John 10:11-21

THE GOOD SHEPHERD

Text 10:11-21

11

I am the good shepherd: the good shepherd layeth down his life for the sheep.

12

He that is a hireling, and not a shepherd, whose own the sheep are not, beholdeth the wolf coming, and leaveth the sheep, and fleeth, and the wolf snatcheth them, and scattereth them:

13

he fleeth because he is a hireling, and careth not for the sheep.

14

I am the good shepherd; and I know mine own, and mine own know me,

15

even as the Father knoweth me, and I know the Father; and I lay down my life for the sheep.

16

And other sheep I have, which are not of this fold; them also I must bring, (or, lead), and they shall hear my voice; and they shall become (or, there shall be.) one flock, one shepherd.

17

Therefore doth the Father love me, because I lay down my life, that I may take it again.

18

No one taketh it away from me, but I lay it down of myself. I have power to lay it down, and I have power (or right) to take it again. This commandment received I from my Father.

19

There arose a division again among the Jews because of these words.

20

And many of them said, He hath a demon, and is mad; why hear ye him?

21

Others said, These are not the sayings of one possessed with a demon. Can a demon open the eyes of the blind?

Queries

a.

Why the contrast between the good shepherd and the hireling?

b.

Who are the other sheep, not of that fold?

c.

What is so important about Jesus-' laying down His life that causes the Father to love Him?

Paraphrase

I, Myself, am the Good Shepherd. The Good Shepherd willingly lays down his very soul on behalf of the sheep. The hireling, who is neither the true shepherd nor the owner of the sheep, when he sees the wolf coming, deserts the sheep and runs awayand the wolf attacks the flock and scatters thembecause the hireling is what he isone who cares not for the welfare of the sheep. I, Myself, am the Good Shepherd; I know those that belong to Me, and those that are mine know Me, just as the Father knows Me and I know the Father. My life I willingly lay down on behalf of the sheep. Now I have other sheep which are not of this particular fold; unto them also must I become Shepherd and they shall hear and heed my voice and all who heed my voice will become in equality one Flock on the basis of their heeding and obeying one Shepherd. This is the reason why the Father loves Mebecause I willingly suffer death in order that I might be resurrected from the dead! No one has the power to take it from Me, but to the contrary I, Myself, voluntarily give it up. I only have authority to lay it down and I only have authority to take it up again. I received this charge from My Father.
There came a division again among the Jews on account of the words which Jesus had spoken. Many of them were saying, He has a demon in him and is insanewhy do you listen to Him? But others were saying, at the same time, These are not the words of one being possessed of demons. A demon-possessed person does not have the power to open the eyes of one born blind, does he?

Summary

The Lord has, in the previous section, contrasted the evil shepherds with good shepherds in general. Now He makes the contrast even more vivid by casting alongside the hireling the One and Only, Good Shepherd of the sheepHimself. His relationship to the sheep is like that of His Father to Himself. He willingly sacrifices Himself for the sheep.

Comment

The syntactical arrangement of the first sentence of John 10:11 in the original is good Greek idiom to stress both the pronoun and the adjective. In other words, the original Greek would be translated literally, I, Myself, am the shepherd, the good shepherd. Both I and good are stressed. In the preceding section (John 10:1-10) Jesus contrasted the evil shepherds (the Pharisees) with good shepherds in generalbut now the distinction is made even more vivid by contrasting all who propose to be shepherds with The One Good and Faithful Shepherd.

The Good Shepherd lays down His life for the sheep. After meditation upon this statement, we begin to see that there is more involved here than the mere sacrificing of a ransomas profoundly sublime as that is itself! Inherent in His goodness as The Shepherd is the fact that only His life as a ransom would be efficacious. Other shepherds of the flock might indeed willingly lay down their lives, but none would bring salvation and safety to the flock through their sacrifice!

