Classic Christianity – Book of John Part 48 (07-22-19)
Synopsis
Jesus walked on this earth to come to his own, to show them that he is the Messiah that was to come into this world but his own did not receive him. But to those who did receive him he gave the right to become children of God, to those who believed in his name.
Jesus identified himself as the good shepherd. He is the shepherd for his sheep. The sheep are those who hear his voice and believe that he is the savior of the world, the one who gives life to men. He came first for the Jew and then the Gentile. The Gentiles later too heard the message along with some Jews and believed and were saved. Jesus all along came to make one new body, the Ecclesia, out of the two.
Jesus also identified himself as the gate, the only way by which man can be saved. Those who try to enter any other way except through Jesus, Jesus says their father is the devil and said they are a thief and a robber. The devil comes to steal, kill and destroy. Those who try the best they can or make up their own philosophy or try religion, God says they climbed over the fence and did not come in. They did not come in through the gate, the only possible way for man to enter the kingdom of heaven. You must be born again to enter the kingdom of heaven. That is the only way.
It is so natural for man to hear from the perspective of this world, of whom the god of this world, or Satan, deceives men. Are you in the world? Do we hear the voice of the world? Are you able to know the difference between the voice of the world and the voice of God? We get trapped in so many ways. The world is full of error, of ways to discourage us, to put us down and make us feel like second rate citizens. We have to learn to listen to the voice of God. If we get discouraged sometimes, and we do, then we need to listen to the voice of God. If you are anxious about tomorrow, and we do get anxious, then you have to listen to the voice of God. My sheep hear my voice. The voice of God says, “Do not be anxious.”
The humble, those who desire to do God’s will, will hear truth and believe the truth when they hear it. The proud have no room in their heart for God’s word. They cannot hear the voice of God. The religious Jews accused Jesus of being demon possessed and said he was a raving mad man. But the humble asked, “Can a demon possessed man make a blind man see?”
The religious world in his day were proud and did not understand him. They thought they could see but were blind to the truth. Jesus is the way, the truth and the life.
It is no different today. Either the devil is your father or God is you father. There is no in between. Whatever you think could save you apart from Jesus, you are blind. You have people today thinking that if you worship Allah, if you are a Muslim, you are saved. You could not be more blind. Others think that if you join the Catholic church you are saved. You could not be more blind. Others think that if you join the Baptist church you are saved. You are not saved by joining a club. You are saved only by God. No one else can save you. Bob once asked a Church of Christ person, “Who died for your sins?” Jesus, who was raised from the dead, and I was baptized by my pastor. “Who baptized you?” The pastor. So if you say baptism is what saved you, then you are saying part pastor and part Jesus. Nothing natural can co-mingle with the spiritual. It is all of him and none of us. If you think anything else you are blind. You think you can see but you can’t.
We must understand that the thief comes to steal, kill and destroy. He comes to steal our joy, to destroy our future thinking and to destroy anything we have got. We cannot allow him to do so. The world is out there. That voice is out there 24 hours a day. If we do not know our shepherd and know what our shepherd is teaching then we are a sitting duck for the enemy.
All you have to do is take this bible, read about the New Covenant, that contains the wisdom of God. If you do not know what is in this book you will not have the wisdom of God. If you do not have the wisdom of God then you will not know what the shepherd is saying. If you do not know what your shepherd is saying you will be a sucker for following what someone else is saying.
Transcript
Bob recalls something that got his attention. He was down in San Diego, a mill representative of a company he represented. He was with the guys just the night before, drinking all over the place. He remembers walking into that and thinking that it sounds like church. He recalls that he was totally wrong. Bob asked the guys, “You go to church?” They surprisingly replied, “What are you talking about, you go to church?” Bob was thinking, “What is wrong with these guys?” He saw no inconsistency in that. He only saw church as a nice place to go. In a church setting, something had to be taught. What Bob thinks what was taught is that if you are basically a nice person and good enough you will be okay. If someone asked, “Are you going to heaven?”, Bob would have answered, “yes, sure”. Bob never ever thought he would go to hell, no matter how bad he got. He grew up in a nice house, hasn’t killed anybody, haven’t stolen anything, at least recently. That is being taught by people blind as a bat who think they can see. Others say “if you come into my church, baptized in my waters, by my pastor, you will be saved. That is all it takes”. That is a person who is taught by a blind person who thinks they can see.
