Jesus is the Door

Well, good morning. Open your Bibles to John chapter 10, please. We will Lord willing cover verses 1 through 10, but I'll read all the way through to the teaching of Jesus here to verse 21. John chapter 10 verse 1. 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 he's a robber.

But he who enters by the door is the shepherd of the sheep. To the shepherd 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 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. So Jesus again said to them, Truly, truly, I say to you, I am 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 will go in and out and find pasture.

The thief only comes to steal and kill and destroy, but I came that they may have life and have it abundantly. I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep. He who is a hired hand and not a shepherd who does not own the sheep sees the wolf coming and leaves the sheep and flees And the wolf snatches them and scatters them Because I lay down my life that I may 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 I have authority to take it up again. This charge I have received from my father. So there's again a division among the Jews because of his words. And many of them said he has a demon and is insane. Why listen to him?

Others said these are not the words of one who is oppressed by a demon. Besides, can a demon open the eyes? Let us pray to our God. O Lord, would you help us in this time now to have your word declared and exegeted and taught, proclaimed. And would you help us to receive your word gladly with open hearts and open mind and with ears that can hear the voice of the shepherd.

God in heaven, we know sin plagues us and we know that sin drags us down and weighs us down. We are so easily distracted and we so easily go astray. But would you help us now by your good spirit, the power of the spirit, applying the work of the redemption of Jesus Christ to cause us to be forgiven of our sins, that to not be under its dominion, so that we can truly be led out by the voice of Christ to green pastures, To be fed, to be taken care of, to enjoy the riches of righteousness by our wonderful shepherd who gave all for us.

Oh God, help us in this time now. I pray for others around this world preaching Christ, around this nation preaching Christ. I pray for our own Michael Coghlan as he preaches in California to a fire church there. I pray, Lord, that you'd be with him as he preaches and be with the congregation as they listen. May God you edify your people and build them up so that we can look more like Jesus conform ourselves to his image and enjoy the riches of his righteousness We thank you Lord in Jesus name Amen You remember in chapter 9 of John we covered this man who was blind from birth but he's had quite the few hours as Jesus has just healed him of this sickness or illness, this disease he had that caused him to be blind.

And what even seems to overshadow that miraculous healing from Jesus This is what happened after he's been healed. And that is, he's been faithful to Christ upon the hardship of believing upon Christ. If you remember, he was questioned by his family and friends in chapter 9. And he was faithful to Christ as he proclaimed Christ to his family, his friends, and his acquaintances.

But you remember, he got turned up whenever the religious leaders interrogated him. And he was faithful to Christ in that interrogation. In fact, he's so faithful to Christ that it almost overshadows the miracle of him being healed of his blindness that he remained faithful to Christ even among the hardship that he received because of it. In fact, so faithful was he to Christ that at the end of the day he gets kicked out of the synagogue by the religious leaders.

So, he's had quite a few hours. He, at one point, was an outcast of society because of his blindness. And now, he's an even bigger outcast of society because of his faithfulness to Christ. He has had quite a few hours. And yet, at the end of it all, Jesus finds him, reveals himself to him, and the man ends up worshiping and bowing down at Christ's feet.

And in some ways, I think we need to understand as we look at chapter 10, that we can all relate to some degree that coming to Christ creates some sort of hardship in our lives. To some degree, maybe not to the point of this man where he was immediately kicked out of the synagogue and kicked out of society for it, but in some degree, all of us who have believed upon Jesus for salvation, we have all experienced the hardship that that comes with to some degree. Jesus will heal us, but he commands our full and total faith and obedience.

So what happens when that causes us to lose our close friends What happens when that causes us to look like fanatics at work or school What happens when full obedience and trust and following Jesus, what happens when we are cast out of society because of our fidelity to Christ? What happens when deciding to follow Jesus and habitually follow him And that's what causes us hardship in this life. In light of this hardship for this man that just decided, I'm following Christ, I don't care what the religious leaders had to say about it.

