The Good Shepherd is No Hireling

Kongsvinger Lutheran Church

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Welcome to the teaching ministry of Kungsvinger Lutheran Church. Kungsvinger is a beacon for the Gospel of Jesus Christ and is located on the plains of northwestern

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Minnesota. We proclaim Christ and Him crucified for our sins and salvation by grace through faith alone.

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And now, here's a message from Pastor Chris Roseberg. The Holy Gospel according to St.

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John, chapter 10, verses 11 through 18. I am the good shepherd.

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The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep. The hired hand is not the shepherd who owns the sheep.

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So when he sees the wolf coming, he abandons the sheep and runs away. Then the wolf attacks the flock and scatters it.

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The man runs away because he's a hired hand and cares nothing for the sheep. I am the good shepherd.

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I know my sheep and my sheep know me. Just as the Father knows me and I know the Father, and I lay down my life for the sheep.

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I have other sheep that are not of this sheep pen. I must bring them also. They too will listen to my voice, and there shall be one flock, one shepherd.

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The reason my Father loves me is that I lay down my life only to take it up again. No one takes it from me, but I lay it down of my own accord.

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I have authority to lay it down and authority to take it up again. This command I received from my

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Father. In the name of Jesus. So Jesus is our good shepherd.

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Now, you'll notice just from the hymn that we sung just now that there's a lot of facets to the picture of Jesus as our good shepherd.

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And I'm just going to take a look at two of them today because I could literally probably give three or four sermons if we were to try to drill in deep into this idea of Jesus being our good shepherd.

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And so I first want to point out that the idea of Jesus being our good shepherd, you get pictures of this in the types and shadows in the

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Old Testament, particularly if you look at King David. King David is both shepherd and king.

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And real quick, I'll point something out from the story of David and Goliath from 1

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Samuel 17. I'll read a few passages from this and kind of point this out.

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We all know the story. This is right after David is anointed the king of Israel, but there happens to also be a currently reigning king.

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It kind of creates one of those awkward situations. So David is king but not yet king. It's weird, isn't it?

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There's some aspects of this that point us to Jesus. So immediately after Jesus is anointed, we read this story, chapter 17, 1

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Samuel. Now the Philistines gathered their forces for war and assembled at Succah and Judah. They pitched camp at Ephes, Damim, between Succah and Azekah.

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Saul and the Israelites assembled and encamped in the Valley of Elah and drew up their battle lines to meet the

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Philistines. The Philistines occupied one hill, the Israelites another with a valley between them.

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Sounds like the perfect setup for a great story. So here comes the tension. A champion named

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Goliath who was from Gath came out of the Philistine camp. He was over 9 feet tall.

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I always feel bad for Goliath because if only he had lived in the 21st century, he would have made at least $50 million a year playing basketball.

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But I digress. Seriously, everyone would be cheering for Goliath.

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The guy would come out on the court. Literally all you have to do is put the ball into the basket and everyone would go, Goliath, Goliath.

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But see, he's the bad guy in this story. So we read about Goliath that he was over 9 feet tall.

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He had a bronze helmet on his head and he wore a coat of scale armor of bronze weighing 5 ,000 shekels on his legs where bronze greaves and a bronze javelin was slung on his back.

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His spear shaft was like a weaver's rod and his iron point weighed 600 shekels.

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His shield bearer went ahead of him. Goliath stood and shouted to the ranks of Israel, Why do you come out and line up for battle?

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Am I not a Philistine and are you not servants of Saul? Choose a man and have him come down to me.

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If he is able to fight and kill me, we will become your subjects, but if I overcome him and kill him, you will become our subjects and serve us.

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Then the Philistine said, This day I defy the ranks of Israel. Give me a man and let us fight each other.

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And on hearing the Philistine's words, Saul and all the Israelites were dismayed and terrified.

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What a disappointing setup, right? So here we have Goliath, 9 feet tall.

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The guy's decked out in armor, all of the latest weaponry. He's got javelin 2 .0.

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This guy is just awesome to behold and everyone is fearing him. Why are they fearing him?

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Because, well, Goliath, like so many people, he trusts in his strength. But who is the strength of Israel?

