Sermon Tone Analysis

Introduction:

Let’s get into the Word in this morning.

Everyone has someone they look up to.

No matter the person they have someone they look up to and follow.

For me, I look up to a couple different people but the most influential is a professor of mine from OBU named Scott Pace.

I look up to him because he is a man who loves the Lord and I know he won’t lead me to a false belief but will point me to the Bible.

However, not everyone has a Scott Pace in their life.

Some people follow others that they really shouldn’t.

For example, a man by the name of David Koresh convinced people that he was Christ and he actually had about 100 followers.

He convinced his followers to allow him to have many wives with some as young as 12.

This led to authorities in Waco, TX going to his compound in order to investigate these allegations.

When they arrived they were met with resistance by Koresh and his followers which led to the death of 4 of these authorities.

After the 51 day siege, Koresh and 85 of his followers died.

This man did not love his followers, but used them for selfish gain which led to their destruction.

The good news is that while Koresh claimed to be Christ and ended up abusing and leading his sheep to destruction, the true Jesus the one who is truly the Good Shepherd does not lead his people to destruction, but to prosperity.

The reality is though is that many believers would rather follow themselves instead of following Christ because they believe they can lead themselves to prosperity better than Christ can.

The problem with this is that we will never lead ourselves to prosperity because we are not shepherds, but sheep.

Sheep on their own will die, but a Good Shepherd leads them to green pasture and still waters.

Christ will not forsake us but will leads us to eternal life if we will follow him.

We can trust him as the Good Shepherd because of what we see in and the truths contained in them.

In this fourth “I am” statement we see two beautiful truths about Christ that leads us to see him as the Good Shepherd who is able to lead his sheep which means we should follow him if we are his.

The Good Shepherd has affection for his Sheep.

(v.11-13)

Jesus saying he is the Good Shepherd fulfills the idea of and the promise of .

states

God here is called a Shepherd and the idea that he is a loving shepherd leading his people to security is affirmed in Jesus statement that he is the Good Shepherd and that he lays his life down for his sheep.

In we see a promise from the Lord which states:

So, God is the Good Shepherd and promises to bring his sheep back into his fold which he fulfills in the person and work of Christ.

Jesus here is contrasting the Good Shepherd with a hired hand.

The Good Shepherd lays down his life for his sheep, but the hired hand flees when he sees a wolf coming.

Jesus here is comparing himself to the Religious Leaders of the day.

The Religious Leaders didn’t truly care about the people, but cared about themselves.

They would perform their duties during the good times, but they did not have any sacrificial love for their followers.

Jesus however has affection for his sheep and loves them so much that he lays his life down for them.

This is the essence of the Gospel, look no further than which states:

On the basis of love Jesus lays his life down.

This idea of a Shepherd laying his life down would have the story of David come in the minds of the listeners.

In states:

David would lay his life down for his sheep and protect them.

Jesus is the true and greater shepherd who lays his life down not against lions or bears, but against the true enemies sin and death.

All of this is on the basis of Christ love.

This love isn’t conditioned upon our performance because states clearly:

While we were sinners Christ died for us, he didn’t wait for us to clean ourselves up but came when we were at our worst and laid his life down to forgive us.

Let me put it to you this way, whenever we go on a date with someone we really like we dress ourselves up.

We try to look as good as possible in order to impress the person we are going out with.

However, in our relationship with Jesus we don’t need to dress up or make ourselves look good because Jesus loves us where we are and who we are, not some fictional version of ourselves we put forward to impress.

Jesus has affection for his sheep no matter how dirty or unappealing we might be.

This means for us his sheep, if you are saved, that we are to follow our Shepherd.

Jesus will never leave us nor forsake us as the Hired Hand would.

Even when we might go astray Jesus doesn’t leave us, but comes after us.

In the ancient world whenever a sheep would go astray from the shepherd, the shepherd would break the sheep’s legs, pick it up, put it over his shoulders, and carry it until its legs healed.