In light of this hardship that he's received, Jesus is going to teach in chapter 10. And Jesus' teaching will be focused on two things that we need to keep in our mind as we go through chapter 10. And the first thing is, how is it that some people, like this man healed from blindness, follow Jesus despite the hardship of doing so? How is it that some people, they see the hardship that following Christ will bring, and yet they still decide to be faithful and to put their trust and confidence in Christ and bring on the hardship?

And the second thing that we'll see through Jesus' teaching here is answering this question, is Jesus truly a better option in light of the hardship he brings to his people when we follow him? Is he truly the better option? Is he truly the better shepherd than the old way that we came forth from? These are good questions to ask whenever we see the hardship on the horizon for our faith in Jesus.

Jesus, how is it that certain people will respond despite the hardship? And is he truly the better shepherd? Can we truly expect better things from him even as we see the hardship on the horizon? We're going to answer both of those questions, or Jesus is going to, in this teaching of him being the good shepherd in chapter 10. And so let us see here, he begins in chapter 10 with a figure of speech.

That's what John calls it a few verses later, a figure of speech. Now, what is a figure of speech? A figure of speech is kind of like a parable. If you remember, Matthew, Mark, and Luke, they rely on parables, right? And a parable is like an extended simile. Okay, simile is comparing two like things using like or as.

I think that's the definition there. And so what a parable is, is the kingdom of heaven. The kingdom of God is like, and then he uses something in nature to explain what it is. Something that you can see with your eyes and see, oh, that's explaining the spiritual kingdom of God. Now, a figure of speech is similar to that, only instead of it being an extended simile, it's an extended metaphor.

It's doing the same thing. It's taking something in nature and describing a spiritual hidden reality, but it's not a simile, it's a metaphor. And a metaphor is comparing two like things without using like or as. And so that's what we have here. Jesus is going to explain how he truly is the better shepherd and how sheep answer to him or how people answer to him despite the hardship by using this figure of speech revealing that.

What does he say? Well, let's look at the first few verses of it in chapter 10, verses 1 and 2. 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 of the sheepfold is the shepherd of the sheep. And so here we see the figure of speech is centered on a sheepfold.

Now, we live in a different time. We don't have many sheepfolds around here. But at the time, around Jesus, there would be sheepfolds around. And a sheepfold was a place that a shepherd could bring his sheep to be protected for the night and then gather them back up the next day to bring them out to pasture so they can eat. And what would happen is there would be a few different shepherds that would bring their sheep into the same sheepfold.

And so this sheepfold would have a large wall all the way around it with one door going in. And there was a porter or a watchman, someone who guarded that gate to make sure that no one got in there that wasn't supposed to be in there, right? And so Jesus is using this common thing that happened around them, a sheepfold, and he's explaining how he is the better shepherd and how it is that sheep or people will respond to him despite the hardship of doing so.

And he says, he explains about this sheepfold. He says that there are two different type of people. There's the true shepherd, and you know the true shepherd because he goes to the door, and he's welcomed in by the porter. But then there the thief and the robber And how can you know the thief and the robber Well the thief and the robber is not going through the door because he not welcome there He instead has to climb the high wall to get into the sheepfold So you know that that man is not authorized and he's not up to anything good.

Like if you drive by my house and you see someone banging a stranger, banging down the window, breaking it down, you don't think, huh, that's interesting and go on. Hopefully you would call 911 because he doesn't belong there. And so here Jesus is saying, there's two types of people here. There's a true shepherd that goes to the door, and there's a thief and a robber that climb the wall.

Now a thief and a robber, a thief is someone who steals. A robber is someone who's willing to hurt or harm in order to steal. And so what we see is a thief and the robber is not interested in the well-being of the sheep at all. The thief and the robber is in there only to exploit and to take advantage of the sheep. But the shepherd, the shepherd very much cares for the sheep.

The shepherd comes in through the door where he belongs and he cares for the sheep. He takes care of the sheep. Now why is he, again I say this often with my family, this isn't story time with Jesus where he's just telling a story just to tell a story. This is pointing to something specific about the nature of himself, the kingdom, what you can expect.

And again, this is pointing to the fact that he is the better shepherd despite the hardship, and the sheep will respond to him despite the hardship. So how does it point to that? Well, in this healed man's life who has faced all this hardship since being faithful to Christ, it is not like he was being taken care of well, And Jesus came and messed it all up now.

