FRIDAY November 22nd
John 10:7 ‘So Jesus again said to them, “Truly, truly, I say to you, I am the door of the sheep.”’
John 10:11 ‘I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep.”’
I have come to two ‘I am’ statements today as they are in the same chapter and obviously linked together and they give us a bit of agricultural language and how beautifully Jesus draws from the world of agriculture to help us understand something of the reason why he came, to lay down his life for the sheep, and of how we come to know him as our shepherd.
Here in these two ‘I am’ statements he is both the door, gate or entrance into the place where we will also find him as our good shepherd! But as the door he first needed to lay down his life so that the entrance into heaven could be opened to welcome all who would come to believe on him.
‘I am the door of the sheep’, I am the good shepherd’, Jesus makes it very clear in what is recorded for us in John 10, that there are many others who would present themselves as a shepherd, or would present alternative ways into heaven, but all who promote themselves and other alternatives are but thieves and robbers, and there intention is exactly the same as the biggest thief and robber, the devil, which is to kill and destroy.
But Jesus has come for a number of reasons, and in this chapter, they are illustrated this way:
Of first importance is that we may have life, and this is called here abundant life. Life in all its fulness, life exactly as it should be, for the life itself comes from the one who is himself both light and life.
Secondly, that we may go in and out and find pasture. Now, this means that as our good shepherd he is going to care for us as his sheep, provide for us as his sheep, and as the door he is also the door keeper who is going to watch out for us as the sheep.
Thirdly, as our good shepherd, he calls us by name, this to me speaks of the intimacy of the relationship we now enjoy with the Lord Jesus Christ as our good shepherd.
I am the good shepherd. David the psalmist knew something of this relationship with God way before Jesus came into this world and we know the famous and favourite psalm, Psalm 23 where he commences with these words ‘The LORD is my shepherd’.
Can you say the same today? We can only know Jesus as our shepherd as we come to him as the door and respond by faith to all that he has done for us as he laid down his life for the sheep at Calvary.