John Chapter 10:16-27

David said, Do you ever doubt the Lord? And today, what is your decision regarding following Jesus? As we look through the scriptures, we see that Jesus was not surprised to be taken to the cross.

He actually laid his life down for you and me. Pastor David McGee discusses this important truth as he continues in the Gospel of John chapter 10. Now, here's David McGee with part 4 of his teaching, The Shepherd. John chapter 10, verse 16. And other sheep I have which are not of this fold, them also I must bring, and they will hear my voice. And there will be one flock and one shepherd. I believe the Lord is speaking of us as Gentiles here, being grafted in, the future flocks. Jesus is looking for those that are hungry and those that are hurting, those that are caught deep and dark in their sin.

He's looking for them. This was spoken to people who lived around sheep and saw sheep a lot. I mean, if you go over to Israel today, you'll see a lot of shepherds outside of Jerusalem keeping their flocks and stuff. But, you know, we don't really understand the symbolism of some of the shepherd sheep things. So the Lord laid on my heart for us to talk about that a little bit.

So do me a favor. Leave your finger right there, John 10. We're coming back to John 10. But let's go to a chapter that talks about sheep and shepherd. Let's go to Psalm 23, Psalm 23.

It's in the Old Testament, about in the middle of the Old Testament. Some of you are familiar with this psalm. And understand, this is a psalm of David who was a shepherd, but David is not writing this psalm as a shepherd. He's writing it as a sheep. And he starts out and he says, the Lord is my shepherd.

Well, that right there is really awesome. David's not just shepherd by anybody. We're not just shepherded by anybody. We're shepherded by God.

How awesome is that? See, this is God who created us, who knows us, who knows our weaknesses, knows our frailties, knows we like to wander and look for holes in the fence. But he still wants to be our shepherd.

What an amazing thing. And let me ask you a question. Who better qualified to be our shepherd than the God who created us? He knows us. Let me ask you a question here.

And I'm not about to do like an expositional teaching of Psalm 23 because we're in John 10. I just want to mention a couple of things here. How did we come to be one of God's sheep? He bought us. He paid for us. And guys, we weren't cheap.

So you can tell the value someone places on an object when you look at what they were willing to pay for that object. Well, friend, God was willing to pay an extremely high price for you. He places that kind of value on you that he was willing to lay down his life so that you could be one of his sheep.

What a precious thing. The Lord is my shepherd I shall not want. Now, and understand too that the thing with a shepherd, this was a humbling analogy for Jesus to use. We've talked about this before. We have kind of sanitized shepherds and they look all nice in the manger scenes out in front of places and stuff.

They were kind of the rough and tumble guys of the time, if you will. For Jesus to humble himself in saying that he is the shepherd was a humbling. It was for him to come down where we are. And it says I shall not want.

Do you understand what this means? See, there's something about us that's always wanting, wanting, wanting, wanting, isn't there? There's something about us that's like that. But you know what? That is our flesh and that's part of this. We need to leave that behind because you know what?

If that's left unchecked, it will kill us. That part that always wants more. You can look at the world and they're always wanting more. It's never enough whether it's money or sex or drugs or whatever.

It's never enough. But that should not be the hallmark of a believer. Paul says I've learned to be content. You know what that means? That it can be learned, but it's not something we have naturally.

See, being content is not something we have naturally. But it can be learned and it says I shall not want. Now, verse 2, he makes me lie down in green pastures.

He leads me beside the still waters. Do you understand if Jesus is your shepherd and he wants to be your shepherd, you should be following him? You know what happens to sheep when they don't follow the shepherd? They get in trouble. They get in trouble pretty quick. I don't know if you can relate to that or not.

I sure can. When you're not following the shepherd, you get in trouble quick. And you know what? We're all following something or somebody, aren't we? Yeah, every one of us. The second life lesson is who you are following makes all the difference. Who you are following makes all the difference. Ask yourself this morning, who are you following? Now, I know a lot of us in here this morning go, Jesus, follow Jesus. Praise God. Well, that's great. That's a good answer.

That is, in fact, the answer I'm looking for. But are you? Are you following Jesus?

Because you know what happens at certain points in my life? I've been like in another pasture going, yeah, I'm following Him. Well, He's going the other way. Yeah, but I'm following Him.

I'm just going the opposite direction. Follow Him. Because you know what happens sometimes?

Oh, and this is really bizarre. We follow ourselves. We follow ourselves. See, when you look to do your will, you're drinking from your own will.

When you look to do the will of the Lord, of the Father, then you're drinking from His will. How often? You don't need to answer out loud, but how often have you followed yourself? Who are you following?