He messed up his life. Jesus is calling these guys who created hardship for him, these religious leaders, he's calling them false shepherds. He's calling the religious leaders thieves and robbers. They only wanted to use him for their own gain. They had no real interest in him at all. And we saw that play out, didn't we, in chapter 9.

We saw they had no interest in this man at all. They had no interest in his healing, no interest in his well-being. They only had interest in their own glory and saving their own glory and getting him to deny Christ for that very purpose. So Jesus is calling the religious leaders thieves and robbers And he is saying that Jesus brought him out of that danger and brought him to his own care as a good shepherd So although he has been kicked out of the synagogue and now he's an outcast, he has been rescued from the thieves and the robbers and is now in the care of the good shepherd.

This figure of speech points to a spiritual truth in your life too, right? This idea of the thieves and the robber coming in and the good, the actual true shepherd going through the door. This is actually pointing to a truth in our lives too, not just this man who was healed of his blindness. Every human being is created by God to be dependent on the care of something beyond us.

None of us are sufficient of ourselves, but we are all sheep in need of being taken care of. Every single one of us are. The question is not whether you are receiving care, but the question is what kind of care are you receiving? Are you receiving the care of the shepherd, the one who went through the door, who is authorized and who is caring for your interests?

Who cares for your well-being? Or are you being taken care of by a thief and a robber, one who is looking to exploit you, take advantage of you, and has no interest at all in your actual well-being? The care of the thief and the robber typically looks like one of two things in our lives. It can look like licentiousness, that is, a license to sin. The care, the philosophies of the evil one will tell you that, hey, you want to live a full and completed life, just do what feels good to you, what seems right in your own eyes.

This is what the liar, the thief, and the robber who acts like he cares for you will tell you will feed you in the pasture land. There's another aspect too. There's legalism. They false religion imposing laws on you that don't ultimately point to Christ at all, but they make you feel like you are doing something that is significantly beyond yourself. The lie is that this can give you greater meaning purpose fulfillment any need But really all it is it just pulling you away from the true shepherd that cares for your soul And so when Jesus comes to rescue you from the false shepherds, the old system can create hardship for you, but it does not mean that the real shepherd is not better.

When you decide to follow Jesus instead of the thief and the robber, there will be hardships with the transition always. The thief and the robber, like the religious leaders, won't go quietly in the night. There will be hardship, but Jesus is saying, but you are following the true shepherd, the good shepherd, the one who cares for your soul instead of the old system that only wanted to exploit you.

Jesus is the true and better shepherd that rescues you from the false shepherds that are only looking to kill and to destroy. And moving on in this figure of speech, he teaches how it is that someone can respond to Jesus despite the hardship. He just underlined the thief and the robber. He underlined the good shepherd, which we can clearly see he's the shepherd.

And the religious leaders in any kind of worldly system are the thieves and the robbers. And now he's going to move on to show how the sheep or how we can respond to Jesus despite the hardship that it brings, like it brought that man healed from his blindness. Look at what he says in verses 3 and 4 of chapter 10. Voice. So again, the figure of speech is the shepherd comes and takes his sheep out of the sheepfold, right?

Out of the security that they were in for the night. And he brings them out to pasture to eat and to get fat and healthy, right? But notice how it starts. The shepherd calls his sheep by name. You see that? The sheep hear the voice of the shepherd.

They hear their own name. Then the sheep recognize the voice of the shepherd, their ears perk up, and then they follow the shepherd wherever he leads. Not just for that time out of the sheepfold, but then they follow the shepherd wherever he goes. For their life. In the West, shepherds drive the sheep forward. So shepherds in the West, they'll drive their sheep forward using sheepdogs and whatever else.

But in the East, the Near East, where Jesus was at here, shepherds, shepherds, not lead. Yeah, my goodness. They lead their flock by their voice. So we're in the West, they drive the flock forward. In the Near East where Jesus was, the shepherds, what they even do still today is they lead their flock by their voice. They guide them, they direct them by their voice.

In fact, you can look on YouTube. It's really cool to see shepherds. You'll see a bunch of sheep there and you'll hear different shepherds calling out their own sheep by name. And the sheep won't respond to the other shepherds. They won't respond to it. But when they hear their own shepherd, they'll move to their shepherd.

