“Truly, truly, I say to you, he who does not enter the sheepfold by the door but climbs in by another way, that man is a thief and a robber. But he who enters by the door is the shepherd of the sheep. To him the gatekeeper opens. The sheep hear his voice, and he calls his own sheep by name and leads them out. When he has brought out all his own, he goes before them, and the sheep follow him, for they know his voice. A stranger they will not follow, but they will flee from him, for they do not know the voice of strangers.” This figure of speech Jesus used with them, but they did not understand what he was saying to them. So Jesus again said to them, “Truly, truly, I say to you, I am the door of the sheep. All who came before me are thieves and robbers, but the sheep did not listen to them. I am the door. If anyone enters by me, he will be saved and will go in and out and find pasture. The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy. I came that they may have life and have it abundantly.” —John 10:1-10
Why Does Jesus Describe Himself As A Door?
When reading this passage in context, you would think that Jesus is going to say that he is the Good Shepherd (which he will later), but he doesn’t. He says He is the door.
In order to even meet the shepherd, before you can get into the sheepfold, you have to go through a door and He is that door. Yes, he’s the shepherd as well, but this relationship that he’s inviting us into, we have to walk through the door first.
The Sheep:
- They Are
- The Shepherd
- The Shepherd Goes Before Them.
- The Sheep
- Sheep Flee From
There are at least a couple of purposes for a door:
- Doors Keep Sheep
- Doors Keep Predators
- Doors Offer
In Jesus You Will Find
.
When he says salvation, when he says that if you enter by you will be saved. This means the salvation of your soul from hell and receiving the eternal promise to live with Him always. He means saved to the uttermost.
I also want to point out that Jesus says he is THE door, meaning that other doors will not lead you to salvation. They will only lead you to death. There is only one door, one name through which people are saved and that is the name of Jesus.
“You may knock at a thousand doors; you may cry and pray and groan and agonize and sweat, even to drops of blood, but there is only one door to heaven, and that door is faith in Jesus Christ. If you will not enter by that door, God himself will not open another.” —Charles Spurgeon
In Jesus You Will Go
And
This coming in and going out is not encouraging us to be like unanchored ships tossed to and fro with every storm of life. This is talking about something different. When Jesus says they go in, I believe it means they enter into his presence. When we enter the door, we are entering into the presence of the God.
“At the heart of the Christian message is God Himself waiting for His redeemed children to push in to conscious awareness of His presence.” —A.W. Tozer
One of the signs of a spiritually healthy person is that we do not run from the presence of God, but instead we run to it.
“The world is perishing for lack of the knowledge of God and the Church is famishing for want of His Presence. The instant cure of most of our religious ills would be to enter the Presence in spiritual experience, to become suddenly aware that we are in God and that God is in us. This would lift us out of our pitiful narrowness and cause our hearts to be enlarged.” —A.W. Tozer
We come into his presence, and he leads us out for service. These ideas are equally important in my opinion.
In Jesus You Will Find
When it comes to the final promise of those that enter the door, it says you will find pasture. When I hear that, I think about the significance of finding pasture. Why is Jesus concerned about his sheep finding pasture. I think there are two good reasons:
You Will Find
On the spiritual side of things, this means we will have our needs met by Jesus. We will receive the word of God with thanksgiving and feast on his words.
You Will Find
The second thing we see here is that when you find pasture, you find rest. How would you know that the shepherd has led you to pasture? You are at rest.
True rest comes from relationship with God, not running from Him.