After this the sheep would never leave the shepherd’s side again.

Now I’m not saying that Jesus is going to break our legs, but the Shepherd will tear down or break down anything that causes us to go astray because of his great love for us so let’s follow the Shepherd and cling to him.

We can do so with confidence because of the affection that Jesus has for his sheep.

No matter how far you may think you are from Christ, he comes after his sheep because he loves us and we can trust that.

Not only does Christ had affection for his sheep, but we also see that…

The Good Shepherd has authority over his Sacrifice.

(v.14-18)

We shift now from the Good Shepherd having affection for his sheep to the Good Shepherd having authority over his sacrifice.

Jesus begins to explain again that he lays down his life for the sheep before explaining that he knows his sheep and his sheep know him which once again confirms that Jesus loves his sheep because he genuinely knows them.

This is not a mere knowledge of them, but knows them intimately.

Jesus knows his sheep which means that if you are a believer Jesus doesn’t just know of you, he knows you.

This is proven also in what Jesus says in verse 15, “Just as the Father knows me I also know my Father, and I lay down my life for the sheep.”

The love and knowledge Jesus has for his sheep is rooted in the love shared between God the Father and God the Son.

As Christians we believe in one God revealed in three persons: Father, Son, and Spirit.

The members of the Trinity have perfect love in themselves and the love we have been shown is rooted in this Trinitarian God.

This is another reason that we as his sheep should follow our shepherd.

After this statement Jesus transitions to the statement that he has other sheep that are not from this sheep pen.

This is a verse pointing to the inclusion of the Gentiles into the people of God.

We know that the Jews were God’s chosen people in the OT, but now through the sacrifice of the Shepherd God’s people are not defined by ethnicity but defined by those who have faith in Christ.

This is good news for us because I’m about 80% positive none of us are ethnically Jewish.

Jesus then gets into the reason that he can do this and it’s because he has all authority.

He explains that he lays his life down so that HE can take it up again which points to his death AND resurrection.

This is confirmed in the next verse where he says that he has the right to lay his life down and take it up again.

This shows us that Jesus was not forced to go to the cross, but went willingly.

This is what states:

Christ subjected himself to death which means that he went willingly.

Nobody forced Jesus to go, even in the story of his arrest in Jesus is very much in control.

Jesus could have had an army of angels swoop in and end all of that, but he didn’t.

He went willingly to the Cross in order to save his sheep.

He didn’t remain Dead though because the Good Shepherd has all authority and that includes authority over death because he rose three days later securing salvation for his sheep.

By doing this Jesus placed his righteousness on us because on our own we are sinful, but now Christ clothes us with his righteousness which justifies us before a Holy Father.

I heard this story about a Scottish Shepherd this past week that beautifully illustrates what Jesus does for us.

This Shepherd faced an unfortunate circumstance, he had a baby lamb die and then had a momma sheep die who had a baby Lamb.

Our minds would say well just put the two together and solve the problem.

However, it didn’t work that simply.

The Shepherd tried that, but the Momma would reject the lamb.

When this didn’t work the Shepherd had an idea.

He sheered the wool of the dead baby lamb and put it on the orphan lamb.

He then proceeded to have this lamb go to the momma who smelled her baby that she lost.

After that moment the Momma took that lamb in as her baby.

states:

As sheep to the shepherd we are clothed with the fragrance fo Christ and are accepted by the Father because it is not our unrighteousness he sees but his son’s righteousness.

If we are believers then we are accepted by the Father truly and perfectly which means we will never be unaccepted.

This is possible solely because Christ had the authority to lay his life down providing forgiveness and had authority to raise it up again which saves us and makes us alive with him.

If you are a believer then this is your shepherd who loves you, who died for you, and who saved you.

Why would we not want to follow such a Great Shepherd?

Why would we not want to worship Christ for who he is?

Follow this great shepherd and live forever with him.

Conclusion: