If you would take a Bible and open with me to John chapter 10,
John chapter 10, we're gonna be in verses one through 18, but
I'm gonna start and read verses one through 6.
Uh, actually we're gonna read 935 through 1/6 to get our
context here. The Bible says Jesus heard that
they had cast out, cast him out and having found him, he said,
do you believe in the Son of Man?
And he answered, who is he, Sir, that I may believe in him.
Jesus said to him, you have seen him, and it is he who is
speaking to you. He said Lord, I believe and he
worshipped him. Jesus said for judgment, I came
into this world, that those who do not see may see, and those
who see may become blind. Some of the Pharisees near him
heard these things and said to him, Are we also blind?
Jesus said to them, If you were blind, you would have no guilt,
but now that you say we see, your guilt remains.
Truly, truly. I say to you, he who does not
enter the sheepfold by the door, but climbs in another way, that
man is a thief and a robber, but he who enters by the door is
the. Shepherd of the Sheep.
To him the gatekeeper opens, the sheep hear his voice, and he
calls his own sheep by name and leads them out.
When he has brought out all of his own, he goes before them,
and the sheep follow him, for they know his voice.
A stranger they will not follow, but they will flee from him, for
they do not know the voice of strangers.
This figure of speech Jesus used with them, but they did not
understand what he was saying to them.
This is the word of the Lord. Would you pray with me?
Lord Jesus, you are the Good Shepherd.
And. We, your sheep are glad forever.
That when you saw the wolf approaching, you did not run
like a hired hand, but you laid down your life for the sheep.
Lord, we pray that as we as we think about what it means.
For you to be the door and for you to be the Good Shepherd and
for us to be the sheep, we pray that through your word that we
would all once again hear. Your voice, not the voice of
strangers or robbers or thieves, but the voice of our Savior.
And that we would hearing you, that we would follow you.
So we pray that you would call us by name, speak to us in this
place at this time in a way that we can understand.
We ask it in Christ's name, Amen.
So one of the most encouraging but unflattering.
Metaphors that the Bible uses to speak about the people of God is
sheep. The sheep of this faster it
sounds. Sweet, it goes good on a card
until you spend time with sheep and realize how dumb and
obdurate and needy they are. Sheep are not what you want to
be. There's there's never been a kid
who who lays in bed at night staying awake that that God
would only give. Him the, the, the speed of a
sheep, right? We think about cheetahs, we
think about bears, we think about lions, any other cool
animals, but God calls us sheep. And in this text, Christ the
great Shepherd is going to remind us that he is our
shepherd and that we are his sheep.
And I want to, I want to meditate on this text with you
and then speak to you about these things.
Trying to apply them when we when we get to the to the end.
So in verses one through 6. I want to show you that that
Christ is both shed and shepherd.
He's he's he's the paddock where the sheep are stored and he's
the shepherd to whom belong the sheep.
So in in verse one, Jesus says in in response to what had.
Happened with the healing of the blind man and John Chapter 9
Jesus says truly, truly. I say to you, he who does not
enter the sheepfold by the door, but climbs in by another way,
that man is a thief and a robber, but he who enters by the
door is the. Shepherd of the.
Sheep. And to him the gatekeeper opens.
The sheep hears voice, and he calls.
His own sheep by name and leaves them out.
OK, so. A couple of words here.
First off, just a word of context.
Do you remember the this same context goes all the way back to
John chapter 8? Maybe you do not remember that,
but Jesus preached a message in John chapter.
Eight that got him that the the Jews picked up stones to stone.
Him and that he leaves the temple at the end of John
chapter 8 and at the beginning of John Chapter 9, he sees a man
born blind from birth, and he restores his sight.
And it's this. Weird irony that John paints for
us that the only guy in the whole.
Text that can actually see. Is a man who's been born blind
and he doesn't even see until the very end.
