The Door
Notes
Transcript
I don’t know if you all are like this or not and maybe this is the greedy part of me but I like things in my life to be full.
And let me explain because a lot of you probably think I am talking on some sort of deep spiritual level but I am just talking about basic things in life.
I like it when the gas tank in my car is full.
It never is (for some reason I like to drive it down to the point I have 5 miles to get to a gas station)
But when I fill its nice knowing I am not going to run out of gas and be stranded on the side of the road.
Another thing I love is the feeling of being full after a big meal.
And you take a nap and its a great feeling.
If you have ever been to a sporting event and the stands are empty its a lot less exciting
But it you go and its packed the atmosphere is awesome, because everyone is building off of each-other and is pumped!
I mean maybe I am wrong but I think it is a pretty safe assumption that in general we like things in our life being full!
But here is what I want you to get because often times we like things to be full, but if we stepped back and did an honest examination of our life as a whole, a lot of us might look at it and ask the questions am I really living a full life ?
My life is busy (in fact experts will say that the time period we live in is actually one where individually peoples lives are bussier then ever)
I have different things that are full in my life
But am I living a life to the full?
Where when I get to the end of our lives we will reflect back and go “wow, I lived a full life.”
So today what we are going to be doing is we are going to be talking about how we are able to live a full life.
So we are going to be in .
And this passage actaully goes a lot deeper because it tells us how it happens, what it looks like and then what we need to watch out for to make sure that this fullness of life we have is not robbed.
So once again we are in and it says:
1 “Very truly I tell you Pharisees, anyone who does not enter the sheep pen 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 recognize 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. 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. 11 “I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep.
(ESV)
So this passage actually starts with Jesus talking and He says truly, truly I tell you and basically in the Bible Jesus is saying listen up because this is important!
I Am the Good Shepherd
10 “Truly, truly, I say to you, he who does not enter the sheepfold by the door but climbs in by another way, that man is a thief and a robber. 2 But he who enters by the door is the shepherd of the sheep. 3 To him the gatekeeper opens. The sheep hear his voice, and he calls his own sheep by name and leads them out. 4 When he has brought out all his own, he goes before them, and the sheep follow him, for they know his voice. 5 A stranger they will not follow, but they will flee from him, for they do not know the voice of strangers.” 6 This figure of speech Jesus used with them, but they did not understand what he was saying to them.
7 So Jesus again said to them, “Truly, truly, I say to you, I am the door of the sheep. 8 All who came before me are thieves and robbers, but the sheep did not listen to them. 9 I am the door. If anyone enters by me, he will be saved and will go in and out and find pasture. 10 The 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.So this passage actually starts with Jesus talking and He says truly, truly I tell you and basically in the Bible Jesus is saying listen up because this is important!
So this passage starts by just saying truly truly I tell you and basically Jesus is saying I want you to listen up because this is important.
And in this passage Jesus is talking about sheep and I will explain this so just give me a second and I am going to unpack everything because what Jesus is do is making a point
Because He is saying how there are people that enter the sheep pen through a door which is the right way and there are people who enter it by climbing a gate and its the wrong way.
That is pretty simple right? The door is the right way to walk into pretty much anywhere properly.
When you walked into church this morning where did you come in from?
I hope and pray all of you walked in through the door.
But here is what I want you to get because in verse 7 and 9 Jesus makes a really odd statement.
And this is jumping down a bit but in this passage in verse
He says “I am the door”
I mean thats something we usually do not use to describe Jesus.
You do not here people saying “Jesus is my door”
But let me explain because what Jesus is saying here is that He is the only way that we are able to properly enter into a full life.
Thats why at the end of verse 10 He says that He came to make it so we can live life abundantly.
Live life to the full
And if you are like me you go wait a minute that sounds really offensive, because think about all the other things that give us joy:
Our family give us joy and fills us up, our friends give us joy, for some of us our job might or hobby might give us joy,
But these things are things that God has given us so of course they will fill us up a little, but it will not be complete.
And that still sounds a little offensive right?
but this is why because if we believe that God created us completely in His image,
But then we say we want to live a life separate from Him the one who created us in His image and if you read Genesis He litterly breaths life into us then it is impossible for us to live a completely full life.
life that is abundant.
So all of that to say if we want to live an abundant life then it has to happen where we are living a life in Christ.
But look at verse 3 and 4 because we enter into this relationship with Christ but this gives us a really nice picture of what this looks like.
