend, condescends to call himself the Door of his Father"s house, none need fear to approach through him. Yet to many Christ"s claim to be the Portal of safety seems superfluous so far as they themselves are concerned. They admit that his glowing offers of life and salvation are well suited to outcasts and prodigals, or to poor despondent creatures who are afraid to repent; but only to such. In their own case they surely possess the germs at least of a good and worthy character, and while they are willing that these germs should be nourished and fostered by the teaching of Jesus Christ, they can ask from him nothing more, nothing at least that can be called salvation. But how did our Lord himself speak to men in such a state of mind as this? Early in his ministry one of them came to him by night, calling him a Teacher sent from God, and asking for instruction. To this man, this master in Israel, Jesus replied, "Ye must be born again." You need a change of mind and heart which I came down from heaven to give. Yes, and to all who are like Nicodemus he gives the same counsel still. He says, "You need more than some general helps to moral improvement, more than the quickening of your consciences, or the strengthening of your better motives and impulses. Supernatural help, even Divine forgiveness and Divine strength, are essential to you nay, they are waiting for you; and in order to realize them and make them your own, there is one direction in all the wide horizon to which you must look, one definite step you must take. "I am the Door.
II In the second part of the text CHRIST CLAIMS TO BE THE PORTAL OF PROMISE TO ALL WHO OBEY HIM. Each one of these, he says, "shall go in and out, and find pasture." For here, as we have said, the image of a fold widens out into that of a kingdom-, a land of promise better than that which Moses saw from the top of Pisgah; a goodly country where there is room for all the flock of God to dwell, and where its wants shall be satisfied. This good land is, in one word, the Christian calling. It is the life to which Christ admits his disciples. Realizing that life and making it their own, they shall lie down and rise up in the Divine favor, and "the Lord shall preserve their going out and their coming in , from henceforth even forever." But what is the pasture they shall find there? What is the nourishment provided for them? In answer to this we have only to think what are the great wants of our being, essential to us as creatures made in the image of God, for assuredly it is these that fall within the scope of Christ"s promises.
1. First of all there is truth. I mean the assured knowledge of God and of his will practical certainty with regard to our position here, and the great realities which surround us. Well has this been called the first necessity of man"s moral nature. The understanding craves for it. The renewed heart would sicken and faint without it. But this priceless nourishment is Christ"s to bestow. At the great crisis of his life, when he stood before Pilate"s judgment-seat, he claimed to be both the Witness and the King of truth. "To this end," he said, "was I born, and for this cause came I into the world." And though his claims were set at naught by the world, they were gloriously vindicated by his rising from the dead, and by the mission of the Holy Ghost, by the outward and the inward seal of the Eternal. Heaven and earth shall pass away, but his words concerning God and man, and the broad way and the narrow way, and the cross of true discipleship and the beatitudes of the kingdom, shall not pass away. Evermore they shall feed and strengthen the souls of his faithful followers. And as in a very deep sense it is the Spirit of Christ that breathes throughout the Scriptures from beginning to end both in those of the ancient prophets and of the holy men who came after, so the flock of the good Shepherd shall ever find green pastures and still waters as they meditate upon them. Even now, as in the beginning of the gospel, Christ opens their understanding that they may understand the Scriptures.
2. Another great need of our souls is sympathy, and we may surely say that abundant food has been provided for this craving in the new life of Christ"s disciples, which is our gospel land of promise. There is such a thing as the communion of saints. Precious is the fellowship which they have with one another as they sing God"s praises together, and as they bow before the same mercy-seat, and as in their assemblies the same thoughts of things which are unseen and eternal fill all their minds. It is well for them when they speak heart to heart of the things which concern their peace, and encourage one another in the good way. But the life and soul of this fellowship is the secret communion which each of them enjoys with God in Christ. To him they can lay open all their hearts. From him they receive help of which they cannot well speak to others. "He is touched with a feeling of their infirmities." Some sorrow may be too deep, some difficulty too delicate, for the ears of their fellow-men; but before him they need have no reserve, and assuredly his Divine sympathy is like nothing else in human experience. "Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of man, the things which God hath prepared for them that love him." They "taste and see that God is good" when they enter into the secret of his presence through the open door of Christ"s mediatorship, and thus our Lord"s great promise is fulfilled, "He that cometh to me shall never hunger, and he that believeth on me shall never thirst." Such are Christ"s claims, such his offers in the words before us. He does not speak to his disciples of raptures and ecstasies, or promise to transport them to some dreamland where they shall enjoy a charmed or enchanted life. But he says they shall be saved, and shall go in and out and find pasture. Their earthly lot may not be such as they would choose for themselves. The outward aspect of Providence may sometimes be stern, circumstances trying and hostile; but he who presides over all the events of life, and sees the end from the beginning, has promised to keep them in the hollow of his hand. He is their Shepherd, and they shall not want. Throughout the years of their pilgrimage here he will feed them with the bread of life, and refresh them with the water of life, and with these experiences and with his own promises he will inspire their minds with nothing less than the hope of glory. "Blessed are the people that are in such a case" as this! G.B.
The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Biblical Illustrator 1887 · Public Domain On v11 I am the Good Shepherd
Joh_10:11-15
I am the Good Shepherd
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Christ the Good Shepherd
Christ is the Good Shepherd.
He is this because
I. He OWNS the sheep. He is the Proprietor of the flock. They are His
1. By the gift of the Father. Thine they were, and Thou gavest them Me.
2. By creative ties. His own--sheep which are His even before they are called.
3. By purchase. The Good Shepherd giveth as a deposit, layeth down as a pledge, His life for the sheep (Heb_13:20). The blood He shed was not in His own defence, but for the sake of those whom He came to rescue.
II. He KNOWS His sheep.
1. By their faces. An ancient and convenient custom among shepherds is to put a mark upon their sheep, an ear-mark, as they call it; and by the mark they know them in years to come. Jesus Christ, too, puts a mark on His sheep, not on the ear, but on the forehead (Rev_14:1).
2. By their names. He knows His followers, not as men and women only, but as Peter and Andrew, Mary and Martha. The saints have queer names in the Epistles. I cannot remember them, but Jesus does. He calls the stars by name too, but then the stars are very big things. The wonder is that He calls the tiny sheep by name, scattered as they are. Whats in a name? A great deal, especially in a Christian name, given at the font, and accepted by Christ.
3. Their circumstances (Rev_2:13). The Good Shepherd knows where you live--the town, the street, the house (Act_9:11; Act_10:5-6).
4. By a thorough apprehension of their character. In the fourth and fifth verses know signifies outside acquaintance--that Christ and man have come within the same circle. But in the fourteenth verse it means a clear discerning insight into the springs of life and the motives of action.
III. He FEEDS His sheep (Joh_10:9).
1. They go in first to the fold. Rest after wandering. He leadeth me beside the still waters (services of Gods House: perusal of the Bible).
2. They go out to graze. He maketh me to lie down in green pastures (marg. in pastures of tender grass). The Bible pasture is green pasture. Every truth as fresh as if it were spoken but yesterday. Not only is the grass green, but there is plenty of it (Joh_10:10).
IV. He LEADS the sheep (Joh_10:3).
1. He leads the sheep. Exceedingly simple and helpless is a sheep gone astray. And when the Bible speaks of sinners it compares them to erring Isa_53:6).
2. He leads them gently (verse 4). He is not behind them, searing them with the lashes of the law, but in front of them, drawing them with the cords of His love, and adapting His steps to theirs.
3. He leads them safely along the paths of righteousness for His names sake. This is, to me, one of the most cogent reasons for believing in His Divinity, that He was able to stamp His feet so deeply on the rock of history, that their prints have not yet been erased. The weight of Godhead was in His steps, the emphasis of the Infinite in His tread.
4. Not only does He lead us through life, but He goes before us through Psa_23:4). Not a single sheep will be wanting, they shall all be safely folded by Divine love (verse 16). (J. C. Jones, D. D.)
Christ the Good Shepherd
This is one of those Divine sayings in which there is so much of truth and love, that we seem able to do little more than to record it and ponder on it, to express it by symbols, and to draw from it a multitude of peaceful and heavenly thoughts. It was the symbol under which, in times of persecution, His presence was shadowed forth. It was sculptured on the walls of sepulchres and catacombs; it was painted in upper chambers and in oratories; it was traced upon their sacred books; it was graven on the vessels of the altar. The image of the Good Shepherd has expressed, as in a parable, all their deepest affections, fondest musings, most docile obedience, most devoted trust. It is a title in which all other titles meet, in the light of which they blend and lose themselves. Priest, Prophet, King, Saviour, and Guide, are all summed up in this more than royal, paternal, saving name. It recalls in one word all the mercies and lovingkindness of God to His people of old, when the Shepherd of Israel made His own people to go forth like sheep, and guided them in the wilderness like a flock. It recites, as it were, all the prophecies and types of the Divine care which were then yet to be revealed to His elect: it revives the visions of Isaiah and Ezekiel (Isa_40:11; Eze_34:12-27; Eze_37:24; Isa_49:9-10). And, moreover, by this title He appropriates to Himself the fulfilment of His own most deep and touching parable of the lost sheep. There is no thought or emotion of pity, compassion, gentleness, patience, and love which is not here expressed. It is the peculiar consolation of the weak, or of them that are out of the way; of the lost and wandering; of the whole flock of God here scattered abroad in the midst of this naughty world. And though it be an office taken on earth, and in the time of our infirmity, it is a name which He will never lay aside. Even in the heavenly glory it still is among His titles. He is even there the chief Shepherd, that great Shepherd of the sheep; and in the state of bliss shall still guide His flock: though more fully to express the unity of His nature with theirs, and His own spotless sacrifice in their behalf, He is called the Lamb (Rev_7:17). Let us then consider awhile the surpassing and peculiar goodness of the One True Shepherd. And this He has revealed to the world in His voluntary death. There was never any other but He who came down from heaven that He might lay down His life for the sheep. This is the one perpetual token of His great love to all mankind--a token ever fresh, quickened with life, full of power to persuade the hearts of His people to Himself. Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends; and therefore the death of the good Shepherd is the subject of all the Churchs testimony. Again, His surpassing goodness is shown in the provision He has made of all things necessary for the salvation of His flock in this state of mortality and sin. For this He has provided, first, in the external foundation and visible perpetuity of His Church. He has secured it by the commission to baptize all nations, by the universal preaching of His apostles, by shedding abroad the Holy Ghost, by the revelation of all truth, by the universal tradition of the faith in all the world. And, secondly, His love and care are shown, not only in the external and visible provision which He thus made beforehand for the perpetual wants of His flock, but in the continual and internal providence wherewith He still watches over it. The whole history of His Church from the beginning--the ages of persecution, and times of refreshing; the great conflicts of faith with falsehood, and of the saints with the seed of the serpent; the whole career of His Church amid the kingdoms of the earth and changes of the world, are a perpetual revelation of His love and power. (Archdeacon Manning.)
Christ the Good Shepherd
He is the Good Shepherd in the sense of real or genuine. He is the Shepherd from the very centre of His being. Every instinct of His nature, every feeling of His heart, every thought of His brain, every touch of His hand are those of the true Shepherd, whose constant purpose is to guide and feed and save the flock, and for that purpose He counts no toil too severe, no suffering too intense, no sacrifice too costly. He has thoroughly identified Himself with the sheep, and whatever adds to their well-being He gladly does and bears. He is the Good Shepherd in contrast with the hireling, whose care is selfish and whose aim is wages. Jesus here gives us a distinction that applies in the most direct way to every phase of life. Interests of all kinds are intrusted with paid workers. Some of these are good shepherds, putting the very best of their lives into their toil; some are hirelings, faithful only so long as fidelity is easy, safe, and profitable. The railroad engineer who sees imminent danger and remains at his post, hoping to save precious lives entrusted to his care, is the good shepherd. The need today in the State, the bank, the factory, the store, the kitchen, is for good shepherds. The presence of hirelings brings disaster to every cause. The Good Shepherd guides His sheep by going before them. Those who follow where Jesus led are safe. He was at times in a very whirlwind of human beings who were wrought to the highest pitch by diverse passions, but His feet never made a misstep, His face never turned in the wrong direction. His lips spoke the right word, His hands wrought the most helpful work always. Jesus said, I know My sheep, and am known of Mine. I lay down My life for the sheep. These were the proofs that He was the true Shepherd. He certainly knew what was in man. He saw the treachery working in the heart of Judas. He saw in Peters self-trusting, impulsive nature the flame that soon burnt itself out to leave only the ashes of his boasted faith and devotion. But further than this, He saw the repentant Peter converted into the brave hero. He looked into the very soul of Zaccheus in the sycamore tree and taw in him a stedfast purpose of righteousness. He knew that back of the cleanly appearance of the Pharisees there was moral leprosy. On the briefest acquaintance with Nathanael He spoke of him as one in whom there was no guile. The young man who came to Him with eager inquiries for eternal life was before Him as an open book--a man with a kindly heart, but too weak to brave danger and privation and sacrifice. There was no martyr stuff in him. Sin blunts the faculties. The most exalted natures have the keenest insight. Jesus, the Perfect One, knew instantly the false and the true. (Boston Homilies.)
