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That's connectwithskip.com. Now let's get into today's teaching from Pastor Skip Heitzig. He's not just any guy. He's the world's oldest living man. He's 113 years old, and he's having his bar mitzvah in Jerusalem. Now what's odd about that is he's 100 years late. Because he should have been bar mitzvah at age 13. He's 113. He's the world's oldest living dude. And he's having a bar mitzvah, a coming-of-age celebration.
I think he's old enough, don't you? So he was born in Poland in 1903. But what happened is his mother died, and his father was out fighting in World War I for the Russian army. So they were gone.
She was dead. His mother and his father was absent for the first time he would have his bar mitzvah. World War I ended. World War II later on happened. He was in Auschwitz concentration camp. He survived the Holocaust, survived Auschwitz. And now at 113 years of age, he's celebrating that he's becoming a son of the commandment, bar mitzvah, a son of the law.
Coming of age. I love that, but I'm praying for him. I'm praying that as a Jewish man at 113, that somebody over there, perhaps my friends or others who are my friends who are believers, will help him to the place of full maturity, fully growing up. For you see, the Bible tells us in Galatians that the law was a schoolmaster, a tutor that was put in place by God to lead us to Christ, that we grow up, we become mature, we come of age spiritually. And we no longer need the parameters of the old religious system because we enter into a true right relationship with the living God. So I'm praying that he will come to that place, that coming of age of full maturity.
It's a great story, but I'm just praying that his heart would be open to the Messiah. Now Israel and Judaism provided a system whereby God's people could be kept sort of like in a fence or in a hedge. In fact, the ancient sages used to call the law of the Old Testament, the laws of God, the fence. It kept them. It kept them safe. It kept intruders out. It kept the good people, the good stuff in.
And so Judaism kept the people of God for a long time. But a new era has arrived. The Messiah has come to the earth. The Old Testament, the old sheepfold is over. The Good Shepherd has come. And all of that introduces chapter 10 of John, which at the beginning speaks about the Good Shepherd. Jesus says, I am the Good Shepherd. Now, what you need to know about chapter 10, this is really profound, is that it's connected to chapter 9.
Can I get an amen? No, I'm just kidding. I'm just kidding.
Just kidding. That's not all that profound. But I say that because you need to know that what happened in chapter 9 continues now in chapter 10. It's not like a different day has arrived.
It's just a different chapter has arrived. But it's the same era, the same day that Jesus is in the temple in Jerusalem after the day after the feast of tabernacles. He has healed a man born blind from birth. He's interrogated by the Jewish elite, the religious leaders, and eventually he is cast out. As we told you last week, aposunagogue, he is de-synagogued, un-synagogued, cast out of Judaism, which had severe repercussions socially as well as spiritually in those days. He is abandoned by them, and so right after that, the text says in the previous chapter, Jesus found him. He is cast out of the fold of Judaism, the Good Shepherd finds him. And this is important because the Lord is going to be showing the people, the crowd who's listening, the leaders who are giving him the evil eye, and the man who is born blind, what is happening spiritually to this man. He has been found by the Good Shepherd. He is being brought into his fold.
This man has heard his voice. He is a true sheep of the Messiah. Now, just a little bit of background about shepherding, and I know not much about shepherding at all. Some of you might, and I've been corrected by many people over the years in this flock who are actual shepherds.
But from their teaching me and from what I have read, this is what I know about shepherding 2,000 years ago. In the Middle East, especially in Israel, there were two types of sheepfolds or sheep enclosures. There was one in the village and one in the country.
Why do I say that? Because some commentators, and as you've heard me say, some taters are more common than others, those who comment on the Scripture will say that verses 1 through 5 of John chapter 10 is about the first kind of sheep enclosure. Verse 7 through 10 is about the second type of enclosure.
One is the village and one is the countryside. In the village, not one but several shepherds would place their flocks, plural, into a communal pen, a sheep enclosure. Every night they would bring them in.
The gate would be closed. A watchman or a porter who was an under-shepherd of some kind, he knew sheep. He was stationed there to guard them, but it was a tall fenced-in area or walled-in area with a gate.
All the flocks were put in there. Before the flocks would retire into the sheep pen at night, the shepherds would stand there with a rod. And the sheep would pass underneath the rod for inspection. So you'd hold one up and then inspect it, let it go, and he'd pass under the rod.
Passing under the rod became a metaphor of a shepherd inspecting the sheep, making sure he's not diseased or infected because he's going in with a whole lot of other sheep so that could get really nasty. Then the shepherd would go home, get a good night's sleep. The porter or the watchman would watch during the night to make sure there's no thieves who would break in and steal. Then in the morning, the shepherds would come. And one by one, because the porter or the watchman recognized that's a legitimate shepherd, the shepherd would come, the gate would be open, the shepherd would make that very distinct call that his flocks understood. And the sheep would follow them out to the countryside where they might be there for the day and come back, or be there for a few days for pasture and then come back later on.
