The Excellent Character Of The Shepherd
By Woodrow Kroll
John 10:1-4
We return to the Gospel of John to show us that it matters what we know--especially about Jesus. If you've been with us the last couple of weeks, you've seen what happens to people with little or no knowledge of Jesus. You've also heard what happens when they meet Him face to face, when facts about the Lord develop into a relationship with Him. Today we'll meet Jesus as the Great Shepherd of the sheep, and we'll begin to understand what it means for us to have him as our Shepherd.
Today in John chapter 10, I want us to look specifically at the character of Jesus, getting to know God by getting to know the Son of God, Jesus Christ. Begin with me at John, chapter 10, at verse 1.
"Most assuredly, I say to you, he who does not enter the sheepfold by the door, but climbs up some other way, the same is a thief and a robber. But he who enters by the door is the shepherd of the sheep. To him the doorkeeper opens, and the sheep hear his voice; and he calls his own sheep by name and leads them out. And when he brings out his own sheep, he goes before them; and the sheep follow him, for they know his voice. Yet they will by no means follow a stranger, but will flee from him, for they do not know the voice of strangers."
Now, let me stop there, there's so much more to this passage, but obviously this is the passage in which Jesus is introducing Himself as the Good Shepherd. I want you to see something about the character of Jesus you want to get to know, the character of the Person I want you to get to know more intimately, the excellent character of the Shepherd.
Notice first of all, in the first two verses, Jesus is the legitimate Shepherd. Jesus did not come to be the Savior by winning a contest. Jesus did not come to be the Savior by being called "tall, dark and handsome." Jesus did not come to be the Savior because He was the most popular man of Galilee. Jesus is the Savior because His bloodline is right. He is God. And it says, "Most assuredly, I say to you, he who does not enter the sheepfold by the door, but climbs up some other way, the same is a thief and a robber."
Anybody who claims to be the Savior, who does not come from God, cannot be the Savior. That person is a liar, a cheat, a thief, a robber. So Jesus presents Himself to the world as the legitimate Savior. Not one of the legitimate Saviors, but the only One. He is, indeed, the only Savior this world will ever have.
And as the legitimate Savior, Jesus shows us just how intimate and how personal He is with you and me. I love what He says in verse 3. Notice it says, "To him the doorkeeper opens, and the sheep hear his voice; and he calls his own sheep by name and leads them out." Now, how do you suppose the sheep hear His voice? Well He talks to them, that's how they hear His voice.
See, Jesus is so intimately involved with us, He talks with us, talks with us through His Word. But when the disciples were with Him...wouldn't you love to have been part of that disciple band? Just to be there and hear the Lord Jesus talk to you, I wonder what His voice sounds like. To know that Jesus, the Good Shepherd, speaks to His sheep, to know that He talks with you and me, and to know that we can recognize His voice, and we can follow Him because of His voice.
Now, I have to admit to you, I'm not much of a shepherd. I haven't had a great deal of experience in raising sheep. I'm not unexperienced in raising sheep, one time when I was a boy the neighbor farmer asked me if I would help him get his hay in one year, and so I helped him. He promised to pay me. We got the hay in, I found out he had no money. So he paid me in three sheep. I was the proud owner of three sheep. I named them; they didn't remember their names. I called them; they didn't come. I tried to love them; they didn't love back. Sheep are really dumb!
And yet, I find a picture here in which the shepherd speaks to his sheep, and there's this sort of communion between the shepherd and the sheep. And I said, "That can't be true." And then a few years ago...Back to the Bible has a series of on-site Bible-teaching videos. Some of you know about them. I figure the best place to teach the Book of Romans is not in Lincoln, Nebraska; the best place to teach Romans is in Rome. So we went to Rome and we filmed my teaching the 16 chapters of Romans in the Roman Coliseum, and in the Forum and elsewhere.
And one of the videos we did is called "Sandals in the Sand." Some of you have that, you've already told me that. And we filmed that in Israel, teaching the Book of Matthew in Israel. Now, I hope I'm not letting out any trade secrets here, but when you do a video like this you don't just hope that you happen on some sheep sometime so you can shoot a sheep scene. It doesn't work that way. You have a fellow who goes out ahead of you. He finds a Bedouin with some sheep, and we say "We want you at this location at 1:00 with 13 sheep. So, that when you show up the shepherd is there and the sheep are there.
And we did that. We had a man, a Bedouin shepherd, who had his sheep there at a cave we needed him to be at south of Bethlehem. And when we arrived he was already there with his sheep. Now, I had to go into the cave and come out of the cave in one of the scenes, and we needed the shepherd and the sheep to get closer to the cave. So I tried to herd these sheep into the cave. They paid absolutely no attention to me. And then, through a translator, we told this Bedouin shepherd "We need those sheep closer to the cave."
You know what he did? He made a little noise with his mouth, kind of like this [making a sound]. That was it, the sheep moved close to the cave. I couldn't believe my eyes. So I said, "He can do it, I can do it!" So I went [making a sound]. They did nothing! And I came to have a greater appreciation for this verse, "To him the doorkeeper opens, and the sheep hear his voice." See, when the shepherd spoke to the sheep, they knew the noise he made and they knew it was different from the noise I made.
Now, if I want to get to know the Lord intimately, I've got to listen for His voice. I've got to know when it's His voice and not some stranger speaking to me, not someone trying to teach me things that are not found in God's Word. I need to spend the time in the Book so that I know the Shepherd's voice. And when I hear His voice, it's such a wonderful thing:
He speaks, and the sound of His voice
Is so sweet the birds hush their singing;
And the melody that He gave to me
Within my heart is ringing.