The Good Shepherd
These words are equivalent to
I. I am A Shepherd. I stand in a peculiar relation to a peculiar people, who are My sheep.
II. I am a GOOD Shepherd. I possess the appropriate qualifications and perform the appropriate duties of the character I sustain.
III. I am THE Shepherd--the one Shepherd--not like him of Joh_10:2, one of the shepherds, but the great, chief, proprietor Shepherd, whose own the sheep are--the Shepherd of shepherds as well as of sheep.
IV. I am THE GOOD Shepherd. I possess in the most perfect degree all the qualifications that are requisite for the discharge of the numerous, varied, and difficult duties of this most exalted office.
V. I am THAT GOOD Shepherd, i.e., the Divine Guardian foreshadowed in prophecy (Eze_34:11-24), and answering in every respect to the type. Christ is all this
1. As He secures for His peculiar people all the blessings they require.
2. As He secures these advantages to them at the greatest conceivable expense to Himself.
3. As there subsists the most endearing mutual acquaintance and intercourse between Him and His people.
4. As He cares for the happiness, so He secures the salvation of all. (J. Brown, D. D.)
The Good Shepherd
The truth here is Christs exceeding love and care for the Church. He would show that He sustained towards it a relationship beyond parallel. Not a king, however wise his rule; not a parent, however fond his care; not a friend, however great his service, for all these are kindnesses of beings of the same nature only. They suggest nothing of that condescension by which a Being of the highest order could embrace one reduced to the condition of fallen man. Hence Christ selected as the type of our lost race the most helpless of animals, and compares Himself to one of the kindest of guardians. Let us consider some of His pastoral offices in which His love is set forth.
I. HE PROVIDES FOR THEIR SPIRITUAL WANTS. This would be the first thing looked for according to the predictions (Psa_23:1-6).
1. Pasture for the flock--enough for all; variety for each.
2. Wisdom to guide.
3. Watchfulness to tend.
4. Constraint to rule.
5. Diligence to seek out.
6. Power to restore.
II. HE PRESERVES THEM FROM FOES AND DANGERS (Joh_10:12). It is our lot to be sent forth as sheep in the midst of wolves. If our soul escapes at all it is because the snare is broken by our Deliverer. That which enables the Good Shepherd to effect our deliverance is His profound and comprehensive knowledge (Joh_10:14). These perils are foreseen and provided for. How many tempted ones have derived comfort from the thought that when Satan has desired to have them, he has prayed, etc. Hence the encouragement, Fear not little flock. He that keepeth Israel neither slumbers nor sleeps.
III. HE IS DILIGENT IN RECOVERING THOSE WHO STRAY (Eze_34:1-31; Isa_53:1-12). In relation to the whole human family Christ came to seek and save the lost. The whole history of the Church has been the gathering in of outcasts. He is found of them that sought Him not; and under backslidings after conversion, will He go after us again. He may leave us to eat the bitter fruits of our ways for a time, and make us contrast the misery of the wilderness with the blessedness of the fold. He, who of all the saints of God lived nearest to Him, and yet wandered furthest, said, He restoreth my soul.
IV. HE HAS SPECIAL CARE OF THE YOUNG, whether young in years or in grace (Isa_40:1-31). An untended lamb is the very type of helplessness and folly. The temptations are many which beset the flock in early life from the example of companions, worldly pleasures, buoyant spirits, etc.; but for these and every spiritual danger the Good Shepherd provides. Still, there are special dangers which account for this pastoral care. The very warmth and freshness of their religious feelings render them more liable to fall. Hence the first duty enjoined on restored Peter was Feed My lambs.
V. HE IS WITH THE FLOCK TO THE END. Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, etc. (D. Moore, M. A.)
The Good Shepherd
I. THE PASTORAL CHARACTER CLAIMED BY CHRIST.
1. We shall learn nothing from the text unless we enter humbly and affectionately into its spirit. We must dismiss all Western ideas. Here the connection between shepherd and sheep is simply one of pecuniary interest; but beneath the burning skies and clear starry nights of Palestine there grows up between the man and the dumb creatures he protects, often at the peril of his life, a kind of friendship. For this is after all the true school in which love is taught; dangers and hardships mutually shared, alone in those vast solitudes the shepherd and the sheep feel a life in common. The vast interval between the man and the brute disappears, and the single point of union is felt strongly--the love of the protector, and the love of the grateful life. Those to whom Christ spoke felt all this and more. He appealed to associations which had been familiar from childhood, and unless we try, by realizing such scenes, to feel what they felt by association, these words will only be dry and lifeless.
2. To the name shepherd Christ adds the significant word Good--not in the sense of benevolent, but true born, genuine, just as wine of a noble quality is good compared with the cheaper sort; and a soldier who is one in heart and not by mere profession, or for pay. This expression distinguishes the Good Shepherd from
(1) The robbers who may guard the sheep simply for their flesh and fleece: they have not a true shepherds heart any more than a pirate has the true sailors heart. There were many such marauders in Palestine. David protected Nabals flock from them. Many such nominal shepherds had Israel in by-gone years: rulers whose rule had been but kingcraft: teachers whose instruction had been but priestcraft. Government, teachership are sublime pastoral callings; but when the work is even well done for the sake of party, or place, or honour, or consistency, it is the spirit of the robber.
(2) The hirelings, who are tested by danger. A man is a hireling who does his duty for pay. He may do it in his way faithfully. The paid shepherd will not desert the sheep for a shower or a cold night. But he is not paid to risk his life against the lion or bear, and so the sheep are left to their fate. So a man may be a hired priest, or a paid demagogue, a great champion of rights paid by applause; and while popularity lasts he will be a reformer--deserting the people when danger comes. The cause of the sheep is not his.
3. Exactly the reverse is the Good Shepherd. The cause of man was His, and His only pay the cross. He might have escaped it all, and been an honoured leader by prudent time service. But this would have been the desertion of Gods cause and mans.
II. THE PROOFS WHICH SUBSTANTIATE THE CLAIM.
1. I know My sheep as the Father knoweth Me, and not simply by omniscience. There is a certain mysterious tact of sympathy and antipathy by which we discover the like and unlike of ourselves in others character. A man may hide his opinions, but not his character. There is a something in an impure heart which purity detects afar off. The truer we become, the more unerringly we know the ring of truth. Therefore Christ knows His sheep by the mystic power, always finest in the best natures, by which like detects what is like and unlike itself; and how unerringly did He read men--the enthusiastic populace, Nathanael, the rich ruler, Zacchaeus, Judas, the Pharisees! It was as if His bosom was some mysterious mirror, on which all that came near Him left a sullied or unsullied surface, detecting themselves by every breath. This Divine power must be distinguished from that cunning sagacity which men call knowingness. The worldly wise have maxims and rules; but the finer shades of character escape. Eternal judgment is nothing more than the carrying out of these words, I know My sheep; for their obverse is I never knew you.
2. Christs sheep know Him, not by some lengthened investigation, whether the shepherds dress be the identical dress, the crozier genuine--but instinctively. Truth is like light; risible in itself, not distinguished by the shadow it casts.
3. Pastoral fidelity, I lay down My life. Here is the doctrine of vicarious sacrifice. Unitarians say He died as a martyr in attestation of His truths; but we cannot explain away the for. This sacrificing love is paralleled by the love of the Father to the Son. Therefore that sacrifice is but a mirror of the heart of God. (F. W. Robertson, M. A.)
The Good Shepherd
We have here
I. THE COMPLETE CHARACTER. There is more in Jesus than you can pack away in shepherd or any other emblem. But note
1. He sets Himself forth as a shepherd: not such as is employed in England to look after sheep a few months till they are slaughtered. The Eastern shepherd is
(1) The owner or his son. His wealth consists in sheep. He has seldom much of a house, or much land. Ask him How much are you worth? He answers, So many sheep. We are Christs wealth, the riches of the glory of His inheritance is in the saints. The Lords portion is His people. For their sakes He gave not only Ethiopia and Seba, but Himself.
(2) The Caretaker. Christ is never off duty. He has constant care for His people day and night. He knows and prescribes for their every complaint.
(3) The Provider. There is not one in the flock who knows about the selecting of pasturage. For time and eternity, body and soul, Christ supplies all our need.
(4) The Leader.
(5) The Defender.
2. Christ completely fills this character.
(1) He is the Good Shepherd--neither thief nor hireling. What He does is con amore.
(2) He is the Good Shepherd. Of others we can only say a shepherd. All the rest are shadows: He is the substance.
3. Christ rejoices in this character. He repeats it so many times here that it almost reads like the refrain of a song. And if He is so pleased to be our Shepherd, we should be pleased to be His sheep, and avail ourselves of all the privileges wrapped up in the name.
II. THE COMPLETE KNOWLEDGE.
1. Christs knowledge of His own, As the Father, etc. Do you know how much the Father knows the Son who is His glory, other self, yea, one with Him? Just so intimately does the Good Shepherd know His sheep.
(1) Their number.
(2) Their persons--age, character, hairs, constitution; and never mistakes one for another
(3) Trials.
(4) Sins.
(5) This ought to be a great comfort, inasmuch as it is not cold, intellectual knowledge, but that of love. He knows you--
(a) By acquaintance.
(b) By communion.
(c) Sympathy. Though He were a Son yet learned He, etc.
2. Our knowledge of the Lord, as I know the rather. This is
(1) By delight.
(2) By union.
(3) By love.
III. THE COMPLETE SACRIFICE. These words are repeated in different forms four times (Joh_10:11; Joh_10:15; Joh_10:17; Joh_10:13), and mean that
1. He was always doing so. All the life He had He was constantly laying out for the sheep.
2. It was actively performed. He did not die merely.
3. It was voluntary.
4. It was for the sheep. (C. H. Spurgeon.)
The Good Shepherd
I. HIS QUALIFICATIONS TO MEET THE NEED OF THE SHEEP.
1. His knowledge of all the wants of the sheep is perfect.
2. His wisdom to provide is infinite.
3. His power enables Him to carry out all His will.
4. His kindness endures through all their waywardness.
5. His faithfulness will never forsake them.
6. His undying interest forgets and omits nothing for their good.
II. HIS ACTIVE WORK FOR THE SHEEP.
1. He rescues them from the great robber.
2. Brings them into His own fold.
3. Provides them with all the nourishment needed.
4. Given them refreshing repose amid the cares and toils of life.
5. Guards them from all danger.
6. Guides them in all perplexity.
7. Heals all their diseases.
8. Reclaims them from all their wanderings.
9. Folds them at last in heaven. (W. H. Van Doren, D. D.)
The slain Shepherd
I. FORESAW THAT HE SHOULD DIE FOR THE SHEEP. The termination of the Saviours life was not accidental nor unforeseen. Many were the intimations He gave of it, which disproves the notion that His death was the disappointment of His hopes.
II. SPONTANEOUSLY UNDERTOOK TO DIE FOR THE SHEEP. He might have saved Himself; He made no attempt at escape; He prayed for no legion of angels to rescue Him; He told Pilate that there was a limitation of his power in regard to his apparently helpless captive; He committed His spirit into His Fathers hands.
III. DIED IN THE STEAD OF THE SHEEP. A shepherd while defending his sheep sometimes falls a victim to his faithfulness. So Christ died a vicarious death, the just for the unjust, which exempted the sinner from the doom deserved. Not that there was a commercial equivalent, as when a debt is paid; but a moral equivalent accepted by a righteous and gracious God.
IV. DIED ON BEHALF OF THE SHEEP. It was not for His own but our advantage. By His sacrifice we are redeemed from the curse of the law and the power of sin, and have secured for us eternal life. Application:
1. Adore and bless the love which animated the Good Shepherd.
2. Live as those who have been bought with a price, and have returned to the Shepherd and Bishop of souls. (Family Churchman.)
The Good Shepherd giveth His life for the sheep
In this statement we notice the following characteristics of this sacrifice which the Good Shepherd makes for His sheep.
1. It was deliberate. For this purpose He came into the world.
2. It was voluntary. No man taketh My life. I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it again.
3. It is vicarious. Not for them in defence, but for them vicariously. He died for them as a substitute, bearing their own sins in His own body.
