If you don't mind, I'm going to have a seat today as well.
Haven't been feeling the best this week.
Tried to stand for first service and it didn't last very long.
So I'm just going to have a seat for this one.
First off, I want to say how many of you came to Thrive
Women, men, how many of you snuck in?
Well, I just want to say thank you to our team.
I'm so proud of our staff that works here and Pastor Shane,
Pastor Brad, everyone, Jordan Eli, everyone that works real
hard to make everything happen. And I just want to say we are
blessed. You know you're blessed, right?
We got awesome staff members that are here and just making
stuff like that happen. I also want to welcome Andy and
Nikki Callas over there. Wave to everyone, our friends
that left here to go pastor in Indiana and they're back with us
this morning. It's good to have you guys.
And today we're going to continue our series, The King We
Need. And so I want to start with some
audience participation. I always think that helps out a
little bit. So I want you to turn to someone
near you. If you're by yourself, you can
talk to yourself, but I want you to share what words come to your
mind when you hear the word king, What words come to your
mind? Go ahead, share with some
people. Participate.
All right, how many of you had strong, powerful, rich royalty?
I haven't gotten any of them yet.
Glory. Jesus.
OK, Got some good church answers.
I like it. What was that?
Playing cards. OK, heathen.
No, I'm just kidding. Playing cards.
It's her last Sunday. She can say things like that
during the sermon. Now you know what I didn't hear?
I didn't hear the word shepherd. And Jesus is the King of kings.
He's our one true king, but he tells us that he is also our
Good Shepherd. And so we're going to look at
John chapter 10 today, verse 11 through 18.
And so you can stand with me. I'll stand as well.
John 10 verse 11 through 18. You can read a log on the screen
as I read it, and Jesus tells us about being the Good Shepherd
starting in verse 11. He says I am the Good Shepherd.
The Good Shepherd lays down his life for the sheep.
The hired hand is not. The shepherd does not own the
sheep. So when he sees the wolf coming,
he abandons the sheep and he runs away.
Then the wolf attacks and the flock and scatters it.
The man runs away because he is a hired hand and he cares
nothing for the sheep. I am the Good Shepherd.
I know my sheep and my sheep know me, just as the Father
knows me, and I know the Father, and I lay down my life for the
sheep. I have other sheep that are not
of this sheep, and I must bring them also.
They too will listen to my voice, and there shall be 1
flock and 1 shepherd. The reason my Father loves me is
that I lay down my life only to take it up again.
No one takes it from me, but I lay it down on my own accord.
I have authority to lay it down and authority to take it up
again. This command I received from my
father. Praise the Lord, you can have a
seat. So Jesus tells us he's the the
Good Shepherd and there's four things we see in this text.
But but the first thing I want to look at is that Jesus says I
am the Good Shepherd. He doesn't say I am a Good
Shepherd. He doesn't say I'm one of many
good shepherds. He says I am the Good Shepherd.
Jesus is the King of kings, the Savior of the world, the Good
Shepherd. There's no other.
I want to make that point today, and we're going to talk about
that a little bit later. There is no other way to
salvation and eternal life than through Jesus Christ.
And so Jesus tells us he's the Good Shepherd.
There's four things we see in the text that that I think are
important and help us understand why he's the Good Shepherd.
The 1st is in verse 11. When we think of a king, we
often think of someone high up. We think of someone with with
tons of power. We think of a conqueror, we
think of someone who can lead us to victory.
And Jesus was very powerful and Jesus ultimately gave us
victory. But he starts verse 11 by saying
the Good Shepherd lays down his life for the sheep, says the
hired hand is not the shepherd, he does not own the sheep.
And so when he sees the wolf coming, he abandons the sheep
and runs away. And then the wolf attacks and
the flock and scatters it. The man runs away because he has
hired A hired hand and he cares nothing for the sheep.
But it says the Good Shepherd lays down his life for the
sheep. The first thing that we see that
makes Jesus the Good Shepherd is that he willingly laid down his
life for his sheep. How many of you would just say
praise the Lord to that? The Good Shepherd lays down his
life for the sheep. Jesus contrasts A hired hand.
He contrasts a leader that that doesn't ultimately love and care
for you with the Good Shepherd, the Good Shepherd.
The Good Shepherd is willing to lay down his life for us.
