Jesus Knows His Own and They Know Him

We continue in our study in John chapter 10 this evening. Really in essence we will Do this evening what we would normally have done this morning. If I can talk faster.

But I.

Have to be slow and measured in my speech and so this evening we will do the exegesis of the text that would be a the normal part of our examination of God's Word.

The Good Shepherd Lays Down His Life for the Sheep

This morning we.

Looked at the background. Once again, we read through the first section of John chapter 10. And so if you were with us, you are aware of that. If you're not you're not going to be missing too much. We will be picking up specifically with verse 11 this evening.

When Jesus says I am the Good Shepherd the Good Shepherd Gives his soul that is the literal word for soul in behalf of the sheep. Now that word to give is Not the term that's normally used of something like an offering of a sacrifice or something like that.

Instead it emphasizes The fact that the individual engaging in the action is in control of the action. This is something that the Good Shepherd does. It is really interesting in the providence of God.

Just this afternoon I got an except exceptionally lengthy Baptist nap that is the genetic thing that happens to Baptists on Sunday afternoons and Greatly lengthened when you're recovering from from the flu and When I got up I noticed in our online chat channel that there was a.

Gentleman.

Who had introduced himself no one had really responded to him because generally on Sundays. It's very quiet and ended up being a Pakistani Muslim living in the Dallas area and we ended up having a rather extensive conversation together and one of the real issues and it's good that we got to the main issues that came up was this idea of the nature of Christ and His ability as the God man To give his life in behalf of the sheep.

This is really honestly the fundamental soteriological or gospel issue that exists between Christians and Muslims in regards to how we are made right with God is the assertion on the part of the Christian faith that What is absolutely necessary is that God's law be fulfilled and that this is what necessitates Jesus being much more than a mere prophet and so here the Good Shepherd Emphasizes the fact that he lays down.

He is the one laying down his soul his life and Then the preposition that is used here Is the preposition of substitution? It is a preposition that would be utilized Numerous times especially in Paul's writings To speak of the giving of Christ in behalf of his people and behalf of those who have faith in him now.

Can we push that preposition to an absolute proof text?

No.

But it is perfectly consistent in the sense that the Good Shepherd is giving his life in behalf of the sheep now remember he is he is. Contrasting this then with what comes afterwards and that is the hireling the one who is the one who literally receives a wage.

The one who is a a wage receiver and not the shepherd and the sheep are not his own. He sees the wolf coming and and he's out of there. He abandons the sheep. He flees and the wolf comes and he he snatches them and he scatters them.

Because it's it's not a matter to the hireling concerning the sheep now, why would you have this entire? Section inserted here when Jesus goes right back to this Emphasis in verse 14. I am the Good Shepherd.

I know my own and my own know me. It seems like a fairly lengthy Detour to go right back to where you were, but I think it's important not only again Continuing that idea that there is a condemnation here of the Jewish leaders who are not functioning as shepherds of Christ sheep but the point is that Those who see the wolf coming Jesus Jesus knows What is going to cost him to be the Good Shepherd?

He goes into this with full knowledge he knows what the cost is going to be and when it says because It is literally not a care To the hireling that's what it says. It's not a matter to him. They're not his sheep.

It is not a care to him concerning the sheep. The emphasis therefore is that that we are really transcending Just the mere human shepherd and sheep relationship here. That's what sort of lays the foundation for What we find in verses 14 and 15 which really takes us into the deep spiritual unity that Exists not only between father and son but between believers.

This is somewhat if you're thinking ahead in the gospel of John. This is somewhat of a preview of what we're going to see in John chapter 17 Where you have the discussion of what it means to be the son to be in the father and us to be in the son.

And therefore a relationship with God and the the the very intimate relationship that exists there. It is important to recognize that in in so many of man's religions. There is nothing like this nothing like this at all and yet in mystic religions where you have a tremendous amount of Emphasis upon union with God and and knowledge of God and things like that.

What's missing from the mystical religions is the continued recognition and necessity of seeing that we are creatures of God created by God Responsible before him and that we have individual value and responsibility before God.

That's what gets lost when in the mystical religions Union with God basically involves the the absorption of yourself into the one.

In.

Christianity you have the continued emphasis upon the reality of God is creator the reality of creation itself the responsibility of mankind before God and yet because of the amazing reality of the incarnation.