4. It was an accepted sacrifice. Therefore doth the Father love Me, because I lay down My life, that I may take it again (Joh_10:17). (G. F. Pentecost, D. D.)
The Shepherd and the sheep
I. THE FLOCK. Were we to take a walk some spring morning among the Yorkshire hills or on the downs of Sussex or Bedfordshire, we should see thousands of sheep belonging to different flocks and masters. Christ has members of His flock not only in Sussex, etc., but in Africa, India, etc.; yes, all the world over. This flock
1. Is an exceedingly large one. If you were to go on counting for a whole year you could not count them all. The patriarchs had large flocks, so have many English farmers, but not altogether one so large. Some say all who are baptized, or take the Lords Supper, or belong to this or that Church, are the Lords sheep. But many of these are wicked, and so cannot be Christs, while some where there are no churches and sacrament are Christs because they love and obey Him. Ever since Abel died men have been gathered in, and thousands are joining the upper fold every day, and still millions are left behind.
2. While it is so large it is increasing very rapidly. Other flocks are to decrease. Every new convert is an addition, and what numbers are sometimes converted in a day (Act_2:1-47)! Missionaries tell us of whole tribes casting away their idols, etc. It ought to increase more than it does when we consider the agencies at work Bibles, tracts, churches, schools, ministers, teachers, Christian fathers and mothers.
3. Christs sheep are very much alike.
(1) In their actions. Just as we can tell wolves from sheep, so we can tell who are Christs and who are not. When we see a man roar like a lion, or greedy like a wolf, we know he is not of Christs fold.
(2) In their colour. If I wash thee not thou hast no part with Me.
(3) In their disposition. If any man have not the spirit of Christ, etc.
(4) In the treatment they require. None can do without the Shepherds care.
4. They bear His mark. What strange marks farmers sometimes put upon their sheep--circles, crosses, initials. Some of Christs sheep have got His mark in greater boldness, but the porter can detect it however faint. If a king were to attempt to enter without it he would be turned away, while a prodigal with it would be welcomed.
(1) This mark is not being an Episcopalian, Independent, etc. We may have the Churchs mark and not Christs.
(2) It is likeness to Christ, and we cannot be like Him without being born again. Some try to imitate this mark and affix Morality, Liberality, Good resolution, Fasting, etc.
5. This is a loving flock. Members of the same family, school, place of worship, ought to be kind and gentle, but Christs flock is the most loving in the world. By this the world knows Christs disciples.
II. THE SHEPHERD.
1. He is awake and watchful. A good many people are awake but not watchful. Sometimes lambs are worried by strange dogs when the shepherd was asleep, and sometimes stray into danger when he is awake but inattentive. But nothing escapes Christs sleepless vigilance. He that keepeth Israel, etc.
2. He is patient. A shepherd cannot have too much patience: much as he may have it will be sorely tried. In all trials Christs patience never left Him; and were it to leave Him now how many would be expelled the fold!
3. He is strong. Look at what He has done in Nature. All power is given unto Me. All ministers, teachers, and angels combined would be unable to provide for or protect His flock. Then His stock of provisions never diminishes, and every sheep is fed according to its need.
4. He goes after every sheep or lamb that goes astray. How strange that any should desert such a fold; stranger still that those who stray should refuse to return. (J. Goodacre.)
Christ the Good Shepherd
The shepherd who can always go to bed regularly at night, and who is able to say, I do not have much trouble with my flock, is not the man to be envied. He coolly says, a few lambs died last winter; we must expect that kind of thing. It is true that some sheep died of starvation; but if the meadows failed, I could not help that. That is the kind of shepherd who deserves to be eaten by the next wolf; but the man who is able to say with Jacob, By night the frost devoured me, and by day the heat, is the true shepherd. He is most irregular as to his rest; the only thing regular about him is his labour and his disappointment, and yet faith makes him a happy man. When you grow very weak as a pastor, and your charge utterly overcomes you, do not repine at such weakness, for then you will be at your full strength; but when you are strong as a pastor, and say, I think that to be a minister is an easy matter, you may depend upon it that you are weak. (C. H. Spurgeon.)
The Good Shepherd and His sheep
I. WHAT THE GOOD SHEPHERD DOES FOR HIS SHEEP?
1. He protects them. Sheep are exposed to many dangers, from which they are not able to protect themselves. When David was a shepherd, he tells us of a lion and a bear, that each came and stole away a lamb from his flock; and how he went after the wild beasts, and slew them, and saved his lambs. And this is just what Jesus, the Good Shepherd, does for His sheep. He protects them from Satan, their great enemy. And in the same way He protects them from all their enemies, and from every danger. A Christian mother who lived in the city of New York, in very humble circumstances, had only one child, a little boy about seven years old, whom she had taught to know and love the Saviour. One day, when this good mother was going quietly on with her work at home, she was startled by a loud knock at the door of her humble dwelling. On opening the door she received this alarming message: Hurry away to the police station; your little boy has been run over. She was terribly frightened, and, hastening as fast as she could to the station house, on arriving there she found her little boy surrounded by strangers. The doctor had been sent for, but had not yet arrived. She was told that the wheels of a large carriage had gone over his foot, but, on examining it carefully, she was surprised to find no real injury about the foot. Why, Willie darling, how was it possible for the wheel of the carriage to have gone over your foot, and not have crushed it? The child looked tenderly up into his mothers face, and said--Mamma, dear, I guess God must have put it in a hollow place. This shows what faith that little boy had in the protection which Jesus, the Good Shepherd, has promised to exercise over His sheep. He always has a hollow place to put them in when danger is near.
2. He provides for them. This is something which the sheep cannot do for themselves, and unless the shepherd does it for them they must perish.
II. WHAT THE GOOD SHEPHERD EXPECTS HIS SHEEP TO DO FOR HIM?
1. To hear His voice. My sheep hear my voice, He says.
2. To follow Him. The sheep set us an example here, not only in hearing the shepherd, but in obeying him. (R. Newton, D. D.)
The Shepherd and His sheep
(Childrens sermon).
I. THE FIGURE OF SHEEP SUITS US. We call them silly sheep.
1. They cannot guide their own way. As wild beasts can.
2. They cannot keep or defend themselves. Frightened at danger.
3. They quickly follow bad examples. Running after wilful one.
4. They are surrounded by unknown dangers. How much mother knows, and teacher knows, that we do not.
II. THE FIGURE OF SHEPHERD SUITS CHRIST. A most blessed thing that we have someone to care for us.
1. Shepherd must be strong. To defend, carry, etc.
2. Shepherd must be wise. To guide to food and water.
3. Shepherd must be watchful. To see foes.
4. Shepherd must be loving and gentle. To tend in weakness.
III. WHEN WE SPEAK OF JESUS, WE WANT TO CALL HIM THE GOOD SHEPHERD. Especially because He was willing to die in defending us, Jesus. The old and familiar tale of Eric, who threw Himself to the wolves to save his master. Or, case of shepherd who died fighting three robbers.
IV. WHEN CHRIST SPEAKS OF US, HE WOULD LIKE TO CALL US GOOD SHEEP. What is it to be good, so that Christ can think us good? A great difference in sheep. The good sheep know the Shepherds voice. They follow, they keep close, they obey. (Weekly Pulpit.)
He that is an hireling
The hireling is
I. MERCENARY. He tends the flock simply for wages as Jacob did Gen_29:15; Gen_29:13), though not with the love that Jacob showed Gen_31:33). An emblem of the Pharisees and Jewish rulers generally who served God in a purely legal spirit, and shepherded the flock with an eye to the merit they might acquire, or the recompense they should receive; of those who in Christs day thrust themselves into the priests office for a morsel of bread (1Sa_2:36); of all who enter the ministry for filthy lucres sake (Tit_1:11).
II. SELFISH. He pursues his calling with an eye to his own interest and comfort--a type of Ezekiels shepherds (Eze_34:2-3), and of socalled Christian pastors who use their official position solely to secure worldly emolument, social preferment, or temporal renown (1Ti_3:3; 1Ti_3:3).
III. NEGLIGENT. Chiefly occupied with thoughts of his own happiness, he not only leaves the sheep to cater for themselves (Eze_34:4; Zec_11:16-17), but fleeing at the first approach of danger, permits the helpless creatures to be ravaged and scattered. Once more a representative of the corrupt hierarchy that presided over Israel, and of such nominally Christian teachers who, neglecting the highest interests of their people, leave them to fall a prey to the principalities and powers of evil. (T. Whitelaw D. D.)
Self-sacrificing teachers
Paton records that at a time of great danger on Tanna he tried to prevail on one of the native teachers from Aneityum to remain at the mission house. The man insisted on returning to his post, and with this unanswerable defence of his conduct: Missi, when I see them thirsting for my blood, I just see myself when the missionary first came to my island. I desired to murder him as they now desire to kill me. Had he stayed away for such danger, I would have remained a heathen; but he came, and continued coming to teach us, till by the grace of God I was changed to what I am. Now the same God that changed me can change these poor Tannese to love and serve Him. I can not stay away from them. On mission ground the term pastor is restored to its original meaning, shepherd, with good reason. Hanningtons message to the ruler who compassed his death was: Tell the king that I die for Buganda. I have bought this road with my life. (Monday Club Sermons.)
The hireling
It is not the bare receiving hire which denominates a man a hireling, but the loving hire; his loving the hire more than the work; the working for the sake of the hire. He is an hireling who would not work were it not for the hire; to whom this is the great (if not only) motive of working. O God! if a man who works only for hire is such a wretch, a mere thief and a robber, what is he who continually takes the hire, and yet does not work at all? (J. Wesley.)
The Wolf
Satan a wolf
1. His attacks are deadly.
2. His surprises are crafty.
3. His hatred of Christ is implacable.
4. His hunger to devour is insatiable.
5. He attacks under darkness.
6. He scatters the flock by tempting them to luxury, avarice, and sensuality. Filling their minds with pride, envy, anger, deceit. (W. H. Van Doren, D. D.)
I.…know My sheep and am known of Mine
The mutual knowledge of Christ and His people
I. CHRISTS KNOWLEDGE OF HIS PEOPLE.
1. The faithful and experienced Eastern shepherd knows every one of his sheep. So does Christ. He knows
1. Their persons; not only the numbers of His flock. We are as well known to Him as the stars (Isa_40:1-31), and as our children are to us.
2. Their condition and circumstances--but general and peculiar--our sins that He may pardon them; our diseases that He may heal them; our wants that He may supply them; our fears that He may quiet them; our burdens that He may give us strength to bear them; our prayers that He may grant them, our graces that we may delight in them; our services that He may reward them.
2. We trace this knowledge to
(1) His great love. It is clear that the shepherd who loves his sheep best will know them best.
(2) His intimacy. He dwells with them.
(3) His omniscience.
II. CHRISTS PEOPLES KNOWLEDGE OF HIM is
1. Peculiar. Their fellow men do not possess it or understand it.
2. Acquired. It is not natural to us. Nature does not teach it. The young sheep knows its mother by instinct, but not its shepherd. All real knowledge of Christ is the effect of a special manifestation of Him to the soul.
3. Experimental chiefly. Some knowledge we get of Him from faith in Gods testimony concerning Him, but our chief spring is this: when we have hungered, He has fed us; when we have not known our way, He has guided us; where we have fallen into danger, He has extricated us.
4. Practical. The soul that possesses it becomes willing and obedient. (C. Bradley, M. A.)
The true sheep
What is the knowledge by which Christs true sheep are known? There are many kinds of knowledge, of which only one can be the true. There is a knowledge which even fallen angels have of Him (Luk_4:33-34; Luk_4:41; Mat_8:29). This is a knowledge of the spiritual intelligence, which may be possessed in energetic wickedness, and with direct resistance of the will against the will of Christ. Again, there is also a knowledge which all the regenerate possess. The preaching of the Church, the reading of Holy Scriptures, the commemoration of fasts and festivals, the tradition of popular Christianity, and all the knowledge which from childhood we unconsciously imbibe, give us a general knowledge of the evangelical facts and of the history of our Lord. This cannot be the knowledge of which He here speaks. It must be something of a deeper kind, something more living and personal. It is plainly, therefore, such a knowledge as He has of us. It is that mutual consciousness of which we speak when we say that we know any person as our friend. We do not mean that we know him by name; for many strangers we know by name; many whom we have never seen, or further care to know: neither do we mean only that we know all about him, that is to say, who he is, and whence, of what lineage, or from what land, or what has been his history, his acts and words, and the like; for in this way we may be said to know many who do not know us, and with whom we have nothing to do. When we say we know anyone as our friend, we mean that we know not only who he is, but what, or as we say, his character,--that he is true, affectionate, gentle, forgiving, liberal, patient, self-denying; and still more, that he has been, and is, all this to ourselves; that we have made trial of him, and have cause to know this character as a reality, of which we have, as it were, tasted, by often meeting with him, seeing him at all times, under all circumstances and in all changes, familiarly conversing with him, doing service to him, ourselves receiving from him in turn tokens of love and goodness. This is the knowledge of friendship and of love. It is something living and personal, arising out of the whole of our inward nature, and filling all our powers and affections. And such is the knowledge the true sheep have of the Good Shepherd. Let us, then, consider in what way we may attain this knowledge.
