I Am the Good Shepherd B

So here, our Lord explains how He fulfills the identity of the Good Shepherd. He is the true Shepherd of the sheep, and He will bring them all together as one flock with one Shepherd, and that's why Paul in Galatians 3 says, in Christ there's neither junior Greek. He unites his sheep.

He brings them together. It may be because you took considerable time and effort and money to get it, or maybe you've taken even more time and effort to restore and maintain it. Whatever the reason, you're always going to be more concerned about your family car than one you rent.

The reason? Ownership. And in the same way, Jesus not only cares for His sheep, He owns them. So what does that mean for His relationship with you, and what are the implications for those who lead local churches? Consider that today on Grace to You as John MacArthur looks at the person of Christ from some angles that you may have missed.

If you have your Bible, turn to John chapter 10 as John MacArthur continues his series called Rediscovering the Christ of Scripture. 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 is not the owner of the sheep, sees the wolf coming and leaves the sheep and flees, and the wolf snatches them and scatters them.

He flees because He's a hired hand, or a hireling, and is not concerned about the sheep. I am the Good Shepherd, and I know My own, and My own know Me, even as the Father knows Me and I know the Father. And I lay down My life for the sheep.

I have other sheep, which are not of this fold. I must bring them also, and they will hear My voice, and they will become one flock with one shepherd. For this reason the Father loves Me because I lay down My life so that I may take it again. No one has taken it away from Me, but I lay it down on My own initiative.

I have authority to lay it down, and I have authority to take it up again. This commandment I received from My Father." This Shepherd, this Shepherd, the Good One, is marked by three particular ministries to His sheep. One, He dies for them. Two, He loves them. Three, He unites them. He dies for them.

He loves them. He unites them. Back to verse 11. The Shepherd, the Good One, lays down His life for the sheep. Shepherds were absolutely responsible for sheep. It was serious business.

It was a man's man's job, and it was really kind of a lowly and humble job as well because it was unskilled, and it was high risk, and it was messy and dirty. But a Shepherd was absolutely responsible for the sheep. If anything happened to the sheep, he had to produce proof that it was not his fault due to dereliction of duty or rustling the sheep away for his own keeping or letting a friend take one or whatever. To the Shepherd, it was the most natural thing then to risk his life. It's what Shepherds did. It's what they did.

You could just take them to the grass and leave them there, I suppose. But why did the Shepherd stay? Why those long, long, long hours of staying there because he had to be a protector? A Shepherd who was doing what he should never hesitated to risk, perhaps even lay down his life.

It was voluntary because he didn't have to engage in that. That's why Jesus says, I am the Good Shepherd. The Shepherd who is the Good One lays down His life. He lays down His life. Go down to verse 18. No one has taken it away from me, but I lay it down on my own initiative.

I have authority to lay it down and to take it again. Freely, voluntarily, Jesus gave up His life for the sheep. Some would say, well, that's no big thing. He's God. So He had a body, and He gave up the body. Big deal. It's more than that.

It's strange that commentators would even say something like that. There was a lot more than that, and it's bound up in the word life. It lays down His life. It's not the word bios or zoē. Those are the two words for life in Greek. Bios, biological life. Zoē, that gets transliterated, zoology, the study of life.

It was neither of those sort of scientific words. It's the word sukē, which is the word for soul, which speaks of the whole person. Not the outside, but the inside.

The sukē is the inside. He gave up His soul, His whole person. He didn't just feel the pain of the nails in His body and the pain of the thorns in His body and the pain of the scourging in His body. His whole soul was tortured with sin-bearing, anguish, suffering. In Matthew 20, 28, Jesus said, the Son of Man gives His soul a ransom for many. It translates life, but it's sukē again. He gives His soul, His whole person, and He felt it in every part of His being.

Why did He do that? Why did He voluntarily laid down His soul? He says, for the sheep who pair on behalf of, for the benefit of. That's exactly what it says in 2 Corinthians 5, 21, where Paul explains, He who knew no sin became sin for us, for us, for us, for us.

Who pair appears in a lot of passages that speak about the substitutionary atonement of Christ, that He took our place, that He died for us. Actual atonement, folks. He laid down His soul for the sheep. That's pretty narrow, for the sheep.

It was an actual atonement, a complete atonement for the sheep whom He knew and who when called would know Him, did it for the benefit of the sheep. From a natural standpoint, if this happened to the shepherd, that's the end of the sheep. If something's coming after the sheep and kills the shepherd, the sheep are going to be vulnerable. They're liable to be killed.

They're liable to be scattered, whether it's an animal or a robber or a thief. The death of the shepherd could really spell the end of the sheep. But this shepherd? No, because He laid down His life. Verse 18 says He had the power to do what?