But all throughout there's this mega theme in that text of the
religious leaders hating and persecuting Christ for healing
his people. And this text ends in verse in
chapter 10, verse 31. This, it doesn't end here, but
it continues the same theme. The Jews picked up stones again
to stone him. And so it's this idea of Jesus
the Good Shepherd coming to his people and the religious leaders
hate him because as he's going to teach us in this text, the
religious leader of that day were thieves and robbers.
They were not good shepherds. So something that we need to
understand about when Jesus says when he's talking about the
sheepfold in in this time we're told that that public places,
all the shepherds would bring their own.
Flocks into the same paddock. It was a.
Walled place with one door and a watchman.
And so. All of us, all the men of the
church who have sheep, we all take them to the same place, put
them in. And then in the.
Morning. When we want to lead them out to
pasture, the question is how do we sort them out?
And the answer is, I have spent enough time with my sheep that I
know them by name, and when I call them, they recognize my
voice and they won't follow anybody else.
So some other. Guy can say here's a little
fluffy or whatever. All he wants.
They're not going to follow that guy.
And so you have, you have in this picture, you have the
public sort of pin for the sheep.
You have the one door and that door has a watchman that won't
let strangers in. And then there are two types of
people that try and get into the sheep paddock.
The 1st is thieves and robbers. Those who are climbing over the
wall, they don't go to the door because they won't be let in,
right? So you think about like driving
through a neighborhood. If you see a man in the middle
of the night standing at the front door of the house and he's
got a key and he's working with a light to try and get the key
in, you're not going to call the cops like it's it's, he's coming
home late. But if you if you're driving
through and the city at night and you look over and there's a
guy breaking a window, you might call the cops and it might be a
situation where maybe he forgot his key and he has to break his.
Own window, but we'll let the cops sort that out.
We just know by the by the optics of it, he does not.
Belong there, it's not his house.
Jesus is saying the same thing about the thieves and the
robbers. Those who try and break in.
To to get the sheep are thieves. And robbers.
But you also have another person coming into the paddock and
that's the Good Shepherd. And he is recognized by the
gatekeeper and his own sheep. Both the gatekeeper and his own
sheep recognize him. It's it's a John tells us this
is a, a figure of speech. And so we want to be careful not
to push it too far and get too much into the details.
But if you think. About who might be the
gatekeeper in this context of of Christ coming to his own, the
sheep hearing his voice. Who's the guy?
Who's the gatekeeper guarding? Well, I think you can make an
argument. I'm not going to fight you.
For it, but I think. It's the Holy Spirit who is
performing the words. He is performing the miracles
and the and the and blessing the words of Christ as, as Christ
comes to his people and says, I am the Messiah, I am your
savior, that the Holy Spirit is testifying to him to Israel that
they might follow. And so you have, you have in, in
Chapter 9, verse 30, Luke in Chapter 9, verse 30, you have
the, the, the religious leaders are grilling this man who has
been born blind and, and they say in verse 29, actually, we
know that God has spoken to Moses, But As for this man, we
don't know where he comes from. We don't know who this guy is.
We do know Moses was sent by God.
We don't know about this Jesus guy.
And then the blind guy very sarcastically says why this is
an amazing thing. You do not know where he comes
from and yet he has opened my eyes.
How many of you have ever seen this before?
That a man born blind can have his sight restored?
It's never happened. So the so the.
Work of Christ through the Holy Spirit is testifying to the
identity of Christ. He he goes on.
We know that God does not listen to sinners, but if anyone is a
worshipper of God and does His will, God listens to him.
Never since the world began has it been heard that anyone open
the eyes of a man born blind. If this man were not from God,
he could do nothing. And they answered him, You were
born in utter sin. And would you teach us and they
cast it out. So do you see the the metaphor
there you've got the Holy Spirit through the works and the words
of Christ is testifying to Israel and that that Christ is
the Messiah. He's.
The gatekeeper he is, He is showing to Israel that Christ is
Lord and they're just rejecting. Let me say this.
In passing, because a lot of tender hearted Christians fear
lest they commit the blasphemy of the Holy.
Spirit, the one unforgivable sin.