That's how it worked in those days. Now, whenever you're dealing with these types of scriptures, these types of analogies, people try to suppose what it is a metaphor for. What could the sheepfold mean? And so some who are commentators will say, well, the sheepfold is a picture of heaven. Or the sheepfold is a picture of salvation. I don't believe it's a picture of heaven because Jesus, in the analogy, said that thieves and robbers come in and steal. That's not a very comforting picture of heaven to me.
Nor is it a picture of salvation because they go in and out. And these sheep are already part of the shepherd's fold before he leads them into any of these sheep pens, these enclosures. So it seems to me, since it's tied to chapter 9 and what happened, is that the sheepfold is Judaism, or at least one of the sheep pens is Judaism. And Jesus is offering an explanation what happened to this Jewish sheep who was kicked out of the fold but brought under the care of the Good Shepherd.
That seems to be the better context to look at it. Chapter 10, verse 1, Jesus speaking. I know that because it's in red letters in my Bible. Most assuredly, I say to you, he who does not enter the sheepfold by the door but climbs in some other way, the same as a thief and a robber. But he who enters by the door is the shepherd of the sheep. To him, the doorkeeper opens and the sheep hear his voice and he calls his own sheep by name and leads them out.
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To give your year-end gift to help meet the $120,000 need, go to connectwithskip.com slash give or call 800-922-1888 and make an investment that will have eternal returns. Now, let's get back to Skip for more of today's teaching. Now, I have a theory. I believe that I know exactly where Jesus spoke this in the temple area.
This is just my theory. I told you that Jesus was speaking at a very particular place in the temple area known as what? We have a coffee shop named after it. Solomon's porch.
He was not getting a cappuccino. He was teaching in a covered portico area that ran the entire eastern breadth of the temple mount. From south to north on the eastern side of the temple mount was Solomon's porch. Jesus exits the temple by one of the gates. Because he's already on the eastern side, I believe Jesus goes out the northeastern gate known as the sheep gate. Now, if you go to Jerusalem today and you go through that gate, it's also called St. Stephen's Gate or the Lion's Gate. But it used to be called, and I remember when it was called this, it still is by many of the locals, the sheep gate. And that is because, and unfortunately it's not there anymore, but it used to be 20, 30 years ago, a sheep market every Friday right by that gate. It was like acres of sheep.
You could tell you were close by the smell. And sheep were bought and sold there by many of the Arab Palestinian shepherds. So from antiquity it was known as the sheep gate and up until recently it was used as the sheep gate. So I believe that Jesus was basically using what was around him to provide an illustration for him. In a very common place in trying to answer the man who has been excommunicated from the sheepfold of Judaism to answer those Pharisees who were attacking Jesus to give them an explanation.
He uses this analogy. Now I mentioned to you that in that village sheep pen that all of the sheep were placed together. Okay, so you have let's say my flocks and you have Carrie's flocks and you have Peter's flocks and you have Antonio and Tamara, they have their sheep over there. We all have our flocks in this sheep pen. There were no brandings, there's no numbers on them.
It didn't say Carrie number one, number two, number three, Skip number four, number five. There was no branding at all on these sheep. So how do you tell your sheep from my sheep? By the call of the shepherd.
The call of the shepherd was very distinct because all of us have a distinct vocal pattern. If you have a pet, your dog knows or your... I don't know if your cat knows much of anything, but you're... I'm sorry. I couldn't resist.
Somebody's going to preach it, others saying heretic. I know my dogs know my voice. And so the shepherd would go and he would make the call that only he could make some kind of a shrilly, a special tone of the voice. You know, we do that to our pets. We don't talk normally to our pets, do we?
You don't say, hey there, Mac. It's all that little that your dog wags a tail and does that. Sheep were like that. They recognized the master's voice. Some of you may remember RCA and the logo that RCA used.
Do you remember it had that parlophone, that big kind of megaphone that was connected to the record player and the little dog? It was listening to whatever sound and it said his master's voice, RCA. Sheep knew the master's voice, the particular tone, the intonation that was used, the pitch that was used.
Interesting story I read about some years back. In Australia, where a lot of people do keep sheep, a man was arrested for stealing sheep. He claimed he didn't steal any sheep.
They were his sheep. So he went to court. On the stand, the judge and the jury cross-examined the plaintiff as well as the defendant.
Judge didn't know what to do. So as a last resort, the judge called the final witness, the sheep. They were brought into the courtroom. Then the judge asked the plaintiff, the one who made the accusation of thievery, to go out into the hallway, keep the doors of the chambers open and call the sheep. He made his call and the little sheep just cowered down and looked very afraid. The accused went out and called and the sheep came to him. He said, case closed, the sheep knows the shepherd's voice. That's what the judge said. The sheep knows the shepherd's voice.