It's a really wonderful, beautiful thing that you can even see today. You can see videos of that on YouTube. But you must not miss the beautiful figure of speech as it relates to this man who has decided to follow Jesus despite the hardship that he's just received. He has done so because he has been called by name by Jesus. This is what Jesus is saying in this figure of speech.

This is what's being taught here. This man has followed Christ despite the hardship, worshipped him, kicked out of the synagogue, mistreated, and he's done it all because Jesus has called him by name and his ear has perked up. And he has done so because he has ears to hear his voice. And this is teaching us why it is that you would respond to Jesus despite the hardships of doing so.

And this also teaches why some people don't respond to Jesus because of the hardship. Because they are not being called by name. They do not hear the voice of the shepherd. If you are in Christ, if you are a believer in Jesus, that's because he's called you by name. And he has given you ears to hear his call. Why is this the case?

Why is it that we need our ears to be open or we need our names to be called in particular and our ears to be open? It's because of our utter corruption and sin. We see and really what helpful is the tulip the Calvinistic way of understanding salvation The acronym is tulip The T is really helpful here in understanding why it is that we don have ears to hear until we are called by the shepherd by name And the T is total depravity.

We are totally depraved of our own to be able to respond in any kind of meaningful way to God. Because of sin, we are utterly corrupted to God. We cannot hear God. We don't care about God. We don't want to hear God. We want to hear the thief and the robber.

We are depraved in our sin. Sin has so many multifaceted curses associated with it. It's mind-boggling. And one that we can see here is that without the shepherd calling our name in particular and opening up our ears to hear, our sin will cause us not to hear the good shepherd. In fact, Matthew, Jesus talks about this when he's teaching parables. He talks about the deafness of our sinful condition.

Go to Matthew 13 real quick. We'll read that. Matthew 13, 10 through 17. So Jesus is teaching in parables. Again, similar concepts, it's just a simile instead of a metaphor. The disciples in Matthew 13, 10 came and said to him, Why do you speak to them in parables?

And he answered them, To you it has been given to know the secrets of the kingdom of heaven, but to them it has not been given. For to the one who has, more will be given, and he will have an abundance. But from the one who has not, even what he has will be taken away. This is why I speak to them in parables, because seeing they do not see, and hearing they do not hear, Nor do they understand.

Indeed, in their case, the prophecy of Isaiah is fulfilled that says, You will indeed hear, but never understand. You will indeed see, but never perceive. For this people's heart has grown dull, and with their ears they can barely hear, and their eyes they have closed, lest they should see with their eyes and hear with their ears, and understand with their heart, and turn, and I would heal them.

But blessed are your eyes, for they see, and your ears, for they hear. For truly I say to you many prophets and righteous people long to see what you see but did not see it and to hear what you hear and did not hear it So we see here Jesus is teaching that there is an issue a problem with humanity that they are unable to hear the words of God They're unable to hear the words of God. Sin causes our hearts to be dull and we do not hear the words of the shepherd.

But we see again from this figure of speech that the shepherd calls the sheep by name. And that ability, that calling the sheep by name, overcomes that natural depravity, and it breaks it, and it frees the person to actually hear the shepherd and to respond to the shepherd. And notice he calls his own sheep by name. In other words, there's all sorts of sheep out there, and the shepherd calls his own sheep by name.

And if we're continuing down the doctrines of grace, of teaching how we're saved, we can see that there's also L, limited or definite atonement. That is, that Jesus saves his particular people, his particular sheep. And so the shepherd comes and he calls out his own sheep by name. He's going to call his own sheep by name, and then they're going to respond and hear it and follow the shepherd.

That's because he has a particular sheep that he calls out and overcomes their natural depravity of deafness. And then, of course, there's irresistible grace that when Jesus does this, the sheep responds. There is no sheep that's going to hear the shepherd call its name and look up and say, nah. Every sheep that is called by name and is able to hear because of the mercies and grace of the shepherd, they look up and they run to their shepherd and they flee from the thief and the robber.