Let me put that in the context of the Gospels where the
blasphemy of the Holy Spirit in context Christ by the agency of
the Holy Spirit is, is miraculously casting out demons
and healing the sick and restoring sight to the blind.
And the Pharisees look at the witness of the Holy Spirit
showing them that Christ is who he says he is.
And they say it's not the Holy Spirit, it's it's the devil.
And they attribute the work of God to Satan.
And so that is the blasphemy of the Holy Spirit, which protects
us or blinds us from seeing the glory of God in the face of
Christ and believing in him. So if you're a tender hearted
Christian and you're here saying, man, I'm just terrified
that I might have committed the. Blasphemy of the holy.
Spirit, relax. Relax.
If you care about that, you haven't done it.
If you if the if the greatest nightmare in your life is that
you would somehow fall short of benefiting from the Lord Jesus
Christ, who you know is Messiah you.
Cannot have committed the blasphemy of the Holy Spirit
because you are confessing Christ is Lord, so in this
context, Christ. Is the Good Shepherd.
He is anointed by the Spirit, calling his own sheep by name
and leading them. His sheep are responding and
following, but the religious leaders do not the thieving and
the robbing Jewish leaders at that time don't like when the
Good Shepherd leads his sheep out of their dominion because
that means less wool and less meat for them to devour.
They hate Jesus because he's setting his people free from
their tyranny. They they crucify him for this
very thing. OK, in verses 7, seven through
10 you have Jesus changes the metaphor slightly and.
And we're told it that Christ is the door of the sheep, and that
he's also the shepherd of the sheep.
So if you look in verse 6, it's very ironic statement that John
makes this figure of speech Jesus used with them, but they
did not understand what he was saying to them.
He has just told us that that his sheep hear his voice, that
he calls his own sheep by name and leads them out.
And then as he's speaking, John tells us the religious leaders
didn't understand what he was saying.
What's the implication they're not of his sheep if you scooch
over across the column? To verse 26 or actually verse
verse 22 at the towards the end of this text, they the Jews say
in in verse 24. Rather, they say to Christ, How
long will you keep us in suspense?
If you are the Christ, tell us plainly.
And Jesus answered, I told you, and you don't believe.
I've already told you. I've answered this question.
You don't believe and he goes on to say.
The. Works I do in my father's name
bear witness about me, but you do not believe.
What's the next phrase? Because you need more proof.
You don't believe. Because you need me to tell you
straight up and I'm speaking in mystery.
What does he say? You do not believe because you
are not among my sheep, my sheep, they're they're
overarching mark of my sheep as that my sheep hear my voice and
I know them and they follow me. So he's speaking to them and
they do not understand or recognize his voice.
Now in verse 7, chapter 10, Jesus again said to them, Truly,
truly, I say to you, I'm the door of the sheep.
All who came. Before me are thieves and
robbers, but the sheep did not listen to them.
I am the door. If anyone enters by me, he will
be saved, and he will go in and out and find pasture.
The thief comes only to steal, kill and destroy.
I came that they may have life and have it abundantly.
I am the Good Shepherd, so he's the door.
He's also the Good Shepherd. The Good Shepherd lays down his
life for the sheep, he who has a hired hand, and not a shepherd
who does not own the sheep. He sees the wolf coming, and he
leaves the sheep and flees. The wolf snatches them and
scatters them. He flees because he has not.
He has a hired hand and he cares nothing for the sheep.
I am the Good Shepherd, I know my own and my own know me, just
as the Father knows me and I know the Father.
I lay down my life for the sheep.
So a couple of a couple of things here.
First off, that Christ is the door.
He has not let anyone in that does not.
Work for him. They are thieves and robbers who
interact with the sheep in some other name than Christ in some
other gospel. They have not been sent by the.
Lord, they come to the sheep. So.
She might ask, why would somebody come to rob, steal,
kill and destroy the people of God, the sheep of God's pasture?
Why would they do that? The answer is because there's
always money in the in the people of God.
There's always power in the people of God.
