Young People’s Blog

“And I have other sheep which are not of this fold: those also I must bring, and they shall hear My voice; and there shall be one flock, one Shepherd” (John 10:16 JND).

A fold was an enclosure made of stones, high enough to keep out predators such as wolves and bears. It is a picture of the Jews, who were in that fold. But the Lord had other sheep also—the Gentiles, and He wanted to bring them too, and have them hear His voice. Now both Jews and Gentiles can be part of the church, all together, instead of being separated from each other. The Jews were not allowed to mix with the Gentiles in the Old Testament, but now God wants both Jews and Gentiles in the church.

Now there is no longer a fold with a wall around it, but rather “one flock, and one Shepherd.” The Shepherd is there now to lead, guide, and protect us. We gather around Him, instead of being in a fold—an enclosure. We do not need the wall of the fold to protect us, for as long as we are with the Shepherd, He keeps us safe.

“My sheep hear My voice, and I know them, and they follow Me” (John 10:27).

There was once a man who was brought into court and accused of stealing a sheep. He claimed that the sheep was his, and that he had not stolen it, while another man claimed that the sheep was his. The judge wisely commanded them to bring the sheep into the courtroom, while he told the accused man to go behind a door for a few moments. Then the judge asked the other man to call the sheep. The man called several times, but the sheep paid no attention to him. But then the accused man called from behind the door where he was, and immediately the sheep responded, and went over to the door.

This simple test showed clearly whose the sheep really was, for the sheep knew its shepherd’s voice. It would respond only to its rightful owner, and not to a stranger. The man who was accused of stealing was in fact the real owner of the sheep, while the other man was the thief.

You and I are to be like that sheep. When we know the Lord, and He knows us, we should listen only to His voice. Sadly, we are sometimes not very good sheep, and we do listen to the voices of strangers, instead of the Shepherd’s voice. Then we get into trouble. Let us listen to the Lord’s voice, and follow Him.

“All things are delivered unto Me of My Father: and no man knoweth the Son, but the Father; neither knoweth any man the Father, save the Son, and he to whomsoever the Son will reveal Him” (Matthew 11:27).

There are some things in Scripture that are impossible for us to understand, and this is one of them. The Lord Jesus is both God and man in one person, and as human beings, we cannot understand this. Only God the Father understands fully the way that God and man are united in one person in the Lord Jesus; we can accept it and believe it, but we cannot understand it.

However, we could not know God the Father either, but when the Lord Jesus came into this world, He revealed God the Father. He could say, “He that hath seen me hath seen the Father” (John 14:9). If we are truly saved, we know God the Father in a way that no one knew Him before the Lord Jesus came into this world as a man. The Lord Jesus revealed God the Father as a God of light, and a God of love. Those two things were brought together at the cross, for God’s holy nature demanded that sin be punished, but God’s love laid that punishment on His Son, so that we did not have to bear it.

You and I live in a very privileged time in the history of this world, for we know many things about God that were not known before this day of God’s grace.

“And from the days of John the Baptist until now the kingdom of heaven suffereth violence, and the violent take it by force” (Matthew 11:12).

This might seem like a hard verse to understand, but let me use an illustration. Over forty years ago I was in a foreign country, and I wanted to get on a bus in a large city. Quite a few people wanted to get on, and I tried to be polite, letting others get on first. You can probably guess what happened! The bus started to move, and I was left standing on the sidewalk. When the next bus came, I pushed and shoved along with everybody else, and I got on. The only way to get on the bus was to force your way in.

That is the way it is today with coming to the Lord Jesus, and it has been that way ever since John the Baptist announced the coming of the Lord Jesus. This world did not want Him, and most of the leaders of the Jews did not listen to John the Baptist. They did not listen to the Lord Jesus either, and those that wanted to come to Him had to overcome the resistance of those leaders. Using the same illustration as I used, they had to “push and shove” their way to the Lord Jesus, against all the opposition of the Jewish leaders.

Even today the Lord Jesus is not wanted, and if you wish to follow Him, you will have to overcome the opposition of this world. You will have to force your way in, but it is well worth the effort!

“And the work of righteousness shall be peace; and the effect of righteousness quietness and assurance for ever” (Isaiah 32:17).

Our verse today speaks of what will happen in the millennium, after the Lord Jesus has come back to this world and executed judgment on all who have rejected Him. Very soon, all true believers will be caught up when the Lord Jesus comes to take us home. After that there will be a time of terrible judgment for this world, but it is only in this way that true peace will be established. After the judgment is finished, the Lord Jesus will set up His glorious kingdom in this world, and there will be true peace.

Although our place is with the Lord Jesus in heaven, yet we can look forward to that day when He will come back to this world to set up His kingdom. At that time, He will have His rightful place, and will reign as “the Prince of peace.”

We notice that righteousness and peace go together in our verse today. That is because God cannot rest or have peace when there is sin that has not been dealt with. Today, many would like to have peace in this world, but they would also like to go on with their sinful ways. God cannot allow this. Only when the Lord Jesus reigns in righteousness will there be true peace in this world.

“Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men” (Luke 2:14).

“Suppose ye that I am come to give peace on earth? I tell you, Nay; but rather division” (Luke 12:51).

When the Lord Jesus was born into this world, the angels praised Him, saying the words of our first verse today. The Lord Jesus had come into the world as the rightful King, and He had come to bring peace. In the Old Testament, the prophet Isaiah had called the Lord Jesus “the Prince of peace.” (See if you can find this verse in the book of Isaiah.)

But sadly, the Lord Jesus was rejected right from the very beginning. Herod the king tried to kill Him when He was only a small child, and throughout His earthly ministry the Jewish leaders were against Him. Finally they plotted to kill Him, and eventually delivered Him over to the Roman authorities to crucify Him.

That is why the Lord Jesus had to say (in our second verse today) that He was not come to give peace on earth, but rather division. We might ask, Why would His coming bring division? It would bring division because there would be some who accepted Him, and many who rejected Him. Now the world is divided between believers and unbelievers, and there is no real peace. True believers can have peace in their hearts, for they know that their sins are forgiven. However, real peace on this earth will never happen until the Lord Jesus has His rightful place.

“But when He saw the multitudes, He was moved with compassion on them, because they fainted, and were scattered abroad, as sheep having no shepherd” (Matthew 9:36).

The expression “as sheep having no shepherd” is rather important, and it is found (with minor variations) at least eight times in the Bible. It is in both the Old and New Testaments. The people of this world are often compared to sheep, for sheep are not very smart animals. Yes, they can endure cold weather, and are generally easy to manage, but they cannot really look after themselves very well. If they get lost, they cannot find their way home. Or they get into places where they cannot get out themselves. Sheep need a shepherd to look after them.

The Lord compares people who have no one to look after them to sheep without a shepherd. They go here and there, looking for something to satisfy them, but they cannot find it. They need someone to care for them, to feed them spiritually, and to guide them in their lives. Most important of all, they need to become one of God’s sheep, by trusting in the Lord Jesus as Savior.

The Lord Jesus felt sorry for the people in Israel when He was here on earth. He loved them, but they had gone astray, and most of them really did not want a shepherd. They liked it when the Lord Jesus fed them, or healed their diseases, but they did not want Him to be their shepherd. If you know the Lord Jesus as your Savior, then you have a Shepherd who loves you and cares for you. No true believer is like a sheep without a Shepherd.

“Charge them that are rich in this world…that they do good, that they be rich in good works, ready to distribute, willing to communicate…that they may lay hold on eternal life” (1 Timothy 6:17-19).

It is clearly wrong for a Christian to set out in life to become rich, as we saw yesterday. However, when a believer works hard in his business or in his job, sometimes the Lord allows him or her to become wealthy. This is not wrong, but it makes us very responsible. The more we have in this world, the more the Lord holds us responsible to use it for Him.

Here in our verse today those who are rich are told to be “rich in good works,” and to be “ready to distribute.” That means that those who are rich should be willing to use their money to help those in need, and there are plenty of needs in this world. The Lord Jesus could say to those around Him, “The poor always ye have with you” (John 12:8), and this continues to be true today, all over the world. Also, we must remind ourselves that most of us who live in Western countries are rich beyond the wildest dreams of most of the world’s population. Thus we are not to aim to be rich, but if we have more than most people in this world, we are to look to the Lord for wisdom to use it for Him.

“No man can serve two masters…ye cannot serve God and mammon” (Matthew 6:24).

We can understand the thought in this verse, for it is clear, even in natural things, that we cannot serve two masters. We have to listen to one or the other when we wish to know what to do. We cannot have two different people telling us what to do, for at some point one will tell us to do something, and the other will tell us to do something else.

Here the Lord Jesus tells us that we cannot serve God and mammon. Mammon is not a word we use today, but it simply means money or wealth. It has also come to have the meaning of wealth that is obtained in the wrong way, perhaps by someone who actually worships money, and wants to have more of it, no matter how it is acquired.

As Christians, we cannot serve the Lord, and yet have money and wealth as our master too. While having money in itself is not wrong, yet the Word of God tells us that “the love of money is the root of all evil” (1 Timothy 6:10). Every kind of evil in this world has been caused by the love of money, and as Christians, we should be on guard to avoid this danger. If our hearts are set on being wealthy, we are not walking with the Lord.

“When the time was come that He should be received up, He stedfastly set His face to go to Jerusalem” (Luke 9:51).

Normally, if we find out that something unpleasant is going to happen to us, we try to avoid it if possible. At the time of our verse for today, the Lord Jesus had finished His time in this world, and He could have gone directly home to His Father. But then He would have gone back alone, for you and I could not be in heaven in our sins. In order to have you and me with Him in heaven, He had to go to the cross.

That is why He “steadfastly set His face” to go to Jerusalem. It was not easy for Him to do this, for He well knew what would happen to Him there. He knew that He would be crucified, and suffer for sin while on the cross. He loved God His Father, and He loved us, so He went directly to Jerusalem. Only His love could have made Him do this.