The sheep hear his voice, and he calls his own sheep by name and leads them out... he goes before them, and the sheep follow him, for they know his voice
3 To him the gatekeeper opens. The sheep hear his voice, and he calls his own sheep by name and leads them out. 4 When he has brought out all his own, he goes before them, and the sheep follow him, for they know his voice.
I want you to notice that it dosn’t say that you enter this door and thats it.
You do not just enter into a relationship with Christ and say I am done!
I did it!
But it says that the Shepard leads them out.
God calls us out to continue to do His will and I love how relational this is because it says that the shepard (Being Jesus) comes before the Sheep and they hear His voice and follow.
Its relational
Its like this Liam is my child, but when he was born he probably did not know my voice that well, I was familiar to him probably but he did not know it well
But slowly over time he has begun to recognize my voice more and more
Even if
and now when he hears me or Arika’s voice he will keep following it until he finds us.
He will do it to the point where he is scared of vacuums but he will hear me talking while vacuuming and he will crawl to me crying because he is scared of the vacuum but really wants to be with me.
Its really cute and sad at the same time.
But you know in our relationship with Christ when we enter into it we will often start to recognize God’s voice in small ways
but as we go deeper and follow him we end up being willing to say yes more.
Where we might start out by saying God I am willing to walk out the door, but we end up following God wherever He calls us because we know His voice.
I mean in our relationship with God we want to go deeper where we say yes more and more, because as we recognize his voice more we realize there will never be a time in our life where He will lead us astray.
We are called to live a life led by the Spirit.
And are you ready for the last point:
Because there has been a pretty natural progression: We enter into a relationship with Christ, we follow Him in that relationship
And a lot of us we have done that, you are probably thinking that I am not talking about rocket science so far.
But this last area is something that I can guarantee is difficult for many of us.
Because we are trying to live a full life for Christ but there are things that get in the way
These are the thief's and robbers that this passage talks about.
and in our life this represents sin.
And in our life there are things that will rob us from where God wants us.
Verse 10 says
(ESV)
Basically the sin in our life is literally tearing us apart, it is ripping us up and it is destroying us.
10 The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy. I came that they may have life and have it abundantly.
Basically our sin does the oppisit of what God does. If God leads to life, when we sin we do things that destroy us.
Sin causes brokenness, pain, hurt and captivity that holds us back from living the life that God has called us to live.
And you know whats amazing… The sheep in this passage they model what we should do when sin begins to creep into our life.
because it says in verse 5 that they see this robber walk in and it says they flee.
They get out of there. And this is probably the biggest application point because in our lives there is a good chance that there might be areas that are toxic.
There is a place where we have allowed sin to live in our life.
But I love what the sheeps reaction is because they get out of there.
I want to end with a story its actually a story that the band King and Country tells but they talk about how a long time ago there was a Captain and he took a fleet of ships full of soldiers to go explore a foreign land
I want to end
If I saw someone
To him the gatekeeper opens. The sheep hear his voice, and he calls his own sheep by name and leads them out. When he has brought out all his own, he goes before them, and the sheep follow him, for they know his voice.
And so he got these men to go with him, they sailed across the ocean and made it to their destination, but then as they got there none of the men actually wanted to leave the comfort of the ship to go explore the land that they had discovered.
So the captain kept telling the men to get the commanders to mobilize the men however every time the men would not go.
So finally the captain gave a drastic order he told all the commanders I want you to burn the ships.
Light them on fire.
Because then there was no other option for the men other then to go to the land.
And can I just say this story reflects where a lot of Christians are today.
Because we have said yes and set sail
We have been on this journey where we are following God.
But then there are these things in our life that still follow us around and we can’t get rid of.
These are things that can destroy our family
These are things that can shatter our future
These are things that are heart breaking
and you probably know the exact area in your life where there is something that is robbing you from living life to the full.
What would happen if you destroyed that area in your life.
What if you flushed the pills?
What if you made it so it was impossible to feed this thing that was robbing you?
Because if you are in that boat this morning the last part of this passage is so strong because Jesus closes where we are today by saying
11 I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep.
Basically our God has laid down His life for you so you do not have to live with the thing robbing your life.
and I do not know where you are this morning, maybe you need to walk through the door
Maybe its time for you to go past just accepting Christ but to start living a spirit filled life.
And maybe there is somthing that is taking away from that life.
But what would happen if you walked in that door and burned the ship.
Burned the thing that is holding you back.
Will you pray with me?