You can go. To I would counsel you against
it, but you can go to. A lot of Christian.
Bookstores and look long and hard and not find.
Christian reading in there. A lot of it is just abject
rubbish written by men and women who know that if you call
something Christian it it'll sell.
If you call a book a Christian book or if you go if you make a
Christian movie. A lot of which are blasphemous
and and totally missed the thrust of the gospel.
But we call them Christian and Christians bye.
Because unfortunately, Christians are often like sheep
without shepherds and so the thieves are always trying to
break in and steal. Christ tells us he's the Good
Shepherd in verse 11. And I want you to think about
this with me. In verse 11, he says, I'm the
Good Shepherd. The Good Shepherd lays down his
life for the sheep. OK, He says in verse 14, I am
the Good Shepherd. I know my own, and my own know
me. Just as the.
Father knows me and I know the Father.
I lay down my life for the sheep.
I have others that are not of this fold.
I must bring them also and they will listen to my voice.
So there will be 1 flock and 1 shepherd.
So you have Christ who is the Good Shepherd, lays down his
life for the sheep and he does that in combat with wolves.
We need to understand when when Christ is dying on the cross, he
is not proving for us an example of how just to suffer for what
you believe. He is destroyed.
He is defanging Satan, disarming the principalities and the
powers that dominated the people of God.
He's laying down his life for the sheep in combat with.
Wolves and he shows in verse 14 and 15 something that is not
often taught in in churches, but it's.
Very true and very. Precious, and it's the idea of a
particular protection for his own.
Sheep. He tells you that a hired hand
is going to bail when he. Sees a wolf coming because.
These are not my sheep, and I can't get my arm back if I if it
if it gets bitten off by a wolf. And so if for somebody else's
sheep, I'll gladly take his money.
I'll gladly lead them to water when I can.
But if a wolf. Comes.
I'm not about to. Bleed for somebody else's
livestock that can be replaced. I, I, I like my body much too
much for that. But Jesus says in verses 14 and
15 that he provides a particular protection for his people.
And I want you to think about this with me.
I'm a Good Shepherd. I know my own, and my own know
me. Just as the.
Father knows me, and I know the Father.
Notice what he's not. Saying.
He's not saying I have a pretty good relationship with with God,
and then I have a pretty good relationship with my people.
He is saying just as the Father knows me before the world began,
there's perfect unity with the Father, relationship between the
Father and the Son. And he says, I know my own, and
my own know me, just as the Father knows me, and I know the
Father. And he says.
I lay down my life not for the world, but for the sheep.
So we need to let, we need to let the Scriptures say what the
scriptures are saying. Yes, John 316 means what it
says. God so loved the world that He
gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever should believeth in
Him. Would have eternal life would
never perish and have eternal life.
God loves the world. You can tell anybody at any
point God loves you. There is a universality in the
in one aspect of the love of God.
At the same time there is also the Scriptures also teach a
particularity to the love of God, that we rejoice in that
here he, he says. He says that I know my own
sheep, and I lay down my life for the sheep.
He says in in John chapter 6, listen to the words of Christ.
I said to you that you have seen me, and yet you do not believe.
All that the Father gives me will come to me, and whoever
comes to me I will never cast out, for I've come down from
heaven to do not my own will, but the will of him who sent me,
and this is the will of him who sent me.
Then I should lose nothing of all that he has given me, but
raise it up on the last day. So the Father has given people
to his son, and when his son dies, he lays down his life for
his people. This is the same as in Ephesians
where husbands notice we're not commanded as husbands to love.
He doesn't say men love women like all men generally love all
women generally. He says husbands love not all
the women in the world, but love your wife as Christ loved not
the world but the church and gave himself.
Up for her. So there is a there is one
aspect the Scriptures teach of the universality of the love of
God and then Christian, you should take this to the grave
with a with a wonderful encouragement.