1. It must be by following Him. My sheep hear My voice and they follow Me. By living such a life as He lived. Likeness to Him is the power of knowing Him. Nay, rather it is knowledge itself: there is no other. It is by likeness that we know, and by sympathy that we learn.
2. There are peculiar faculties of the heart which must be awakened, if we would know Him as He knows us. There can be no true obedience without the discipline of habitual devotion--in prayer, meditation, sacramental communion.
3. This true knowledge of Him is not a transitory state of feeling. Out of obedience and devotion arises an habitual faith, which makes Him, though unseen, yet perceptibly a part of all our life. (Archdeacon Manning.)
The understanding between shepherd and sheep
You will notice the difference between the Old and the New translation here. The new translation makes the meaning of our Saviours words much clearer. He says, I am the Good Shepherd; and there is an understanding between Me and My sheep, as there is an understanding between My Father and Me. For people to understand one another, there must be something in common. The Pharisees could not understand our Lord. They had nothing in common with Him. As He said to them, Ye are from beneath; I am from above; ye are of this world; I am not of this world. No, they could not understand Him; any more than a man without an ear for music can understand music, or a dull prosy mind can understand poetry, or a person who always acts from self-interested motives can understand another who has more thought for others than for himself. But Christs disciples could understand Him: not perfectly, often very imperfectly; still they had that which made them capable of understanding Him to some extent, and of being trained to understand Him more fully in time; as one who loves music can enjoy and to some extent understand a great musician, one who is not altogether selfish can appreciate the nobility of self-sacrifice for the good of others. Some of Christs disciples had made sacrifices for Him, though small compared with what He had made for them. There were those among His little flock who had left all they had on earth to follow Him, and this, and the faith which led them to it, had made them able to know and understand Him who had left all He had in heaven for their sake. (J. E. Vernon, M. A.)
The shepherds mark
Edmund Andrews was a thoughtless, cruel boy. One day he was passing by Burltons farm, and saw Wilkinson, the old shepherd, busy with his pitch kettle and iron, marking the sheep with the letters J.B., for John Burlton. So you are putting your masters mark upon the sheep, are you? said he. Yes, Master Edmund; but God, the Almighty Maker, has put His mark upon them before. What do you mean? asked Edmund. I mean that our Heavenly Father, in His wisdom and goodness, has put marks upon the creatures He has made, and such marks as none but He could put upon them. He gave wings to the cockchafer, spots to the butterfly, feathers to the bird, a sparkling eye to the frog and toad, a swift foot to the dog, and a soft furry skin to the cat. These marks are His marks, and show that the creatures belong to Him; and woe be to those that abuse them! Thats an odd thought, said Edmund, as he turned away. It may be an odd thought, said the shepherd, but odd things lead us to glorify God, and to act kindly to His creatures. The more we have, Master Edmund, the better.
How Christ knows His sheep
Suppose one of the sheep in a fold were to go to the shepherd, and say, I think Im your sheep, because you get six pounds of wool off me; and another should say, And I think Im your sheep, because you get four pounds of wool from me; and a third, I hope I am your sheep, but I dont know, for you only get three pounds of wool from me; and sometimes it is but two. Finally, suppose one poor scraggy fellow comes who dont know whether he is a sheep or a goat, and makes his complaint; the shepherd would say, I know who are the best sheep, and who are the worst. I wish you could all give me ten pounds of wool; but whether you give me ten pounds or one, you are all mine. I bought you, and paid for you, and you are all in my fold, and you every one belong to me. It is not how much a sheep brings his owner which proves him his. The proof that the sheep belongs to the shepherd is, that the shepherd bought him and takes care of him. (H. W. Beecher.)
Christs knowledge of His sheep
The most fearful attributes of the Godhead turn to the sweetest comfort of a believer. His justice, to the natural man so awful, requires Him to forgive those whom He has punished in our Substitute. His power so tremendous when turned against us is assuring in the same proportion, when it is for us. So with omniscience, a terror to the wrongdoer, but a comfort to the penitent believer.
I. CHRIST KNOWS WHO ARE HIS SHEEP. Leave it then to Him to pronounce who are so. We seldom make a greater mistake then when we attempt to trespass on this province of Deity. I know, almost as much as to say, You do not. And there are times when it will be best not to form the judgment respecting ourselves. Leave it thus. He knows whether I am His; and if not, that I wish to be, and therefore will make me. If I am, He will keep me.
II. HE KNOWS THEM AS A WHOLE. As all one, gathered out of the same desert, washed in the same fountain, etc. In this collectiveness He expects concert of action, sympathy, unity among His people. We are accustomed to regard ourselves as separate individuals, families, churches. Hence our narrowness, selfishness.
III. HE KNOWS THEM AS INDIVIDUALS. Each stands out known and loved as if He cared for none else. He knows
1. You, and not merely about you.
2. How long you have been in the fold, and expects accordingly.
3. Your natural temperament, what you can and cannot bear, how much exposure, liberty, etc. What kind of pasture you require.
4. Your future, and is always working up to it.
IV. HE KNOWS HIMSELF IN THEM AND THEREFORE HIS FATHERS MIND ABOUT THEM. (J. Vaughan, M. A.)
I lay down My life for the sheep
Christ died to save men
At the time of the gold fever in California, a man went from England to the diggings. By and by he sent money for his wife and child to follow him. They arrived safely in New York, and there took a passage in one of the beautiful Pacific steamers. A few days after sailing, the terrible cry of Fire! fire! rang through the ship. Everything that the captain and sailors could do was done, but it was of no use; the fire rapidly gained ground. As there was a powder magazine on board, the captain knew that the moment the flames reached it the vessel would be blown up; so he gave the word to lower the life boats. These were got out, but there was not room for all; so the strong pushed in and left the weak to their fate. As the last boat was moving off, a mother and her boy were on the deck and she pleaded to be taken. The sailors agreed to take one but not both. What did the mother do? Did she jump in herself? No! Kissing her boy and handing him over the side of the ship, she said If you live to see your father, tell him I died to save you. That was great love, yet it is but a faint type of what Christ has done for us. (J. L. Nye.)
Damon and Pythias
Damon, being condemned to death by Dionysius, tyrant of Syracuse, obtained liberty to visit his wife and children, leaving his friend, Pythias, as a pledge for his return. At the appointed time Damon failed in appearing, and the tyrant had the curiosity to visit Pythias in prison. What a fool you were, said he, to rely on Damons promise! How could you imagine that he would sacrifice his life for you or for any man? My lord, said Pythias, with a firm voice and noble aspect, I would suffer a thousand deaths rather than my friend should fail in any article of honour. He cannot fail. I am as confident of his virtue as I am of my own existence. But I beseech the gods to preserve his life. Oppose him ye winds! Disappoint his eagerness, and suffer him not to arrive till my death has saved a life of much greater consequence than mine, necessary to his lovely wife, to his little innocents, to his friends, to his country! Oh! let me not die the cruelest of deaths in that of Damon! Dionysius was confounded and awed with the magnanimity of these sentiments. He wished to speak: he hesitated, he looked down, and retired in silence. Pythias was brought forth, and with an air of satisfaction walked to the place of execution. He ascended the scaffold and addressed the people. My prayers are hoard; the gods are propitious; the winds have been contrary. Damon could not conquer impossibilities: he will be here tomorrow, and my blood shall ransom that of my friend. As he pronounced these words, a buzz arose; a distant voice was heard; the crowd caught the words, and Stop, stop, executioner! was repeated by every person. A man came at full speed. In the same instant he was off his horse, on the scaffold, and in the arms of Pythias. You are safe! he cried, you are safe, my friend! The gods be praised, you are safe! Pale and half speechless in the arms of Damon, Pythias replied in broken accents, Fatal haste! cruel impatience! What envious powers have wrought impossibilities against your friend? But I will not be wholly disappointed. Since I cannot die to save you, I will die to accompany you! Dionysius heard and beheld with astonishment. His eyes were opened, his heart was touched, and he could no longer resist the power of pity. He descended from his throne and ascended the scaffold. Live, live, ye incomparable pair! Ye have demonstrated the existence of virtue, and consequently of a God who rewards it. Live happy, live revered; and as you have invited me by your example, form me by your precepts to participate worthily in a friendship so divine.
Other sheep I have which are not of this fold
Outsiders
The grace of God is no mans little property, fenced off all for ourselves. It is not a kings park, at which we look through a barred gateway. It is a Fathers orchard with bars to let down and gates to swing open. There are Christians who keep a severe guard over the Church, when God would have all come and take the richest and ripest of the fruit. Then, again, we have those who get up statistics and say so many Methodists, Presbyterians, etc., there, that is the number of Christians. Christ comes and says No! you have not counted rightly, other sheep have I which are not of these folds.
I. The heavenly Shepherd will find many of His sheep, among those who are NON-CHURCH GOERS. I do not think that the Church gains when you take sheep from one fold and puts them into another. It is the lost sheep on the mountains we want to bring back.
II. The heavenly Shepherd will find many of His sheep among those who are now REJECTORS OF CHRISTIANITY. I do not know bow you came to reject Christianity: but I want you, before you finally discard it, to give it a fair trial. You want what it alone can give--if it does not give that to you then you may reject it. But it will. Take not the word of a clergyman, who may be speaking professionally, but that of laymen who have never preached--Milton, Wilbcrforce, Newton, Boyle, Locke, Morse.
III. The heavenly Shepherd will get many of His sheep among THOSE WHO HAVE BEEN FLUNG OF EVIL HABIT. The way Christian people give up the prodigal is outrageous. They talk as though the grace of God were a chain of forty or fifty links, and, when they had been run out, there was nothing to touch a mans iniquity. But there is only one class about whom we may be despondent: those who have been hearing the gospel for twenty, thirty, forty years, and who are gospel hardened. (T. De Witt Talmage.)
Other sheep and one flock
I. OUR LORD HAD A PEOPLE UNDER THE WORST CIRCUMSTANCES. This fold was not the Jews, but His handful of disciples.
1. Doubtless these times are exceedingly dangerous, and some brethren never allow me to forget it, for they play well on the minor key. But I heard it thirty years ago, and the times have been bad ever since, and always will be. This is better, perhaps, than living in a fools paradise; but certainly the days of Christ were terrible days in the point of
(1) Utter ungodliness. A few godly ones watched for the coming of Christ, but the great mass were altogether gone out of the way.
(2) Will worship; the commandments of men were taught for the doctrines of God.
(3) Fierce opposition, as seen in the treatment Christ received. Yet He had a chosen company, and however guilty our age may be in these points, there is an election of grace still.
2. This company was a fold. Afterwards they were to be called a flock; but as yet one glance was sufficient to embrace them all.
(1) They were distinct from the world Ye are not of the world, etc.
(2) In that fold they Were protected from ill-weathers, and from the wolf and the thief.
(3) Even there were goats--One of you is a devil.
(4) They were being strengthened for future following of the Great Shepherd.
3. When Jesus had thus shut them in He would not allow them to be exclusive, but opens wide the door of the sheepfold and cries, Other sheep I have. Thus He checks a common tendency to be forgetful of outsiders. Seeing that He has those who would be found by Him through His faithful people, let us rouse ourselves to the holy enterprise,
4. Never despair. The Lord is with us. We may be poor, but we are Christs, and that makes us precious. There were three men who had to carry on a college when funds were running short. One complained that they had no helpers and could not hope to succeed. Why, said another, we are a thousand. How is that? I am a cipher, and you and our brother; so we have three noughts to begin with. But Christ is ONE. Put Him down before the ciphers, and we have a thousand directly.
II. OUR LORD HAS OTHER SHEEP NOT YET KNOWN TO US. I have, not shall have. The apostles never dreamed of His having sheep in Britain or Rome. Their most liberal notion was that the scattered seed of Abraham might be gathered.
1. Who are these sheep?
(1) Christs chosen--Ye have not chosen Me, etc.
(2) Those whom the Father had given Him.
(3) Those for whom He laid down His life that they might be the redeemed of the Lord, Ye are not your own, etc.