Because who you're following makes all the difference. He makes me to lie down in green pastures. He leads me beside the still waters. He restores my soul. He leads me in the paths of righteousness for His name's sake. Jesus wants to lead us into this type of life, and sheep tend to be wandering and rebellious so much that one of the things they do is they will mark the ear of the sheep so they know who it belongs to, which kind of reminds me, if you remember in the Old Testament, it talks about the fact that when somebody wanted to be a servant for life for somebody, doulos in the Greek word, they would mark them by putting an aw, by putting an earring in their ear, and they were marked as the servant for life to that person. I want to be content with what the Lord has provided, and I want this kind of relationship with the Lord.

I desire that, the still waters. There's a thirst and a hunger that seems to drive people that don't know the Lord that, you know, sometimes can drive me as well. It shouldn't be. It shouldn't be for you.

It shouldn't be for me. As a matter of fact, that's kind of a heart check sometimes. Another thing about sheep is they tend to run. That's what sheep do. Whenever they see something that freaks them out in the least little bit, I was reading a book by a shepherd, and he said, you know, he had like 200 sheep, and this guy came and visited the ranch, and a little Pekingese dog got out of the truck, and the sheep weren't really sure about the Pekingese, so they all ran in the opposite direction. Does that make, I mean, sheep are kind of big, I'm sure, and there's 200 of them.

I'm thinking they could have taken the Pekingese, okay? But they didn't. They were freaked out, so they ran.

You know why? Because that's what sheep do, but it can get them in trouble. And very often, it puts them right in the face of danger. They run so that they will feel safer, but in running, they place themselves in danger. Beloved, I don't know if you relate to that or not, but I sure do, because I have a propensity to do that as well, to run. To run when the Lord is trying to do something in my life.

Oh, I'm not talking about physically necessarily, although that could work. You know, leave church, leave a job, leave whatever, because you're running because you got freaked out about something. But you know, as a believer, as a follower of Jesus Christ, you don't have to do that. You don't have to run. Or if you do run, you run to Him.

You run to Him. Speaking of still waters and good waters, Jeremiah 2.13 says, They have forsaken me, the fountain of living waters, and hewn themselves cisterns, broken cisterns that can hold no water. See, this verse tells kind of what's going on. See, it makes sense that if a sheep needs a shepherd, that if you don't have one, that explains what's up with the world today. That explains why people are wandering around and they're hurt and they're lost and they're hungry and they're thirsty.

Why? Because they don't have a shepherd. And then they start to hewn these cisterns that don't hold water. You see that in broken lives and shattered hopes and messed up things in the lives of people who don't have a shepherd. Verse 4, Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for you are with me. Your rod and your staff, they comfort me. You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies. You anoint my head with oil.

My cup runs over. Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life, and I will dwell in the house of the Lord forever. So Psalm 42.5 says, Why are you cast down, O my soul?

Why are you disquieted within me? Hope in God, for I shall yet praise Him for the help of His countenance. In Psalm 37.23, we just looked at this one a couple weeks ago. The steps of a good man are ordered by the Lord, and He delights in His way. Though He fall, He shall not be utterly cast down, for the Lord upholds Him with His hand, or the Lord writes Him with His hand. Now notice it doesn't say that the good man never falls. It says though he fall, he's not cast down. The Lord will come and help him to write himself back again. So there's a lot of stuff in about sheep and shepherd, but let's go back to John chapter 10. Thank you for allowing me the rabbit trail there, if you will. We'll be right back with more from David Magee on Cross the Bridge. Right now, here's a word from associate pastor D.A. Brown. Hey Bob, I want to take a minute to pray for some of our listeners in these cities in Hawaii.

Kihei, Lanai City, Lehu, and also Ammon, Asseton, Boise, and Burley, Idaho. God, we thank you that we get to pray for these listeners today. We pray that they would be encouraged and remember how much you love them. Lord, if some of them are sick, we pray that you please heal them from the top of their head to the bottom of their toes. And Lord, we pray that you would equip them and empower them to share their testimony of your goodness to other people. In Jesus' name, amen. Amen.

Thank you, brother. And now, let's get back to David Magee as he continues teaching verse by verse. Verse 17, Therefore my Father loves me, because I lay down my life that I may take it again. No one takes it from me, but I lay it down with myself. I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it again.

This command I have received from my Father. Jesus here is not only predicting his death, but predicting his resurrection. Do you understand how amazing that is? I think we miss it because we've heard it so many times.

I don't think we give it its significance because we're so familiar with it. Understand, he's saying, you know what, guys, at some point I'm going to lay down my life, I'm going to die, but don't be too concerned because I won't be dead long. What an amazing thing. What an amazing thing of Joseph of Arimathea as they got the tomb. Hey, Joseph, we need this tomb, we need a place that's hewn out of rock because that's prophecy. We need a place where no man ever laid because that's prophecy. But, you know, it'll be fine because we just need it for like the weekend.