There is also a specificity taught in the Scriptures in
numerous places that God has uniquely loved his people by
name and called them by name. So there is a particular
protection. There is also the unity of flock
and shepherd. I want you to see this you bunch
of mainly Gentile Christians. Jesus tells the Jewish leaders
who are rejecting him. He says I have other sheep that
are not of this fold. I watch the the definite term I
must bring them. Also they will listen to my
voice. So there will be 1 flock and 1
shepherd. When Jesus and John 15 says I am
the true vine, he is saying there is a false vine.
There's another thing out there claiming to be the vine of God's
blessing. On the Earth.
And it's the at that point, the unbelieving nation of Israel,
and he is saying I am the heir of Abraham.
All of the promises of God are yes and Amen in Christ alone.
And when Gentiles believe in him, they are grafted into him.
We become the branches. And those who he tells the
Jewish people in John 15, those who do not abide in me are cut
off and thrown into the fire. Those who do abide in me and
bear fruit, the Father prunes so that they'll bear more fruit.
But there's one flock, there's one vine, and Christ is the
shepherd. Christ is the vine.
So there is unity. There's the unity of flock and
shepherd that Christ. The book of Ephesians says that
he broke down the dividing wall between Jew and Gentile.
Jewish. The special people by race, a
special people, and then the Gentiles, special strangers
marked out for the wrath of God. Paul says Christ broke down that
wall when he was on the cross, and he made the two one new
people, the people of God, the Church of Jesus Christ.
And so if you are in Christ, you have been grafted into the
promises of Abraham. Paul says it this way in
Galatians that it is those who are of faith who are sons of
Abraham, not those who are just physical descendants.
That doesn't matter. Circumcision doesn't matter
anymore. It is faith in Christ that makes
us recipients of all of the promises in the Old Testament.
OK, last thing I want to point out from the text.
And then I want to seek to try and apply it to us.
Is I want to show you. The unity of the Father and the
Son and the Person, and in the purpose and in the work that
Christ comes for. He says I must bring them also
in verse 16. I must bring them also.
They will listen to my voice. There will be 1 flock and 1
shepherd. Verse 17.
For this reason the Father loves me, because I lay down my life,
that I may take it up again. No one takes it from me.
I lay it down on my own accord. I have authority to lay it down.
I have authority to take it up again.
This charge I have received from my Father.
Whose plan is it that Christ executes in His life, death and
resurrection? Jesus just told you it's the
plan of the Father. We do not have a confused
Trinitarian deity where the Father is is giving a particular
people to Jesus and then Jesus dies for the whole entire world
trying to save everybody. But come short.
No, we have we we also do not have a a Christ who loves us and
who is a a high priest and then a wrathful Father who hates us
and who's angry all the time that that Christ is always
placating. We have a Father from whom comes
all goodness, all blessing, all gospel, all love, all mercy, and
he pours out to us the person of his Son.
And so Christ comes saying, I'm here to obey my father, and this
is the will of my father, that I wouldn't lose anything of the
people that he's given to me. So there's a unity of the
Father, Son and Holy Spirit in your salvation and in mine.
And if you want homework, go read Ephesians chapter one that
just describes in breathtaking detail the salvation that God
has worked on our behalf. And it breaks down very
marvelously what the Father has done, what the Son has done, and
what the Spirit has done all in unity to save his people.
OK, So what? How would we how do we think
about applying these verses The 1st?
Thing that I would show you to apply is that we need to
understand and refresh this idea that has fallen on hard times in
our culture, and that is that Christ came into the world for
judgment. We're told in other places that
he didn't come to to to condemn the world, but that the world
would be saved through Him. And that's true.
That's true. It is also true that Jesus says
in John 939, Jesus said for judgment, I came into this world
that those who do not see may see, and those who see may
become blind for judgment. I came into this world.
Christ, his person, his work, His word, they, they have always
and they continue to create division, and that division is
judgment. When you, when you.
See Christ as he's offered to you in the gospel, and you say
that's the greatest news I've ever heard, and you run to it.
That is the judgement. It's because he's calling you by
name. Otherwise you would not care.