So that's how it was done. Then the sheep were taken out and led out, directed out to the green pastures. So we've told you before about sheep, right? The Bible uses the metaphor of sheep throughout the Bible. And we who are not shepherds, or we don't come from an agrarian culture, but from a very modern techno-urban city kind of a culture, we don't understand all the ramifications.
It's a beautiful picture, right? The Lord, we are the sheep of his hand, the Bible says. Psalm 23, the shepherd's psalm. But sheep, as I've told you, are not the smartest thing going. They are prone to wander. All of us like sheep have gone astray. But though they're not the smartest, they know their master's voice. You know, it's funny, whenever I teach on sheep, and I do mention that sheep are kind of dumb, I just see some people just sort of like, I don't like this part of the sermon.
I like being told I'm not smart. You know, the fact that the Bible calls you a sheep, you're going to hear it one of two ways. You're going to either hear it as a chop, a put-down, or you're going to hear it as a compliment. I see it as a compliment. David, I think, was bragging when he said, the Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want.
He does this, he does that. In other words, I'm a sheep, that I recognize, but I have it good because I have a good shepherd. And he was bragging, and how many of you are pet owners? Okay, hands down.
I'm not going to ask you to raise your hands on the next one. But I'm going to tell you this. There are good pet owners, and there are some bad pet owners. And I mean bad in the true sense of not cool, but not good. Not good, bad pet owners. Some own pets. They never walk them. They never exercise them.
They never spend much time. They sort of keep them in a little enclosure in the backyard. They run around barking all day long. I have a neighbor that goes all day long, all day long, all day long. Not an extra neighbor, so Donna wants you to try to Zillow that and find out who is that.
Somewhere else in the neighborhoods. I'm thinking, goodness, that dog is out there all the time, barking all the time, needs an owner who will take care of it. Then there are those who are good normal pet owners.
Probably you, since you're Christians. You are good pet owners. You might even quote text of scripture to your pets.
I don't know. But then there are those other pet owners on the other side of the spectrum who are like, they carry their pets wherever they go. They have little sweaters with monograms for their pets. They go to dog psychiatrists if something is wrong.
Their dog house is air conditioned in the summer. This exists, by the way. We hear them and go, that's stupid. That's overboard. But let me ask you a question.
If you were a dog and you could choose which house to go to, you can take A, B, or C. I'm going with C. I want the A, C if I'm a dog in the summertime. Right? So when David said, the Lord is my shepherd, you're going, I'm C. Yeah, I got the great shepherd who takes such great care of me. It was a boast. So back to our story. Notice something about the good shepherd, the true shepherd. False shepherds don't come through the door.
They try to climb in some other way. So in the morning, the shepherds come to the door. The doorkeeper, the porter says, I know you. You're the right shepherd. Call your sheep and they go with them.
A false shepherd is going to try to climb in probably at night to steal the sheep. Jesus came through the front door of Judaism. He came in the right way. Jesus was predicted by the prophets, inspired by God the Father throughout the Old Testament. Three hundred, three hundred and thirty predictions made that Jesus fulfilled. He came in through the front door of Judaism. That was Paul's point, Galatians chapter 4, verse 4. That in the fullness of the time, God sent forth his son, born of a woman, born under the law, to redeem those who were under the law.
He came in the right way, came in through the front door. Verse 4, and when he brings out his own sheep, he goes before them and the sheep follow him, for they know his voice. This I have found out from people who keep sheep over in these United States is that western shepherds drive their sheep, but eastern shepherds would lead their sheep.
And you see it today when you go over to the Middle East. You see a shepherd walking in front of the flock, not driving them, leading them. And why would he lead them? Because sheep don't know where they're going.
Yeah, you can drive them using sheep dogs, but it's better if you lead them because the sheep will come to trust you, actually. Shepherds have said, my sheep are very at ease when I'm around because it's like they have this instinct that says, I know that he knows where he's going. He knows where the spots are, right?
He makes me lie down in green pastures. He leads me beside the still waters, as David said. So he goes in front of them. He leads them. They follow him.
They know his voice. Yet they will by no means follow a stranger, but will run away from him, flee from him, for they do not know the voice of a stranger. Jesus used this illustration, but they did not understand the things which he spoke to them. Then Jesus said to them, before we get into that, and then we're going now to the second sheep enclosure.
There's an underlying truth in all this, and we've kind of given you and unfolded and unpacked the meaning of these words, but here's an underlying truth. Sheep need to be led. Sheep need shepherds. We need his guidance. We need him to lead us.
We need to depend on him. We're glad you joined us today. Before you go, if you've been blessed by this ministry and want to bless others with the kind of teaching you've heard today, please consider a generous year-end gift to help meet our financial goal by December 31st. Through your support, you'll help encourage and equip more people with solid biblical teaching that takes them verse by verse through Scripture and connects them with Jesus. To give a tax-deductible year-end gift today, call 800-922-1888.
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