See, he, he tells us here that that the hired hand does not own
the sheep. They're they're just someone
that's hired to do a job. So he says when the enemy
attacks, number one, they, they don't own the sheep.
So they're not willing to risk anything for the sheep or
definitely not willing to risk their lives.
And so it says. When the wolf attacks, the hired
hand makes the business decision and runs away.
Doesn't want anything to do with it, but the Good Shepherd lays
down his life. The hired hand doesn't truly
care about the sheep. Have you ever questioned whether
the people in charge care about you or not?
Have you ever questioned whether our elected authorities care
about you or not? I hope you haven't ever
questioned whether I care about you or not.
I do love you very much, but I want you to know that the Good
Shepherd loves you more than anyone could ever love you.
The Good Shepherd loves you so much that he not only would lay
his life down that that's a question we ask ourselves,
right? We kind of judge our our friends
and the loyalty by what would we give for each other?
What would we sacrifice? Jesus says the Good Shepherd
lays down his life for the sheep and Jesus, good news laid down
his life. He came and he walked this earth
and he gave his life on the cross so that you could have
salvation and eternal life. The Good Shepherd lays down his
life for a sheep, says the the enemy comes the the wolf.
It it references here and, and I just want to be clear.
I got a little side sermon here. The enemy comes and he sees the
wolf coming. The hired hand abandons the
sheep and runs away. But the wolf attacks.
And what is the wolf attack? What happens when the wolf
attacks the flock? They scatter, guys.
A little side sermon here. A tool of the devil, a tool of
the enemy is to scatter the flock, and we give in to this
way too easily. When we go through tough times,
sometimes our first instinct is to run.
Our first instinct is to get away from others, especially if
those tough times involve others.
The enemy's goal is to separate us.
How many of you have ever watched the the Animal Planet or
any documentary of like the the predators in the wild attacking
A flock? What do they do?
They isolate one or two of them away from the flock and then
they're helpless to defend themselves.
That's the goal of the enemy is to isolate us because we're at
our weakest when we're apart from the flock.
So little side sermon here. This is, this isn't one of the
main points, guys, don't let the enemy scatter you.
Don't let the enemy push you away from the flock.
That's when we're at our most vulnerable.
A lot of times that the thought is, well, if you walk away from
the flock, then the flock is hurt.
And that's true. But, but more so, your faith
will hurt when you walk away from the flock.
But I've got good news. The Good Shepherd loves you and
the Good Shepherd, we'll lay down his life for not only will,
but has laid down his life for you.
And in Luke 15, Jesus tells us the the the parable of the 99
for the one that that a shepherd, if one sheep wanders
off, what does the shepherd do? He leaves the 99 to go after the
one. Why?
Because the one is vulnerable. And so here's the thing.
Don't allow the enemy to scatter you.
Don't allow the enemy to separate you.
But good news, the Good Shepherd loves you so much that he'll
come after you. He'll come chasing after you.
The Good Shepherd lays down his life for the sheep guys today.
Maybe some of you are are following things or leaders or
influences that don't really care about you.
They don't really love you. They're not willing to risk
anything for you guys. The Good Shepherd, Jesus Christ
gave everything on the cross for you.
The second thing we see is in verse 14.
I am the Good Shepherd. I know my sheep and my sheep
know me, just as the Father knows me and I know the Father
and I lay down my life for the sheep.
Jesus says that he knows his sheep.
Does this blow anyone's? How many of you have driven by?
There's There's one place around here that I know of that has
sheep. It's over on.
Oh man, I shouldn't have started this.
You listen to each other, Yankee and whatever other Rd. it is.
There's a little place that has sheep.
Thank you. Yankee and Princeton, they would
have figured it out. It's OK Yankee and Princeton
there, there's there's sheep there.
Have you ever driven by and thought?
I'll bet I could figure out exactly which ones of those are
which. They all look the same to me.
Jesus, the Good Shepherd knows his sheep and he's known by his
sheep. I was in a, I'm in a pastors
group that meets just to encourage each other every other
month or so. And we met last week and one of
the questions came up and the question was when a new person
walks in, do you automatically recognize it and notice it?
Or when somebody usually is there and doesn't show up, do
you recognize it and notice it? That was the question that was
asked. And I got to tell you guys, I
wish I could tell you that I noticed every time you were gone
from church. It's becoming increasingly
harder in today's day to know when people are here or not here
because people are here less frequently.