When you see Christ and you respond like the religious
leaders and you, you constantly naysay him and dismiss him and
ignore him and accuse him of being an evil person.
That is the judgement, that the the way you respond to Christ is
the judgement of what you are. And here's the judgement.
My sheep hear my voice, and they follow me.
Have you heard the voice of Christ?
Are you following Christ? If so, the judgment has been
passed. You are his sheep.
Secondly, we need to remember that there are thieves and
robbers. Who wish to steal and kill and
destroy God's people? If you think about this, if
you're a shepherd. You have to protect your sheep
from. Kind of a lot of things.
First off, you have to. Protect your sheep from hurting
themselves. There's this.
We don't do a lot of audio visual.
Here at our church. But there's this.
It's one of my favorite videos of all time.
The caption reads what Jesus must be like when he's when he's
helping me. And there's this really deep
ditch and all you can see is the leg and the hind.
Quarters of this fluffy sheep sticking out of the ditch and
the shepherd is is like standing over him.
He's gotten by the back leg and he's yanking, yanking, yanking,
pulling, and then all the sudden the sheep comes loose.
Comes flying out of there, the shepherd falls on the ground,
the sheep like lands. He does this like sort of shake
and then he takes 3 or 4 bounces.
Chop, chop, chop. And dives right back into the
ditch. 5 foot down and the shepherd is in the same spot if
you're a shepherd. You have to know that your sheep
will eat things that will kill them.
Your sheep will do dumb things that will kill them.
So you got to protect them from themselves.
You also have to protect them from one another.
You have an aggressive ram That's that's ramming, baby.
Sheep, you have to stop that they can be hurt by outsiders,
so they can hurt themselves. They can be hurt, they can hurt
one another. They can be hurt by the.
Wolves on the outside. And a shepherd wants to protect
his flock because he loves them. So a shepherd is is always I, he
always has eyes on the flock so that he can protect them from
themselves, from one another, from outside influence.
It's very interesting that that thieves want to protect the
flock as well. Thieves want the church to be
gathered. Thieves want to build big
churches that make lots of money because the flock can then be
more easily fleeced and slaughtered.
So as your pastor. Let me, let me exhort you that
there, there are there. Are a lot of voices out there.
A lot of them have open Bibles. A lot of them purport to say
thus saith the Lord. I'm not saying that you should
only exclusively listen to me. Please do not do that thing.
There are much better teachers. There are great men out there
who are faithful stewards of God's Word.
Listen to those guys. But there's a lot of rubbish
that some of you need to turn off forever, right?
Don't listen to to Christian to garbage masquerading as the
Christian faith. It's my job to protect you from
wolves. And as one of my, one of the
guys in our presbytery, the older guys in our presbytery
said it's your job as a shepherd to protect your, your flock from
wolves and podcasts for clothing.
And I thought that was a great way to say that.
So, so turn off the garbage. Thirdly, the Good Shepherd
appoints, and this is going to be painful, He appoints
imperfect under shepherds, OK. We are told that there is one
senior pastor of the church, the chief shepherd, and he appoints
under shepherds to tend his people.
But everybody that he can appoint is an imperfect person,
an imperfect pastor. And I need you to hear this, and
I need you to lean into this, that that pastoring, pastoring a
flock is very similar to. To a husband loving a wife.
You'll notice, gentlemen, that when Paul says.
That a husband you're to love your wives as Christ loved the
church. Sanctify her with the Word.
Lay down your life for her, nourish her, cherish her.
There is no caveat for doing that.
When she's lovely, love her, so long as she's easy to love.
No, it's not there. You have to do that, and I have
to do that. Scratch that.
We get to do that because Christ has commanded US one way or
another. And so in the same way there is
New Testament command at the end of Hebrews.
Where where your? Your commanded congregants are
commanded to obey your leaders as those who are keeping watch
over your souls, as many will give an account.
Let them do this with joy and not with groaning.
You guys do a marvelous job of that.
But I want you to know that sometimes the commands of God to
shepherds are. Are hard to carry out when
there's not cooperation from the flock.