Now the hireling is described. Hireling is simply one who receives wages for his labor. He may be a good hireling or an evil hireling Moses and Paul were under-shepherds of God's flock who received wages for their labors and they were hired men with a large measure of the love and concern of the Good Shepherd in their hearts for the sheep. But the Pharisees and Sadducees were mercenary, evil hirelings whose primary concern was not for the sheep but for the wages. The sheep do not belong to the hirelinghe has no personal relationship to them, nor will he tender any personal commitments to them. The hireling is not willing to give up himself for the sheep when they are attacked, but looks out for -number one-' flees to preserve his own safety. Read Ezekiel 34:1-10 for God's condemnation of the hireling shepherds.

We quote here from an anonymous Palestinian traveler of many years agoa beautiful illustration of a good shepherd:

It was while riding through the low hills covered with this vegetation, and coming out on the blighted flats of the Dead Sea, that one of those pictures passed before me which are ever after hung up in the mind's gallery among the choicest of the spoils of Eastern travel, By some chance I was alone, riding a few hundred yards in front of the caravan, when, turning the corner of a hill, I met a man coming toward me, the only one we had seen for several hours since we had passed a few black tents some eight or ten miles away. He was a noble-looking young Shepherd, dressed in his camel'S-hair robe, and with the lithesome, powerful limbs and elastic step of the children of the desert. But the interest which attached to him was the errand on which he had manifestly been engaged on these Dead Sea plains from which he was returning. Round his neck, and with its little limbs held gently by his hand, lay a lamb he had rescued, and was doubtless carrying home. The little creature lay as if perfectly content and happy, and the man looked pleased as he strode along lightly with his burden; and as I saluted him with the usual gesture of pointing to heart and head, and the -Salaam alik!-' (Peace be with you!), he responded with a smile and a kindly glance at the lamb, to which he saw my eyes were directed. It was actually the beautiful parable of the Gospel acted out before my sight. Every particular was true to the story; the Shepherd had doubtless left his -ninety and nine in the wilderness,-' round the black tents we had seen so far away, and had sought for the lost lamb till he found it, where it must quickly have perished without his help, among those blighted plains. Literally, too, -when he had found it, he laid it on his shoulders rejoicing.-'

What a high ideal the Good Shepherd, the Chief Shepherd (1 Peter 5:4), has set for all his under-shepherds! Elders are, by divine appointment, shepherds of God's flock under His Chief-Shepherdship. In our opinion, deacons, evangelists and teachers should be considered in some sense shepherds, inasmuch as they feed (teach) and minister to the flock. Those who desire the awesome responsibility of shepherding God's flock need to remember that they watch in behalf of the souls of the sheep as they that shall give account (cf. Hebrews 13:17). The under-shepherd is to feed the flock of God and protect it against wolves both from within and from without (cf. Acts 20:26-32); he is to accept the oversight willingly and not by constraint, to do it eagerly and not for love of money, not to use the position for the exercise of power, and to be an example to the flock (1 Peter 5:2-3). One of the qualifications for elders is that they must not be greedy of filthy lucre. The ministry or the eldership is not to be considered as a calling on the basis of pay scale. The Lord is not interested in hirelings (those interested primarily in their wages). This does not mean, however, that ministers should not be paid a living wage. When the Lord ordained that they that proclaim the gospel should live of the gospel (1 Corinthians 9:14), He intended that the man who labors in the kingdom is worthy of his hire. We should never think of the minister's salary as simply a giftif he labors he earns, and is worthy of, his hire.