The average used to be that like 3 1/2 * a month people were at
church that were regular attenders.
And now the average is much lower.
They, they say it's under 2 * a month.
And so it's hard to know whether someone's just missing or
whether they're gone. And occasionally some of you
come up to me and maybe you, this has happened.
You come up and say I'm back and I look at you like, yeah, guys,
I am, I am so sorry. I love you guys.
I, I really, I really want to know.
The church has changed a lot. 1 of the things I, I really think
was incredible about my dad, who is the pastor here before me, is
that he knew everyone so well. And when we do funerals
together, it's amazing the stories he tells of the people
and how well he knew them. And I want you to know that that
that's an important thing. The Good Shepherd is relational.
And, and I want you, I just want to say this guys, I love you.
I would love to spend time with you.
Please give me that opportunity. But the church has changed a lot
and we have become less relational in the body of
Christ. But the Good Shepherd is
relational by nature. The Good Shepherd knows his
sheep and is known by his sheep. This blows my mind.
Jesus knows every single one of his sheep.
Not just knows of them, not just knows if they were in church or
not, but knows us deeply. Does that not just blow your
mind? Think about how many churches
are meeting right now around the country or how many churches on
this day we'll meet around the world, How many Christians that
follow Jesus and He knows every single one of them deeply.
That is a beautiful thing about our Good Shepherd.
You know, I got 4 boys and when they get in the car with me, if
it's a meal time, I know exactly where they're going to want to
go. Each one of them.
We got Taco Bell. You can figure out which boys,
which Taco Bell, Jimmy John's, Panda Express, and probably
Chick-fil-A. I could be wrong on that one.
That's, that's the one I'm in the car with the least.
But I know my boys. I know where they want to eat.
I know what they want to do. I actually know how they're
going to respond to situations as they're happening.
Sometimes my kids will go out in the backyard and play and then I
can tell by the way they come in from the backyard, the way the
doors open and close, the noises I hear, and I'm not just talking
about yelling. I can tell whether something's
wrong or not. Not only that, most of the time
I can take one look at them and tell whose fault it is.
You guys know that, right? I know my boys pretty well.
The Good Shepherd knows us so much better than we can ever
know each other. He knows us completely.
In fact, he says, just as I know the Father and the Father knows
me. This is incredible.
The Good Shepherd knows us and wants to be known by us, just as
Jesus knows the Father and the Father knows Jesus.
That's another thing that should blow your mind.
See, we in the church believe in the doctrine of the Trinity,
that that the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, Father God,
Jesus, the Son and the Holy Spirit are one.
They're three separate persons, but they're one.
They're one nature, one purpose, 1 mission.
They're together. They have complete unity in
unison together. And Jesus says the Good Shepherd
knows you, just as he knows the Father and the Father knows him.
But it's not just that. It's that true followers of
Jesus will know him and know his voice.
Jesus reveals himself to us. Sometimes we think of God as
disconnected because honestly in in our culture, leaders and
kings and all that they, they're disconnected, that they travel
with protection. They travel with people around
them. And that's not the Good
Shepherd. He knows us and he wants to be
known by us. He wants to reveal himself to
us. As Jesus walked this earth, time
and time again people came to him the the Good Shepherd.
Jesus, let me say that again walked the very earth that you
walk. And time and time again people
came to him and his disciples tried to shield him.
Hey, stay away from him. He's too important.
And Jesus said no, let him come. Why?
Because he knows them and he wants them to know him.
Our Good Shepherd is relational and true followers know Jesus
and know his voice. This past week, a, a cool thing
happened to me. I have a friend that's going
through some, some difficult stuff and, and I got a text from
one of you actually at about 10:00 one night.
And it, it's a, it, it was a text sharing a prayer chain for
my, for my friend who's going through cancer.
And, and basically that night was a really critical night for
him and he really needed to get through that night without going
back to the hospital. And so they were asking people
to sign up for an hour of prayer over the next 12 hours over the
night. I'm to pray for him and pray for
his healing and protection. And so of course, I signed up.
In fact, I, you know, I stay up pretty late.
So I signed up for 1:00 AM to 2:00 AM.
You can tell I'm getting older because I used to, would have
maybe gone two to three or three to four, but it's too late now.
I signed up for 1:00 to 2:00, and as the time got closer, I
started to think, how am I going to pray for an hour for healing
for my friend. How many of you think you could
just pray for a whole hour just for healing for one person?
