John 10:1-10 - Life in All Its Fullness

A couple of years ago a man from West Virginia won the Powerball lottery jackpot. His friends had always described him as a boisterous, generous and happy-go-lucky guy until he won the $315 million prize. To most of us that would seem like such a blessing, but with money comes great temptations and complications. James Whittaker’s winnings were the richest undivided jackpot in U.S. history. Although he quickly gave millions away to his church and other charities, his money eventually brought him problems and difficulties that he had never experienced before. He became a slave to his wealth and it led him down paths where he never thought he would find himself. Since winning the jackpot in 2002, Whittaker has been arrested twice for drunken driving and has been ordered into rehab. Recently, he pleaded no contest to a misdemeanor assault charge for attacking a bar manager, and is accused in two lawsuits of causing trouble at a nightclub and a racetrack. His wife, understanding the effects that the money has had on her husband, recently was quoted as saying, “I wish all of this would have never happened, I wish I would have torn that ticket up.” The Whittakers have come to realize that money and material things do not bring happiness. This is not where true fulfillment in life is found. Their material possessions and wealth had robbed them of their joy.

We have all seen examples of these types of things first hand. People who have reached the pinnacles of their careers or have made fortunes, yet they still feel emptiness. Something in their life is missing. Their lives lack significance and purpose and they continue to wander aimlessly looking for their soul’s true home.

A few weeks ago I was at a birthday party for a friend of my wife’s. I really did not know too many people there so I found a couch by the TV where a group of guys were sitting. I started to talk with one guy in particular. He was a really bright guy who had always dreamed of being a lawyer. He had just graduated from Harvard Law School a couple of years earlier and was now working at a large law firm in downtown Chicago. He was getting married, had a brand new condominium in Chicago, and a new car. He was doing well in his job and thought that he could make partner in his law firm in three years. He claimed he had accomplished nearly all of his goals and realized all of his dreams. If there is an American dream this guy was living it.

BUT his story did not end there. As we talked some more, this guy conveyed to me that he was unhappy. All these things that he had amassed, all the goals that he had met, all the successes that he had had, did not satisfy his heart. He yearned for more. His heart desired something greater. Something more significant. He was searching for something that his Harvard education, his high profile job, and his new condo could not provide.

He told me that he was ready to leave his legal career and seek after something more fulfilling. . . maybe a career in computer science he thought out loud.

This guy was searching; he was looking for life in all its fullness, but he was looking in the wrong places. He was guided by the wrong priorities and was being led astray by falsehood and deception.

This afternoon’s passage shows us that the Pharisees had a similar problem. They were looking in the wrong places and in the wrong direction for guidance in their lives and they were leading people from God as opposed to God. Although the Pharisees did not recognize their emptiness, Jesus attempts to explain how they can obtain life in all its fullness.

Jesus clarifies things for them with a parable. He uses an example of something they could relate to and seeks to explain to them where they can find a better life, a life that will result in true fulfillment. Jesus uses the example of a shepherd and his sheep to describe his relationship with God’s people, those who choose to be his followers. Jesus draws a clear distinction between those that try to lead the sheep astray, who want to destroy and kill them, and the good shepherds who want to lead the sheep out of danger and into an abundant life. The shepherd goes to the sheep by the proper way and enters through the gate, whereas the thief and robber are not permitted entry and seek to climb over the wall. The sheep are the shepherd’s. He has a claim of ownership over them and anyone who seeks to take the sheep away is a robber and a thief. Jesus’ words were a direct critique of the leadership of his day.

Jesus says that when he calls the sheep, they know his voice and follow him. Sheep are amazing this way. They know their master’s voice and can distinguish it from a stranger’s voice.

Take for instance this story of a man in Australia who was arrested and charged with stealing a sheep. He vigorously protested that it was one of his own that had been missing for many days. When the case went to court, the judge didn’t know how to decide the matter. Finally he asked that the sheep be brought into the courtroom. Then he ordered the plaintiff to step outside and call the animal. The sheep made no response except to raise its head and look frightened.

The judge then instructed the defendant to go to the courtyard and call the sheep. When the accused man began to make his distinctive call, the sheep ran toward the door and that voice. It was obvious that he recognized the familiar voice of his master. “His sheep knows him,” said the judge. Case dismissed.

Jesus wants his hearers to recognize that the sheep, the followers of Christ know his voice and are quick to follow after his lead. The sheep can also distinguish between their shepherd’s voice and that of a stranger. They flee the stranger’s voice. Genuine Christians strive to be so focused on Jesus that they recognize the difference between God’s truth and the thieves and bandits of the world that seek to destroy life with false idols and deception.

The figure of the thieves and robbers in this passage does not refer to any particular person, but is applicable to anyone who unlawfully claims to have control over the flock, to every corrupter of the faithful or of those who are called to faith, to everyone who might be a temptation to them. Our culture and our world reek of these things. Of robbers and thieves seeking to steal us away from the protection of our shepherd. The Pharisees were sometimes this to the people of Jesus’ time. Sometimes the thieves and robbers succeed and our lives are left torn and tattered. Jesus, however, calls us closer to him so that we will more readily be able to distinguish his truth from the lies and deception of those that sneak around his way.

But Jesus takes the parable a step further still and explains the way that his true followers, the true sheep that are not influenced by the cheap trick and sneaky tactics of the robbers and thieves, should act. Jesus says that his sheep are accustomed to the way he comes to them and they are frightened by thieves and robbers climbing over the walls.

