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John 10:19-29: Winter!

^“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?’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?’²² Then came the Festival of Dedication at Jerusalem. It was winter, ²³ and Jesus was in the temple courts walking in Solomon’s Colonnade. ²⁴ The Jews who were there gathered round him, saying, ‘How long will you keep us in suspense? If you are the Messiah, tell us plainly.’²⁵ Jesus answered, ‘I did tell you, but you do not believe. The works I do in my Father’s name testify about me, ²⁶ but you do not believe because you are not my sheep. ²⁷ My sheep listen to my voice; I know them, and they follow me. ²⁸ I give them eternal life, and they shall never perish; no one will snatch them out of my hand. ²⁹ My Father, who has given them to me, is greater than all; no one can snatch them out of my Father’s hand.” NIV

We should not be surprised if we find ourselves on the receiving end of the same responses Jesus got. It may be disappointing, but it will happen. We have seen a similar pattern of reactions in earlier parts of John. Jesus came to ”bring a sword” and people were, and are, divided over Him (19). Some are interested and open (21). Others are angry and abusive (20). There are those who even want to kill Him (31) – and now that translates into violence towards His people. Some are just plain obtuse (24, 25), and they leave you scratching your head!!

”It was winter…” (22b). It was winter in more than one sense. It was deepest, darkest winter in terms of Jesus’ relationship with His Jewish opponents. You can feel the icy chill in the air. But in this highly charged atmosphere, Jesus just kept right on walking with the Father (25, 29/30), doing His works and preaching the word. He did this in the belief that His ”sheep” would hear His voice and come to Him (27, 28).

Let us do the same. His sheep are out there in our communities. We play our part and expect them to be drawn.

PRAYER: Whatever people say or do, keep me Lord faithful to you.

John 10:11-18: The ‘beautiful’ shepherd.

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.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 – and I lay down my life for the sheep. ¹⁶ I have other sheep that are not of this sheepfold. I must bring them also. They too will listen to my voice, and there shall be one flock and one shepherd. 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.’ NIV

There are, apparently, at least two words for ”good” in the Greek language. One means aesthetically good/pleasing to the eye. The other means morally good, and there is the idea of ”beautiful”. Jesus is the ”beautiful” shepherd, and this is the beauty of holiness.

The beauty of Jesus shines through in His leadership. Goodness is attractive, and there will be a winsome radiance about any leader who comes anywhere close to Christ-likeness. Robert Murray McCheyne said, ”It is not great talents God blesses, but great likeness to Jesus.” Here is something to aspire to. Our world seems to prize the C.E.O model of leadership. This has also affected (infected?) the church. Senior leaders in business tend to sit atop a hierarchical structure, and are far removed from most of the people in the organisation. I know I generalise, but I believe this is often the case. They probably don’t know many employees by name. But in the Bible, kings were called shepherds too. The ideal ‘rule’ (leadership style) is one of servanthood, care and concern. As a leader, I want to be teachable; to be able to learn anything that is good and true and helpful from all types of leaders. But I must not lose sight of the particular kind of leadership I am called to in Scripture. It is exemplified in Jesus, and we are to follow the pattern.

In the Old Testament God is shown to be the shepherd of Israel. This is one of several portraits of Him. When He came into this world, incarnated in Jesus, He declared, ”I am the good shepherd” (11). Biblical leadership must be seen through this lens. It’s what leaders in the church are called to. It entails the laying down of our lives for the sake of others (11, 15, 17, 18), and there is more than one way to die. It is Christ-centred and therefore cross-centred. It’s a self-sacrificing way of life.

It involves caring for others at cost to yourself (12, 13). You don’t put your own convenience or safety first. Someone described Jesus as ”the Man for others.” Every leader in Christ’s church is called to be a man or woman ”for others”;
It involves knowing people and being known (14,15) – being available and accessible;
It has a missionary heart/an evangelistic heartbeat (16). ”I must…” There is a sense of urgency and compulsion. Jesus was speaking here about His mission to bring in the Gentiles.