Because of that one thing where the word becomes flesh invades his own creation. You have something absolutely unique. There just there just isn't anything like it even if you talk about alleged incarnations and polytheistic religions.

There's just nothing that can be be paralleled in any meaningful fashion with the Christian faith and the Christian message when it makes these claims. And so I am the Good Shepherd verse 14 and.

I know my own and.

My own know me. Now that might seem a very simplistic statement it might be. Okay, what's that supposed to mean? But you need to understand here is where you have such a massive division between paganism.

And what it is we present to the world. We do not present to the world an unknown God. We simply do not. What we have is a known God who has made himself known. He has made himself known in a not just as a as a being far far away.

Not just as a God who thunders from Mount Sinai. But he has made himself known in such a way that I know my own.

My own.

There is a sovereignty in that statement. He does not say I know those who have chosen me and allow me to know them. I saw I saw a I even took a screenshot of it. This is a thing on a computer pestering and There literally was a.

It could have just been. I don't know. Maybe you all tell me maybe I was just being overly sensitive because I haven't been feeling well lately, but there was a red button above some Jesus memes thing.

I don't know what it was, but Evidently Facebook thought I'd find this Wonderful. I don't know but there is a a red button to click Click here To accept Jesus now. Now this wasn't at the end of some kind of gospel presentation.

This was an advert. I mean there was you were clicking here to accept Jesus. So we have clickbait evangelism going on on on the computer and I was absolutely shocked By what I was looking at. How could someone think that this has anything to do with the with the intimate call of discipleship that is throughout the pages of the New Testament,.

I know my own. This relationship that Jesus has with his sheep is not a relationship that exists.

Merely.

With a theoretical group now again, I know sometimes The theological battles can become tiring but there's a reason why those before us have fought the theological battles that they have. And I know sometimes Calvinists can be jerks and I know sometimes that there I know there are lots of Calvinists that just like to run around Drawing their theological Swords and chopping up.

Well. We've been getting out of how many letters here at the church addressed to me. From one fellow I opened up one and you have permission by the way if you get any more from this guy. You can you can line the line the windows with them whatever you want to do insulation It doesn't matter but the very first line said I know that you're famous for debating.

Armenians.

Some of you are going. What's wrong with that? Well, I actually have never debated an Armenian and I happen to know some Calvinistic Armenians because Armenia is a country and Arminianism is a theological system.

And I sort of figure if you're writing to challenge me to debate on that subject if you don't know the difference between Armenia and Arminianism, it's probably not gonna go really well in the long term and.

And so there are Calvinists that just love to find somebody like that and just Get that big old hunk and sort out and and and take off a few theological heads. I Understand all that. I I get it. I get tired of the battles too.

But there is a reason why you always have to step back and go. But there are certain things that remain extremely important and one of these important things is this. The doctrine of election Requires that we believe that God Sovereignly elects.

Not just a group called the elect. But the individuals therein. Now our confession of faith says that there's no way around that. But that's because there is a massive chasm of difference between saying that God has freely chosen to save and elect people and then what you do is you take a few steps back and say and We basically get to choose who they are.

It's up to us. That's a very very popular perspective very very popular big big names. Promote that kind of a perspective because it can it can allow you to sound like you're very biblical. While still holding to a very man-centered concept.

Well, what's the cost of that? I mentioned it briefly this morning the cost of that is That the work of Christ becomes impersonal. It becomes impersonal. What I mean by that is that his work becomes that which makes possible the salvation of a nameless faceless group and then we fill in the details as Time rolls on.

Have you ever thought about the fact that when Jesus says I know my own. That if you are one of his own That means you have been Foreknown and for loved. It's difficult for us to wrap our minds around eternity.

It's difficult to wrap our our very time centered thinking around this. But the scriptures are very plain That we have been foreknown Predestined called justified glorified. And when Jesus says the Good Shepherd knows his own it's real easy for us to just simply leave that limited to thee right now once I Buy my sheep card.

Then Jesus gets to know me. Isn't that a privilege for him? No, I Know my own and my own know me. There is a personal relationship that is found here now. I didn't exist when Jesus said these words but the certainty of my existence was as certain as the decree of God in creating this universe and Just as it can be said that we have been already seated in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus.

The certainty of what God is doing in the gospel lies at the very root of The confidence that we can have that God is going to accomplish what he said he's going to accomplish. It's a trendy theological thing.