(4) Those on whose behalf He had entered into suretyship engagements even as Jacob under took the flock of Laban that he should lose none.
2. What was their state? People without a shepherd--lost, wandering, ready to be devoured by the wolf. Bad as the world is today it must have been far worse in the vile Roman world.
3. This thought gave Christ great encouragement when confronting their adversaries, and should be a great comfort to Gods people now. I have much people in this city. This is our authority for seeking the lost sheep in whoevers preserves they may be.
III. OUR LORD MUST LEAD THOSE OTHER SHEEP, not bring; Christ must be at their head, and they must follow.
1. It is Christ who has to do this, even as He has done it hitherto, also. As Jesus has done it for us He must do it for others.
2. He must do it. Subjects are usually bound by a must; this must binds the sovereign. Who can resist it? Clear out all enemies!
3. How He must do it? They shall hear my voice. Christ is going to save people still by the gospel, and we must not look for other means. Go ye into all the world.
IV. OUR LORD GUARANTEES THE UNITY OF HIS CHURCH. One flock.
1. We hear a great deal about the unity of the Church. We are to have the Roman, Greek, and Anglican all one. God has chosen people in each, but their union would be a dire mischief.
2. This has been carried out as a matter of fact. There never was but one Shepherd and never will be but one flock. All the visible Churches contain parts of it.
3. As a matter of experience this is carried out in believers. A spiritually minded man is at one with all spiritually minded men. Set a Calvinist and an Arminian at prayer: let the Spirit work on Baptist and Paedo-Baptist. What Protestant but loves Bernard?
4. The external Church is needful, but it is not the one and indivisible Church of Christ.
5. This Church is known by its obedience to Christ. (C. H. Spurgeon.)
This fold and the other sheep
I. THIS FOLD: the seed of Israel. By His personal ministry our Lord founded the kingdom in Israel and some of the seed of Abraham were gathered in.
II. OTHER SHEEP NOT OF THIS FOLD. Here the expansive love of Jesus breaks forth. He began at Jerusalem, but the longings of His heart go forth to the end of the earth.
III. I HAVE. Mark the all encompassing sovereignty of His love. They were His in the covenant from the beginning. At a time when they were neither born nor born again He counts them His.
IV. THEM ALSO. There is no respect of persons. No poor slave will be left out because he is black; no servant pushed aside to make way for his master; no rich or powerful man is kept out at the cry of the envious mob. If any were kept back the Lord would say, them also; gather up the fragments, etc. What a cheering word l It embraces the prodigal, the dying thief, Saul of Tarsus.
V. I BRING. He sends none forward to make or find their own way. In all their afflictions He is afflicted. They shall not traverse the valley of the shadow alone. None shall stand at the Judgment to make the best of his own case. I am the Way. He brings them through the regeneration into the fold on earth. It often takes much bringing; but all power is given to the Captain of our salvation. The drunkard, miser, etc., are made willing in the day of His power. And that same bringing power shall rend the gates of death.
VI. I MUST. He commands the winds and the sea and they obey; who then can command Him? His own yearning love. (W. Arnot, D. D.)
The missionary's warrant
We have a right to go anywhere to seek after our Masters sheep. If they are my Masters sheep who shall stop me over hill and dale inquiring, Have you seen my Masters sheep. If any say, You do intrude in this land, let the answer be, We are after our Masters sheep which have strayed here. You have a search warrant from the King of kings, and, therefore, you have a right to enter and search after your Lords stolen property. If men belonged to the devil we would not rob the enemy himself; but they do not belong to him. (C. H. Spurgeon.)
Them also I must bring.--They must be brought
1. To realize the visions of ancient prophecy.
2. To accomplish the promise of the Father (Psa_2:3).
3. To secure the object, and to recompense the suffering and the toil of the Redeemers mediatorial undertaking.
4. To answer the prayers, fulfil the expectations, and crown the prayers which He has animated and inspired. (T. Raffles, LL. D.)
One fold and one shepherd
I. CHRISTS PROPERTY IN HIS SHEEP.
1. How acquired.
(1) By donation. Thine they were and Thou gavest them Me. Ask of Me, etc.
(2) By purchase, Ye are bought with a price.
(3) By the sanctification of the Spirit; after which He gives them back to the Father to be glorified.
2. There are but three possessions to which the word property really belongs.
(1) The sinners possession of his own sins.
(2) The believers possession of his own Saviour.
(3) Christs possession of His own people.
3. Possession is an endearing thing. If you possess a thing you love it; and that feeling is a faint copy of the mind of Christ.
4. Concerning this possession, Christ declares that He holds it not only over those He was then addressing, but over others separated from them--perhaps other worlds, certainly Gentiles, of whose admission Jews werejealous.
5. Note, then, that Christ said this of those who were then unconverted. Paul (Act_13:1-52) was almost driven from Corinth by opposition, but was stopped by I have much people in this city; and yet, with the exception of two or three persons, all were locked in unbelief. But it was not so eighteen months after. What a joy to the Christian worker to be able to think that any man may be among Christs other sheep!
II. CHRISTS ENGAGEMENT FOR HIS SHEEP. Them also I must bring.
1. The imperative obligation. God permits Himself to be ruled by His own covenant.
2. This certified engagement is this: They shall hear My voice.
(1) When a soul just awakened hears Thou art the man.
(2) When the stricken conscience hears Go in peace, etc.
(3) When the soul, better knowing now Christs accents, hears It is I; be not afraid.
(4) When the heart, better ordered, always hears and says, Speak Lord, etc.
(5) When the ear shall drink in Come ye blessed, etc.
3. Your corresponding duty to this pledge is to hear--obey. This is happiness here and glory by and by.
III. CHRISTS INTENTION WITH HIS SHEEP. One fold, etc.
1. This will be literally fulfilled in heaven.
2. It is spiritually fulfilled herein
(1) Unity of condition.
(2) Unity of Spirit.
(3) Unity of action.
(4) Unity of headship--One Shepherd. (J. Vaughan, M. A.)
Christs collected flocks
I. WHAT THINGS ARE TO BE DONE FOR THE COMPLETION OF THIS END? I observe
1. The views of mankind concerning religious subjects are to be extensively changed.
2. A mighty change, also, must be wrought in the disposition of man.
3. The change will not be less in the conduct of men.
II. IN WHAT MANNER ARE THESE THINGS TO BE DONE? I answer, they are to be accomplished not by miracles, but by means.
III. BY WHOM ARE THESE THINGS TO BE DONE? Solitary efforts will here be fruitless; divided efforts will be equally fruitless; clashing efforts will destroy each other. Learn
1. The work to which you are summoned is the work of God.
2. The present is the proper time for this glorious undertaking.
3. The necessity of this work irresistibly demands every practicable effort. The whole world, says St. John, speaking of his own time, lieth in wickedness (1Jn_5:19). Lieth--for such is the indication of the original--as a man slain lies weltering in his blood.
4. The day in which these blessings are to be ushered in has arrived. The day in which the mighty work will be seen in its full completion is at hand. We must labour, that those who come after us may enter into our labours. (T. Dwight, D. D.)
Unity the final purpose of God
An old Scottish Methodist, who had clung vehemently to one of two small sects on opposite sides of the street, said, when dying: The street I am now travelling in has nae sides, and if power were now given me I would preach purity of life mair and purity of doctrine less. Since I was laid by here I have had whisperings of the still small voice telling me that the wranglings of faith will neer be heard in the kingdom I am nearing; and, as love cements all differences, Ill perhaps find the place roomier than I thought in times past. (Dean Stanley.)
United in anticipation of death
When seven men imprisoned in a Pennsylvania coal mine were rescued after five days imprisonment they were asked if they hoped to escape. We prayed for it, was the reply; we prayed together. Some were Protestants and some Catholics, but when death is as close as that you only think of God.
Unity defined
I distinguish the unity of comprehensiveness from the unity of mere singularity. The word one, as oneness, is an ambiguous word. There is a oneness belonging to the army as well as to every soldier in the army. The army is one, and that is the oneness of unity; the soldier is one, and that is the oneness of the unit. There is difference between the oneness of a body and the oneness of a member of that body. The body is many, and a unity of manifold comprehensiveness. An arm or a member of a body is one, but that is the unity of singularity. (F. W. Robertson, M. A.)
Therefore doth My Father love Me
The Fathers love of Jesus
Observe what Christ says
I. OF LAYING DOWN HIS LIFE.
1. No mere man could have said this. Power over life is Gods prerogative. To none but the Son has He given to have life in Himself; and power to take it again is manifestly not ours. But we must not separate this claim from His obedience. Christ knows no power but to do the Fathers will.
2. Much of our metaphysics is here silenced. Is obedience free if we are not also free to disobey? The truest liberty is voluntary restraint. The freedom of obedience is learned as we love to obey. The fullest consciousness of power is that of power to do Gods will.
3. Christs assertion of power is intended to illustrate His obedience. I lay down My life of Myself. He could have withdrawn Himself from the people, or by yielding to their prejudices have won them. He could have awed them, as He did the soldiers, by His majestic presence. He had power over mens consciences, as was seen in the case of the Pharisees who brought the woman taken in adultery, and in the case of Pilate. The concealed aid of heaven was at His bidding. But more than all this was the strength of His submission. He speaks of His power to show how full was His obedience.
4. We have here an awful revelation of the powerlessness of sin. The Jews were simply tolerated, ignorant of the power that restrained itself. So with all sinners. But Christ was thus patient that when they had done their worst He might be their Saviour.
5. The chief truth here is the fulness of Christs obedience. The consciousness that we might escape would be to us a motive for disobedience. We are kept submissive by weakness. He speaks not of power to avoid the sacrifice but to make it.
II. OF THY FATHERS LOVE.
1. We see the reason of this partly in Christs obedience. Here is the oneness of the Father and the Son; the Son rejoices to obey; the Father commits His whole counsel to the Son that He may accomplish it.
2. The commandment was that Christ should lay down His life for the sheep. The Fathers love for the Son is not one in which all others are shut out. We read that God did not rest in Creation till He had made man in His own image. His love is so bountiful that it forms objects on which to lavish itself. Here we have something more surprising--the pity for lost man which is in the Father, and that pity finding response in the Son. Well was it said that God is love.
3. Christ tells us why the Father loves Him.
(1) That we may know the men who are dearest to God--not as with us the learned, wealthy, powerful, but the obedient and loving.
(2) That we may understand Christs life and death. Neither Jews nor disciples could understand the Man of Sorrows. Hence the double proclamation, This is My beloved Son. How many a reason has been given why Christ must die! But how poor all reasons beside the simple one that He loved us.
(3) In order that we may know God. The object of our affection reveals ourselves. If the man of force be our hero, we show ourselves worshippers of power; if a good man, we prize goodness. Christ is dear to the Father because He loves us. What a witness to the love of God.
III. OF THE ISSUE OF LAYING DOWN HIS LIFE. Christ is to reap the reward of His sacrifice, and we of the travail of His soul.
1. This alone renders His sacrifice lawful or possible, and distinguishes between sublimity of sacrifice, and scornful waste of self. The Fathers commandment is not that the Son should perish. The life which is yielded up for the ends of love is restored in the triumph of love.
2. This illustrates the true character of trust in God--the assurance that He is righteous to vindicate fidelity and loving to reward it.
3. It is not love for men which is indifferent about sharing with them the joy of their restoration--this makes any sacrifice an affront. Christ anticipates the joy of leading many sons to glory.
4. Heaven would lose its value if Christ perished to secure it for us. We should feel that our salvation had been too dearly purchased, and the bitter sorrow that He was absent whose joy it would have been to meet His redeemed.
5. To labour in hope of reward is not always selfish. We need the triumph to vindicate the suffering.
6. We learn how to sustain ourselves in Christian struggle and endurance. If we suffer with Him, etc. The sacrifice and resurrection of Christ is a rebuke to all despondency. (A. Mackennal, D. D.)
God loving His Son
The assertions of Christ as to His relation to God are very different from those of Old Testament saints. Not once did they call God Father--this Jesus always does; and the Father acquiesces. This is My beloved Son. Here Christ seems to found His Fathers love on something He is about to accomplish on earth. But a stranger having rescued a child from drowning and restored it to its parent might say, Therefore doth the Father love me. And so some infer that Christ was related to God only in virtue of His obedience to death. Not so. God is love; but love cannot exist without an object, and this object must be coexistent with the eternal affection. So Christ is the eternal object of an eternal love, and the text only states an additional reason for that love. A king has a beloved son and a revolted province. The latter he could crush, but prefers to accept a voluntary mission of the former to win the rebels by privation, forbearance, and kindness. This succeeds. The king expresses his satisfaction, and the son says, Therefore doth my father love me. The idea of the text is similar. What were the elements in Christs death which drew forth the love of Christ?