Paradoxically (and the Christian faith is full of paradoxes) this way of dying is the way to life (17, 18). It is as we lose our lives that we find them. Try it and you’ll prove it’s true!

PRAYER: Lord make me like you.

John 10:1-10: The Shepherd who is the Gate.

‘Very truly I tell you Pharisees, anyone who does not enter the sheepfold by the gate, but climbs in by some other way, is a thief and a robber. 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. ⁵ But they will never follow a stranger; in fact, they will run away from him because they do not recognise a stranger’s voice.’ 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. 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.^[a] 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.” NIV

Here are some simple thoughts from a well known passage. But it is one thing to know these truths and another to live them.

Come through the ”shepherd” (11). Jesus is both the ”shepherd” and the ”gate” (7). I understand that sometimes eastern shepherds would literally lie across the entrance to a sheepfold at night, thus acting as the door. It is vital that there should be a truly converted ministry (2). People who are to serve as ‘under-shepherds’ over Christ’s flock must first of all come to God through Jesus who is both ”the good shepherd” (11) and ”the gate” (7).
Listen to the shepherd (3-5). Eastern shepherds had a personal relationship with each animal in their flock. Often they had a different name for each one and, possibly, an individual call. If you have come to be part of Christ’s flock, you will surely recognise His voice. ”…a father or mother will recognise their child’s voice in a crowded room. But those of us who don’t have much to do with the bird and animal kingdoms on a daily basis are often startled at just how much animals can distinguish between different people as well as between other members of their own species. To this day, in the Middle East, a shepherd will go into a crowded sheepfold and call out his own sheep one by one, naming them. They will recognise his voice and come to him. The shepherd, after all, spends most hours of most days in their company. He knows their individual characters, markings, likes and dislikes. What’s more, they know him. They know his voice. Someone else can come to the sheepfold and they won’t go near him, even if he calls the right names. They are listening for the one voice that matters, the voice they trust.” Tom Wright: ‘John for everyone’, pp.147/148.
Follow the shepherd (3-5). He goes ahead of the flock. It is for us to keep our eyes on Him and follow where He leads. We follow ”the lamb” who is also the shepherd (Revelation 14:4). Our following must be to the extent of ”wherever he goes.” He is Lord.
Let the shepherd give you real life (10). Here’s a suggestion: read Psalm 23, and pray it through, giving thanks for this abundant life that is yours.

John 7: 32 – 44: ”Streams in the desert.”

^“32 The Pharisees heard the crowd whispering such things about him. Then the chief priests and the Pharisees sent temple guards to arrest him.³³ Jesus said, ‘I am with you for only a short time, and then I am going to the one who sent me. ³⁴ You will look for me, but you will not find me; and where I am, you cannot come.’³⁵ The Jews said to one another, ‘Where does this man intend to go that we cannot find him? Will he go where our people live scattered among the Greeks, and teach the Greeks? ³⁶ What did he mean when he said, “You will look for me, but you will not find me,” and “Where I am, you cannot come”?’³⁷ On the last and greatest day of the festival, Jesus stood and said in a loud voice, ‘Let anyone who is thirsty come to me and drink. ³⁸ Whoever believes in me, as Scripture has said, rivers of living water will flow from within them.’ ³⁹ By this he meant the Spirit, whom those who believed in him were later to receive. Up to that time the Spirit had not been given, since Jesus had not yet been glorified.⁴⁰ On hearing his words, some of the people said, ‘Surely this man is the Prophet.’⁴¹ Others said, ‘He is the Messiah.’Still others asked, ‘How can the Messiah come from Galilee? ⁴² Does not Scripture say that the Messiah will come from David’s descendants and from Bethlehem, the town where David lived?’ ⁴³ Thus the people were divided because of Jesus. ⁴⁴ Some wanted to seize him, but no one laid a hand on him.” NIV

I suppose it is better to ”whisper” about Jesus (32), than to not speak about Him at all. The mention of ”whispering” here reflects the generally tense atmosphere in Jerusalem at that time. It was a dangerous period. Tension filled the air. There were people who were impressed by Jesus, but it wasn’t safe to express such sentiments. At least, that’s how many felt about it. So they kept their voices low.