You can go become a missionary and that if you take a mission trip, then you are on your way. There are people who think that if you become a missionary and take a mission trip that will do it. John Wesley was one of those. John Wesley came to America to minister to the Indians in hope to save his own soul. He was a pastor, educated and came here to America trying to work to obtain salvation. He went back to England in total frustration. On his way back, his boat got in a terrific storm. He was scared to death, petrified. In the same boat were Moravian, bible believing Christians. They were singing songs. He thought, “How can these idiots be singing songs about Jesus when this boat is about to go down and I am sitting here petrified as a pastor?” The storm calmed down and they arrived in England. In a few weeks, he arrived in a place outside London, called Altersgate. While there a man was reading about a premise from the book of Romans, about justification by faith and faith alone. While they were reading, he came to realize that although he was trying to work for God, he realized he never accepted what God had done for him in the person of Christ Jesus. He trusted in Christ alone 100 percent for salvation and said his heart grew strangely warm. He was born again and then went all over England sharing the gospel when he finally understood that it was not about what he did for God but what God did for him. The teaching he was under was by blind men. Prior to that he thought he could see. He was blind thinking he could see. If he wasn’t thinking he could see, he would not be over there trying to save others.
That is what Jesus is talking about.
John 9:39
39 Jesus said, “For judgment I have come into this world, so that the blind will see and those who see will become blind.”
Whatever you think could save you apart from Jesus, you are blind. You have people today thinking that if you worship Allah, if you are a Muslim, you are saved. You could not be more blind. Others think that if you join the Catholic church you are saved. You could not be more blind. Others think that if you join the Baptist church you are saved. You are not saved by joining a club. You are saved only by God. No one else can save you. Bob once asked a Church of Christ person, “Who died for your sins?” Jesus, who was raised from the dead, and I was baptized by my pastor. “Who baptized you?” The pastor. So if you say baptism is what saved you, then you are saying part pastor and part Jesus. Nothing natural can comingle with the spiritual. It is all of him and none of us. If you think anything else you are blind. You think you can see but you can’t.
John 9:40
40 Some Pharisees who were with him heard him say this and asked, “What? Are we blind too?”
Duh! Who do you think I am talking to?
John 9:41
41 Jesus said, “If you were blind, you would not be guilty of sin; but now that you claim you can see, your guilt remains.”
You think you can see but you are going a different direction than me. Your problem is that you are blind but think you can see.
John 10:1<br\>
1 “Very truly I tell you Pharisees, anyone who does not enter the sheep pen by the gate, but climbs in by some other way, is a thief and a robber.”
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There is one way to get into the sheep gate. So if you don’t go through the gate, but climb over the fence it means you are trying to get in some other way than the way to go in. He calls him a thief and he calls him a robber. It is like people trying to get into heaven some other way than through the sheep gate. A person says, “I am trying to get in by my good works”. Jesus responds, “You are climbing over the fence. You are a thief and a robber”. A person says, “I am trying to get in by belonging to this church”. Jesus replies, “You are climbing over the fence”. A person says, “I am going to get there because God chose me. He did not choose you but he chose me\”. Jesus replies, “You are climbing over the fence. You are not going in through the gate but you are thinking God dropped you in there because he likes you. You are not going through the gate. You are a thief and a robber”. That is a reformed theology, going by a parachute drop and not through the gate.
John 10:2-4
2 The one who enters by the gate is the shepherd of the sheep. 3 The gatekeeper opens the gate for him, and the sheep listen to his voice. He calls his own sheep by name and leads them out. 4 When he has brought out all his own, he goes on ahead of them, and his sheep follow him because they know his voice.
In the sheep herding business, even today in Israel, there is a guttural sound that a shepherd makes that is only heard by the sheep. The sheep immediately respond for this is the voice of the shepherd and they follow him. If you are not hearing his voice, then you are not his sheep. There are two fathers. If you do not belong to God then you belong to Satan. There is no in between. You are either in Satan’s camp or in God’s camp.
John 10:5
5 “But they will never follow a stranger; in fact, they will run away from him because they do not recognize a stranger’s voice.”
You can have shepherds in a field and all have their own sheep. One sheepherder will make this guttural sound and only his sheep will hear and follow him. Yes, these sheep are very interesting, that this guttural sound with over a thousand sheep, and only his sheep will hear and follow him.
John 10:6-7
6 Jesus used this figure of speech, but the Pharisees did not understand what he was telling them.
7 Therefore Jesus said again, “Very truly I tell you, I am the gate for the sheep.”
Another one of those “I am”s. Did he not say he is the way, the truth and the life and no man can come to the Father except through me?
John 14:6
6 Jesus answered, “I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.”
John 10:8
8 All who have come before me are thieves and robbers, but the sheep have not listened to them.
All this theology you have heard of how to be saved were made by people who are jumping over the fence. But the sheep do not listen to them.
