2022-10-26 I Am The Good Shepherd (Next Steps Edition)

The speaker discusses Jesus' analogy of himself as the Good Shepherd and the significance of his "I am" statements. Jesus declared his divinity and his role as the one and only way to God. He sacrificed his life for the sheep, offering them a rich and satisfying life. The speaker emphasizes the importance of knowing God's voice through studying the Bible and confessing Jesus as Lord in both words and actions. Belief in Jesus' resurrection and accepting his authority are key to a relationship with God. The speaker encourages listeners to be fully known and loved by God, acknowledging that God knows and loves us despite our flaws. The speaker also provides resources for further engagement with the message through social media and audio recordings. Tonight I'm going to be talking to you about an analogy that Jesus made as Describing himself as the Good Shepherd and we're going to unpack What that means so I brought a few Proceed things today to help us get in the feel of you know shepherds and stuff. We've got our staff here There we go also, I Have a sheep So, you know, we're prepared. We're ready This is doubly everyone. This is Hannah's sheep. She got him when she went on a trip to Dublin hence the name doubly So what's with all this? It's because we are looking at Jesus. I am statement the guy where he said I am the Good Shepherd Now Jesus I am statements in the Bible are several statements that he made in the gospel records about who he is, right? You know, maybe somebody says what do you do and you say? Oh, I am an electrician or something like that, right? So it was a statement about who he is, but this was more than just Jesus telling us his occupation I'm a good shepherd, you know, I'm pretty good at it. This is more than that. This was a Culture shaking statement these I am statements that he made because way back in the book of Exodus in the beginning of the Bible God introduces himself to Moses as I am He was stating that he's the ever Existent one. So as Jesus stated, I am the Good Shepherd and all the other I am statements that he made in the New Testament He was also stating his divinity at the same time He was stating that he is God, right? So if anyone ever asks you where in the Bible does Jesus say he is God every single time He said I am the Good Shepherd. I am the door I am the way and the truth in life each one of those statements was a statement declaring that he is God and Not just any God, but he was signaling to the Israelites in particular. Hey this I am the same one I'm the God of Moses nation of Israel and ultimately the world So we're going to be in particular though looking at the Good Shepherd. I am the Good Shepherd. So we're going to pick this up in John chapter 10 starting in verse 1 So he says I tell you the truth This is Jesus speaking anyone who sneaks over the wall of a sheepfold rather than going through the gate must surely be a thief and A robber but the one who enters through the gate is the shepherd of the sheep The gatekeeper opens the gate for him and the sheep recognize his voice and come to him He calls his own sheep by name and leads them out After he has gathered his own flock. He walks ahead of them and they follow him because they know his voice They won't follow a stranger. They'll run from him because they don't know his voice Those who heard Jesus use this illustration didn't understand what he meant So we explained it to them. I tell you the truth. I am The gate for the sheep all who came before me were thieves and robbers, but the true sheep did not listen to them Yes, I am the gate those who come in through me will be saved They will come and go freely and will find good pastures The thief's purpose is to steal and kill and destroy. My purpose is to give them a rich and satisfying life. I Am the Good Shepherd the Good Shepherd Sacrifices his life for the sheep a hired hand will run when he sees a wolf coming He will abandon the sheep because they don't belong to him and he isn't their shepherd And so the wolf attacks them and scatters the flock The hired hand runs away because he's working only for the money and doesn't really care about the sheep I am the Good Shepherd I know my own sheep and they know me just as my father knows me and I know the father So I sacrifice my life for the sheep I have other sheep too that are not in this sheepfold I must bring them also they will listen to my voice and there will be one flock with one shepherd The father loves me because I sacrificed my life so I may take it back again. No one can take my life from me I Sacrificed it voluntarily for I have the authority to lay it down When I want to and also to take it up again for this is what my father has commanded So there's a lot of nuggets to unpack in this passage first Let's remember that this passage and I would personally argue the entire Bible are meant to teach us about who God is. I Think we often turn to the word looking to learn more about ourselves or how we can respond to specific situations in our lives rather than learning who God is