Another characteristic of the Divine Shepherd is held up for an example in John 10:14-15. The Good Shepherd knows His own sheep and His sheep know Him, just as the Son knows the Father and the Father knows the Son. And what is this knowing relationship between the Father and the Son which is to be exemplified in under-shepherds and the flock? It is a union of wills, purpose and works (cf. John 5:19-23 and our comments, Vol. I, pp. 184-186). There is absolute harmony and oneness. The Father was constantly aware of His Son's needs and sustained Him every momentwhen Jesus felt pain or hunger the Father's heart went out to Him. When Jesus knew joy, the Father rejoiced. On the other hand, the Son knew the Father's will and found exceeding joy in doing His will (cf. John 8:29). Now, the Good Shepherd knows His sheep individually and knows their needs better than they themselvesHe is constantly sustaining them. Those who are true sheep of the Good Shepherd hear His voice and are united with Him in will, purpose and workthey obey Him for they trust Him as the Shepherd of their souls. This characteristic is applicable, also, to under-shepherds (elders and ministers) and to the flocks which they serve. The matter of shepherding the Lord's flock and being a member of the Lord's flock is a reciprocal arrangement, The under-shepherds should know their flock as much as possible, like Jesus knows them. The members of the flock should know the voice of their under-shepherds the same as Jesus was in harmony with His Father's will! Obey them that have the rule over you, and submit to them: for they watch in behalf of your souls, as they that shall give account; that they may do this with joy, and not with grief: for this were unprofitable for you (Hebrews 13:17). When elders are to be chosen to act as Christ's under-shepherds, this allegory of the Good Shepherd, the hireling, the Door of the Sheep ought to be studied and applied:

... the flock suffers from a double danger. It is always liable to attack from outside from the wolves and the robbers and the marauders. It is always liable to trouble from the inside from the false shepherd. The Church runs a double danger. It is always under attack from outside. It often suffers from the tragedy of bad leadership, from the disaster of shepherds who see their calling as a career and not as a means of service. The second danger is by far the worse; because, if the shepherd is faithful and good, there is a strong defense from the attack from outside; but if the shepherd is faithless and a hireling, then the foes from outside can penetrate into and destroy the flock. The Church's first essential is a leadership which is based on the example of Jesus Christ. (The Gospel of John, Vol. II, Daily Study Bible, by William Barclay.)

It is very evident in the incident of the man born blind and the Pharisees (John 9:1-41) that the supposed shepherds of Israel did not know the sheep (the blind man) as the Good Shepherd would have them knowthey were hirelings. Further, once the stubborn unbelief and obstinate ungodliness of the Pharisees was revealed, the blind man recognized them as false shepherds and did not know them (obey them) as his spiritual shepherds.

His contrast throughout this allegory has been between evil shepherds and good shepherds, and finally, The Good Shepherd. A big difference between the two has been their concept of who are and who are not true sheep. Now in John 10:16 Jesus looks ahead a few short months when the middle wall of partition will have been broken down and the Gentiles will be led into the one flock. The Jewish spiritual leaders refused to accept this idea from the very beginning of Jesus-' ministry (cf. Luke 4:16-30). The uniting of Jew and Gentile into one flock was plainly foretold in their prophets (cf. Isaiah 56:8 and Ezekiel 34:23). The Gentiles were not to be gathered into the Old Covenant fold, but both Jew and Gentile would be led into a New Covenant flock. It was not intended that the Gentiles be led into the fold of Judaismthe Old Covenant was intended exclusively for the Hebrews (cf. Deuteronomy 5:1-3; Romans 3:19; Ephesians 2:11-18).

When Jesus said I have, He is manifesting divine foreknowledge. It is not a predestination in the sense that He has made an absolute and irrevocable choice of some and passed over others. The sovereign will of man is not violated in foreknowledge. His foreknowledge and man's will is exemplified in Judas, the traitor, whom Jesus foreknew, while Judas very evidently exercised his own free will in betraying Him.

And so Jesus, through His apostles, went out into the wilderness of heathendom and led the strays and the outcasts into the one flock (cf. Acts 9:15; Acts 22:21). They did gladly hear His voice through the apostles and many thousands obeyed (cf. Romans 1:5; Romans 1:8; Ephesians 1:15; Philippians 1:9; Colossians 1:3-4).

The important phrase of John 10:16 is: ... and they shall become one flock, one shepherd. Jesus sees the unity of the future church. Most commentators on this verse hold to a mystical, invisible unity only as the inference of one flock, one shepherd. It is true that Christians are one in Christ, held together by a spiritual bond which is stronger and higher than any visible structure. But it is also true that this spiritual unity must, by its very nature, express itself in a visible unity of doctrine and worship according to the divine standard in the New Testament (cf. Ephesians 4:1-16).