And by the way, I really haven't had a whole lot of communication
with this friend over the last five to 10 years.
How many of you think you could pull that off a full hour?
I mean, I can pray for an hour. I've done that many times.
But I mean, the prayer is pretty quick prayer.
So I started to think, how is this going to work?
Well, I started up at 1:00 and I started praying at about 10
minutes. And I was thinking, man, I'm
going to have to repeat myself a bunch.
And all of a sudden I decided, you know what, maybe what I
should do is, is I should just look to God's Word and pray
God's word. And so guys, this is a really
simple thing. This isn't rocket science.
I googled scriptures about prayer.
I didn't go to some fancy books that you don't have access to.
I googled scriptures about prayer and 45 scriptures about
prayer came up and I just started praying one by one over
my friend. And the most incredible thing
happened. God started to reveal Himself to
me through His word. It wasn't about me, it was about
praying for my friend. But through reading His Word and
spending time in prayer for my friend, God's just pouring
Himself out to me. This is who I am.
This is what I'm all about. I want you to know that the Good
Shepherd wants you to know Him. He's relational.
He knows you completely. He loves you completely.
He's laid down His life for you and He wants you to know him.
Guys, if there are any of you that are in here, that your
faith and your Christianity consists of coming to church and
checking a box or even coming to church and calling yourself a
Christian or coming to church and behaving the right way, you
are missing. You are missing the most
important part of your relationship, your faith in
Jesus. It's a relationship with Jesus
Christ. He knows you better than anyone
else. He knows you completely and He
wants you to know Him. You can walk.
He's given you his Holy Spirit to walk with you every single
day. The Good Shepherd knows his
sheep and his sheep know him. The third thing we see in this,
this might be controversial in our world and it shouldn't be.
Verse 16, he says I have other sheep that are not of the sheep
pen. I must bring them also.
They too will listen to my voice, and there shall be 1
flock and 1 shepherd. Now let me tell you why that's
controversial. Because in our culture and our
day, people want to tell you that there are a lot of
different ways to get to the end point of salvation and eternal
life. There are a lot people will tell
you in the world around you that there are a lot of different
religions and a lot of different, you know, gods or
leaders. And, and it's popular to think
these days that it's wrong to think that there's one way.
But Jesus makes it crystal clear in Scripture.
He is the way, the truth and the life.
And no one comes to the Father except through Jesus the Good
Shepherd. He says, I have other sheep that
are not of this sheep. Penny he he's referencing here.
We have the Jews, God's chosen people, the Israelites.
And then we have the Gentiles who were not the original chosen
people, but they were a part of God's plan.
And he says, I've got these others that are coming in and
they're going to come into the flock.
They are my sheep, the same as you chosen people are my sheep.
This is good news for us guys, and I know we've talked about
this before, but this is good news because we would all be
considered the other sheep that he's bringing in.
We would all be the Gentiles. But even further than that, can
I tell you that there is nobody that the Good Shepherd does not
know and love and is not available to the Good Shepherd
is for anyone. But but we got to get this right
guys. Anyone that will listen and
follow him. He says I have sheep that are
not of this pen, but they will listen to my voice and they will
come into the flock. This is important guys.
This is why evangelism is so important because there's not
100 different ways to salvation and eternal life.
There's not 100 different ways to be saved.
There's one and it's Jesus Christ.
The good news is the Good Shepherd is not just for you and
I. He's for your neighbors, it's
for your friends, He's for your Co workers.
He's for all people. And Jesus wants all people to
come to know him and walk with him.
But they have to choose to follow him.
There's one flock. There's one Shepherd, maybe
today, some of you the first point, some of you just need to
receive the salvation. He laid down his life for you
and you've never received that salvation.
Maybe some of you need to to to know the Good Shepherd, to walk
in a deeper relationship. But maybe some of you need to
understand that the Good Shepherd is for the people
outside the walls of the church as much as he's for the people
inside the walls of the church. And it's so important, guys.
That's why I carry a coin because every time I get up to
preach, I don't want to forget that I'm not just preaching to
Christians, but I'm preaching because Jesus is all about lost
sheep and lost coins, guys. We have to be about reaching
others for Jesus. He's the only hope for the
world. Last point, verse 17 The reason
my father loves me is that I lay down my life only to take it up
again. No one takes it from me, but I
lay it down on my own accord. I have authority to lay it down
and authority to take it up. Again.
