shepherd | DaveTrenholm.com

Published March 13, 2023

Loving Christ’s Church

For the past several weeks, the Apostle Paul has been in Ephesus on his third missionary journey – preaching the Word of God, doing miracles, and as usual, causing riots and uproars!

As we’ve been following Paul on his journeys through the book of Acts, it seems every city he visits ends up absolutely divided in their opinion of him! Either the people love and accept Him as a brother – or they reject and hate him as public enemy #1.

And the city of Ephesus is no exception to that rule. Last week the entire city was in an uproar against Paul – stirred to action by the silversmith Demetrius (who accused Paul of destroying his lucrative idol-making business and undermining the worship and the credibility of their goddess Artemis.)

Thankfully, the mayor of Ephesus didn’t see things quite the same way. He didn’t see Paul or Christianity as a threat to their city and he was able to disperse the mob before things got out of hand.

But now today, in contrast to that angry mob, we’re going to see the opposite side of that spectrum. Today we’re going to see just how dearly loved Paul was to the many who had been transformed by the power of the Gospel! It seems that Paul never had a neutral effect – you either loved him or you hated him!

Paul actually wrote about this in 2 Corinthians 2:15…

15 Our lives are a Christ-like fragrance rising up to God. But this fragrance is perceived differently by those who are being saved and by those who are perishing. 16 To those who are perishing, we are a dreadful smell of death and doom. But to those who are being saved, we are a life-giving perfume.

2 Corinthians 2:15-16a

I really like Paul’s metaphor here of being a fragrance – and it certainly fits his experience!

Now to be sure, Paul was certainly a strong scent. He was kinda like smell of garlic… You either love it or you hate it! There was no middle ground! But one way or another, Paul’s life made an impact on the people around him.

To those who wanted nothing to do with God – Paul’s life was a stench and everything about him was repulsive to them.
But for those who were seeking a real, authentic relationship with the God of heaven – Paul’s life was a breath of fresh air – like the smell of freshly-baked bread or the country air after a spring rain! For those who would come to Christ, Paul’s life and his message was absolutely refreshing!

And I think that’s really what we are called to be like as well. Jesus describes us as salt and as light – two things that should made a tremendous impact on the environment in which we find ourselves. As salt, we should be packed with flavour – and as light we should be like a million-candle-power flashlight! What a tragedy it would be if our lives were like a 1 watt bulb – or just a single grain salt in a big batch of french fries! NO! We need to be like Paul – packed with flavour – lighting up the darkness like a floodlight! Or to use Paul’s analogy, people should be able to smell us a mile away!

Perhaps that’s not the most attractive analogy, but do you get my point? God didn’t leave us on this planet to be neutral, to be unnoticed, to be inconsequential to the world around us. Like Paul, God has us on this planet to make an impact – one way or the other – for Him.

And today, as we read through Acts chapter 20, Paul is going to tell us exactly how He did that – and how we can do that as well.

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Our Good Shepherd

In our journey through the life and ministry of Jesus Christ – we now find ourselves somewhere in the middle. We made it through the birth and early childhood of Jesus some time ago, we saw his baptism by John and his subsequent temptation in the wilderness… We saw how Jesus began his earthly ministry by choosing 12 disciples and and inviting them to follow him. We’ve also seen Jesus do some amazing miracles like turning water to wine and feeding the 5000 and even healing a variety of people.

And of course, while Jesus is doing all of this, He’s constantly preaching and teaching the Good News about the Kingdom of God. As we’ve mentioned before, Jesus’ ministry wasn’t all about performing signs and wonders to amaze the crowds of people – but rather, His purpose was to communicate vital truths about God.

Sometimes he would do that through preaching – the sermon on the mount is a good example of that. Sometimes he would do that through telling parables – like that of the sower and the seed or the Good Samaritan. Or sometimes he would just use teachable moments – as he walked along and experienced life with his disciples, he’d often use everyday objects or events to teach about life in the kingdom of God.

And since teaching and preaching was such a key part of what Jesus did, I thought it would be important, as we journey through his life and ministry – to take a moment to sample some of his teachings!

And so that’s what I want to do today.

Of course, there are a whole variety of teachings that I could chose from to share with you this morning – the Gospel are full of examples of what Jesus taught and preached. But I’ve chosen the first part of John chapter 10 to go through this morning because I think it really is an excellent summary of the central message of Jesus. Even if we had no other record of anything else that Jesus said or taught – this passage would still give us a good, clear understanding of who Jesus is and what He came to do.

Now as we’re going to see, this passage isn’t really a sermon per se or even technically a parable. But it is very similar to a parable. The Gospel of John actually doesn’t include any parables (you’ll only find those in the other three Gospels), but John does include what he calls a paroimia.

A paroimia is like a parable, but it’s less of a story (like the Good Samaritan for example) and more of a word picture. It’s almost like an object lesson – where Jesus uses a common, familiar item to explain something about Himself. It’s a figure of speech not intended to be taken literally, but it helps us understand more about who Jesus is and what He came to do.

But like His parables, these paroimias are always shrouded in a bit of mystery – it’s a bit of a riddle. And, like with his parables, many people simply did not understand what He was trying to say. And we’ll see that in our passage today.

But hopefully, as we take some time this morning to consider these paroimias in John chapter 10 – and as the Holy Spirit works in our hearts and minds, and speaks to us through the Scriptures – I trust that we will be able to understand and apply what Jesus is communicating to us.

So John chapter 10, starting at verse 1. It begins like this:

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Go Tell It

At that time the Roman emperor, Augustus, decreed that a census should be taken throughout the Roman Empire. 2 (This was the first census taken when Quirinius was governor of Syria.) 3 All returned to their own ancestral towns to register for this census. 4 And because Joseph was a descendant of King David, he had to go to Bethlehem in Judea, David’s ancient home. He traveled there from the village of Nazareth in Galilee. 5 He took with him Mary, his fiancée, who was now obviously pregnant.

6 And while they were there, the time came for her baby to be born. 7 She gave birth to her first child, a son. She wrapped him snugly in strips of cloth and laid him in a manger, because there was no lodging available for them.
Luke 2:1-7

Now I’m sure you know the next part of the story – the part about the “shepherds watching over their flocks by night” – But before we continue with the rest of the passage – I want you to try to put yourself in the shepherds place as we read this. Imagine that you are with them that night – out on one of the grassy hills that surround Bethlehem. You’re just up there on that big hill with your flocks of sheep and a few other shepherds. The sheep are in their pen for the night already. You can hear their “baaas” in the background. It’s a cool, clear night so you’re probably sitting around a fire to keep warm – just relaxing and chatting with the other shepherds. Its a beautiful night. You can see a million stars and the lights of the village of Bethlehem maybe down there in the valley. It’s just beautiful. Kinda makes you wanna quit your job and go be shepherd, doesn’t it? Well, keep that picture in mind as we continue reading at verse 8.

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Tag: shepherd

Loving Christ’s Church

Our Good Shepherd

Go Tell It