We're not going to use the tomb for very long. What an amazing thing. And Jesus doesn't just say this, but, you know, it's like when he said, I'm the light of the world, and what did he do? He healed a blind man that had been born blind. Here he says they will pick up his life again, and what does he do in the next chapter? He raises a guy from the dead. Oh, I guess I just ruined the next chapter for some of you, but still read it anyway.

There's a great story, Lazarus, the whole thing, we'll be in there in a couple of weeks. But words and deeds, words and actions. This is power here, isn't it? Power to lay down my life, power to pick it up again.

This is incredible. And understand, you know, we talk about who killed Jesus. Jesus says here, I laid down my life. I laid down my life.

He did it willingly for you and for me because he knew there was no other way. That's real power. You know, we think of power, I don't know, you know, we get, we think of power as a lot of weird things, don't we? We think of power as controlling finances or controlling people or controlling this or controlling that. We think that that's power. We are mistaken about what real power is. I saw a car last night, it was a Maserati, it was a nice car.

It was a Maserati, and as a matter of fact, the license plate says does 185. I thought that was kind of cute. Anyway, it's an old song, never mind. But that's not real power. That's not real power. What Jesus is talking about here, that's real power. You know what's really cool?

That's real power. That's our shepherd. Amen.

Doesn't that make you feel good? We're not like following some shepherd that hopes it works out and oh, how do you work this sling thing, you know? We're following a shepherd that has the power to be resurrected from the dead.

Man, if shepherds go, we got a good one, huh? That's the next life lesson. Jesus chose to lay down His life for you.

Jesus chose to lay down His life for you and me. You want to know real love? You're looking for real love, like all the commercials are looking for real love. If you're looking for real love, this is it, man. This is it.

It doesn't get any better than this. Because this is Jesus. We've done stuff against Jesus. We've committed sins. David said, against thee and thee alone have I sinned, Lord.

We've sinned against God. But He lays down His life for us. And while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. Jesus didn't die because of some political conspiracy or some Passover plot or whatnot. Jesus laid down His life for us so that we can be forgiven, so that we could have a relationship with Him. And you know what, friend? No one, but no one will ever love you so completely as Jesus loves you. Some of you may have been looking for love in some kind of weird places.

It doesn't get any better than this. He loves you so much, He laid down His life for you. Verse 19. Therefore there was a division among many, again, among the Jews because of these sayings. And many of them said, He has a demon and is mad.

Why do you listen to Him? Others said, These are not the words of one who has a demon. Can a demon open the eyes of the blind? Now it was the feast of dedication in Jerusalem and it was winter. Then Jesus walked in the temple in Solomon's porch. Then the Jews surrounded Him and said to Him, How long do You keep us in doubt?

If You are the Christ, tell us plainly. Is it just me or are these guys just a little bit thick? He's pretty much told them. And they're like, Well, You're causing us to doubt.

Don't miss that. You're causing us to doubt. They're blaming Jesus for the fact that they have an unbelieving heart. That's different, isn't it?

Yeah. A lot of people do that today. Verse 25. Jesus answered them and said, I told you and you do not believe. The works that I do in My Father's name, they bear witness of Me. So Jesus had done stuff.

He had said stuff. And again, the problem wasn't Jesus. The problem was their unbelieving heart. Now let me assure you of something. I've heard some people define faith as the absence of doubt. I personally kind of have a problem with that definition. I think faith is acting in spite of your doubt.

Because sometimes we paint to people, Hey, you know what? Don't ever doubt. You can't ever doubt the Lord. Well, let's be honest.

Who can qualify under those standards? I love what the man said to Jesus, whose son needed help. He said, I believe. Help my doubt. That is what we should say.

And we should be honest. At times when we're feeling weak and we feel filled with doubt and get people to pray for us and minister to us. I believe, Lord. Help my doubt. And don't act on your doubt. And don't believe your doubt. If you're going to doubt something, I know something weird. Doubt your doubt. Don't doubt your faith.

Amen. Verse 26. But you do not believe because you are not of My sheep, as I said to you. My sheep hear My voice, and I know them, and they follow Me.

My sheep hear My voice, and I know them, and they follow Me. These guys were looking for a political messiah. They were looking for somebody to liberate them from Rome. They were looking not for the messiah, but for their messiah, to act a certain way, to conduct himself a certain way.

And when Jesus didn't do that, they were disappointed in Him. Jesus says, My sheep hear My voice, in verse 27, and I know them, and they follow Me. Loved one, who are you following? You're here this morning.