For people to come up with the idea That the future is open and it's a continued struggle and you need to sort of sign up for God's side. That sounds real good. If you just want to have a God who sounds like the most recent political victor in a campaign or something but the biblical teaching Simply cannot survive this kind of trendiness.

Jesus says that the Good Shepherd knows his own and it's a reciprocal relationship between His own and himself. My own know me. Not just about him. Not just about him. There is a danger my friends. There is a danger in apathetic non-passionate reformed theology.

Have you looked at Europe? Have you looked at where Calvinism once was the very law and essence of the land. Those are some of the most secular Rebellious spiritually dead places on the planet today. This faith is not passed on genetically.

It is not passed on simply by doing the proper catechesis and reading the proper Questions and having the proper statements of faith. All those things are wonderful and good and proper but knowing about Jesus is not the same thing as Knowing him and we've said it so many times before.

Do not think that well, you know our our pews. God bless our pews. I Wish I had seen them when they were all brown. Some of you don't know that they were once Chocolate brown I'm not sure how they got that way, but I heard that it took a long time to get them No longer that way a lot of hard work.

But.

There's almost something We'll have to call it semi Puritan about our pews. Because we have one cushion. Now if we had two cushions, we couldn't even claim to be Puritan. Right. I think that's why we don't have on the back is That we can still Read about the Puritans so we can still read about their two and a half hour long Sermons and the people walking it up and down the aisles the big long things where you reach out and whack people on the head To keep them awake.

Because we have the backs of our pews and so we sort of enter into that Suffering of the people of God over time in that way but not in fullness because we have cushions and That pew. You may have noticed that Reformed Baptists tend to gravitate toward the same spot.

For example, there is a pew right there that on the edge. Half of its brown and half of its more blonde toward the back. That's how brick knows where you're supposed to sit on Sunday morning. Okay?

Now.

I'm not sure what happened with George this evening. We're leaning. I'm sort of holding on like this because George is too far over to the side and the balance of the room has been completely lost, but.

But we sort of know where people end up. You know and it's it's funny when when when people come it's do you just sort of walk in and you just Look around and and you know, does God predestine you to a particular seat?

I'm really not sure how that works. But we can become comfortable there and It's a wonderful thing to be able to look back over decades of Faithful ministry and preaching and teaching in the church if as you sit in that pew.

What you're doing is you're truly Hearing the Word of God and desiring to be obedient. But that pew will never protect you from the fires of hell if you do not know Jesus. You can go into hell knowing more about Jesus than anybody else in there.

You can go into hell knowing more facts about Jesus than half the people in heaven won't make any difference. Unless you know him not about him. It doesn't there is a particular word for about and it's not there.

It doesn't say my own know about me.

Says my own know me and.

Then to emphasize that reality just as the Father knows me and I know the Father and I give my soul in behalf of the sheep using the exact same phraseology that have been used just up above and.

So.

Again, this is gonna be expanded upon in John chapter 17. We're not gonna go there this evening, obviously but twice in the Gospel of John Jesus emphasizes that the reality of his knowledge of his people the the personal nature of Our knowledge of him and his knowledge of us is to be likened to his own.

Relationship with the Father now if you're thinking about that. If you're thinking about that in your more honest moments. You're saying to yourself, I don't know. That really describes my experience.

Well, each one of us has to look at our experiences. There's no question about that. But what we must realize is you do not get to judge the truthfulness of Jesus's words by your experience. The truthfulness of what Jesus says here is Based upon the spiritual union that we have with him.

We are indwelt by the Spirit of God. It is the Spirit of God who binds us to the Son. He binds us to him. It is through him that our prayers are presented before the Father. In John chapter 14, this is gonna be brought out when Jesus says I will come to you.

I and the Father will make our abode with you. How by the presence of the Spirit in their lives and.

So.

The temptation for some of us is to look at a statement like this and Maybe you've been in a period of Apathy. Lethargy. I was FaceTiming with Clementine a couple days ago and She was saying yeah, I'm feeling a little sick and lethargic.

You're not for yet, and you're talking about I think she was trying to say allergic, but she said lethargic. So I I ran with it. That's okay. That's all right. Sometimes we experience that spiritually and It's real easy then to look at this and and judge the truthfulness of Jesus's words by what we are experiencing.

I'm not discounting the reality that we need to look honestly at our own hearts. What I am saying is That we should recognize that the true basis of our union with Christ Is found in the work of the triune God not my feelings about it.