I. PERFECT SPONTANEITY IN THE OBEDIENCE HE RENDERED. Not that His sufferings or death were in themselves well pleasing to the merciful Father. All men die, and by Divine appointment; but God does not love them for this, else the wicked would be loved as well as the righteous. It was the Divine principle that prompted it--obedience. It was not snatched from Him, nor did He yield it in idle passivity; He laid it down of His active free will, and so revealed the Fathers will, developed the plan of redemption, and is therefore the object of Gods intensest love.
II. FAITH. There would have been no merit in His death had He sacrificed Himself without assurance of resurrection. It might have been from despair. Nor could it have taken place without this assurance. The extinction of such a one could not be permitted in the government of a righteous God. Knowing that He was sinless, He must have known that death, the wages of sin, had no power over Him. Hence He never spoke of His death apart from His resurrection. The taking up was as much in the Divine plan as the laying down. He was confident of the successful issue, and God loved Him because of this. Conclusion:
1. If God finds a new reason for loving His Son in the moral qualities He displayed, He will love us if we strive to live as Christ lived. Wherever He sees men obedient and self-sacrificing He will love them.
2. We should do our duty in spite of consequences, or rather with regard to the remoter consequences. Lay down our lives that we may take them again. Whosoever loseth his life for My sake shall find it. (T. James, M. A.)
The stimulating power of the consciousness of being loved
What heat is in nature that love is in the human realm. It tends to quicken and expand and beautify those on whom it lights; it assists men to be better and stronger and more gracious than they would otherwise be. Under its influence, souls are enabled to bud and blossom more freely; and let none of us be ashamed of needing it, and leaning on it for succour. (S. A. Tipple.)
The Sons work approved of the Father
I. THE GREAT WORK IN WHICH THE SON IS ENGAGED--the salvation of His sheep
1. From danger, the curse of the law, eternal death.
2. To obedience, holiness, blessedness, heaven.
II. THE APPOINTMENT OF THE SON TO THIS GREAT WORK BY THE FATHER. This commandment. This principle holds a high place in the Bible. Christ was predicted as the servant and sent of God; gladly accepts this subordination; and His apostles teach the same doctrine.
III. THE QUALIFICATIONS OF THE SON FOR HIS GREAT WORK.
1. To atone for guilt He must be and was free from guilt.
2. To save man He must be and was man, and yet more than man. As man He had a life to lay down; but He had no power as man to lay it down of Himself; this was Divine.
3. This Divine-human life had sufficient merit to expiate the sin of the world.
4. But redemption could not have been consummated without its resumption; and so He had power to take it again.
IV. THE SONS ACCOMPLISHMENT OF HIS GREAT WORK. His offering has been effectual for the purpose for which it was presented. There remaineth no more sacrifice for sin. Millions are now through His expiation the spirits of just men made perfect, and millions are preparing for that blessed state.
V. THE COMPLACENCY MANIFESTED BY THE FATHER TO THE SON IN AND FOR THE ACCOMPLISHMENT OF HIS GREAT WORK. (Php_2:9-11). (J. Brown, D. D.)
Christ comforting Himself
The people were listening with sneers and anger to Christs asservations of the union between Himself and God, and contemplating a step which would expose their emptiness. When put out of the way, His presumptuous claims would be shattered. He read this thought, and answered it calmly, with the inward consciousness that that event would only culminate His voluntary self-sacrifice, and render Him the special object of the Fathers love. Such is frequently the blindness and defeat of bad men. It is poor business trying to hurt a saint. You can never be certain that your hardest blows will not ensure him more abundant consolation.
I. CHRIST COMFORTING HIMSELF
1. With the reflection that someone loves Him. We find Him constantly doing this. I am not alone, etc.; pausing in the midst of hostility, etc., to get soothing and inspiration. He could not get on without it any more than we can. Let none of us weakly and selfishly long for this, nor stoically determine to be above it; but value it as an impulse for work.
2. With His felt possession of power. His adversaries regarded Him as their victim. He muses, they are mistaken; instead of being dragged helplessly, I shall march in might to die. We need not shrink from the thought that Jesus found solace in the consciousness of His superiority to what He looked: that while He seemed weak, He was sublimely strong. It is both natural and legitimate, when we are being estimated falsely, to feel the excellence or the gift that is not perceived. We may need this in encountering disparagement, to preserve our self-possession and keep ourselves from fainting. There are others, however, who can never have this consolation. Their reputation is the best thing they have; they are meaner than the social estimate of them.
II. THE GROUNDS OF THIS COMFORT.
1. The Father loved Christ because He lay down His life in order to take it again. The beauty of self-sacrifice lies not in the act, but in its animating purpose. There is no necessary virtue in denying yourself. Sacrifices are often made out of mere weakness, regard for the usages of society, self-indulgence, even to spite others, and in disregard of the right and the claims of other people. Christ laid down His life in order to take it again. This explanation is at first sight disappointing. What was there to charm the heart of God in surrender for the purpose of recovery? But this recovery was meant to be a great source and fountain of good, that He might be the first-born among many brethren. It is noble to sacrifice self with a view to acquiring more capacity for service.
2. The secret of Christs power was not that He had a right to elect to die, which we have not, but that He felt Himself able to make the sacrifice required of Him. He did not need to be dragged or urged into it, but was able to make it freely. What happens there then is in the sense of the power to respond at once to the call of a difficult, trying duty. But He was certain not only that He could bear the Cross, but that He should reap to the full the anticipated fruit of it. What more blessed than this--the assurance of power to do what is wholly true, and an assurance of gaining the object?
3. What was the secret of it all? This commandment, etc. What God calls one to, one will have strength to accomplish, and it will assuredly yield its due fruit. In other things you may break down or be disappointed--never in this. (S. A. Tipple.)
I lay down My life
Victim and priest
Types, like shadows, are one-sided things. Hence in the shadowy worship of Judaism Christ was brokenly seen in a variety of disconnected images. The sacrificial lamb was a picture of Him who is the first of sufferers and the only sin bearer; but the dumb brute, led in unresisting ignorance to the altar, not otherwise than it might have been to the shambles, was no picture of the perfect willingness with which He devoted His life to God. For the type of that we must go to the white-robed priest. There was need for a double shadow. But in the one real sacrifice the two are one. Jesus is priest and victim. There are certain steps we must take in comprehending Christs self-sacrificing will as expressed in the text.
I. It was CONSTANT. The strength of ones will to suffer is tested by its deliberate formation and persistent endurance.
1. Our Saviours resolution was no impulse born of excited feeling, liable to fail before calmer thought; nor a necessity for which He was gradually prepared, and at last shut up to through circumstances; but a habitual purpose, steadily kept in view from the first, till it grew almost to a passion. How am I straitened, etc.
2. Many men are heroic only by impulse; give time, and the bravery yields to prudence. Men have ignorantly taken the first step towards martyrdom; but, having taken it, have felt bound to go forward. But when the mind can form so terrible a purpose, and calmly hold it on for years, in the face of unromantic neglect and mockery, the purpose must have its roots deep. Such will was never in any except Christ. Precious life, which carried its own death in its bosom, like a bunch of sweet flowers, filling all its days with fragrance.
II. It was ACTIVELY FREE.
1. While resignation was the habitual attitude of His soul, there was more than resignation. We underestimate His priestly act, by thinking more of His willingness than of His will to suffer. I lay down My life means that, with ardent desire and fixed resolution, He is, at His own choice, giving away His own Spiritual Person, including that which is the most personal thing of all--His will. And this active exposure to penalty accompanied Him through every stage. His was both the right and strength at every stage to free His soul; but He chose to go on deeper into the darkness till all was over. This came out very plainly when Peter put before Him the alternative; when, His time being come, He set Himself to go to Jerusalem, when He said to Judas, What thou doest, etc.; when, on His arrest, He spoke about the legion of angels; yes, and when the torment reached Him, Let Him now come down from the cross.
2. Now, it is harder to will a disagreeable lot than to consent to bear it when it is laid upon us. Many a man has piety to submit to unavoidable evil, or even to rest in it as wise, who would yet be unequal to make it a choice. Most men, therefore, aim at nothing higher than passive acquiescence in suffering; but it is nobler to seal Gods afflictive will with our own, and will not to have it otherwise. It is a further advance still to enter voluntarily into affliction for righteousness sake. Yet even the martyrs choice of death before sin is less absolute and free than that of Christ.
III. It was CROSSED BY HINDRANCES FROM THE WEAKNESS OF THE FLESH AND IT OVERCAME THEM. As you walk by the side of a deep, swift-running river, you know not how strong the current is till you reach the rapids, where its flow is broken. So on reading the smooth, constant story of Jesus life, there is little to tell us with what power He was advancing to His agony. Near the end came one or two places where this was seen (chap. 12:27-29). That was a short struggle. His will to die soon overcame the momentary perplexity, and the voice from heaven was needed not by Him, but for the bystanders. This, however, was only a foretaste of the greater strife in the garden--the weak flesh against the willing spirit; yet in the end it is divinely upborne to bear the unimaginable suffering for the worlds guilt. In that hour He sacrificed Himself--laid down His life. With what relief do we read, It is enough, the hour has come, etc. (J. O.Dykes, D. D.)
I have power to take it again
Our Lords resumption of life
I. WAS HIS OWN ACT. Nowhere is the majesty of our Lords Divine Person more manifest than here.
1. He had power to lay His life down. Could we use His words? There is much in life we can control, but not our way of leaving it.
(1) So far from laying it down, we yield it up. It is wrung from us by disease, violence, or accident. No men of this century have wielded more power than the two Napoleons; they little meant to die--the first at St. Helena, the third at Chislehurst. Bishop Wilberforce never entered a railway carriage without reflecting that he might never leave it alive. He was a fearless horseman, but he met his death when riding at a walking pace.
(2) But cannot a man lay down his life at pleasure? And did not the Stoics commend it? As a matter of physical possibility, we can; but what about its morality? It is at once cowardice and murder.
(3) A good man may find it his duty to accept death at the hands of others. Patriots and martyrs have had moral power to lay down their lives; but they could not control the circumstances which made death a duty.
(4) Our Lords act differs from that of the suicide in its moral elevation (Joh_10:11), and from that of the martyr in His command of the situation. As the Lord of Life, He speaks of His human life as His creature.
2. He had power to take it again.
(1) Here His majesty is more apparent, for He speaks of a control over His life which no mere man can possibly have. When soul and body are sundered, there is no force in the soul such as can reconstitute the body. In the Biblical cases of resurrection, the power came from without.
(2) Here barbarism and civilization are on a level. Science has done wonders in bringing the various forces of nature under control; but no scientist cherishes the hope of undoing the work of death, or of keeping it indefinitely at bay.
(3) When Christ claims to take His life again, He stands in relation to His life, which is only intelligible if we believe Him to be the Son of God.
II. WAS HIS ACT AND THE FATHERS CONJOINTLY?
1. He is repeatedly said to have been raised by the Father. This was Peters language (Act_2:24; Act_3:15; Act_4:10; Act_5:30; Act_10:40), and Pauls (Act_13:30-37; 1Th_1:10; 2Ti_2:3; Rom_4:24-25; Rom_6:4; Rom_3:11, etc., etc.).
2. On the ether hand, our Lord speaks of it as an act distinctly His own Mar_10:34; Luk_13:33; Joh_2:19, and text).
3. There is no contradiction here. The resurrection does not cease to be Christs act because it is the Fathers. When God acts through mere men, He makes them His instruments; but the power which effected the resurrection is as old as the eternal generation of the Son (chap. 5:26).
4. There is a moment when imagination, under the conduct of faith, endeavours, but in vain, to realize when the human soul of our Lord, surrounded by myriads of angels, on His return from the ancient dead, came to the grave of Joseph and claimed the body that had hung upon the cross.
III. SUGGESTS THE FOLLOWING CONSIDERATIONS.
1. What Christianity truly means. Not mere loyalty to the precepts of a dead teacher, or admiration of a striking character who lived eighteen hundred years ago. It is something more than literary taste or a department of moral archaeology. It is devotion to a living Christ. If it were a false religion, literary men might endeavour to reconstruct the history of its earliest age. This is what has been done with the great teachers of antiquity, and with Christ. But there is this difference. What Socrates, etc., were is all that we can know of them now. They cannot help us or speak to us. But in the fulness of that power which He asserted at His resurrection, Christ still rules and holds communion with every believer. A living Christianity means a living Christ.
2. What is the foundation of our confidence in the future of Christianity? Based as it is on a Christ who raised Himself from the dead, it cannot pass away.