Take it up again. And on the third day, He came out of the grave and regathered His scattered sheep. Were they scattered?

Yeah, they were. Smite the shepherd and what? The sheep were scattered, Zechariah promised, and they were. But He came back from the grave and regathered them. And He said this, all that the Father gives Him will come to Me, and I have lost none of them. So the death of the shepherd usually meant the death of the sheep in some cases, but not in this case.

Why did He die? Isaiah 53, 8, for the transgression of My people. Matthew 1, 21, you shall call His name Jesus, for He shall save His people from their sins, His sheep. It's an actual atonement.

It's not a potential one that you can sort of turn into a real one by believing. He actually paid in full the penalty for His sheep whom He knew, and throughout human history is calling to Himself. Very unlike a hired hand, verse 12, He was a hired hand and not a shepherd, who is not the owner of the sheep, sees the wolf coming, leaves the sheep and flees, and the wolf snatches them and scatters them. He flees because He's a hired hand and is not concerned about the sheep. The true shepherd, or the owner, and sometimes they were the same, He cares about the sheep.

It's not a job for Him. It's His very life, and He has developed relationships with those sheep. They're known to Him.

They're loved by Him. That's not true of hired hands. I like the old translation, hirelings, hirelings. Characteristic of a hireling, according to Zechariah 11, is that He makes no attempt to gather the scattered sheep. The world has always been full of hirelings. This is another word for the leaders of Israel. Strangers, thieves, robbers, now hired hands, hirelings.

I suppose it's better to be a hireling who runs than a thief or a robber, but the end is the same and the end is the same. The sheep become victims of any of these, and the world has always been full of this, and the flock of God is always attacked, and the world is always attacked by these false leaders who fleece and destroy the sheep and who flee when real trouble comes. And who is the wolf? The wolf is anything that attacks the sheep, anything.

Anything satanic, anything satanically orchestrated through the world, anything. Anything that comes against the sheep. There are many false pastors, false teachers, as there have been throughout history. They may say, Lord, Lord, we did this, we did that, and He's going to say, Depart from Me, I never knew you.

They're perverse men, Acts 20, who rise up within the church and lead people astray, as well as wolves from the outside. But Jesus is the one who will risk His life and give it up for the sheep. So the first characteristic, then, of the shepherd's relationship to the sheep is he gives his life. Secondly, he loves his sheep. And this is, of course, what's behind the giving of his life. Verse 14, I am the shepherd, the good one, and I know My own, and My own know Me, even as the Father knows Me, and I know the Father, and I lay down My life for the sheep. This explains why he lays down his life voluntarily for the sheep, because he knows them. You say, where did he get love?

There's no love there. It's all four times the verb genosko, to know. Well let me show you something, just a little bit of a hint. My Father knows Me, verse 15. My Father knows Me, verse 15. Verse 17, the Father loves Me. The Father loves Me.

That's the interpretive key. The word know here has the idea of a loving relationship. And this goes all the way back to Genesis 4, 1, where Adam knew his wife, and she had a child. Cain knew his wife, and she had a child. Adam knows Eve again, and another child, Seth. God actually says, in Amos, Israel only have I known. It doesn't mean the Jews are the only people He's acquainted with. What is it talking about?

It says about Joseph that he was so disturbed because Mary was pregnant, and he had never known her. What is that talking about? That's a euphemism for intimacy. It's not about information.

It's not about information. It's about love, and that four times that word know here, it implies this intimate relationship, this intimate, sweet, loving fellowship, this sort of consummated relationship. In the fourteenth chapter of John and verse 21, He who has My commandments and keeps them is the one who loves Me, and he who loves Me will be loved by My Father, and I will love him and disclose Myself to him. So there the language is love rather than knowing, verse 23. If anyone loves Me, he will keep My word. My Father will love him.

We will come to him and make our abode with him. So when you see the word know in this context, it's the idea of loving, intimate relationship. He loves his sheep. He knows them more than knowing their name, more than knowing who they are. He has an intimate relationship with them. He knows them intimately. In this Sermon on the Mount, Jesus said, Depart from Me, I never what? I never knew you, but I know who you are. It's not about information. I know who you are.

I don't have any intimate relationship with you, any love relationship. He wanted to give His life for His sheep because He knew them. He loved them. That is John 3.16, God so loved the world that He what? Gave His only begotten Son. That's why the Father gave the Son.

That's why the Son gave His life. He loves His sheep. He loves His sheep. This, too, is in stark contrast to the false shepherds who have no love for the sheep, no affection for the sheep that they claim to shepherd. He loves His own.