and therefore growing closer to him and I think that we will find though that as we grow closer to him and we learn more about him We will be able to better face the specific situations in our lives But it's going to come from first starting to learn about who he is That's what we come to the Bible for you know, we ought to we need to remember that the Bible is not a self-help book It's not a reference book of good moral values It's the primary portal with which we learn about God and his character, that's what the Bible is It's how we get to know his voice you know, I used to Think when I was younger that the Bible was kind of secondary to prayer and I thought this is because you know That's where we get our personal application of Scripture, but without thorough and constant study of the Bible We won't recognize God's voice when we pray and we'll be open to just interpreting our own thoughts or worse distractions from elsewhere right from the devil and from negative influences out there and interpreting it as if it was God's voice so maybe as We read through this passage About how the sheep will know his voice. You might have been thinking. I don't really know his voice I wish I did. I wish it was clear to me when God is speaking Let me ask you this what voice or voices? Do you fill your mind and heart with all sorts of object lessons today? So my parents used to say that if you fill up a bucket, this is this Container if you will, it's filled with jungle blocks here. If you fill up a bucket and then it gets knocked over What Comes out is what you put in I fill this up with Jenga blocks. So that's what came out when I knocked it over What are you filling your bucket with what voices are you putting inside your life? That is going to come out we will know his voice by spending time in his word and filling our buckets with him and I've met people who told me you know, I read the Bible so I know all about Christianity I mean good job congrats on your brownie points read it again, then read it again and then read it again It's a layer upon layer revelation and it's only in reading this best record We have of his words that will begin to notice his patterns It's just like reading a letter or an email or a text from your friend over time You'll see the consistency in their voice, right? Let's look at the first I am statement in the passage that we just read and it came from the section on verses 7 to 10 there And it's my first point that the Good Shepherd is our one way to God the Father In that section Jesus said I am the door or the gate There's not another way to get to the Father except through Jesus What so what is Jesus way? To get to the Father look like while Romans 10 9 says if you confess with your mouth The Lord Jesus and believe in your heart that God has raised him from the dead. You will be saved So, what does that mean? There's two main parts of that number one Belief in the miraculous fact that God died and came back to life Not metaphorically, but literally I mean most of us tend to understand that part, right? But it's the next part we have trouble with the confession that Jesus is Lord part. That's somewhat harder That's the second part of this confessing that Jesus is Lord. So well, what's a Lord? Well, Lord is a title and it indicates that Jesus is our Authority figure He's the most supreme and utter authority in our life so to confess that Jesus is Lord is to acknowledge Jesus both verbally and With our actions and life choices in all that we do It's funny. We really really focused on that first part the being saved part. He's our Savior and Lord, right? We say right we really focused on that saves part. We call it getting saved. We don't call it getting being made a servant Right. We don't really like to focus on that. Do we? So why can't there be another way, you know, a lot of people wish there was another way besides Jesus way But Jesus is saying he is the gate the one Entrance way to God an eternal life and freedom from sin Acts 4 12 says that salvation is found in no one else where there is no other Name under heaven given to mankind by which we must be saved Directly though. Could there be a better way? It's kind of a funny question because if God is perfect, then why would he create many ways? To him if he knew the best way if he's perfect and he knows the best way why is he going to make a whole bunch of funky detours to for your or choose your own adventure to get there and I think That's why the idea that a lot of people have that All religions serve the same God with a different name or details is pure nonsense. There's no logic to that argument why would God create a religion with a million faces and names if he knew the singular best way and I think if we're honest with ourselves When we want to believe that it's not because we're tolerant or inclusive of other people's beliefs. It's because it's not fun Jesus way Sometimes it's hard. Sometimes it's hard to have God as the Lord of your life We want to be free spirits and not have any authority over us except for ourselves But that's the way that he gave us