John 10:9
9 I am the gate; whoever enters through me will be saved. They will come in and go out, and find pasture.
If you enter through me you will be saved. You can go out and intermix with the world but when you hear the voice of God you will know to follow him. Are you in the world? Do we hear the voice of the world? Are you able to know the difference between the voice of the world and the voice of God? We get trapped in so many ways. The world is full of error, of ways to discourage us, to put us down and make us feel like second rate citizens. We have to learn to listen to the voice of God. If we get discouraged sometimes, and we do, then we need to listen to the voice of God. If you are anxious about tomorrow, and we do get anxious, then you have to listen to the voice of God. My sheep hear my voice. The voice of God says, “Do not be anxious.”
Philippians 4:6-7
6 Do not be anxious about anything, but in every situation, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. 7 And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.
That is God’s voice. The world’s voice says, “Worry about it. Get discouraged.” Depression is almost in epidemic proportions in the world today. Did you know there is no such thing as being depressed apart from being full of self pity? The deeper you are in self pity, the deeper you are in depression.
When you let self pity go downward and downward, then you will see your depression go downward and downward to the point you are without hope, and even leading right to suicide. How many of you have heard, even yourself saying, “Woe is me?” or “How can this happen to me?” We go through all kinds of these things. We can say to ourselves, “I am a jerk and I will always be a jerk”. If I heard you say something about me what I said about me, I would be all over you. There is no such thing as self pity. What is the solution to this? If I recognize I am in a pity party, I do not want to be by myself. I also realize nobody else wants to come to my party either. I am all by myself. So your say to yourself, “See, they do not like me”.
So when those voices hit, you have to know when to say “no” for that is not the voice of the shepherd calling. You are following another shepherd when listening to those voices. This is not unusual. It is common to the human experience. All you have to do is have an adverse circumstance and you can get depressed. If you do not have one, then just make one up. And that is easy to do because we are capable of doing that. All we have to do is think about all the things that happened yesterday and all the things that could happen tomorrow. So you think, “and have a beard down to my knees, and say woe is me”. You have to get to the point that those voices are not yours, although they sound like yours. So cast those voices away and say that is not my shepherd. My shepherd tells me, that if I make a big mistake, there is nothing I can do with it. It is over and done with. Get up and move on. Get up and sin no more. Jesus did not beat up the woman caught in adultery and tell her what a scumbag she was. Jesus just told her to get up and sin no more. Bob says he knows people who lost their entire fortune on the stock market. Realize this is what it is and this is where I am and this is where I hope I am going and get up and start working on another goal. You are never going to go forward when thinking backwards. We have to understand these thinking patterns. We must understand that the thief comes to steal, kill and destroy. He comes to steal our joy, to destroy our future thinking and to destroy anything we have got. We cannot allow him to do so. The world is out there. That voice is out there 24 hours a day. If we do not know our shepherd and know what our shepherd is teaching then we are a sitting duck for the enemy.
All you have to do is take this bible, read about the New Covenant, that contains the wisdom of God. If you do not know what is in this book you will not have the wisdom of God. If you do not have the wisdom of God then you will not know what the shepherd is saying. If you do not know what your shepherd is saying you will be a sucker for following what someone else is saying.
John 10:7-10
7 Therefore Jesus said again, “Very truly I tell you, I am the gate for the sheep. 8 All who have come before me are thieves and robbers, but the sheep have not listened to them. 9 I am the gate; whoever enters through me will be saved. They will come in and go out, and find pasture. 10 The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy; I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full.
Jesus says he is the gate and who ever enters through him will be saved and will come in and out and find pasture. The thief comes to steal. kill and destroy but Jesus came so that we might have life and have it to the full.
All through life you are making decisions, sometimes good and sometimes bad. We do not know if our decisions are good or bad until the results come in. Nevertheless we are making decisions. If we do not stand tall in the wisdom of God where will we be? The good shepherd you follow laid down his life for the sheep.
John 10:11-13
11 “I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep. 12 The hired hand is not the shepherd and does not own the sheep. So when he sees the wolf coming, he abandons the sheep and runs away. Then the wolf attacks the flock and scatters it. 13 The man runs away because he is a hired hand and cares nothing for the sheep.
If I do not own you, then when the wolf the comes I just walk away. Since I am just a hired hand, I am not going to get involved. I do not care about something I do not own.
John 10:14-15
14 “I am the good shepherd; I know my sheep and my sheep know me – 15 just as the Father knows me and I know the Father
Jesus said, “I am the good shepherd and the sheep know me.” If you know Christ, then Christ knows you, if you are in Christ. If you are in Christ, you can sing in total knowledge, “what a friend we have in Jesus, all my sins and griefs to bear.”
What a Friend we have in Jesus,
All our sins and griefs to bear!
What a privilege to carry
Everything to God in prayer!
O what peace we often forfeit,
O what needless pain we bear,
All because we do not carry
Everything to God in prayer!
2
Have we trials and temptations?
Is there trouble anywhere?
We should never be discouraged,
Take it to the Lord in prayer.
Can we find a friend so faithful
Who will all our sorrows share?