This is not an enforced unityheld together by a great superstructure or World Church organization. This is a unity based on faith and love where all the true sheep hear, answer and obey one shepherd. This oneness is based on loyalty to Jesus Christ and His person. The very foundation for Christian unity is in all the sheep hearing and obeying one Shepherd, even Jesus. It is as simple as this: If ye love me, ye will keep my commandments (John 14:15), and, By this shall all men know that ye are my disciples, if ye have love one to another (John 13:35). An intelligent, believing, obeying, sacrificing love for Christ and His Body will result in unity!

John 10:17-18 are full of meaning. Jesus willingly lays down His life for the very purpose that He may take it up again, We like the statement of Hendriksen in this connection, The dying and rising again are deeds, not merely experiences. Jesus was not helplessly caught up in a mesh of circumstances over which He had no power. There was purpose behind His death and that purpose was the resurrection! He did not lose His life: He gave it. He was not killed: He chose to die. Every word and every deed of Jesus had a purpose within the plan of redemption and none of it was accidental (e.g., John 7:30; John 8:20; John 12:23-28; John 13:1; John 17:1; John 18:4-11; John 18:37; John 19:11).

The Son willingly emptied himself, taking the form of a servant, being made in the likeness of men; and being found in fashion as a man, he humbled himself, becoming obedient even unto death, yea, the death of the cross (cf. Philippians 2:5-8). As an earthly father's love is the more drawn out when his child willingly and lovingly obeysso on account of this willing obedience by Jesus, His Father's love is the more drawn out. Wherefore also God highly exalted him, and gave unto him the name which is above every name; (Philippians 2:9-11).

Jesus possessed the prerogatives of Divine Omnipotence. No one had power or authority to take His life. When He died it was because He allowed it (Matthew 26:53; John 19:11)! And He permitted wicked men to kill Him for the very purpose of Himself taking up His life again in three days! The Father presented the Son with this charge or commission (commandment), the Divine plan for man's salvation (cf. John 3:14; John 8:28; John 12:32). This death and resurrection of the Incarnate Word was the Father's scheme of redemption for man because God's wisdom and love decreed it so; it was the only way to win man's heart! The Son, being the Son, is in perfect accord (in knowledge, love, authority) with the Father (cf. our comments on John 5:19-23, Vol. I, pp. 183-186). Although equal with the Father and free to do that which He wills to do, He wills to lay down His life and take it up again. His will is motivated, directed and controlled by His divine love and trust in His Father and by His love for mankind.

All of this dissertation concerning the Good Shepherd (especially the power to lay down life and take it up again) has been sort of a parabolic statement of divine equality with God by Jesus. Evidently many of the Jews present understood clearly that Jesus was claiming what would be preposterous for any mortal to claimdivine power over life and death. This could only mean to the Jews that He was claiming to be God; in their eyes blasphemous, demonical or insanity. Many of them did indeed speak out and call Him insane and possessed of demons. Others, remembering the great miracle they had witnessed could not, inspite of the consequences of disagreeing with the rulers, deny what they had seen. The choice still remains today; the claims which Jesus makes through the historical records of the Gospel writers are either the claims of a deluded maniac, a deliberate liar, or the Divine Son of God. In light of the empirical, historical and absolutely trustworthy evidence, the first two alternatives are absurd! We shall discuss the evidence for His deity more fully in the next section. Suffice it to say here, there is overwhelming evidence of verifiable nature sufficient to convince any honest-hearted searcher that Jesus is all He claims to be!

Quiz

1.

What is the evident purpose for declaring Himself to be The Good Shepherd?

2.

What is the essential characteristic of the hireling?

3.

What application may be made in the church from this allegory of the Good Shepherd and the sheep and the hireling?

4.

What responsibilities do the elders have to the flock? The flock to the elders?

5.

What is the very foundation stone to unity? How is unity expressed?

6.

Was Jesus-' death a mistake? Explain!

7.

What alternatives present themselves in light of Jesus-' claims?