Abundant Life

John 10: 1 – 15, 27 - 30 (April 25, 2010)

1) The Text

10“Very truly, I tell you, anyone who does not enter the sheepfold by the gate but climbs in by another way is a thief and a bandit. 2The one who enters by the gate is the shepherd of the sheep. 3The gatekeeper opens the gate for him, and the sheep hear his voice. He calls his own sheep by name and leads them out. 4When he has brought out all his own, he goes ahead of them, and the sheep follow him because they know his voice. 5They will not follow a stranger, but they will run from him because they do not know the voice of strangers.” 6Jesus used this figure of speech with them, but they did not understand what he was saying to them. 7So again Jesus said to them, “Very truly, I tell you, I am the gate for the sheep. 8All who came before me are thieves and bandits; but the sheep did not listen to them. 9I am the gate. Whoever enters by me will be saved, and will come in and go out and find pasture. 10The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy. I came that they may have life, and have it abundantly. 11“I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep. 12The hired hand, who is not the shepherd and does not own the sheep, sees the wolf coming and leaves the sheep and runs away—and the wolf snatches them and scatters them. 13The hired hand runs away because a hired hand does not care for the sheep. 14I am the good shepherd. I know my own and my own know me, 15just as the Father knows me and I know the Father. And I lay down my life for the sheep.

27My sheep hear my voice. I know them, and they follow me. 28I give them eternal life, and they will never perish. No one will snatch them out of my hand. 29What my Father has given me is greater than all else, and no one can snatch it out of the Father’s hand. 30The Father and I are one.”

2) The Context

In the previous chapter (Chapter 9), Jesus has raised the ire of some religious leaders by giving sight to a blind man on the Sabbath. Some of them have heard Jesus say “‘I came into this world for judgment so that those who do not see may see, and those who do see may become blind’” (9:39). Some have asked him, “‘Surely we are not blind, are we?’” (9:40), to which he has replied. “‘If you were blind, you would not have sin. But now that you say, ‘We see,’ your sin remains.’” (9:41) Thinking themselves worthy makes them unworthy in God’s eyes.

Now Jesus uses a metaphor to expand on his point (but no metaphor works perfectly). In Palestine, sheep belonging to villagers roamed freely during the day but were confined to a common enclosure at night, to protect them from predators. Each morning, each shepherd called his sheep who followed him to pasture.

While “this figure of speech” (v. 6) is hard for us to understand in detail (as it was for those who heard Jesus), we can get the drift. So irate does the metaphor make the leaders that they try to stone him (in v. 31) and, in v. 40, Jesus flees across the Jordan. As he explains (v. 7), he is the “gate” of v. 2, so presumably the thieves and bandits are the Jewish religious leaders. Jesus, both the “gatekeeper” (v. 3) and the “shepherd” (v. 2) is the true leader. He calls the faithful to follow him (v. 4); they don’t follow a “stranger” (v. 5). The people listen to him and not to the “Pharisees” (9:40), “all who came before me” (v. 8). He is the only “gate” (v. 9) to eternal “life” (v. 10), to freedom (“come in and go out”, v. 9, a Jewish idiom), and to nourishment beyond measure (“find pasture ... abundantly”).

3) Interpretation

Shepherds had a hard life, since they faced all of the hardships of the hostile landscape through which they herded their sheep. Being with the flock, they faced all of the dangers and difficulties that the flock faced, and they were just as vulnerable -- to heat in the day, to cold at night, and to human and animal predators at all times. They slept with their flocks on nights when there were few enough predators for them to sleep at all; they were seen as poor prospects as husbands and fathers, since they had to leave their families alone and vulnerable at night as well.

That's the kind of life Jesus lives for and with us. Jesus journeys with the most vulnerable, and takes on all of their vulnerability. He knows what it's like to be out in the cold. He knows what he's saying when he calls people to leave their homes and villages, and even their families, since he had done the same himself. He knows what it's like to have people think that you're crazy or irresponsible because of what you leave behind and let go of, because people said the same things about him.
And he knows something else, too: this crazy life he lived, and calls us to live, is abundant life (John 14:10). It's THE abundant life, to be precise.

How could that be? Jesus of all people knows the risks and the hardships, the cost of the life he's leading. But Jesus is the shepherd, and he knows that as hard as it can be to follow the shepherd, it's much better than being prey for the others, thieves and bandits.

It may be costly to confess Jesus as Lord, but there are two ways to that confession which are implicit in this Sunday's gospel.

The first is that if Jesus is Lord, then the position is filled; no others need apply. If Jesus is not Lord, then there are countless others who will try to take that position in your life: bosses, politicians, parents; acquisitions, ambitions, causes; always just one more favor to do, one more promotion to get, one more enemy to defeat, before you can rest secure. Bob Dylan was right when he sang, "You've Gotta Serve Somebody," and those other would-be masters are bad news, keeping us penned with anxiety and work toward things which never turn out to be quite what was promised -- international, personal, or job "security" which really mean a lifetime of vigilance while trying to deny or hide vulnerabilities that are still very real.

The second is the Good News. Jesus is the good shepherd. Like his Father, he leads us together to what we need: food, water, air; true security, deep rest, and real love. Trusting him frees us to enjoy all of those good gifts as fully as God gives them, and the richness of God's blessings are far beyond what I know how to describe. When he's our shepherd, we experience abundant life that no thief can take away. When he's the gate, there's no need for us to try to do that job for him, and our anxieties about whether the "wrong" sort of people are getting in are replaced with freedom to love whomever we find ourselves with in the flock. Jesus is our Lord and shepherd, and so we need fear no evil; surely, as we follow him, goodness and mercy will follow us.

4) Thought Exercise

How has Jesus led you to find what you need?

How are you experiencing abundant life?