Not my feelings about it, and so what the the beauty of the promise in verse 15. Can you imagine? the son ever forgetting the father. Can you imagine a disruption in the relationship of the father and the son?

There's a big controversy going on right now. Big controversy right going on right now. There is a big bunch of big stuff going on at the Evangelical Theological Society and stuff going on about What monogamous means the term only begotten?

Unique one-of-a-kind. All sorts of stuff in regards to the eternal generation of the Sun and all sorts of Trinitarian theology. But the funny thing is from my perspective it has little to do with the term monogamous.

If you want to see the real depth of Biblical doctrine regarding the relationship of the father and the son.

It's right here.

It's right here and the term monogamous isn't even used in here because you see the. You must understand Jesus is making a statement here. He's making an analogy and so something must be taken as a given and the given is.

The use of turn the term father and son. Father and son just as the father knows me, and I know the father. What's being asserted? There is an intimacy and a completeness of relationship. One that's seen elsewhere in the gospel of Matthew.

And what's called the gospel of John in Matthew because it sounds so much like John, but it's in Matthew where Jesus says no one knows the son except the father and then there's the idea of the freeness the father and the son have in revealing these truths and.

So here what is what is being assumed here is? The perfection of that relationship between the father and the son and given that that means the sheep. Have just as much assurance. That the shepherd will always know them and therefore give his soul in behalf of the sheep as.

They have assurance based upon the reality that father and son. Know one another and have intimate relationship with one another. Isn't that a lot different than so many of the Christian theological systems?

That ground your relationship with God. Based upon performance. Based upon what you do. Who you are what you've accomplished? There is a vast difference when you realize that in the Christian faith. In the Christian faith, this is this is something God does we say it all the time.

We emphasize it all the time. That the gospel is to the glory of God, it's not about man, but what does that mean? How do you work that out? Well when you start looking at what the gospel actually accomplishes when you look at how God actually saves this this taking of this undeserved people.

Deserving of the wrath of God just as anyone else and this sovereign election of them not based upon anything that they've done. The uniting of them with the Sun.

Being.

Placed in him Ephesians 1 what Ephesians 1 and in John chapter 10. Yeah, they're talking about the same things and You consider the fact of that union with Christ in him you have all these things in him you have all these things.

There is no place left open whatsoever for any kind of human accomplishment accomplishment any kind of human Sacramentology where we somehow control the grace of God any type of human boasting. It's all wiped out and what we're left with is a foundation.

That gives us the strength to face the most difficult tasks and the most difficult Persecution and suffering this world would it could ever present to us? It's totally different than the very popular forms of Evangelicalism that exists in our land today.

And so we have the promise Father knows me. I know the father. If you trust what Jesus said you gotta. We're so used to hearing this but you've got to realize. This was a leap of faith. These people the Jewish leaders were saying this man's a false teacher.

He's dangerous. He's leading you away from the truth. You had to believe that Jesus what Jesus was saying. I know the father and the father knows me. If you believe what Jesus says about that then you have to believe everything else everything that flows from it and I lay down my life in behalf of the sheep.

Right there in the midst of a discussion of union.

Knowledge.

Election. Once again. Soteriology salvation. Atonement. The giving of life and behalf of the sheep because the sheep have a need. The sheep have a need. It's not enough just to know. Well God knows me because I know me too, and I've got a need and he's gonna meet that need.

There's only one way of meeting that need. The way of meeting that need is that he gives his life in their place in behalf of.

The sheep.

The Beauty and Balance of the Gospel

Hopefully both this morning and this evening what you see is the tremendous balance and beauty. Balance and beauty of the Christian gospel. So often we cut it up into little pieces and we have our doctrine of God over here and our salvate doctors Salvation over here.

They are so much fuller and more beautiful when they are held together and seen in their glory and This is a glorious Glorious passage it truly truly is.

Now.

The text talks about.

The shepherd and.

Elsewhere in the New Testament the elders of the church Are called under shepherds. Peter refers to Fellow elders fellow fellow shepherds of the of the sheep even as he is one of the Apostles was Told to feed Christ's lambs and things like that.

At this time dr. White's message is complete and he segues then into discussing local Congregational business which the staff of Phoenix Reformed Baptist Church Believed was best left out of the final mix.

I pray that you've enjoyed this sermon and found it edifying. Thank you very much.