Don't hear a browbeat here. This is more like a.
You guys listen to me, y'all do a a much better job of
responding to shepherding than I do of.
Initiating shepherding. I just want to have.
A conversation with you about how.
We can do this better because this week at presbytery we had
the oldest, most seasoned pastor in our presbytery gave us a list
of about 7 exhortations for what it means to shepherd the flock
of God over which the Holy Spirit has made you overseers.
And it was really painful. Really painful of of all of the
things. Hey gentlemen, like this is the
standard and every point there were seven of them was an Ouch.
I was going to read them to you and then I walked off and forgot
them at my table. But a couple of the ones that
made me uniquely uncomfortable is he said and he quotes from
the text that was my sermon text for this Sunday.
Christ knows his sheep by name. He has a personal relationship
with all of his sheep And and here's the thing, like.
I have a lot of. Weirdness in my makeup that this
is not an excuse, it's just an explanation.
My family probably have have observed that.
Some of the deepest wounds in the history of my life have been
given to me two minutes after picking up a a phone.
And so anytime my phone rings, I jump out of a chair like I've
been cattle prodded. I hate the phone.
And so the the idea. The idea that if I had a perfect
nightmare of the day. It would be.
I'm just going to call everybody in the church and say, hey
buddy, what do you want to talk about?
Like I, I, I don't, I, I don't want to do that 'cause I don't
think you want to talk to me that bad if I have something to
talk to you about. I love to to sit down and do
coffee and have relationship for sure.
But I'm just really, really uniquely bad at at.
Picking up the. The phone and calling people for
no reason. Now here's what's Here's what.
Happens is if I don't do that on the regular then when I need to
talk to you about something. I get in my own head about it,
like I've got to call them and talk to them about it, but I
haven't talked to them in a while.
And it feels weird. And so I just, it gets
stalemates and all of that. None of that is your fault.
All of that is I'm, I'm telling you that so you can know some
unique ways that you can pray for me because I want to do, I
want to do better. I want to be close enough to you
that I can know what you need as your as your shepherd.
OK, So he, he, he made a statement, he said about, about
prayer. So knowing the flock and then
praying for the flock, pray with and for them, he said.
And, and this old faithful servant of Christ told a bunch
of pastors that needed to hear it.
Gentlemen, prayer is not an accessory to pastoral ministry.
Prayer is pastoral ministry. That's what it's for.
And the reality is, if I don't know you.
If I don't know what you're struggling with, if I don't know
what what you're what's hurting, what, what needs help, I can't
pray as faithfully as I should. I, I, I lift you up.
We pray for you. You are a prayed for
congregation for sure. But I think really early when we
started, when we appointed elders, and at first it was, it
was Aaron and it was Russ and I. And we, we said, OK, we're going
to get into diligence of like, do you remember this?
Like sharing a page where each of us are going to call
everybody on one page. And then, and then Roy got here
and Trey got here. And we, we tried to do this and,
and we would come back weekly to pray for you.
And a lot of what? We would hear is.
Everybody kind of said we were fine.
OK. How can I pray for you, brother?
Oh, we're fine. That's OK, you're not supposed
to like. Make up things that we can be
praying for you, but the here's here's the big ticket.
I want to be. Faithful to pray for you.
In order to. Do that.
I need to know what's going on, OK.
And so I don't know how that happens.
I don't know how we do a better job of that.
It's probably all on me. But I just want you to know if I
call you and it's awkward and it's painful, this is what I'm
aiming at. I'm trying to be faithful.
So the most important question that anybody ever asked me in my
life was when I was 19 or 20 years old was Camilo Ardeela, my
pastor at the time. And he said he goes, if I was
trying to figure out how to provide for family, I was trying
to figure out what to devote myself to with life.
And Camilo said, hey, if God promised to make you excellent
at anything, what would you want to do?
I'd never considered this question.
I would exhort all of you to consider it.
It's a great. Question.
I'd never thought about it before, but I had an immediate
answer and I said I would want to teach.