Do you see a strong contrast with Jesus standing and raising His voice (37)? At the right time, He spoke His message loudly and clearly. He was prepared to die for it. He would die for it.

He spoke of a wonderful offer (37) – the satisfaction of spiritual ‘thirst’ (contrast with John 6:35). ‘Coming’ to Jesus and ‘believing’ in Him are two sides of the same coin (38). In Christ alone can the profound spiritual longings of the human race be assuaged. If you feel at all ‘thirsty’ now, you know who to go to.

But He also spoke of a glorious opportunity (38). Jesus can make us a blessing to the parched, dry, barren world around us. We receive from Jesus the Holy Spirit (39), when we come to Him/believe in Him, and then the Holy Spirit flows out from us in ”streams” (or ”rivers”). Remember these words were spoken in a hot, dusty culture where people really valued water and knew the seriousness of water shortage. A believer has an out-going, out-flowing life. This life brings life wherever it goes (see Ezekiel 47:1-12). And it doesn’t merely trickle; it ”streams”; it rushes like a river in flood. Jesus, by His Spirit, makes the believer like running water in a barren land. We are totally necessary to this world, and we need to ensure that we keep the outward focus.

But however loudly and clearly we speak about Jesus – repeating His offer to the world – and however refreshing our Spirit-filled lives may be, there will still be those who persecute and oppose (32, 44). There will also be those who are dull and lacking spiritual perception (35, 36). And we will find a divided response (40-43). The gospel has always had to face these differing realities, and will do so for as long as time lasts.

(By the way, contrast verse 27 with 41b, 42. Not everyone thought the same way. But even those who could say that the Messiah would come from Bethlehem didn’t seem to know that He had!)

Prayer: Help me Lord Jesus to keep bringing my thirst to you, looking to you alone for true satisfaction. And I pray you will keep on flowing through me by your Spirit, and affecting the world for good. Help me to keep moving in you, regardless of the responses of people. Let my life water the society in which you have placed me.

John 5:10-18: That’s gratitude for you.

¹⁰ and so the Jewish leaders said to the man who had been healed, ‘It is the Sabbath; the law forbids you to carry your mat.’¹¹ But he replied, ‘The man who made me well said to me, “Pick up your mat and walk.”’¹² So they asked him, ‘Who is this fellow who told you to pick it up and walk?’¹³ The man who was healed had no idea who it was, for Jesus had slipped away into the crowd that was there.¹⁴ Later Jesus found him at the temple and said to him, ‘See, you are well again. Stop sinning or something worse may happen to you.’ ¹⁵ The man went away and told the Jewish leaders that it was Jesus who had made him well.¹⁶ So, because Jesus was doing these things on the Sabbath, the Jewish leaders began to persecute him. ¹⁷ In his defence Jesus said to them, ‘My Father is always at his work to this very day, and I too am working.’ ¹⁸ For this reason they tried all the more to kill him; not only was he breaking the Sabbath, but he was even calling God his own Father, making himself equal with God. NIV

I still smile at the memory of some words I read in a commentary years ago: ‘The man healed by Jesus appears to have been an unpleasant character!!’ He certainly wanted to avoid any flak coming his way and was happy for them to train their sights on Jesus (10, 11 and 15). He showed them where to aim their fire (15). If he did repent of his sins, we have no clear indication of it. Yet the Lord had been so good to him.

It appears that the healed man’s illness was connected in some way to sinful behaviour (14). Sin is ultimately destructive to the human body. It is not good for your health. It is for our own good that Jesus asks us to leave our sinful burden at the foot of His cross. That’s not the main reason, of course, but it is a reason.

Religion shows its worst face where it just cares about rules and regulations and not the needs and struggles of real people. The key to understanding all this anger towards to Jesus lies in the fact that the Lord performed the miracle on the Sabbath day. It led to the man carrying his bed on the Sabbath, and these clerics interpreted that as work (9b, 10; see also 16). Even worse, Jesus said the man He healed was in fact healed by His Father  in heaven (who was also working on the Sabbath day), and so He was expressing His oneness with God (18). That’s what they took Him to mean, and they were correct to do so:  ‘It was not his own deed, but the Father’s in him and through him. If, then, they condemned it, they were in direct collision with the Infinite One from whom the Sabbath law had originally come.’ F.B. Meyer: ‘Devotional Commentary’, p.461.