But here's the good part of that Jesus didn't come in and say I am the mediocre shepherd and I am the one way I Kind of not very good, but I'm all you got he said I'm the good Shepherd, right? That is the shepherd that we get to follow Which brings us to our second point the second statement that he makes in here the good shepherd Gives his life for the sheep. Why is he a good shepherd? Anyway, this is why he gives his life for the sheep And why did he have to give his life right because way back in the Garden of Eden Humankind broke their covenant with God and we were infected with sin. So what what the covenant in Modern terms, you know when you you install an app or you go to a website and there's a Terms of Service Agreement that none of us read and we just click accept If you've actually read one through I'll be impressed But we just accept that well That is essentially a covenant that you are making to use that software or that app this agreement while humanity broke the Terms of Service agreement with God for a holy relationship with him and That's sin that Imperfection cannot coexist with a perfect God so the destruction of that Impurity was the only solution and Unfortunately now we were tied with that impurity so Jesus steps in to take that impurity to Himself and have it put to death on the cross and take the punishment for the crimes for humanity. So how do you and I? benefit from this We can now get the grace that we don't deserve because Jesus took the penalty that he didn't deserve We now get to have a relationship with God without the barrier of sin in the way You know in practice we still mess up while we live here on earth, but in heaven You know the full essence of this relationship can be experienced but here on earth We pledge to acknowledge that we need Jesus to be the bridge or the gateway to God to cover over the chasm of our sin there was an Unpassable chasm between us and a holy God because of our imperfection and Jesus became that bridge Which brings us to my last point for tonight Jesus reiterates that he is the Good Shepherd that he knows his sheep Jesus knows us What does it mean? That he knows you and I Jesus like a shepherd knows the quirks and the character of His sheep probably no one in this room is a shepherd or has ever been a shepherd or probably even met a shepherd So you probably haven't spent much time around sheep but if you've ever heard the expression herding cats or if you've ever been around a cat or Kids for that matter, you know, they don't just go where you want them to go Right sheep are like that. They're all over the place. They're prone to wander Like a shepherd Jesus knows the quirks and characters of the sheep they're competing desire to wander off and do their own thing and their desire to get fed and be safe and Protected he knows where we stray and knows what's best for us And we like sheep tend to push back at this. We don't want to be told which way to go We want to do our own thing and yet we want nothing but being told which way to go and we're confused Isn't that true? right We want all of Jesus guidance, but complete autonomy to make up our own minds and have no consequences about it Yeah, he knows us and loves us Anyway, the song known by Torn Wells says I'm fully known and loved by you. You won't let go no matter what I do, and it's not one or the other It's hard truth and ridiculous grace to be fully known and loved by you A lot of people struggle to understand God's seriousness about sin But also his grace and his love but it's not one or the other It's both it's both Isn't it a beautiful thing to be fully known Yet fully loved beyond our flaws beyond our wandering God knows all this and loves us anyway anyone here Who's married or in any kind of relationship honestly when you first met those people their flaws were not as apparent, right? You know if you've ever Experienced any kind of sort of love at first sight or puppy love It's based on a lot of superficial things and as you get to know that person You know whether you continue with them not they're going to drive you crazy at points, right? I've seen nodding heads. I know I'm If they're going to drive you crazy, but you choose at that point now it becomes a choice to love you choose to love But God knows us even more than our partner our parents anyone in our life could ever know He knows all of the crazy thoughts that we have in our head that nobody else hears and yet he still fully loves us So, how can we know him more, you know, you might be thinking that sounds pretty good to be fully known yet fully loved How can I be known this way again as we said before it's confessing Jesus as Lord in words and actions and believing that God raised him from the dead and it's funny because We say I got saved or so-and-so is a believer, right? It's really funny terminology and I don't have the better words for us and then probably just sound goofy if we try to use a Different word anyways, but my point that I'm trying to get as here being a Christian is so much more than believing in God, there's a verse in the Bible that