And that's an indicator that you're open and want to hear spiritual things in the Bible. But who are you following? Are you following yourself in your ways?

Are you living a life that's filled with bitterness and disappointment? Well, you probably are if you're following yourself. May I suggest that this morning, today, you make a change in who you're following. Some of you may have followed the Lord for a long time, but something happened last week, last month, last year, and you got a little off track, and you're not really following Him the way that you know that you should, and you find yourself in trouble.

Maybe you're thirsty, and you don't know where the still water is. He's calling to you this morning. Hear His voice. You don't have to earn His forgiveness in any way. He wants to give it to you.

What you need to do is ask for it. This morning, you can choose to follow Jesus. And the last life lesson is your decision chooses your destiny. Your decision chooses your destiny.

See, the Lord has left it up to us, silly sheep that we are, He has left it up to us to make the decision on whether to follow Him or to follow someone else or to follow our own ways. But guys, let me tell you, somebody that has followed myself, it leads to disaster. And maybe you've been asking yourself, what's wrong with my life?

Why is this not working for me? I have to ask you, are you really following Jesus? Or maybe somewhere, somehow, you've gotten off track, and you're no longer following the shepherd. See, in spite of all our shortcomings and all our flaws and all our rebelliousness, Jesus wants us. He paid for us.

He paid for us this very morning. Isaiah, who knew something about sheep, in Isaiah 53, 6 says, all we like sheep have gone astray. We have turned everyone to His own way, and the Lord has laid on Him the iniquity of us all. So this morning, you can know the safety of the waters in a green pasture if you'll hear His voice. The sad thing is there may be people in here that won't listen. They're wondering what's wrong with life.

They're dissatisfied because they're in a barren pasture with no water to drink. And Jesus is here this morning calling to us, reminding us how much He loves us and how good of a life He desires for us. Don't turn away from that. Don't turn away from that. Some of you perhaps thought, well, you know, when I'm good enough for long enough, then the Lord will accept me and I'll come to Him.

It's not about being good enough for long enough. It's the fact that He already loves you, and this morning He's calling to you to come to Him. Some of you may have gotten off track somewhere along the way, and you need to be reminded that we are to follow Jesus. We are to follow the Good Shepherd. I recognize that as a sheep sometimes I'm rebellious and wandering, and I don't think that catches the Lord by surprise. But part of that is realizing that quite often I need to make sure I'm following the Good Shepherd. And notice, guys, it's not just the Shepherd.

It's the Good Shepherd. And I don't know what you've been following or who you've been following, but I promise you this, that if this morning you'll turn and you'll begin to follow Jesus, you will find yourself in a place of green pastures and still waters. If only you'll stop and you'll surrender. Friend, do you know for sure that your sins have been forgiven?

You can know right now. I want to lead you in a short, simple prayer, simply telling God you're sorry and asking Him to help you to live for Him. Now, God wants you to pray this prayer so much that He died to give you the opportunity and the ability to ask Him to forgive you.

Please pray this prayer with me out loud right now. Dear Jesus, I believe you died for me, that I could be forgiven. And I believe you were raised from the dead, that I could have a new life. And I've done wrong things. I have sinned.

And I'm sorry. Please forgive me of all those things. Please give me the power to live for you all of my days. In Jesus' name.

Amen. Friend, if you prayed that prayer, according to the Bible, you've been forgiven. You've been born again.

Jesus said He would not turn anybody away who comes to Him, and He came for those people who knew they needed forgiveness, those who were sick, not the righteous. So congratulations, friend. You just made the greatest decision that you will ever make. God bless you. If you prayed that prayer with David for the first time, we'd love to hear from you. You can visit crossthebridge.com to receive our First Steps package with helpful resources to help you begin your walk with Christ.

Or you can write to Cross the Bridge at P.O. Box 12515, Winston-Salem, North Carolina, 27117, and share how God is working in your life. You know, the Bible tells us that the free gift of God is eternal life in Jesus Christ our Lord. But it does cost for us to come and bring that message to you and to others in your neighborhood through radio, through the Internet, and through the mobile technologies that God has gifted us to be able to use. So if you'd like to support this ministry, please go to crossthebridge.com, click on the donate button, and ask God how much he would have you give, either on a one-time basis or a continuing basis each month to help ensure that the teaching of God's Word continues to go out through Cross the Bridge.

Thank you so much. Well, D.A., before we go, what are some ways that we can bless our listeners? Each day you can wake up with encouragement from Pastor David through the Word of God with his email devotional, life lessons to consider, a daily reading plan, and a thought to meditate on throughout your day from the heart of David McGee. Thanks again for listening, and join us next time as David McGee continues teaching verse by verse in the Gospel of John.