(1) Mankind has lavished admiration on great teachers; but they have died and been forgotten. Their age proclaimed the dust of their writings gold; a succeeding age scarcely opens their folios. Why are we certain that this fate does not await Christ? Because mens loyalty rests not on His words mainly, but in His Person. Christ is Christianity. And why is it that, in thus clinging to His Person, Christian faith is so sure of the future? Because she has before her not a Christ who was conquered by death.
(2) Had it been otherwise Christianity might have perished more than once; by the wickedness of the Roman Court in the tenth century; by the hordes of Islam in the first flush of their conquests, or by the great Turkish sultans of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries; by the accumulated weight of corruption which invited the Reformation; by the Babel which the Reformation produced; by the relation of the Church to corrupt governments: by the dishonest enterprises of unbelieving theologians. Men said the Church was killed under Decius and Diocletian, after the French Revolution. But each collapse is followed by a revival, because Christ willed to rise.
3. What is our hope for the departed? Because Christ lives, they live also; because He rose, they shall rise. (Canon Liddon.)
The mastery of life
These are the strongest words that human lips have uttered, I think; the strongest, because they give us a glimpse of what elsewhere we cannot find in man or his history--the complete mastery and control of life. Where is the man who comes to life as the workman comes to his clay or marble, and shapes out his idea precisely as he first has thought and designed it, and leaves it fulfilled without that obedient material having demanded any change in the work? How little of such mastery you and I have. Your very purpose in life, of which you speak so proudly, have you not got it by living? And when you had conceived it, when you had said I will, That is my purpose, did life flow liquidly and obediently into your mould, and stay there, and harden in it lastingly? Who has just the life he planned? And when you begin to see your purpose, or something like it, coming on:, of life, what control have you over it and its continuance? You have time to say, Yes, that is the shape of my wish, of my plan, and you or it are hurried away. But even suppose that a man cares not whether his purpose be lasting, if for a moment he reaches the place at which he had aimed; if he stands there where he had struggled through life to be; if he has made life carry him there--is he not master and victor? May he not say, as the soldier who dies in victory, I die happy? The hands that stiffen at that moment, are they not, after all, a conquerors? Oh! but think if the mastery of life does not include something else. It is not only to carry ones own purpose for a moment; it is to do it in such a way as to show that you are not indebted to lifes favour for it; that it is not a gift to you; that you will take it at your own time, as one who is completely, unanxiously master; that you will not be hurried by the thought, Now life is offering me my prize; if not now, never; but can quietly choose the time of acquisition when it is best, and then reach out the hand to take it. But stop again. Mastery of human life--is it not something vastly more than all of this? Is it not to be above counting it indispensable, to use it only as one help in the working out of the great purpose; to lay it down, and yet win the aim by other help; to lay it down as a workman puts down a tool and takes it again? But who of us is so boldly independent as that? Who can work out his human purpose without the help of human life? But I must go yet one great step farther in this description of what it is to be a master of human life. It is this: Suppose you were independent of this human life, yet you are not master of it if it can withdraw itself and you have no power to keep or resume it. If, after showing your ability to do without it, it were able to keep away from you, if you had no power to take it again, you would not be its master. That is the complete mastery of human life, not only to work out your purpose independently of it, but to really resume it, to take it again when it has been laid down … I find, in the midst of all this history of man and his life--believing himself master, and yet never so in reality--one life which has no such feature, which could never have been troubled by the thought of fate. There is One among all human existences which bears all the marks of the mastership of life, which claims from all the title of Lord and Master. First of all, Christ comes to human life with His own purpose fully formed and self-originated. He brought a Divine purpose to earth. Then see how absolutely, without change, that purpose of Christs is carried out. Not a feature is altered; not a circumstance is varied, nor any addition made. It is accomplished just according to the heavenly purpose. Life has no power to change it in the smallest particular. But this royal purpose, will not human life override it, and outgrow it, and destroy it, or gather it into itself and its own purpose, like the little rift that your hand makes in the water of the strong river? Will it remain as it was planned? How those words, the everlasting gospel, answer our question! What is there but the word of God, which endures forever? Oh! what is there today in the world which remains unchanged but the salvation of Christ? But did life give to Him the fulfilment of His purpose, as it does to its favourites, granting the prize to Him in its own time as its favour? I do not know anything more quietly grand about Jesus life than the way in which He chooses the very time when it all shall be done. My time is not yet come; I lay down My life of Myself; I must work today and tomorrow, and the third day I shall be perfected, He says, conscious of controlling the time completely. But how His Mastership grows upon us! Still let me go on to show you how His great purpose is independent of human life. Life is not indispensable to it as to our purpose. He can fulfil His purpose in loss of life, and by loss of life. I lay down My life of Myself. This commandment have I received of My Father. The Divine purpose is not lost, but won, by passing into death. I, if I be lifted up, shall draw all men unto Me. How little is human life necessary to His purpose, who died that we might live! How little dependent on this human existence is that love of God which came from heaven, which has heavens life, which is greater than death, which survives the loss of earthly life! There is but one more addition. I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it again. Here is the highest and last sign of the Master. Can you not see how the river of life flows from the throne of God and the Lamb, where Christ, the ascended God-man, sits, who has taken human life again? Christ would take us all into His great purpose. Follow your own human purposes alone, and then, indeed, life is your master. But become our Lords follower, have a share in His purpose, have a real part and place in the salvation of Christ, and then you, too, have a superiority to life, a mastery of life. Then you, too, are living for an aim which life did not give you; an aim which life cannot modify or destroy; an aim which will be fulfilled in its own chosen time of heavenly happiness; an aim that can survive death and the loss of human life; an aim which, in a resurrection, will be able by its power to resume life as its obedient servant. (Fred. Brooks.)
The Biblical Illustrator, edited by Joseph S. Exell (c. 1880s–1900s) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
B. W. Johnson 1891 · Public Domain On vv9–11 9. By me if any man enter in, he…
9. By me if any man enter in, he shall be saved. Christ is at once the door, the shepherd and the pasture. His pasture is the bread of life and the water of life.
B. W. Johnson's The People's New Testament with Notes (1889–1891) — public domain. Electronic text from the Christian Classics Ethereal Library (CCEL) ThML edition.
Alexander MacLaren 1905 · Public Domain On v9
John
THE GIFTS TO THE FLOCK
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Joh 10:9.
One does not know whether the width or the depth of this marvellous promise is the more noteworthy. Jesus Christ presents Himself before the whole race of man, and declares Himself able to deal with the needs of every individual in the tremendous whole. ‘If any man’-no matter who, where, when.
For all noble and happy life there are at least three things needed: security, sustenance, and a field for the exercise of activity. To provide these is the end of all human society and government. Jesus Christ here says that He can give all these to every one.
The imagery of the sheep and the fold is still, of course, in His mind, and colours the form of the representation. But the substance is the declaration that, to any and every soul, no matter how ringed about with danger, no matter how hampered and hindered in work, no matter how barren of all supply earth may be, He will give these, the primal requisites of life. ‘He shall be saved, and shall go in and out, and find pasture.’
Now I only wish to deal with these three aspects of the blessedness of a true Christian life which our Lord holds forth here as accessible to us all: security, the unhindered exercise of activity, and sustenance or provision.
I. First, then, in and through Christ any man may be saved.
I take it that the word ‘saved’ here is rather used with reference to the imagery of the parable than in its full Christian sense of ultimate and everlasting salvation, and that its meaning in its present connection might perhaps better be set forth by the rendering ‘safe’ than ‘saved.’ At the same time, the two ideas pass into one another; and the declaration of my text is that because, step by step, conflict by conflict, in passing danger after danger, external and internal, Jesus Christ, through our union with Him, will keep us safe, at the last we shall reach eternal and everlasting salvation. ‘He will save us’ by the continual exercise of His protecting power, ‘into His everlasting kingdom.’ There is none other shelter for men’s defenceless heads and naked, soft, unarmed bodies except only the shelter that is found in Him. There are creatures of low grade in the animal world which have the instinct, because their own bodies are so undefended and impotent to resist contact with sharp and penetrating substances, that they take refuge in the abandoned shells of other creatures. You and I have to betake ourselves behind the defences of that strong love and mighty Hand if ever we are to pass through life without fatal harm.
For consider that, even in regard to outward dangers, union with Jesus Christ defends and delivers us. Suppose two men, two Manchester merchants, made bankrupt by the same commercial crisis; or two shipwrecked sailors lashed upon a raft; or two men sitting side by side in a railway carriage and smashed by the same collision. One is a Christian and the other is not. The same blow is altogether different in aspect and actual effect upon the two men. They endure the same thing externally, in body or in fortune. The outward man is similarly affected, but the man is differently affected. The one is crushed, or embittered, or driven to despair, or to drink, or to something or other to soothe the bitterness; the other bows himself with ‘It is the Lord! Let Him do what seemeth Him good.’
So the two disasters are utterly different, though in form they may be the same, and he that has entered into the fold by Jesus Christ is safe, not from outward disaster-that would be but a poor thing-but in it. For to the true heart that lives in fellowship with Jesus Christ, Sorrow, though it be dark-robed, is bright-faced, soft-handed, gentle-hearted, an angel of God. ‘By Me if any man enter in, he shall be safe.’
And further, in our union with Jesus Christ, by simple faith in Him and loyal submission and obedience, we do receive an impenetrable defence against the true evils, and the only things worth calling dangers. For the only real evil is the peril that we shall lose our confidence and be untrue to our best selves, and depart from the living God. Nothing is evil except that which tempts, and succeeds in tempting, us away from Him. And in regard to all such danger, to cleave to Christ, to realise His presence, to think of Him, to wear His name as an amulet on our hearts, to put the thought of Him between us and temptation as a filter through which the poisonous air shall pass, and be deprived of its virus, is the one secret of safety and victory.
Real gift of power from Jesus Christ, the influx of His strength into our weakness, of some portion of the Spirit of life that was in Him into our deadness, is promised, and the promise is abundantly fulfilled to all men who trust Him when their hour of temptation comes. As the dying martyr, when he looked up into heaven, saw Jesus Christ ‘standing at the right hand of God’ ready to help, and, as it were, having started from His eternal seat on the Throne in the eagerness of His desire to succour His servant, so we may all see, if we will, that dear Lord ready to succour us, and close by our sides to deliver us from the evil in the evil, its power to tempt. If we could carry that vision into our daily life, and walk in its light, when temptation rings us round, how poor all the inducements to go away from Him would look!
There is a power in the remembrance of Jesus to slay every wicked thought; and the things that tempt us most, that most directly appeal to our worst sides, to our sense, our ambition, our pride, our distrust, our self-will, all these lose their power upon us, and are discovered in their emptiness and insignificance, when once this thought flashes across the mind-Jesus Christ is my Defence, and Jesus Christ is my Pattern and my Companion.
Oh, brother! do not trust yourself out amongst the pitfalls and snares of life without Him. If you do, the real evil of all evils will seize you for its own; but keep close to that dear Lord, and then ‘there shall no evil befall thee, neither shall any plague come nigh thy dwelling.’ The hidden temptation thou wilt pass by without being harmed; the manifest temptation thou wilt trample under foot. ‘Thou shalt not be afraid for the pestilence that walketh in darkness, nor for the destruction that wasteth at noonday.’ Hidden known temptations will be equally powerless; and in the fold into which all pass by faith in Christ thou shalt be safe. And so, kept safe from each danger and in each moment of temptation, the aggregate and sum of the several deliverances will amount to the everlasting salvation which shall be perfected in the heavens.
Only remember the condition, ‘By Me if any man enter in.’ That is not a thing to be done once for all, but needs perpetual repetition. When we clasp anything in our hands, however tight the initial grasp, unless there is a continual effort of renewed tightening, the muscles become lax, and we have to renew the tension, if we are to keep the grasp. So in our Christian life it is only the continual repetition of the act which our Lord here calls ‘entering in by Him’ that will bring to us this continual exemption from, and immunity in, the dangers that beset us.
Keep Christ between you and the storm. Keep on the lee side of the Rock of Ages. Keep behind the breakwater, for there is a wild sea running outside; and your little boat, undecked and with a feeble hand at the helm, will soon be swamped. Keep within the fold, for wolves and lions lie in every bush. Or, in plain English, live moment by moment in the realising of Christ’s presence, power, and grace. So, and only so, shall you be safe.