always blows me away every time I read it in James I'm gonna paraphrase here. Okay, this is the Chris translation here. He's like You know, he says you believe in God Slow clap good job, buddy. He then he goes on it says even the demons believe and shudder We don't even usually do that part the shutter part we believe but we're not even usually convicted by that, right? He's saying yeah, the demons know God is real You're seeing them in heaven. Like what relevance is that for them? What relevance is this if we're not walking it out living it out, right? It's the confessing Jesus is Lord and not just our words Not just saying it any one of us could just sit here and say yeah, Jesus is Lord, whatever, right? Are we saying it with our actions? Are we saying it with our life? I don't want you to get caught up in this mentality of all I'm not good and I haven't done enough good things for God So I'm not you know a real Christian That's not what I'm saying here, but I'm just saying that if you we really believe something we live like we believe something You guys believe the seats gonna hold you up. We've talked about this before So you're living like it if you didn't believe that you wouldn't be sitting on the chair right now You wouldn't be living that way not about guilt It's not about things like that, but it is something to take to heart where you know, do I live like what I say? I believe so as we wrap up If you'd like to be fully known by the Good Shepherd yet loved Anyway, then let's pray together and even if you've been a Christian for many many years That's that's awesome. And I applaud that But let's still pray together. It's always good to recommit yourself and to to really think about what it means and and to take the seriousness of these moments and and Learn from them too for the conversations that we have with others you're never going to come to church and Come across a message that has nothing in it for you because if you knew it already Somebody's going to put it in different words that you haven't heard before That you'll be able to share somebody else Because I don't have the ability to go tell everybody in the world about Jesus No one in this room has the ability to tell every single person but God's going to put certain people in your path that he wouldn't put in my path because he knows if I put Chris in That person's path. They wouldn't be able to stand that guy, but you have the perfect Way of being you that is going to connect with that person in a way that I never could and there's other people that I'm Going to be able to connect with that. Maybe you never could so we each have that opportunity Well, let's just pray Lord, we acknowledge that we are prone to wonder That we have been rebellious that we've sinned against you and broken our covenant with you We need Jesus to be our gate our bridge to Heavenly Father We can't get there on our own Jesus come into our lives fill us with your Holy Spirit and help us to confess you To confess that you are the supreme authority over our life not just in our words, but in our actions, too But we believe that Jesus was raised from the dead in a literal way and live In us and that we are able to display him to the world around us and that he's erased Our sin and given us that connection to the father. We thank you for this in Jesus name. Amen Well, thanks so much for coming everyone really Appreciate each and every one of you that's here and I'm praying for you guys through the week I really mean that I am also I wanted to share with you guys that on here. You can find information about Our social media and our website and where that is a benefit to you If you've ever been sitting if you've ever gone from a church service here or anywhere else You've gone home you sat down and you're like, I remember that was a really good sermon I have no idea what he talked about in it. There's a famous quote I forget which president it was but it was a president United States who went home told it From church and his wife said what did the preacher talk about and he said sin I think and he said oh What was his position? He was against it, I think and You know So if you've ever been thinking like man There's something that he said or there was a particular Bible verse that he mentioned and I'm trying to look at that back up Again, if you go to that web page, we're starting to actually put up Audio recordings of these sermons that you can listen back You can listen to them back as a podcast as well If that's your that's your jam or if you're like, ah, that sounds cool, but I have 60 seconds Chris I'm a busy person. You can go to our social media It's the handle is on there. It's all the same on Facebook Instagram. Tick-tock YouTube go on any one of them and I've started doing like a 60-second recap of what I talked about From the previous night. It's also a great way if you want to show your friends what we are talking about It's a really easy way to share a one-minute video Anyhow, those will be on the table that looks like this next to the door out there and we'll see you guys next week God bless