No amount of danger from false shepherds and thieves and robbers will stop the sheep to charge after the shepherd. So we see that this man had all sorts of dangers around him. He had the religious leaders that are wanting to kill him, and yet he goes to the shepherd. Why is that? It's because Jesus called his name and overcame his deafness, and he, despite the cost, went to the shepherd.

So Jesus in this figure of speech is revealing another miracle he has done for this man who was born blind He not only healed him of his blindness but he healed him of his spiritual deafness He has called his name, and he has responded, this man has responded, even at the danger of the false shepherds who have kicked him out of the synagogue. Is there any danger? Is there any danger that comes between you and Jesus?

There's some, again, as I already said at the intro of the sermon, there's always some hardship and danger for following Christ. He is a very offensive person. Very exclusive. There's not much inclusivity for him. I think that's a word. Jesus is offensive and there's always going to be some kind of hardship, some kind of danger for following this offensive person.

And whenever he overcomes your deafness by his mercies and grace, and he calls you by name, and you hear it, you will go to him. So when a sheep has been called by name and given ears to hear the true shepherd, the fake, no matter how hard following the real shepherd may seem, the fake loses his appeal. And this is what he goes on to say in John chapter 10, verse 5.

He says after they've been called out by name, they follow. And he says a stranger, that is the one who is a thief and the robber, the one who jumped over the wall, right? A stranger they will not follow, but they will flee from him. For they do not know the voice of strangers. A stranger who jumped over the wall could be promising the world to the sheep.

If you follow me, it'll be so much easier for you. You won't have to fight sin anymore. You can just give into it. No more fight. No more battle. You just give into it.

I mean, think about it. All you Christians, sometimes that sounds pretty good, doesn't it? It sounds pretty good to be able to not have to fight your flesh anymore. And the thief and the robber, the stranger will jump the wall and tell you everything that you need to hear in order for you to go that way and not go to the shepherd. The easy life, the comfortable life, no persecution, no hardship, pleasure.

This man, you no longer have to be kicked out of the synagogue. You can go back and be with your family and friends and it can be normal. You can have your eyesight and be with everyone again. The thief and the robber will tell you everything. Anything you need to hear in order for you not to follow the voice of the shepherd. But because the sheep has been called by name by the true shepherd and can hear his voice, nothing can be told to that sheep, nothing can be told to him that will cause him to say, yeah, I'll go the thief and the robber's way.

In fact, whenever their ear has been opened, they can see the thief and the robber for what it truly is. Death and destruction. Whereas before, those ears that have not been opened, wow, that sounds pretty good. That actually sounds like happiness to me. But when the shepherd calls out your name, opens your ears, you say, no, you are filled with death, destruction.

I will flee from that, and I will go to Jesus. It's like in Pilgrim's Progress, right? When Christian is on his way, If Apollyon comes and he says, you're coming with me, it'd be a lot easier for Christian to have just said, okay, I'll go back with you, Apollyon. But he says, no, I will fight you. I will not go back. I will continue to follow Jesus.

I will continue to follow his voice. So this figure of speech from Jesus reveals that Jesus is the true shepherd despite the hardship. And it reveals that the sheep responds despite the hardship because they are called by name and given ears to hear. And speaking of hearing, look at verse 6 of chapter 10. This figure of speech Jesus used with them, but they did not understand what he was saying to them.

So remember, Jesus didn't put anything. He didn't say, I'm the shepherd. You're the sheep, or possibly not the sheep. The religious leaders, they're the thieves and the robbers, the worldly systems and everything. He didn't explain any of that. He just simply gave the figure of speech.

And they're just like, wow, that's a cool story, Jesus. And that's all it was. They did not understand it at all. So then Jesus moves on to explain and expand the figure of speech. He's going to explain it by saying, I am dot, dot, dot, you numbskulls. And he's also going to expand it.

Because you would imagine he's going to say, if he's going to explain it, he's going to say, I am the good shepherd right away. Because that's obviously where he's going. But he expands it by saying I am the door first And so we going to spend the next few minutes covering him saying I am the door And then next week Lord willing we will cover how he says and I am the good shepherd the true shepherd So let's see how he explains and expands this figure of speech.