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Who is your strength? Not you. God is.

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And so we begin to see now here kind of the setup where we begin typologically and prophetically to see this idea of the shepherd king who steps onto the battlefield for us.

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I'll fast forward a little bit to where David, he shows up, and this is what it says.

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David said to Saul, Let no one lose heart on account of this Philistine. Your servant will go and fight him.

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Now, how old is David at this point? Maybe 12, 13. So here we've got this short, ruddy teenager who's going to take on Goliath.

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But, see, that's kind of the thing. It's really not David who's taking on Goliath. Because who is

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Goliath defying? He's defying God. And so God chooses the foolish things of the world to shame the wise.

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So Saul said to David, You're not able to go out against this Philistine and fight him. You are only a boy, and he has been a fighting man from his youth.

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But David said to Saul, Your servant has been keeping his father's sheep. Notice David's first response.

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I'm a shepherd. Your servant has been keeping his father's sheep.

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And when a lion or a bear came and carried off a sheep from the flock, I went after it, struck it, and rescued the sheep from its mouth.

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When it turned on me, I seized it by its hair, struck it, and killed it. Your servant has killed both the lion and the bear.

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This uncircumcised Philistine will be like one of them because he has defied the armies of the living

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God. The Lord who delivered me from the paw of the lion and the paw of the bear will deliver me from the hand of this

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Philistine. So Saul said to David, Go, and the

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Lord be with you. What an amazing answer. But see, in there we begin to see the typology of the

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Messiah being our shepherd. And so here David has done these miraculous things, or I should say

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God has done these miraculous things, through this young shepherd, now who's king, but not yet reigning.

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Again, you've got to work that all out. And he says that when a lion came and carried off a sheep from the flock,

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I went after it, struck it, and rescued the sheep from its mouth. And this is where we can see ourselves in the story properly.

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So many times when people read this story, they want to think they're David. No, no, no, no, no. You're the little sheep that got taken away by the lion.

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And your shepherd has come and rescued you from the mouth of the lion.

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And that lion is the devil. We're born in his power under his sway and tyranny.

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And Christ, our shepherd king, has come and rescued us, and he's done it by dying for us. That's how he rescues us.

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So this idea of Jesus being our shepherd, it's a deep and rich theme in Scripture.

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And with that, I want to go back to our Gospel text, but I want to show you something about what aspect we're talking about is

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Jesus as our shepherd in our Gospel text today. And that requires us to understand what's going on in the story in which

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Jesus makes these amazing statements about being our good shepherd. So if you have the Bible, go open to the

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Gospel of John 9. We're going to put this story in its context, and I think you'll find there's something really rich and deep going on here.

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John 9, verse 1, here's what it says. As he, Jesus, went along, he saw a man blind from birth.

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So his disciples asked Jesus, Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?

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Now this is an important question because the assumption in Jesus' day, and unfortunately in ours too, is that if something terrible has happened to somebody, that the only possible explanation is that God is punishing them for their sins.

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Now, it is true that God does punish for sins, but not every time we have an illness or something happens to us is it because God is punishing us.

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You've got to keep this in mind. Think of Job, right? We all know the inside story regarding Job, and think of how much that man suffered and how he longed to be dead.

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It would have been better for him to be dead. But see, he didn't suffer because of his sin.

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He suffered because the devil hated him, and the devil asked to sift him in order to knock his faith off of Christ.

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That's what the devil was all about, so that's the reason why he suffered. But in Jesus' day, the

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Pharisees would teach, Oh, are you poor? Are you stricken? Do you have an illness? It's because you're a sinner.

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That was the only possible solution. So, as Jesus is discipling his disciples and teaching them, they come across this man who was blind from birth.

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And keep this in mind, this poor man has lived a difficult life. Being blind is no easy feat, especially in the days before we have handicapped parking and crosswalks that can tell you when it's okay to cross.

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Being blind is a difficult road to hoe. So he suffered greatly as a blind man.

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So Jesus' answer to his disciples is this. Neither this man nor his parents sinned.

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He's not saying they're sinless. He's saying that the reason why this man was born blind is not due to God punishing his sin.

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So Jesus said this has happened so that the work of God might be displayed in his life. That's the reason why he suffered.

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God was doing something. It's tough for us to swallow this, but sometimes our suffering is because God is doing something for his own glory.

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So Jesus then says this. As long as it is day, we must do the work of him who sent me.

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Night is coming when no one can work. And while I'm in the world, I am the light of the world. Having said this, he spit on the ground, made some mud with the saliva, put it on the man's eyes.

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Go, he told him, wash in the pool of Siloam. This word means sent. So the man went and washed and came home seeing.

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Now keep in mind, mud made with spittle does not have any medicinal properties to heal people and give them their eyesight back.

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But this mud did. Jesus, if you would, kind of made a sacrament of sorts. And so he takes and he spits in the dirt and makes some mud and puts it on the guy's eyes.

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This guy goes over to Siloam, and so he's got this mud on his eyes. And while the mud is on his eyes, he clearly can't see anything, but God's miracle -working power is working in him.

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He gets to Siloam, and he washes and he sees. Think of your baptism here.

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You are blind until you are washed, and then God opens your eyes.

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There's something going on in this theme as well. He still has not seen Jesus. He's heard

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Jesus' voice, but he hasn't seen him. He doesn't know what Jesus looks like. Keep all of that in mind.

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Having said this, he spit on the ground, made some mud with the saliva, put it on the man's eyes, go, he told him, wash in the pool of Siloam.

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So the man went and washed, and he came home seeing. His neighbors and those who had formerly seen him begging asked, isn't this the same man who used to sit and beg?

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Some claimed that he was, and others said, no, he only looks like him.

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Maybe he has a twin brother, right? But he himself insisted, I'm the man. Well, then how then were your eyes open, they demanded.

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The man they called Jesus, he made some mud and put it on my eyes, and he told me to go to Siloam and wash.

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So I went and I washed, and then I could see. Where is this man, they asked him.

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I don't know, he said. Well, whenever there's a miracle, you've got to get the religious authorities involved.

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They've got to conduct an investigation at this point. But I want you to keep this in mind.

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This is a little bit of the story that you don't understand. They're going to bring in the Pharisees, and you're going to look long and hard in the

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Old Testament to find where the Pharisees have the authority to do what they're doing.

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God has not called Pharisees to teach Israel. The job of the

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Levites is to teach Israel. When you read about the Levites in the

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Mosaic Covenant, they are the priestly clan. They are to perform the duties of the temple, and they are called by God as the

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Levites to be the teachers of Israel. But remember this. Remember Saul of Tarshish, before he was

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Paul? What clan was he from? He was from the clan, the tribe of Benjamin.

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Nowhere in the Old Testament is Benjamin given the authority to be the teachers of Israel. So when we keep this in mind, you have to understand this.

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The Pharisees are usurpers. These are men who have asserted their own authority.

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They have no calling from God to teach Israel. And so if you understand this about them, they put themselves forward, and they are teaching their doctrines, which they're not authorized to teach, and they created this idea that the written

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Word of God is not enough. They claim to not only have the written Torah, they claim to have the oral

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Torah. And this is just as authoritative. And so when you see the clash between Jesus and the

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Pharisees going on, and this is one of them, keep that in mind. If you understand this, you'll understand what

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Jesus then says regarding the hireling, because he says his statement about being the true shepherd in light of the fact that there are hirelings, people who jump the fence, who shouldn't even be in the sheep pen.

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So keep that in mind. So here's what it says. So Jesus performed this miracle. We've got to get the Pharisees involved.

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So they brought to the Pharisees the man who had been blind. Now the day in which Jesus had made the mud and opened the man's eyes was a

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Sabbath. Therefore the Pharisees also asked him how he had received his sight.

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So the man says, Well, he put mud on my eyes. And the man replied, And I washed, and now I see.

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Some of the Pharisees said, This man is not from God, for he does not keep the Sabbath. Where in the

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Sabbath does it say you can't spit in the mud on a Sunday? Sorry, not a Sunday. Saturday, right?

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It doesn't say that anywhere. Well, keep this in mind. In the tradition of the elders created by the

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Pharisees, there's a whole section in there about what you can and can't do on the

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Sabbath. And according to the Pharisees, if you live in a home where you have a dirt floor and you have a table and chairs, on the

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Sabbath you cannot sit at that table and then push back from the table.

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Because if you did that, the legs of the chair would create furrows in the dirt and that would be plowing.

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I'm not making this up. And of course, then you have the Pharisees with this ultimate conundrum.

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If you have an apple in your hand and your arm is extended outside of the window of your home and the sun goes down and it's

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Friday night and it becomes the Sabbath, because the Sabbath begins when the sun goes down, can you bring your arm in to your home?

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Answer, no, because then you would be delivering groceries. But can you drop the apple?

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No, you can't drop the apple either because then you'd be planting a tree. No joke.

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What a sick and twisted religion this is. Really? You're going to sin? Never mind.

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Clearly, this is what's going on here. Jesus made mud on the

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Sabbath. You can't work on the Sabbath. Jesus didn't sin. He literally healed a man.

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This is the conundrum. Some of the Pharisees said, this man is not from God for he does not keep the Sabbath. Others said, how can a sinner do such miraculous signs?

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So they were divided. Finally, they turned again to the blind man. What have you to say about him?

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It was your eyes he opened. Notice the accusation here. What has this man done?

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How dare you be healed? So the man replied, he's a prophet.

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Get out of here. So the Jews still did not believe that he had been blind. The answer to this solution is that he couldn't possibly, this is some kind of a ruse, right?

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So the Jews still did not believe that he had been blind and he had received his sight until they sent for the man's parents. Now watch this line of questioning.

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Is this your son, they asked? Is this the one you say was born blind? How is it that he can now see?

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These are not safe questions, right? I mean, you would think these people had committed murder or something, you know, had plotted to kill the emperor of Rome, right?

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Well, here's where they answered. Well, we know this is our son, parents answered, and we know he was born blind.

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Now they go all squishy. But how he can see and who opened his eyes? We don't know. Ask him.

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He's of age. He'll speak for himself. Thanks, Mom. Thanks, Dad.

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Right? The text says, so his parents said this because they were afraid of the

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Jews. For already the Jews had decided that anyone who acknowledged that Jesus was the Christ, the

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Messiah, they would be put out of the synagogue. That was why his parents said, he is of age, ask him.

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Now think about this. The religious leaders of Israel are saying they're going to put you out of the church.

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They're going to excommunicate you if you believe that Jesus is the Messiah. What kind of religious leaders are these?

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Because who is Jesus? He is the Messiah. So something terrible has happened.

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These usurpers, this office of Pharisee, the ones who've become the instructors of Israel, they're not true religious leaders, are they?

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The reason they're not is because they claim to worship the God of the Bible, the

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God of the Torah, the God who revealed himself on Mount Sinai. And yet Moses said, a prophet like me will arise among you, and you must listen to him.

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And if you don't, you will be held accountable for this. And so now he's come, and they don't recognize who he is.

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How does one get to be so blind? Yet they read their

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Bible, do they not? So think about the irony of the situation. Well, the investigation continues.

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A second time they summon the man who had been blind. Give glory to God, they said. We know this man is a sinner.

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Really? So now watch what happens. And we learn from this that the man who had been born blind was not only healed with his eyesight, but God also gave him faith.

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And listen to that. And so he has faith in Christ, and now he's going to suffer for it.

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He's going to be persecuted. Watch this. So the guy replied, all right, whether or not he's a sinner, I don't know.

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One thing I do know. I was blind, but now I see. So then they asked him, what did he do to you?

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How did he open your eyes? He answered, I told you already, and you did not want to listen.

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Why do you want to hear it again? Do you want to become his disciples too? Well, that didn't go over too well.

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So the text says, so they hurled insults at him. You are this fellow's disciple.

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We're disciples of Moses. We know that God spoke to Moses. But as for this fellow, we don't even know where he came from.

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And now watch the chutzpah here. So the man answered, well, now that's remarkable. You don't know where he comes from, yet he opened my eyes.

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We know that God does not listen to sinners. He listens to the godly man who does his will. Nobody has ever heard of opening the eyes of a man born blind.

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If this man were not from God, he could do nothing. Boom. Yeah.

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Drop the mic. Walk off stage. Yes. Okay. What boldness.

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What a great proclamation. And what again? What has this guy done wrong? He was healed.

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That's it. Now watch the theology. So to this the Pharisees replied, you were steeped in sin at birth.

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How dare you lecture us? And they threw him out. So they really believed that he was steeped in sin from birth.

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Why? Because he was born blind. But Jesus explained, he wasn't born blind because of sin, so that the works of God might be displayed in his life.

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Now, they threw him out. What an encounter. Now, by the way, you can't go through something like this without being a little shaken up.

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I mean, you know what I'm saying? You think your church fights can be a little ornery at times. I mean, this is kind of like taken to a different level.

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So the guy's shaken up clearly. And all he's done is be healed. That's it.

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But he confessed as Christ. And so here's what happens. Jesus seeks him out. Jesus heard that they had thrown him out.

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And when he found him, he said, Do you believe in the Son of Man? Who is he, sir?

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the man asked. Tell me so that I might believe in him. And these beautiful words come out. You have now seen him.

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In fact, he is the one speaking with you. Remember, he hadn't seen Jesus yet.

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And now he says, you have now seen him. And the emphasis is on the seeing. What a beautiful thing that Jesus has done here.

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Seeking this man out. And then it says this. So then the man said,

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Lord, I believe. And he worshiped him. You only worship God, and Jesus accepts worship from this man.

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What a beautiful picture. Jesus seeks out the blind man who had never seen him. And keep this in mind.

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We have a lot in common with this blind man. A lot. Each of us were truly born blind. And each of us were washed in the waters of our baptism.

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And God has given us sight now. And like this man, up to this point, we have yet to see the one who has opened our eyes with our physical eyes.

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But like Job says in his book, I will behold him with my very eyes.

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So you too will behold Jesus with your very eyes. And he will be just as kind to you as he was to this man.

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Because he's healed you and he's given you faith. He's washed away all of your sins.

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He is truly your Lord and your shepherd. So this story then continues.

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Jesus said, it is for judgment that I have come into this world so that the blind will see and those who see will become blind.

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And Jesus isn't here talking about physical sight. He's talking about that spiritual sight.

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So some of the Pharisees who were with him, they heard him say this and they asked him, What? Are we blind too?

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What do you think? They're so blind, they'll excommunicate anybody who confesses

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Christ as the Messiah. And yet that's exactly who he is. So Jesus said, if you were blind, you would not be guilty of sin.

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Boy, is that a theologically charged statement. He's going right after their false teaching. But now that you claim that you can see, your guilt remains.

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I tell you the truth, the man who does not enter the sheep pen by the gate, but climbs in by some other way, is a thief and a robber.

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Who's Jesus talking about? The Pharisees. There is no office of Pharisee.

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These are people who've basically climbed the fence while no one was looking.

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Came right into the sheep pen. They have no authority to be teaching what they're teaching. And what they're teaching is contrary to the

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Word of God. If they were teaching the truth, they would recognize Jesus for who he is.

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And like the man who was just healed, they too would worship Jesus. But they don't.

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So Jesus says they are thieves and robbers. And that's what false teachers are.

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The man who enters by the gate, he is the shepherd of his sheep.

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And now Jesus speaks about himself. And this is the context in which he makes our statement from our Gospel. The watchman opens the gate for him, and the sheep listen to his voice.

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He calls his own sheep by name and leads them out. When he has brought out all of his own, he goes on ahead of them, and his sheep follow him because they know his voice.

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They will never follow a stranger. In fact, they will run away from him because they do not recognize a stranger's voice.

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Jesus used this figure of speech, but they did not understand what he was telling them. Notice it says they didn't understand what he was telling them.

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The Pharisees didn't get it. In other words, Jesus said, my sheep know my voice.

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Jesus is speaking to them. And all they're hearing is wah, wah, wah, wah, wah, wah. They're not his sheep.

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Therefore, Jesus said again, I tell you the truth, I am the gate for the sheep. All who ever came before me were thieves and robbers.

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Talking about the Pharisees. But the sheep did not listen to them. I am the gate. Whoever enters through me will be saved.