And He walks with me, and He talks with me,
And He tells me I am His own,
And the joy we share as we tarry there,
None other has ever known.
See, that's what I mean by getting to be intimate with the Savior, getting to know Him intimately. I mean, you know Him as Savior, but get to know Him intimately as Savior. This Shepherd is the legitimate Shepherd. And this Shepherd speaks to us, His sheep. Get to know His voice.
But isn't it interesting, also in verse 3, not only does He speak to the sheep, but "he calls his own sheep by name." Now, I know these shepherds, some of them have flocks that are just huge--and yet they know how to distinguish one sheep from another. And they all look alike to me. And here it talks about the Shepherd calling His sheep by name. Isn't it interesting how often God calls His people by name?
I mentioned this the other day, but isn't it interesting, when God spoke to Adam--the very first time after Adam and Eve sinned--He said Adam, "Where are you?" God knew exactly where Adam was, but He called him, nonetheless. "Abraham...Take now thy son, thine only son Isaac," (Genesis 22:2); He spoke to Abraham and called him by name. "Moses, Moses...Take off your sandals, you're standing on holy ground" (Exodus 3:4-5); He called Moses by name. "'Samuel, Samuel'...'Speak [Lord]; for Thy servant heareth'" (1 Samuel 3:10).
See, God is in the habit of calling His people by name, even before they become His people. "Saul, Saul, why persecutest thou Me?" Isn't it interesting that God knows our name? And He knows our name because, well, He's omniscient, and because He has it written down in that little book, the Lamb's Book of Life. There's a new name written down in glory, and it's mine, friends, it's mine. He knows my name.
And that's important to me, because I can't tell you the number of people who don't know my name. But my God does! And I want to be intimate with that Person who knows my name, so He knows. He speaks to His sheep, He calls His sheep by name, and then--notice, it also says, He "leads them out." Not only does He know me He leads me as well. He leads them out; He doesn't just send us out, friends, He goes with us. That's how intimate He is with us.
"The LORD is my shepherd; I shall not want. He maketh me to lie down in green pastures; He leads me beside the still waters" (Psalm 23:1-2). Isaiah 40:11 is a wonderful verse. It talks about the Shepherd and the sheep. And it says, "He shall feed his flock like a shepherd: He shall gather the lambs with His arm, and carry them in His bosom, and shall gently lead those that are with young."
His leading of me is so incredibly gentle, He just...He picks me up like I'm a little lamb, and He treats me much kinder and more gently than anybody in this world treats me.
Savior, like a Shepherd lead us,
Much we need Thy tender care.
See this is, this is the personality, this is the character of the Person you want to get to know intimately. And of all the times we've encountered the word know, K-N-O-W, in this Gospel of John...I think here in John chapter 10 we encounter it again and again and again. And it's most meaningful to me in this chapter because it tells me how to get to know Him more intimately. This is the Shepherd who loves me, who knows me, who leads me.
Oh, and by the way, notice in verse 4, He is a worthy Shepherd as well. He's not just a personal Shepherd knowing me, but He's worthy of whatever I have for Him. "When he brings out his own sheep, he goes before them; and the sheep follow him, for they know his voice." Great, isn't it? He knows my name; I know His voice. So when He calls, I recognize, because I recognize His voice and I recognize my name--he knows My voice.
The sheep follow Him; He is worthy of your life. He is worthy of you and me to follow Him anywhere, to do anything He asks us to do. And it's when we follow Him anywhere, when we're completely sold out to whatever the Shepherd asks of us to do, that He makes of us the most precious sheep possible.
There have been lots of people who have learned to follow Him. Jim, Pete, Ed, Roger, and Nate learned to follow Him. And it's been more than a generation now, that they followed Him to Ecuador and to Glory. And more recently, Mark, Dave, and Rich followed Him to Panama, and apparently to Colombia. And at this point, we don't know, but we know that they learned how to follow Him.
Why did they follow Him? Because this Shepherd is worthy of being followed. This Shepherd is intimate. This Shepherd loves us. This Shepherd does for us the things nobody else would ever dream doing for us. You see, folks, you and I will follow if we believe the character of the Shepherd is absolutely pure and pristine. I will follow Him anywhere if I believe He is who He claims to be.
And, you know? The only way I get to know and believe who He is and who He claims to be, I get to know Him through His Word. I get to know Him intimately when I spend some time with Him--solid, silent, still, surrendered time with Him. And, oh, if I could challenge you today to do something in your life that would help you to get to K-N-O-W, to get to know the Shepherd more, it would be this--you only get to know the one you love by spending time with the one you love.
And if you're not spending enough time with the Shepherd today, if you don't recognize His voice when He calls, if you're not willing to follow Him--the One who loves you and gave Himself for you--then you need to get to know Him. You need to spend the time necessary in order for you to become intimately involved in His life.
And my prayer for you today is my prayer for me--that each of us will know this Shepherd so well that when He says, "Follow Me," we will simply do what those early disciples did. Peter, Andrew, James and John got up and left their nets behind and followed Him. Philip followed Him. Matthew followed Him. There was no debate; there was no rebuttal. There was only adoration for the Shepherd who said, "Come and follow Me." Yeah, that's what I want us to be like.
That's what I want my life to be like. I want to be so intimately involved with this Shepherd--I want to believe in His character so very, very much--that whatever He says for me to do, I am willing instantaneously without a second thought, with no rebuttal at all. I want to be able to do that. But, I won't do that unless I'm intimately involved with Him on a daily basis and I trust Him like the sheep trust the shepherd. "My sheep hear My voice, and they know Me."
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