First, he says that he is the door of the sheep. And next we'll see how he is the door for the sheep. The door of the sheep allows people to come in rightfully to the sheepfold. But the door for the sheep allows the sheep to go out rightfully. So first he's going to say that he is the door of the sheep. In verses 7 through 8, that is, he is the true and proper entrance that any true shepherd must go through to actually get to the sheep.

And see that in verses 7 and 8 of chapter 10. So Jesus again said to them, they don't understand, so now he's going to start saying, okay, this is what I'm saying. Truly, truly, I say to you, I am the door of the sheep. All who came before me are thieves and robbers, but the sheep did not listen to them, or they ran away from them. In this figure of speech, one could know if someone was a shepherd by if they came in through the door or not.

Remember? You could know if the shepherd's real, true, if they're coming through the door. And Jesus is saying that he is the door. All that came before him that went over the wall, the religious leaders, they are all thieves and robbers. They didn't have any care for the sheep. But all who went through the door, they are the ones who actually cared for the sheep or actually shepherds.

You see, Jesus isn't saying that everyone before him were all a bunch of fakes like Moses and the prophets. But what he's saying is anyone who did not go through me to get to the sheep were fakes. In other words, Moses, he taught the law. He taught the laws for Israel. But what did Moses ultimately point to? Jesus.

The prophets taught condemnation, judgment. They taught all sorts of things. But what were they ultimately pointing to? The Messiah, Jesus. So they were true shepherds of the sheep. But for those who did not ultimately point to Jesus, they were only thieves and robbers wanting to destroy and not wanting to feed and help the sheep.

And that what Jesus is saying here He saying I am the door All who came through me are proper shepherds All who did not they are thieves and robbers I look at the religious leaders over there They are thieves and robbers because they hated the glory of Christ and they loved their own glory So you can see that any teaching, any philosophy, anything that explains to you and teaches you the bigger things of life, What you should be doing with your life, if it's not pointing to the door, if it's not pointing to Christ, it is meant only to kill and destroy you, even if it's promising you the world. That's what Jesus is saying. He is the door to the sheep.

The only authorized venue, way to get to the sheep that is through him, to point to him, to reveal Christ. And anything that doesn't is simply a thief, a liar, a destroyer, someone who promises the world but yet always brings destruction. Remember, we are all sheep and need to be led and guided by something. And if that something is not revealing Jesus to you, to us, then it is ultimately a thief and it's a robber bent on your destruction.

Think about how many different philosophies there are out there that promise to guide you to a fulfilled and happy life. There's a lot of them. Do what makes you feel good and happy. The new one, it's not the new one, but it seems like it's really prevalent. Complain all the time and don't believe anyone. Then you will be happy.

Kids are raised up being told they are naturally good and shouldn't change a thing about them. Adults are being told to stay true to yourself. We are told to be inclusive as possible, and anyone who claims things like they are the only way is mean and bigoted. But true shepherds come through the door of Christ and proclaims you are a broken, and you can only find healing in the death and resurrection of Christ.

Any other message is just for destruction and to bring you to peril. So again, the one speaking through the true door might be proclaiming things that are offensive and hard to hear. And the other voices may proclaim things that are easy to hear without the hardship. But all those not going through the door are ultimately not for the good of the flock.

Instead it is for its ultimate destruction Jesus and his gospel is the door of the sheep He is the better shepherd the better caretaker for the sheep And next we see, and we'll end with this, Jesus is the door for the sheep. He's not only the door to enter into to get to the sheep, but he's the door that the sheep go out of to get to pasture. He says in verses 9 and 10, The thief, they come and rob and destroy and bring them to death.

But he says, I am the better shepherd despite the hardships because I bring you to life. And there's only one objective for the sheep, for a shepherd. And that is that they would be led to a pasture where they can eat and be satisfied. That's what the shepherd wants to bring them to. A nice green place to eat and to get fat. The thief and the robber will lead the sheep to a place where they can be abused for their own purposes.

But the shepherd is faithful to lead the sheep to pasture. There is one major objective for a human being as well. Every one of us, we have a main objective, the main purpose for our life, and that is that we would be led to a place where we can be satisfied truly. We are meant to be satisfied creatures. We're meant to be taken care of. We're meant to be led by someone to a place where we can be satisfied.