II. Now, secondly, note, in Jesus Christ any man may find a field for the unrestricted exercise of his activity.
That metaphor of ‘going in and out’ is partly explained to us by the image of the flock, which passes into the fold for peaceful repose, and out again, without danger, for exercise and food; and is partly explained by the frequent use, in the Old Testament and in common conversation, of the expression ‘going out and in’ as the designation of the two-sided activity of human life. The one side is the contemplative life of interior union with God by faith and love; the other, the active life of practical obedience in the field of work which God provides for us. These two are both capable of being raised to their highest power, and of being discharged with the most unrestricted and joyous activity, on condition of our keeping close to Christ, and living by the faith of Him.
Note, then, ‘He shall go in.’ That comes first, though it interferes with the propriety of the metaphor, since the previous words already contemplate an initial ‘entering in by Me, the Door.’ That is to say, that, given the union with Jesus Christ by faith, there must then, as the basis of all activity, follow very frequent and deep inward acts of contemplation, of faith, and aspiration, and desire. You must go into the depths of God through Christ. You must go into the depths of your own souls through Him. You must become accustomed to withdraw yourselves from spreading yourselves out over the distractions of any external activity, howsoever imperative, charitable, or necessary, and live alone with Jesus, ‘in the secret place of the Most High.’ It is through Him that we have access to the mysteries and innermost shrine of the Temple. It is through Him that we draw near to the depths of Deity. It is through Him that we learn the length and breadth and height and depth of the largest and loftiest and noblest truths that concern the spirit. It is through Him that we become familiar with the inmost secrets of our own selves. And only they who habitually live this hidden and sunken life of solitary and secret communion will ever do much in the field of outward work. Christians of this generation are far too much accustomed to live only in the front rooms of the house, that look out upon the street; and they know very little-far too little for their soul’s health, and far too little for the freshness of their work and its prosperity-of that inward life of silent contemplation and expectant adoration, by which all strength is fed. Do not keep all your goods in the shop windows, and have nothing on your shelves but dummies, as is the case with far too many of us to-day. Remember that the Lord said first, ‘He shall go in,’ and unless you do you will not be ‘saved.’
But then, further, if there have been, and continue to be, this unrestricted exercise through Christ of that sweet and silent life of solitary communion with Him, then there will follow upon that an enlargement of opportunity, and power for outward service such as nothing but emancipation by faith in Him can ever bring. Howsoever, by external circumstances, you and I may be hampered and hindered, however often we may feel that if something outside of us were different, the development of our active powers would be far more satisfactory, and we could do a great deal more in Christ’s cause, the true hindrance lies never without, but within; and it is only to be overcome by that plunging into the depths of fellowship with Him. And then, if we carry with us into the field of work, whether it be the commonplace, dusty, tedious, and often repulsive duties of our monotonous business; or whether it be the field of more distinctly unselfish and Christian service-if we carry with us into all places where we go to labour, the sweet thought of His presence, of His example, of His love, and of the smile that may come on His face as the reward of faithful service, then we shall find that external labour, drawing its pattern, its motive, its law, and the power for its discharge, from communion with Him, is no more task-work nor slavery; and even ‘the rough places will be made smooth, and the crooked things will be made straight,’ and distasteful work will be made at least tolerable, and hard burdens will be lightened, and the things that are ‘seen and temporal’ will shimmer into transparency, through which will shine out the things that are ‘unseen and eternal.’
Some of us are constitutionally made to prefer the one of these forms of Christian activity; some of us to prefer the other. The tendencies of this generation are far too much to the latter, to the exclusion of the former. It is hard to reconcile the conflicting claims, and I know of no better way to hit the just medium than by trying to keep ourselves always in touch with Jesus Christ, and then outward labour of any sort, whether for the bread that perishes or for His kingdom and righteousness, will never become so absorbing but that in it we may have our hearts in heaven, and the silent hour of communion with Him will never be so prolonged as to neglect outward duties. There was a demoniac boy in the plain, and therefore it was impossible to build tabernacles on the Mount of Transfiguration. But the disciples that had not climbed the Mount were all impotent to cast out the demoniac boy. We, if we keep near to Jesus Christ, will find that through Him we can ‘go in and out,’ and in both be pursuing the one uniform purpose of serving and pleasing Him. So shall be fulfilled in our cases the Psalmist’s prayer, that ‘I may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of ray life, to behold His beauty, and to inquire in His Temple.’
III. Lastly, in Jesus Christ any man may receive sustenance. ‘They shall find pasture.’
The imagery of the sheep and the fold is still, of course, present to the Master’s mind, and shapes the form in which this great promise is set forth.
I need only remind you, in illustration of it, of two facts, one, that in Jesus Christ Himself all the true needs of humanity are met and satisfied. He is ‘the Bread of God that came down from heaven to give life to the world.’ Do I want an outward object for my intellect? I have it in Him. Does my heart feel with its tendrils, which have no eyes at the ends of them, after something round which it may twine, and not fear that the prop shall ever rot or be cut down or pulled up? Jesus Christ is the home of love in which the dove may fold its wings and be at rest. Do I want {and I do if I am not a fool} an absolute and authoritative command to be laid upon my will; some one ‘whose looks enjoin, whose lightest words are spells’? I find absolute authority, with no taint of tyranny, and no degradation to the subject, in that Infinite Will of His. Does my conscience need some strong detergent to be laid upon it which shall take out the stains that are most indurated, inveterate, and ingrained? I find it only in the ‘blood that cleanseth from all sin.’ Do my aspirations and desires seek for some solid and substantial and unquestionable and imperishable good to which, reaching out, they may be sure that they are not anchoring on cloudland? Christ is our hope. For all this complicated and craving commonwealth that I carry within my soul, there is but one satisfaction, even Jesus Christ Himself. Nothing else nourishes the whole man at once, but in Him are all the constituents that the human system requires for its nutriment and its growth in every part. So in and through Christ we find ‘pasture.’
But beyond that, if we are knit to Him by simple and continual faith, love, and obedience, then what is else barrenness becomes full of nourishment, and the unsatisfying gifts of the world become rich and precious. They are nought when they are put first, they are much when they are put second.
I remember when I was in Australia seeing some wretched cattle trying to find grass on a yellow pasture where there was nothing but here and there a brown stalk that crumbled to dust in their mouths as they tried to eat it. That is the world without Jesus Christ. And I saw the same pasture six weeks after, when the rains had come, and the grass was high, rich, juicy, satisfying. That is what the world may be to you, if you will put it second, and seek first that your souls shall be fed on Jesus Christ. Then, and only then, will what is else water be turned by His touch and blessing into wine that shall fill the great jars to the brim, and be pronounced by skilled palates to be the good wine. ‘I will feed them in a good pasture, and upon the high mountains of Israel shall their fold be. There shall they lie in a good fold, and in a fat pasture shall they feed upon the mountains of Israel.’
Alexander MacLaren, Expositions of Holy Scripture (1904–1910) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
C. I. Scofield 1917 · Public Domain On v9 (See Scofield "Rom 1:16").
saved
(See Scofield "Rom 1:16").
The Scofield Reference Bible (1917 edition), notes by C. I. Scofield — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Paul E. Kretzmann 1924 · Public Domain On v11 Jesus the Good Shepherd:
Jesus the Good Shepherd:
v. 11. I am the Good Shepherd; the Good Shepherd giveth His life for the sheep.
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v. 12. But he that is an hireling, and not the Shepherd, whose own the sheep are not, seeth the wolf coming, and leaveth the sheep, and fleeth; and the wolf catcheth them, and scattereth the sheep.
v. 13. The hireling fleeth, because he is an hireling, and careth not for the sheep.
v. 14. I am the Good Shepherd, and know My sheep, and am known of Mine.
v. 15. As the Father ’knoweth Me, even so know I the Father; and I lay down My life for the sheep.
v. 16. And other sheep I have which are not of this fold; them also I must bring, and they shall hear My voice; and there shall be one fold and one Shepherd.
Jesus here applies the parable in still another way, from another view-point. He calls Himself the Good shepherd, with emphasis, as the only one that may bear this name with full justice. In this sense the name is applicable to Christ alone; He is the one most excellent Shepherd of the spiritual sheep. The first feature which distinguishes Him as the true Shepherd of souls is this, that He gives His life, His own soul, as a ransom, as the one complete sacrifice, for the guilt of all sinners, who have earned eternal damnation. He became their Substitute; He took upon Himself their transgressions and died in their stead. Thus the guilty, the sinners, were delivered from sin and destruction. In this respect Jesus incidentally is an example for all those that bear the name pastor as His assistants in the great work. For that purpose He also places Himself in deliberate contrast to the hirelings, the false teachers, the Pharisees. Such hirelings, whose sole concern is the money and the desire to take their ease in Zion, have no interest in the souls of men entrusted to their care. They are strictly mercenary and will work only so long as their lives and well-being seem to be safe. At the first sign of the wolf, at the first indication of real danger, of probable persecution, suffering, and even martyrdom, they turn in precipitate flight. The result is the dispersion and the murder of the sheep on the part of the enemies. But the hireling does not care; he has no worry, no anxiety for, no interest in, the sheep. "He that will be a preacher, let him love the work with all his heart, that he seek only God’s honor and the welfare of his neighbor. If he does not seek God’s glory and his neighbor’s salvation only, but thinks, in such office, of his benefit and detriment, there you need not think that he will last. Either he will flee shamefully and desert the sheep, or he will keep silence and let the sheep go without pasture, that is, without the Word. Those are hirelings that preach for their own benefit, are covetous, and do not want to be satisfied with that which God gives them daily as an alms. For we preachers should not desire more from our office than enough and to spare. Those that want more are hirelings that do not care for the herd; whereas a pious preacher will give up everything on that account, even his body and life. " The second feature that distinguishes Jesus as the Good Shepherd, in contrast to all others, is the fact of the intimate acquaintance and knowledge between Him and His sheep. Just as Jesus knows them that are His, according to body, mind, and heart, so the believers know Jesus; their heart, their mind and will, is centered in Jesus, rests in Jesus. The expression fitly pictures the intimate, cordial relation and communion of love that obtains between Christ and His true disciples. This intimacy and communion is as close and embracing as that which exists between Father and Son. Their hearts and minds are open to each other; there is a mutual interchange of thoughts and ideas, all guided by a wonderful love. Thus it is between Christ and the believers. It is due to Christ’s knowledge of the Father and His will that Jesus declares that He will lay down His life for the sheep. The ransom is paid for the sins of the whole world, but the believers alone take advantage of the mercy of the Savior, they alone obtain the grace of the Father. And Christ has other sheep, which are not of this fold; He shall gain believers in Him also from the members of other nations outside of the Jewish. For the Father has given a great number to Him, out of every nation in the world; they are His by the Father’s design and gift. Christ here declares that His voice, In the Word of the Gospel, would go out unto the people of other; descent and tongue than the Jews. It is the, obligation of the divine will resting upon Him, which is urging Him to gain also these for the Gospel. And they would listen, they would obey His voice in the Gospel, and the final result would be one dock, composed of all such as have accepted salvation through the blood of Christ, and one Shepherd, the Son of God Him! self. "But nothing is said of unity of organization. There may be various folds, though one flock. " The dreams of unionism find no support in this passage. The "holy Christian Church, the communion of saints," has been gathered in the world ever since the first proclamation of the Gospel, and all the true believers in Christ form the great invisible Church. But there is not a word here of uniting visible church organizations into one great, powerful body.
Paul E. Kretzmann, Popular Commentary of the Bible (1921–1924) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
unfoldingWord translationNotes 2017 · CC BY-SA 4.0 On vv9, 11 I am the gate
I am the gate
Here "gate" is a metaphor. By referring to himself as "the gate," Jesus is showing that he offers a true way to enter the kingdom of God. AT: "I myself am like that gate" (See: Metaphor)
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pasture
The word "pasture" means a grassy area where sheep eat.
does not come if he would not steal
This is a double negative. In some languages it is more natural to use a positive statement. AT: "comes only to steal" (See: Double Negatives)
steal and kill and destroy
Here the implied metaphor is "sheep," which represents God's people. AT: "steal and kill and destroy the sheep" (See: Assumed Knowledge and Implicit Information and Metaphor)
so that they will have life
The word "they" refers to the sheep. "Life" refers to eternal life. AT: "so that they will really live, lacking nothing"
translationWords
gate
save
life
unfoldingWord translationNotes — © Distant Shores Media and the Door43 World Missions Community, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Source: git.door43.org/Door43/en_tn.
Tyndale Open Study Notes 2022 · CC BY-SA 4.0 On vv9–11 10:9 will be saved (or will find safety): As…
10:9 will be saved (or will find safety): As gatekeeper, Jesus keeps away those who might harm his sheep, keeping his sheep inside the pen where they are safe.
Tyndale Open Study Notes — © Tyndale Open Resources, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Text via the HelloAO Bible API.