This is one of the massive claims made by Jesus about His own identity. He did not think that He was just a man. How about you? What’s your view of Jesus? As C.S. Lewis argued, Jesus is who He says He is, or He is a psychiatric case (on the same level as someone saying he’s a poached egg), or He is the devil from hell. But we must not come out with any patronising nonsense about Him just being a good man. He has not left that option open to us.

John 4:43-54: Lord over space.

⁴³ After the two days he left for Galilee. ⁴⁴ (Now Jesus himself had pointed out that a prophet has no honour in his own country.) ⁴⁵ When he arrived in Galilee, the Galileans welcomed him. They had seen all that he had done in Jerusalem at the Passover Festival, for they also had been there.⁴⁶ Once more he visited Cana in Galilee, where he had turned the water into wine. And there was a certain royal official whose son lay ill at Capernaum. ⁴⁷ When this man heard that Jesus had arrived in Galilee from Judea, he went to him and begged him to come and heal his son, who was close to death.⁴⁸ ‘Unless you people see signs and wonders,’ Jesus told him, ‘you will never believe.’⁴⁹ The royal official said, ‘Sir, come down before my child dies.’⁵⁰ ‘Go,’ Jesus replied, ‘your son will live.’The man took Jesus at his word and departed. ⁵¹ While he was still on the way, his servants met him with the news that his boy was living. ⁵² When he enquired as to the time when his son got better, they said to him, ‘Yesterday, at one in the afternoon, the fever left him.’⁵³ Then the father realised that this was the exact time at which Jesus had said to him, ‘Your son will live.’ So he and his whole household believed.⁵⁴ This was the second sign Jesus performed after coming from Judea to Galilee. NIV

Sometimes, when we pray we don’t get the wording exactly right. This Royal official ‘begged’ Jesus ‘ to come and heal his son, who was close to death’ (47b). Again he pleaded, ‘Sir, come down before my child dies’ (49). His urgency is understandable, but he thought Jesus had to be in his home; that He had to enter the same room as the child in order to heal him. The wording of the ‘prayer’ wasn’t exactly right. But Jesus saw the man’s heart and did the work of healing anyway (50). This is a miracle of healing at a distance. Jesus is Lord over space.

When we start to pray about a matter, we may well need to persevere through discouragements (48). After the man’s initial plea, it looked like Jesus Himself was putting him off. At least, His words didn’t sound promising. But things were not how they appeared. The nobleman persevered and received the object of his intercession. It is, however, a reality to contend with that faith often has to persevere through discouragements; through seeming barriers and obstacles. Ronald Dunn observed that when we start to pray in earnest about a matter, things regularly ‘drop by worse on the way to better!’

This is a story, then, about praying and persevering. It is also about timing (52, 53). This ‘coincidence’ was really a ‘God-incidence’, and it brought people into the Kingdom.

It is fundamentally, of course, a story about believing.The essence of faith is to take Jesus at His Word (50).You go about your business, trusting that His Word is true, even when you have no evidence. Faith is the evidence (Hebrews 11:1). F.B.Meyer shares an interesting insight on this:

”It would appear…that he went to some inn or caravansary on his way back, because there would have been ample time between the seventh hour (one o’clock in the day) and nightfall to get from Cana down to Capernaum. Why should he hasten! The boy was living, doing well, since the Master had said so. He was sure of it and thanked God for it and gladly took the opportunity of a quiet night’s rest, to sleep off the effects of long watching, intense anxiety, and the swift journey to Cana. When his servants met him with the news that the boy was healed, he inquired at what hour the change had taken place, merely to corroborate his own conclusions.” F.B. Meyer, Devotional Commentary, p.461.

Prayer: ”Give me the faith which can remove, and sink the mountain to a plain.”