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I will come in and go out and find pasture. The thief comes only to steal, to kill, and to destroy.

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Now oftentimes you hear people quote this passage. The Bible says that the thief comes to kill, steal, and destroy.

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And people think it's talking about Satan. It's not. It's talking about false teachers.

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That's the context. The thief comes to only steal, to kill, and to destroy.

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And that's what false teachers are. I have come so that they might have life, have it to the full. I am the good shepherd.

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And the good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep. Now normally this wouldn't help sheep.

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Think about this. If a shepherd's out in the field and the wolf comes, and the shepherd lays down his life for the sheep, well, no sooner is the wolf done with the shepherd that he's going to start gnawing on the sheep.

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But in this case, Jesus, by laying down his life for his sheep, that is how he conquers.

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This is how he rescues us from the mouth of the lion and from being torn apart by the devil, by laying down his life, by paying the price for all of our sins.

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We, like silly, stupid sheep, have wandered away and put ourselves in danger with our sin.

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We've done that in all the ways in which we fall short. We don't love God with our whole heart, and we don't love our neighbor as ourselves.

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Every one of our adulteries, even of mind, every one of our thefts that we've committed, every time we've lied about somebody, we have put ourselves in grave danger.

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But our shepherd has laid down his life for the sheep, and that's what we are. We are Jesus' little lambs.

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And so he's done this out of his great love for us. He says, just as the Father knows me and I know the

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Father, I lay down my life for the sheep. I have other sheep that are not of the sheep pen. And Jesus there is referring to Gentiles.

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He said this in a Jewish context. So he's here at this point making it clear that he lays down his life for his sheep, both who are genetically related to Abraham and those who are just rank

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Gentiles like us. I have other sheep. I must bring them also. They too will listen to my voice, and there shall be one flock, one shepherd.

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So the reason my Father loves me is that I lay down my life, only to take it up again.

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No one takes it from me, but I lay it down of my own accord. I have authority to lay it down and authority to take it up.

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This command I received from my Father. Now notice that. Jesus says I have the authority to lay it down,

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I have the authority to pick it up again, and this command I received from my Father. That is in total distinction to the

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Pharisees, who have no authority to be doing any of the things that they're doing. God did not send them.

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They have no authority to be teaching Israel, and the doctrines they're teaching are contrary to the written word of God.

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But Jesus makes it clear. I have the authority to lay my life down again, and I have the authority to take it up, and all of this

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I have received from God. He truly is our shepherd. The Pharisees, they're hirelings.

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They care nothing for the sheep. False teachers care nothing at all for Christ's sheep.

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But Jesus does. At these words, the Jews were again divided. Many of them said, well, he's demon -possessed, and he's raving mad.

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Why listen to him? Are these the words of a madman? Not at all.

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Others said, these are not the sayings of a man possessed by a demon. Can a demon open the eyes of the blind?

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So do you hear Jesus' voice today? Do you? Hear his voice again, where he says,

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I have bled and died for you. I've laid down my life for the sheep. And this, my friends, changes everything.

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It changes everything. And let me remind you of the words that we read in our epistle text, 1

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John 3 .16. By this we know, love, that he laid down his life for us.

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And it doesn't end there. And we ought to lay down our lives for the brothers, for each other.

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Remember Christ's singular command. As I have loved you, love one another.

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And how has Christ loved us? By laying down his life for us. So if there's somebody needy among us, somebody who's fallen, we care for them.

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We love them. We pick them up. We forgive their sins. As Christ has loved us, we also ought to love each other.

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So this good shepherd of ours, who has the authority to lay down his life and take it up again, has done so, and he's done so for you.

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And by the authority that was given to him by the Father, he now commands us to love each other in this same way.

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What a great, merciful, kind shepherd we have. Let us listen to his voice and let us follow him, even as he leads us to the valley of the shadow of death, because on the other side of that is the promised land and eternal life with him.

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And when we get there, we will be like the blind man, who, even though our eyes were opened, we have not seen him with our eyes.

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When we get there, we will see him face to face, and he will say to us, Well done, good and faithful servant.

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In the name of Jesus, Amen. We thank you for your support.

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