Who thinks most, feels the noblest, acts the best.
Life's but a means unto an end; that end,
To those who dwell in Him, He most in them,
Beginning, mean and end to all things, God.^
^ Bailey, Festus^
The Good Shepherd.
ST. JOHN — 29
Literature.
Alford (H.), Quebec Chapel SermonSj vi. 226.
Arnold (T. K.), Sermons, 1.
Bickersteth (C), The Gospel of Incarnate Love, 163.
Butler (W. J.), Sermons for Working Men^ 235.
De Koven (J.), Sermons, 19.
Hamilton (J.), Faith in God, 127.
Hill (J.), Waymarhs, 23.
Holland (H. S.), Vital Values, 141.
Learmount (J.), In God's Orchard, 218.
Liddon (H. P.), Easter in St. Paul's, 312.
Maclaren (A.), Expositions : John ix.-iiv., 34.
Manning (H. E.), Sermons, iii. 1.
„ „ The Teaching of Christ, 123.
Newman (J. H.), Pa/rochial and Plain Sermons, viii. 230.
Palmer (J. R.), Burden-Bearing, 115.
Price (A. C), Fifty Sermons, vii. 161, viii. 209.
Ritchie (A.), Sermons from St. Ignatius' Pulpit, 173. „ (D. L.), Peace the Umpire, 20.
Robertson (F. W.), Sermons, ii. 251.
Ross (J. M. E.), The Self-Portraiture of Jesus, 110.
Russell (A.), The Light that Lighteth every Man, 115.
Spurgeon (C. H.), Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit, li. (1905) No. 2919.
Wilson (S.), Lenten Shadows and Easter Lights, 144.
Christian World Pulpit, Ixvii. 305 (Scott Holland) ; Ixxix. 330 (Birch- enough).
Church of England Pulpit, xxxi. 304 (Carr) ; xl. 209 (Price) ; Iv. 254 (Swithinbank) ; Ixiii. 277 (Silvester).
Church of Ireland Gazette, May 28, 1909, p. 525 (Dean of St, Patrick's).
Churchman's Pulpit : Second Sunday after Easter : viii. 44 (Taylor), 46 (Jones), 49 (Manning), 52 (Newman), 55 (Gurney), 57 (Alford), 59 (Price), 61 (Meyer).
HomiUii^ Review, xlii. 302 (Jennings).
The Good Shepherd.
I am the good shepherd ; the good shepherd layeth down his life for the sheep.— John x. ii.
1. The imagery of the text is an incidental claim on the pajt of our Lord to be the Messiah of Israel. For it was as a shepherd that Jehovah was to fulfil His promise of redemption to His people. " He shall feed his flock like a shepherd : he shall gather the lambs with his arm, and carry them in his bosom." So wrote Isaiah, and Ezekiel after him, " Thus saith the Lord God ; Behold, I, even I, will both search my sheep, and seek them out." The Divine promise is fulfilled in Jesus who preaches Himself as the fulfiller and the fulfilment of Israel's hope and expectation : " I am the good shepherd"; and then, going beyond all former revelation of Divine grace and love, He adds, " the good shepherd layeth down his life for the sheep."
^ How quietly and unostentatiously, but at the same time with what confidence and assurance, our Lord assumes to Himself titles that were predicted of the Messiah in the Old Testament. He adopts them in the most natural manner, folds them about Him as a man would clothe himself in his own garments. There is never any excuse or apology for doing so. Everywhere our Lord takes His Messiahship for granted. He and no other is the being pointed to by the finger of prophecy, and so after His resurrection He took trouble with His disciples to show them out of those Scriptures the things concerning Himself.
2. This Messianic title of " Shepherd " is also freely accorded to Him afterwards by His followers, as, for example, by the writer of the Epistle to the Hebrews, who calls Him " that great Bhepherd of the sheep," and by St. Peter, who speaks of Him as " the Shepherd and Bishop of your souls," and says to the faithful presbyters of the Church " when the chief Shepherd shall appear,
451
452 THE GOOD SHEPHERD
ye shall receive a crown of glory that fadeth not away." When we pass out of the region of Scripture and from the Apostolic Church the figure still haunts us. The early Christians in the days of their trial and persecution loved to depict on the walls of the catacombs Jesus as the Good Shepherd, with His sheep standing round Him, and earnestly gazing up into His face. With authority and power did our Lord arrogate to Himself the care and guidance of His Church to the end of time when He spoke these expressive words — " I am the good shepherd."
There are two points to be considered— I. Christ's Claim. II. Its Significance.
Christ's Claim.
"I am the good shepherd."
1. I am the Shepherd. We are all familiar enough with the ideas connected with shepherd -life as it is pictured amongst ourselves. The poetry of our country dwells much upon it, especially down to about the beginning of last century. It was described as the ideal of a simple natural life. It was associated with the piping times of peace. The shepherds were regarded as happy swains, living a free, healthy life in communion with nature.
But the shepherd's life in Palestine was attended with much hardship and great danger. In a country where at any moment sheep are liable to be swept away by a mountain torrent, or carried off by hill robbers, or torn by wolves, every hour of the shepherd's life is risk. David tells how, in defence of his father's tlock, he put his life in his hand and slew both a lion and a bear ; while Jacob reminds Laban how he watched the sheep, exposed to the extreme of heat and cold. Pitiless cold at night, long hours of thirst in the day, must be endured, if the flock is to be kept in safety. So it is not difficult to imagine how a feeling of afiection would spring up between the lonely Syrian shepherd and the dumb objects of his care. The sheep would follow him wherever he might lead, or call them with his voice.