Jesus knows our every weakness,
Take it to the Lord in prayer.
3
Are we weak and heavy-laden,
Cumbered with a load of care?
Precious Savior, still our refuge –
Take it to the Lord in prayer;
Do thy friends despise, forsake thee?
Take it to the Lord in prayer;
In His arms He’ll take and shield thee,
Thou wilt find a solace there.
John 10:15
15 and I lay down my life for the sheep.
Jesus is the good shepherd and he knows me. He laid down his life for you and me. There is no better demonstration of God’s love than this.
Romans 5:8
8 But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.
John 10:16
16I have other sheep that are not of this sheep pen. I must bring them also. They too will listen to my voice, and there shall be one flock and one shepherd.
I have no other sheep of this sheep pen than those that are mine. Only one sheep pen, and that is mine. My pen is only entered through me. This is not dogmatic, narrow-minded thinking. You are hated of this world, who call you bigots or intolerant, when you hold to the truth of Christ and His word. I am not better than anyone else but I am better off than someone else.
When Jesus said, “I have other sheep not of this sheep pen”, he was referring to the Gentile world. Jesus is saying, “I also have the Gentile world I am going to reach.” That was a foreign thought, to save Gentles just as he is going to save the Jews!
The mystery, or mysterion, is that God will bring the Jews and Gentiles under one new man, to make one out of the two, the Ecclesia, the body of Christ, the church, made up of Jew and Gentile. The Gentiles too will listen to His voice.
Ephesians 3:7-12
7 I [Paul] became a servant of this gospel by the gift of God‘s grace given me through the working of his power. 8 Although I am less than the least of all the Lord‘s people, this grace was given me: to preach to the Gentiles the boundless riches of Christ, 9 and to make plain to everyone the administration of this mystery, which for ages past was kept hidden in God, who created all things. 10 His intent was that now, through the church, the manifold wisdom of God should be made known to the rulers and authorities in the heavenly realms, 11 according to his eternal purpose that he accomplished in Christ Jesus our Lord. 12 In him and through faith in him we may approach God with freedom and confidence.
There will be one flock. Jesus says, “I will make one out of the two to be one flock. Right now there is just a Jew flock. Before long there will be a Jew and a Gentile flock.”
Ephesians 2:13-18
13 But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far away have been brought near by the blood of Christ. 14 For he himself is our peace, who has made the two groups one and has destroyed the barrier, the dividing wall of hostility, 15 by setting aside in his flesh the law with its commands and regulations. His purpose was to create in himself one new humanity out of the two, thus making peace, 16 and in one body to reconcile both of them to God through the cross, by which he put to death their hostility. 17 He came and preached peace to you who were far away and peace to those who were near. 18 For through him we both have access to the Father by one Spirit.
Whereas before the Jews and the Gentiles used to hate one another but now the two will become one. There will not be a Jew Jesus and a Gentile Jesus. There is just one Jesus, who is God over both the Jew and the Gentile.
John 10:17-18
17 The reason my Father loves me is that I lay down my life – only to take it up again. 18 No one takes it from me, but I lay it down of my own accord. I have authority to lay it down and authority to take it up again. This command I received from my Father.”
Jesus is saying, “I will enter into the death of my people so when I rise from the dead they can enter into the resurrection with me.” Jesus said, “No one takes life from me.” Could Jesus have stopped at the cross? Yes, but if Jesus stopped at the cross, could he save you and me? No.
John 12:24
Very truly I tell you, unless a kernel of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains only a single seed. But if it dies, it produces many seeds.
Until a seed falls to the ground and dies, it abides alone. But if it is planted, it sprouts and new life appears. Jesus would have been the only one saved. The seed went into the ground and died so out of the seed, you and I can be born again of the Spirit.
John 10:18-20
18 No one takes it from me, but I lay it down of my own accord. I have authority to lay it down and authority to take it up again. This command I received from my Father.” 19 The Jews who heard these words were again divided. 20 Many of them said, “He is demon-possessed and raving mad. Why listen to him?”
At these words, the Jews were divided, between the pride and the humble. Among the proud, you would hear them say, “He is demon-possessed and raving mad.” Can you believe those words? That of a raving mad man? Not to us, but to them. They were blind. They thought they could see but they were blind. They said, “Why listen to him?”
James 4:6
But he gives us more grace. That is why Scripture says: “God opposes the proud but shows favor to the humble.”
John 10:21
21 But others said, “These are not the sayings of a man possessed by a demon. Can a demon open the eyes of the blind?”
Who does God give grace to? The humble. Who does he resist? The proud. The proud of heart says, “he is demon possessed. He is a raving mad man.” The humble man says, “these are not sayings of a man possessed by a demon. I have heard demons talk and that is not it. And how could a demon open the eyes of a blind man?”