Those who hear Jesus’ voice and recognize it are those who are of the truth. Man’s true being is more than simply his or her worldly existence; everyone was created to be in relationship with God, led by the shepherd Jesus Christ. We are not forced to go to Jesus, however, we must make a conscious decision to do so. Jesus does not poke and prod the sheep as someone leading them to slaughter would do; he simply walks and the sheep can choose to follow. They trust him. Jesus’ call goes out to all and everyone has the right to choose it. Everyone is given the opportunity to be led by Jesus into the abundant green pastures and to feast on God’s goodness, but the opportunity must be taken.

Just as Jesus’ followers fully recognize his voice, Jesus as the shepherd fully values and appreciates his sheep. To a much greater extent than many of us can comprehend.

Here the analogy of the sheep and the shepherd provides great significance. Shepherds had an unbelievable relationship with their sheep. Sheep were like valued pets. There was nothing about their sheep that good shepherds did not know. Although the individual sheep in a flock all looked alike to the untrained eye, a good shepherd could tell them apart – often because of their specific markings or peculiar traits. A shepherd would say, “see that sheep over there? Notice how its feet toe in a little. The one behind it walks kind of sideways; the next one has a patch of wool off its back, there’s one with a black mark below its eye, while the one closest to us has a small piece torn out of its ear. The shepherd knows each by name. These were not just sheep; they were Patch, Limpy, Blackie, Tag, Nosey, and so on. By day and night the shepherd lived with them. He had to be close to them.

Jesus in a similar manner came from heaven to earth to be close to us. Jesus knows our traits and watches over us with love and concern. He looks at us and calls us by name. Dan, Cheryl, Noah . . . He knows us intimately. He knows what we have been through and what we need.

But John reports that the Pharisees did not understand what Jesus was saying. Their issue is not that they cannot comprehend the point intellectually, but that they are unwilling to respond to Jesus’ challenge. It is too difficult. Jesus calls them to give up their allegiance to themselves or to other things that seek to steal God’s glory. Jesus calls them to follow him. Not to lead, but to follow. Jesus wanted more than their intellectual understanding, he wanted them to walk behind him. He wanted them to be his sheep.

So Jesus tries to explain the parable further. He explains that he is not only the good shepherd who cares for his sheep, but he is the gate to their pen as well. Jesus is the gate leading to the green pastures, a gate through which the sheep must pass if they are to have an abundant life. Jesus has come to bring us an abundant life. This idea mirrors that of John 14:6. There Jesus says, “I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the father except through me.” Those who go in and out of the gate, that is Jesus, find the life in all its fullness. This gift of life is in direct contrast to the slaughter that is associated with the thieves and robbers. The thieves come to destroy, but Jesus came so that everyone who believes in him may not be destroyed but may have eternal life.

An artist around 1500, right before the beginning of the reformation, depicted this passage in an etching on a piece of wood. The print shows Jesus standing at the doorway to the sheep pen, which is depicted as a church. Jesus is determining who can enter the sheep pen. A text beneath the etching reveals what is happening in the picture. On the roof of the church are monks and bishops, even the pope himself, chopping their way in and escaping with big bags of money. In the distance Christ is being re-crucified by such violence to his church and the sheep that should have been inside the church are now outside, gathered around the crucified shepherd.

Of course much has changed since this etching was done and we no longer have to look at the Catholic Church in this way, but the etching does encourage us to consider who the text’s thieves and robbers are in our own time – and whether we really want to insist on following the world’s guidance to wealth and material possessions.

Jesus presented the Pharisees with a choice . . . we are presented with the same choice. Whose voice will you recognize? Which voice will we respond to? Jesus says that his sheep will run from the robbers and thieves. They don’t just ignore them, they run from them. They flee from them. All Christians must do the same.

We are too easily duped. The robbers and the thieves sneak in and steal our hearts, they steal our souls, they steal our lives. But Jesus calls us to enter into his flock. To walk through the gate, which is him, to eternal life. . . to life in all its fullness. This essential Christian message has the power to transform lives. To change priorities and to bring people into a right relationship with God. We must convey this message to a hurting world.

Author, pastor, and one time atheist Lee Strobel said in one sermon: “How can I tell you the difference God has made in my life? My daughter Allison was 5 years old when I became a follower of Jesus, and all she had known in those five years was a dad who was profane and angry. I remember I came home one night and kicked a hole in the living room wall just out of anger with life. I am ashamed to think of the times Allison hid in her room to get away from me.

Five months after I gave my life to Jesus Christ, that little girl went to my wife and said, “Mommy I want God to do for me what he’s done for Daddy.” At age 5! What was she saying? She’d never studied the archeological evidence validating the truth of the Bible. All she knew was her dad used to be this way: hard to live with. But more and more her dad is becoming this way. And if that is what God does to people, then sign her up. At age 5 she gave her life to Jesus. Strobel says, “God changed my family. He changed my world. He changed my eternity.”

Lee Strobel discovered something amazing when he became a Christian. He discovered God’s ability to change lives. To change a person’s focus so that it is on the good shepherd and not on thieves and robbers. The good shepherd leads to a life full of fulfillment. A life full of promise. A life that is abundant. That is the good news that should be preached. That by entering through the gate of Jesus Christ we become his sheep ready to be led to green pastures; to the life of abundance and fulfillment. Where we can learn to flee from the thieves and robbers that threaten our well-being.

An entire world is searching for the abundant life, for life in all its fullness. They have a desire to find it, but are lost. They have been lured by robbers and thieves. As Christians we need to tell others where they can find what they are looking for. We need to lead them to Christ, who then will lead them to green pastures, life in all its fullness.