This command I have received from my Father.
Now this is something you probably wouldn't dwell on if
you were studying the text, but but what Jesus is showing here
is that he is in complete harmony, in unison in mission
with the Father. He says the reason that my
Father loves me is that I lay down my life.
Now can I explain this? Jesus didn't earn the Father's
love by laying down his life. Jesus laid down his life because
He and the Father are one. They have the same purpose, they
have the same heart, they have the same mission.
They're one. They're unified.
We struggle in our world. Let's be honest, we struggle.
How many of you know what's best for you?
How many of you know what's best for our country?
Oh, some of you relying on Facebook?
Then We like to think we we know what's best, don't we?
I'm actually impressed a few people raised their hands at
first service and nobody did in this service.
I mean, it's complicated, isn't it?
There's war going on right now. War, I think we can all agree,
is a terrible thing. But, but is it the right thing?
Is it the wrong thing? Is it ultimately for good?
Is it ultimately not for good? It's tough to know.
What about policies? What about some of the
regulations and rules? What about financial stuff?
Is it best for us? Is it not best for us?
What about the decisions you make every day?
Do you know what's best for you? I can't tell you how many times
I thought I knew what was best for me and I was completely
wrong. I don't know what's best for me.
And we tend to think of a king as someone who the buck stops
here. They are all authoritative.
They're over everything. There's and listen, Jesus is
over everything, but he's one with the Father.
He and the Father, the creator God and the Spirit were one
together and created us. And they and they alone know
what's best for us. And so Jesus laid down his life.
Jesus knows us. Jesus is available to all of us.
And the Good Shepherd is completely obedient to the
Father God. What a beautiful thing.
He knows what's best. See, when Jesus walked to the
earth, he was human, just like you and I.
And there were moments that Jesus felt what we would feel.
He knew he was going to a cross and even prayed.
Oh, if there's any other way. But ultimately, more than
anything else, he knew what was best for us because he knew the
Father and the Father knew him, and they are one in heart and
mission. And so he went to the cross and
gave everything for you and I, the Good Shepherd.
Guys, there's a lot of different.
There's a lot of different leaders.
There's a lot of different political ideologies.
There's a lot of different things you can put your faith
in. Jesus is the Good Shepherd.
He's the only way. Worship team, come on up and
stand with me as we respond to God's Word.
Maybe some of you today are here and you've never really taken
into account the fact that Jesus laid down his life for you.
If there's anyone here that is not a follower of Christ, I want
you to know that the Good Shepherd knows you and loves you
so much that he gave everything so that you could have salvation
in life. And all it takes today is a
surrender, a repentance saying, Lord, I know I've done it the
wrong way. I know I followed the wrong
things, but I want to follow you today.
If that's you, it's the best decision you could make.
But maybe some of you here today would say, Hey, I, you know,
I've, I've been living a faith that's not relational when
living a faith that's more checklists and more right and
wrong and more about being a good person.
Guys, today the Good Shepherd knows you and invites you into a
deep relationship. You can have that today.
Maybe some of you have forgotten how much Jesus loves your
neighbors, how much he's for the people that look different, act
different. Maybe some of you have forgotten
the importance of being evangelistic and sharing Christ
with others today. Maybe God's calling you to
surrender that. Guys, Maybe today you've
forgotten that Jesus knows what's best for you.
Today I want to invite you to respond.
There's different ways you can respond.
There's a prayer station in the back, a straight back on the
back wall. There's altars that you can come
and pray at. If you want someone to pray with
you, you can come over to the right side, my right, your left
side, over here and someone will pray with you.
But but today, respond to God's word.
The Good Shepherd is here. He sent his Holy Spirit to walk
with us and today he knows you. He's given everything for you
and He wants you to know Him and follow him.
Father, be with us, speak to us, lead us and guide us.
Help us to be completely surrendered to you.
We give you everything. We respond to your word now help
us to respond in whatever way you lead us.
Lord, maybe that's to sit down and read your word.
Maybe that's to go to a prayer station in the back.
Maybe it's to come to an altar. Maybe it's to stand up and sing.
Lord, help us to respond to your word.
Not to just sit here, not just to stand here and and go through
motions, but to give you our hearts to surrender everything.
We give you everything now in Jesus name, Amen.