“I am the Good Shepherd.” John 10:14
This statement is part of a long conversation that Jesus had with the Pharisees. They had thrown the man who had been born blind out of the synagogue when he said that the man who healed him (Jesus) must have come from God. Because the healing had taken place on the Sabbath day, they deemed Jesus a sinner. They believed themselves to be the true keepers of God’s law, but Jesus pointed out to them that they were spiritually blind, more intent on serving themselves than God and were actually like the bad shepherds and false prophets of Jeremiah 23:1-22.
The Pharisees of Jesus day piled up law upon law for the people to keep if they wanted to be accepted by God. Anyone who disobeyed the rules or challenged their authority were thrown out of the synagogue, and if their disobedience was deemed severe enough, they were put to death. They were like bad shepherds driving the sheep too hard, not feeding them properly and not doing the day to day caring jobs like trimming their hooves and checking their fleece for ticks or fleas. The Pharisees wanted prominent positions and to rule over the people. They wanted what they could get from the people both in the way of money through temple offerings and to be revered and respected just because of their position and the prestige this would bring.
Jesus came to set people free from this type of bondage. He was and is the Good Shepherd who feeds his sheep the best food. He cares for His sheep on a daily basis, prompting us to remove spiritual “ticks and fleas” that if left unchecked could cause severe spiritual health problems and even death. He goes ahead of His sheep and calls out warnings about the ground that lies ahead, and where we should walk to stay out of danger. And for those who do get lost, He sets out to find them and bring them back to the sheepfold again. But the greatest thing that Jesus did was to fend off and defeat the great enemy of the sheep, the devil who “comes only to steal and kill and destroy” John 10:10.
The devil was using the religious leaders of Jesus day to harm the sheep, and there are many “spiritual” people today who will lead the unsuspecting sheep away from the Good Shepherd into false religious belief, or no belief at all.
Who is leading and guiding you in your life, your own ideas, someone else’s ideas, the ideas that are culturally in vogue, or the Good Shepherd? No other God ever cared enough for His people to come and live among them and then die to save them. There is only one Good Shepherd, and Jesus stated that He was that one.