That love leads to a third aspect of the relationship. He unites the sheep, first with Himself and then with each other. Verse 16, I have other sheep which are not of this fold. I must bring them also, and they will hear My voice, and they will become one flock with one shepherd. The fold in verse 1 is Israel, right? The shepherd comes to the fold, calls out his sheep. The Lord is the shepherd. He comes to Israel, to the Jew first, and He calls out His sheep by name, and they follow Him. But He also has sheep which are not of the fold of Israel.

I have to bring them also. Who are they? Non-Jews. Anybody outside Israel, the Gentiles, the nations.

This is stunning. This is unacceptable to the Jews. This is more fuel for their animosity because they resent Gentiles.

They believe Gentiles are permanently outside salvation, the covenant, and the promises of God. And yet, in Isaiah 42, a Messianic chapter, a Messianic prophecy, we read, verse 6, I am the Lord. I have called you in righteousness. This is God speaking to the Messiah.

I will also hold you by the hand and watch over you. I will appoint you as a covenant to the people, as a light to the nations, to open blind eyes and bring prisoners from the dungeon and those who dwell in darkness from the prison. There's a Messianic promise that the Messiah would take salvation to the nations. He's shocking them by saying, look, I have sheep not in your fold.

That's why there's a great commission. Go into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature. Go make disciples of all nations. And He will bring them all together as one flock with one shepherd. And that's why Paul in Galatians 3 says, in Christ there's neither Jew nor Greek, Jew or Gentile.

That's why in Ephesians 2, Paul says, the middle wall of partition is torn down and we're all one in Christ, Jew, Gentile. That was always his intent. He unites his sheep. He brings them together to himself, to each other. So that is the relation of the good shepherd to the sheep. He gives his life because he loves them and he brings them into intimate unity with himself and with one another.

He that is joined to the Lord is one Spirit, one with Him and one with all others in the one body of Christ. Secondly, and just briefly, the relationship of the good shepherd to the Father is in verses 17 and 18. For this reason the Father loves me because I lay down my life so that I may take it again. No one has taken it away from me, but I lay it down on my own initiative. I have authority to lay it down, have authority to take it up again. This commandment I received from my Father.

Let me give you a simple understanding of that. The Father gave a command. The command to Jesus was lay your life down and take it up. You have the authority to do that. I'm commanding you to do it. It was a command, but no one has taken it from me.

I lay it down on my own initiative. That's why the Father loves me, because of my obedience. This is pretty profound. Yes, the Father chose Jesus to be the Lamb, the acceptable sacrifice. Yes, the Father is the one who killed the Son by the predetermined counsel and foreknowledge of God. He was the sacrifice.

But this is not fatalism. This is not something about which Jesus had no choice. I lay my life down. No one takes it from me, including God. Jesus is telling us this was a perfect act of willing obedience.

These are mysteries. He couldn't sin. He had no capacity to sin, and yet there's a real struggle because in the garden He says, Father, if it's possible, do what? Stop this.

Take this cup from Me. Nevertheless, not My will. Let Yours be done. He voluntarily did what the Father commanded Him to do, and that's how He demonstrated His love to the Father, and that's why the Father loves Him. The Father loves me because I lay my life down that I may take it again. That's what the Father wanted Him to do.

That was critical to the plan of salvation, to gather the redeemed into eternal glory. He did it voluntarily. This was not fatalistic. This wasn't something He had no choice about.

He couldn't make a wrong choice, but He voluntarily made the right choice. I had a command given to Me. I voluntarily, willfully obeyed that command, and thus secured the Father's love. If You love Me, Jesus said, do what? Keep My commandments. That's how You affirm Your love. His relationship to the Father was one of love and obedience, love and obedience, two sides of the same thing.

That's a model for us. Have this mind in you, which was also in Christ Jesus, who was obedient unto death, even the death of the cross. The Father eternally loves the Son.

Of course, the Son eternally loves the Father, but in some unique way in the incarnation, the Son voluntarily, willfully obeyed the command of the Father to give up His life out of love for the Father, and in so doing, sustained the Father's love forever, love and obedience. There's a final relationship here, the relationship of the Good Shepherd to the world. The relationship of the Good Shepherd to the world.

What is it? Well, it's in verses 19 to 21, a division occurred again among the Jews because of these words. By the way, if you go back to chapter 7, verse 43, back to chapter 9, I think it's verse 16, there are divisions. Jesus divided the crowd. The divisions, though, are not between necessarily believers and non-believers. They're divisions among non-believers, and that's what you have here.

A division occurred among the Jews because of what Jesus had said. Many of them, many of them, maybe the majority of them, were saying, He has a demon and is insane. Why do you listen to Him?