God's word to God's people. That's what I would want to.
Do if God promised to make me great.
I don't want to be mediocre in that endeavor because I think
something really powerful happens when when men preach to
God's people. But I would want to preach God's
word to God's people. And I'll tell you my answer has
stayed the same with this one edition.
I would that God would give me excellence in the shepherding of
His people, not just the preaching to and at His people.
So if I were going to state it negatively, I want you to hear
me on this, that it's the greatest negatively.
The desire I have for pastoral ministry is that none of you,
none of your marriages, none of your children would fall because
in some way I've been negligent. In the duties that Christ has
called me to. Does that make sense to you?
I don't want you to fail because I didn't help you.
I didn't shepherd you. You needed somebody when you
were wayward to come and grab you and say no.
We're going this. Way and I didn't that's I'm I'm
terrified of that eventuality because Christ cares that much
for for the sheep that he promises.
Me a day of reckoning where he says what did you do?
What did you do? OK.
And so again, I'm, I'm telling you that so that, so that when
we reach out and, and it's, it's inevitable that the, that the
times where you're reached out and you and you have what feels
like a negative or a rebuke or, or a, or a what's a discouraging
word? That's always it's the hardest
season in which to hear them. And it's usually the most
important seasons to hear those things positively.
I would stated this way that when the Good Shepherd calls you
home at the end of your life, that by God's grace I would have
been some ingredient in your life having been well.
Lived to the glory of. God that that.
Think, think about, think about standing.
Before the chief shepherd who loves his sheep and being told
being shown the fruit of your hand in the lives of eternal
souls, that is, that is what I'm after.
That's what I I long to be. Great at that, and I'm not, and
so I'm asking you to. To pray for me, or at least I'm
not what I want to be. So there are many aspects of
pastoral ministry that I'm that I'm far too timid about.
And I'm just asking you to pray for me and be patient with me,
even though I have extended your patience far beyond the means
of, of normal wear and tear. Because I've been your pastor
for 17 years now, for better or for worse.
And so, for better or for worse, your Chief Shepherd has made me
your under Shepherd. And it is one of the great joys
of my life to be able, Sunday after Sunday, to open the Word
of God with you and to marvel at the mercy.
Of Christ with you I love I love being your pastor to to not just
teach the word with you not just marvel at Christ and ideas with
you, but also to to to break bread with you to know the state
of your lives to be. Praying for you.
By God's grace, I have baptized a whole lot of you people and I
have offered the Lord's Table to all of you on many occasions,
and it is a great gift to be a part of the body of Christ with
you. So brothers and sisters, I
believe that Christ himself, the Good Shepherd, the Chief
Shepherd, that he sent me to remind you again and again
through word and through sacrament all the days of your
life, that he loves you and that his body was broken for you, and
that his blood was shed for the forgiveness of your sins, and
that he intends to feed you on himself.
And so, brothers and sisters, the Shepherd is calling you each
by name at this moment. Don't be thrown by the fact that
he's using my mouth to do it. Follow Christ as I bid you come
and welcome to King Jesus. Let me pray for us, Lord.
We. We remember that you are the
Good Shepherd, that you lay down your life for the sheep.
And Sunday after Sunday we come to the Lord's Table, where we
remember and where we participate in the broken body
and the shed blood of Christ in this divine mystery that is the
Lord's Table. And so Lord I.
Pray for these your sheep. I pray for the elders of our
church. I pray that we would, that we
would accurately reflect to them the care and the bravery, the
courage, the the love that the Chief Shepherd has for them.
God, would you take us up and would you love them well through
us? And we pray, Lord, for, for, for
thus for all of us, that we would all receive your
shepherding well, that we would treasure it as a gift that you
give. And so, Lord, would you take
this moment as we, as we break the bread and as we enjoy the
cup together. Would you draw near to us?
Would you shepherd us in these things?
Would you give to each sheep what he or she needs most this
morning at your table? Would you feed us?
Would you draw near? We ask it in Christ's.
Name Amen.