Not food, but life. To the fullest, Jesus says. And not physical life, but spiritual life, and that to the fullest. We are meant to be led to a place where we can have righteousness and life and union with God to the fullest. We see this kind of life in Psalm 1, 1-3. It is life to walk obediently and in union with your God.

We talk about this often. You want to know what life is? You want to know what feeds you? You want to know what you need? You need to be near to God in righteousness. And you want to know what the thief and the robber will say?

No, you can actually have happiness if you go the sinful trail instead. And what Jesus is saying, he's saying, I am the door. If you want to be close to God, if you want real, true enjoyment and fulfillment in life, you must go through Jesus Christ, for there is no other way. Licentiousness, sin, will lead to destruction. Moralism, legalism, doing it your own way, okay, I'll be right before God with my own power, All of these will lead you to the same death and decay.

But Jesus, he has provided everything necessary for life and godliness. He is the one who can forgive you of your sins, and he says, follow me now, I will lead you unto righteousness. Not just standing righteousness, although that's wonderful of itself, but practicing righteousness. This is what it means for a sheep to be led to a place of life. That is a place of righteousness.

And Jesus says there is no other door There is no other way Romans 8 28 through 29 And we know that for those who love God all things work together for good for those who are called according to his purpose to come out For those whom he foreknew, he predestined to be conformed to the image of his son. You want to know what the good that God is working in your life? That is for you to look like Jesus.

And there is no greater life that you can experience than to look like Christ. So let the hardships come. As you see, following Christ is going to bring hardship, but you're going to look more like Christ in that hardship. That is life. The thief and the robber says, don't go that way. There's a bunch of danger that way.

But as a sheep who's been called out, you say, you have a crisis that way. Go there. I could go the easy way. I'm going to go Christ, where he's at. Jesus is the better shepherd. Despite the hardship, Jesus, by his power, can call your name and bring you forth unto this life.

The purpose of your life is to enjoy righteousness that is only possible as you are led by the shepherd 3 Jove This man has experienced hardship now for his fidelity to Christ Is Jesus truly the better shepherd And the answer is yes. For he is the only one that can give you what you truly need. That is closeness with God through his mercy and grace. The question that remains is, have your ears been opened to hear the call of the shepherd to see the danger that you are in by following false shepherds?

Have you heard the call of Christ? Or are you still believing that there is a way outside of Christ that can lead to fulfillment and happiness? Cry out to the true door for the sheep to awaken your spirit to the benefits he provides by his death and resurrection, to lead you to the true pastures for your soul. Let us pray. O God, we thank you for Christ Jesus.

We thank you, God, that he is truly the door. We know that we live in this world where there's many lies and deception. There's many thieves and robbers. 1 Peter 1 John 2 Timothy 2 John 3 John 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 40 38 31 34 35 36 39 40 42 35 46 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 42 45 47 48 49 50 51 52 43 52 53 52 54 57 52 53 54 57 52 54 57 54 57 58 51 52 52 57 52 The true good shepherd Everyone who comes through in contrary ways a thief and a robber Would you help us to remind would you remind that to us now Lord, I know I have many Christians before me who has been following the voice of the shepherd for some time now.

But Lord, it's so easy for our ears to be perked up to something that we used to desire a long time ago. It's so easy for sin to grab hold of us and for us to forget. I'm so thankful, as we'll see in these coming verses, that we follow a good shepherd. One that will never let us go. The one that has called us by name at the beginning, and he'll continue to call, and he'll lead us unto eternal life with God.

Lord, I pray for those who have never heard the call of Jesus. Lord, I pray that even now that they would hear their name being called, even as I'm preaching your word. I pray, Lord, that as they hear your word, they can see that they've been following thieves and robbers, they've been following lies that promise so much but yet never actually fulfill.

And that even through this, they would hear their name being called by Christ. And they would forsake their sin. They would forsake the lies. And they would go to Christ no matter the hardships it may bring. Thank you for being so good to us. Thank you for being our God and Savior.

You have done all things well, and for that we say a hearty amen.