According to John 10:1-16 [NLTse]
“I tell you the truth, anyone who sneaks over the wall of a sheepfold, rather than going through the gate, must surely be a thief and a robber! 2 But the one who enters through the gate is the shepherd of the sheep. 3 The gatekeeper opens the gate for him, and the sheep recognize his voice and come to him. He calls his own sheep by name and leads them out. 4 After he has gathered his own flock, he walks ahead of them, and they follow him because they know his voice. 5 They won’t follow a stranger; they will run from him because they don’t know his voice.”
6 Those who heard Jesus use this illustration didn’t understand what he meant, 7 so he explained it to them: “I tell you the truth, I am the gate for the sheep. 8 All who came before me[a] were thieves and robbers. But the true sheep did not listen to them. 9 Yes, I am the gate. Those who come in through me will be saved.[b] They will come and go freely and will find good pastures. 10 The thief’s purpose is to steal and kill and destroy. My purpose is to give them a rich and satisfying life.
11 “I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd sacrifices his life for the sheep. 12 A hired hand will run when he sees a wolf coming. He will abandon the sheep because they don’t belong to him and he isn’t their shepherd. And so the wolf attacks them and scatters the flock. 13 The hired hand runs away because he’s working only for the money and doesn’t really care about the sheep.
14 “I am the good shepherd; I know my own sheep, and they know me, 15 just as my Father knows me and I know the Father. So I sacrifice my life for the sheep. 16 I have other sheep, too, that are not in this sheepfold. I must bring them also. They will listen to my voice, and there will be one flock with one shepherd.
Sermon
Amy and I will have been married 24 years this October. Like all good friends and married couples, we’ve grown close and gotten to know each other by spending time together, sharing our lives together, and finding out about one another, like what hurts the other and what each other likes, and committing to do the likes and trying to avoid that which hurts. We try to do what each other asks us to do, responding to one another’s calls for help and calls telling us we love each other, calls sharing fears and upsets… We’ve grown close by sharing our strengths and our weaknesses with one another, and by partnering in each others’ callings and causes.
The same is true with us and God.
The Lord Jesus says, “I am the good shepherd; I know my own sheep, and they know me… So I sacrifice my life for the sheep.” The word to know in Greek is ginosko. Ginosko is a verb that speaks of the action – the activity – of observing or listening to or touching, smelling, tasting: It describes the actions involved in knowing someone or something. So the knowledge Jesus seems to be enjoying with His followers – His sheep – seems to be the active action of getting to know and continuing to get to grow closer and becoming more and more intimate. Hear in this “knowing” the idea of ongoing relationship while seeking to deepen that relationship. It’s not a growing in the possession of intellectual facts. I know Amy’s birthday and her favorite color and who her parents are and all manner of other details about her. But that is only knowing about Amy. No. Ginosko is the word that gets used to speak of being sexual with one’s wife or one’s husband. It is that type of knowledge Jesus is speaking of: Intimate, personal, and relational. Ginosko includes the motivation behind the activities of getting to know – the desire for relationship that lead us to observing, listening to, touching, smelling, tasting –all focused upon growing closer, growing to be better friends, more intimate, increasingly one…
Sir G. A. Smith in his Historical Geography of Palestine gives this illustration of shepherding-life in Israel: “Sometimes we enjoyed our noonday rest beside one of these Judean wells, to which three or four shepherds come down with their flocks. The flocks mixed with each other, and we wondered how each shepherd would get his own again. But after the watering and playing were over, the shepherds one by one went up different sides of the valley, and each called out his peculiar call, and the sheep of each drew out of the crowd to their own shepherd, and the flocks passed away as orderly as they came.”
There’s another story of a Scottish traveler who changed clothes with a Jerusalem shepherd and tried to lead the sheep; but the sheep didn’t follow him. They didn’t follow the shepherd’s clothes, they followed their shepherd’s voice.
With the repeated mention and focus that Jesus makes of the sheep knowing their shepherd’s voice, His point is that people come to God and come to know God because He calls them, and because they respond and follow. People grow close to God when we respond to His call; getting to know Him as we find out what He likes and acting on it. Making ourselves available so that when He needs us we’re ready. It’s a covenant life God calls us to, like that of husband and wife.
And like that first husband and wife – Adam and Eve – God has work for us. Our Father is not passive here in the world. He’s on the move winning a people back to Himself. I love the way Mark portrays Jesus in his Gospel. It’s always, “And immediately Jesus did this,” “and immediately Jesus did that.” Jesus is on the move. There’s no time to waste. He’s advancing God’s Kingdom. He’s taking enemy territory one disciple at a time. And our good shepherd is calling us to follow and join with Him in it! To be about advancing the Kingdom of Heaven until all the world knows.
Many people want to know God, but don’t want to exercise the work and the obedience of getting to know Him. We will never get to know God living in a one-sided relationship with Him. We can’t always be looking for God to care for us, provide for us, always looking to Him to make things work together for our good, without offering ourselves to Him for His work, for His desires, for His heart. No. Covenants go both ways.
Jesus is calling us to join Him in God’s work. He’s called us out of our old sheep pens of pride and anger and lust. He’s called and calling us out of excess and envy. Out of greed and lazy living and all our related busy-ness. And as we make ourselves available, and as we do as He calls, and as we follow where He leads, we experience His care for us. We experience His provision. We see our needs met. We see guidance given. We see enemies dealt with. We see ourselves growing in grace. We see ourselves growing in intimate knowledge and relationship with Him as we trust and follow and obey. We see ourselves getting to truly know Him (in the full, biblical sense of the word). We see ourselves as we were made to be. We see ourselves doing what we were made to do. And it’s a full and satisfying life! Not the sheep being used by and providing for the shepherd, but the good shepherd laying His life down for the sheep. And our living in trust and security, our lives to His hands, as we join Him in spreading such good news…
Are you growing to know Jesus better and better? Are you following Him – making yourself available to Him and responding when He calls? They are the same question.
Jesus’ sheep hear His voice and they follow Him, and as they do so they know Him and continue seeking to get to know Him better and better. And in that way, with that focus, and through that relationship, there will be one flock, and there will be one shepherd, and there will be one table…