That would have been the mantra, of course, of the leaders, and the people would have bought into it. You know, He does what He does by the power of Beelzebub, Satan, as we read in Matthew 12. So at one pole in the division were the people who said, Jesus is a maniac. He's a madman. He's a demon-possessed lunatic. We have people like that, people who don't mind cursing Jesus, saying blasphemous things about Him. But then there were the others, verse 21, saying, these are not the sayings of one demon-possessed. I mean, that's pretty rational, isn't it?

That's pretty rational. A demon can't open the eyes of the blind, can he? Demon-possessed people don't talk like that. They're not coherent, and they don't do that.

They don't do those miracles. So whatever counterfeit things demons do, they don't look like this. So these are the more rational people. I guess you could say the first are the irrational blasphemers. The second are the more rational people, and they both end up in the same hell forever because it really doesn't matter whether you curse Jesus or whether you think you need to treat Him more reasonably.

That kind of hesitation gets you nothing. You either confess Jesus as Lord or die in your sins and occupy the same hell with the extreme blasphemers. So we meet the Good Shepherd. In relation to His sheep, He gives His life for His sheep. He loves His sheep. He unites His sheep. His relation to the Father, He loves and obeys the Father.

His relation to the world, He's rejected either by those who blaspheme Him in a kind of irrational way or by those who rationally tolerate Him. But for us, we'll place ourselves among the disciples there that day, and we'll say with them, you are the Christ, the Son of the living God, won't we? And we'll say this for our benediction, Hebrews 13, 20, now the God of peace who brought up from the dead the great Shepherd of the sheep through the blood of the eternal covenant, even Jesus our Lord equip you in every good thing to do His will, working in us that which is pleasing in His sight through Jesus Christ, to whom be the glory forever and ever.

Amen. We declare Him to be the great Shepherd of the sheep who came out of the grave. He is our Shepherd. This is Grace to You with John MacArthur.

Thanks for being with us. John is a pastor, author, and chancellor of the Masters University and Seminary. His current study is titled Rediscovering the Christ of Scripture. John, I love this series, and it's obvious you've done some deep study on this, because you keep bringing out points that aren't really obvious from a casual reading of Scripture.

You've got background on shepherding, you tell us the meaning of key Greek words, and that's always important. So do we have to know Greek or ancient history in order to benefit from God's Word? Yeah, the answer is we do, because it was written in an ancient language, and when you go back to the original autographs, the original inspired autographs inspired by the Holy Spirit, the Holy Spirit inspired the words in Hebrew and Greek.

So we need to be able to go back and understand them at their very, very primary point. Also, history fills in the context for Scripture. I often think about that with Jesus when he said, I am the light of the world.

And that seems like a statement out of nowhere, unless you understand that he was standing in the temple, and that the candelabra, the menorah, the massive menorah was in the courtyard there, and the feast had ended, and that candle had been extinguished, and Jesus is standing by that massive candelabra in the temple and saying, I'm the light that never goes out. Well, how significant is that little bit of information about the context? So yes, all of that helps us understand the Bible, because we have to understand it in its original language and its original context. Now that leads me to remind all of you about the MacArthur Study Bible. This is a one-volume library to help you understand the Bible.

Over 25,000 footnotes explaining context, sometimes explaining original words. It gives you the text of the Bible and then explanations on every page of virtually every passage. It helps you navigate and dig into and grasp truth.

It gives you cross-references, all kinds of historical explanations. It's the single most important thing that we offer at Grace To You. We have it in everything from hardbound and leather and premium goatskin and New American Standard, New King James, ESV. If you don't have a MacArthur Study Bible, you need to get one, and you can certainly order it from Grace To You. With detailed introductions to each book of the Bible and about 25,000 footnotes from Genesis to Revelation, the MacArthur Study Bible makes virtually every passage of the Bible clear. It's an ideal gift for a new believer or for someone who's been a Christian for years. To get your copy of the MacArthur Study Bible, contact us today. Call our toll-free number 800-55-GRACE or visit our website, gty.org. Again, the MacArthur Study Bible comes in several different bindings and several different translations. You can choose from the English Standard, New King James, or New American Standard versions. To see all the different binding options and the many non-English editions that are available, go to gty.org or call us at 800-55-GRACE. Also, let me remind you that Grace To You is supported by listeners like you, people who love the Word of God, who have been changed by it, and want to help us take biblical truth to believers worldwide from Peru to the United Kingdom to South Africa and beyond. To express your support, mail your tax-deductible donation to Grace To You, Box 4000, Panorama City, California 91412, or call 800-55-GRACE or donate online at gty.org. Now for John MacArthur and the Grace To You staff, I'm Phil Johnson. Thanks for making this broadcast part of your day, and be here tomorrow when John continues his series Rediscovering the Christ of Scripture with a look at perhaps the most astounding claim Christ made about Himself. It's another half hour of unleashing God's truth, one verse at a time, on Grace To You.