The Pulpit Commentary — John — Volume 2 — Section 80

and ho,,. m11Rt he find his own amid the mixed crowd? Dy the ein1ple plan of calling each ~hrep by name. And eo the shepherd takes them out and goes in front or them till thr pasture is reached. His voice is quite enough to keep them tight. They will not folio,,- a etrnnger, for they know not the voice of strangeTB. IT. JEBUl! OAN BAY MORE FOR THE BIIEEI' THAN FOR THE SHEPHERDS, He can say this of a sheep, that if a shepherd gives H a name, and then calls it by that name, it will make its way to the familiar voice, even though it be amid a large crowd of other sheep. But t.a'ke a lad and entn1st him with a flock or sheep. Explain to him their ways, their wants, and their perils. Still you cannot tell beforehand what sort of e. ebeplterd he will turn out. He must be tried by actual experience, and the name good or bad given to him according to the way in which he behaves. III. JE~us THE ooon SHEPHERD. What power there Is in the word" I" when Jesus U!'l's it! We like Jesus all the better when be talks about himself. We do not call him egotist. Think in bow many respcct.s men are like sheep, and need 11, good shep- herd. In many things we can look after ourselves, but in the most import.ant things we need to be looked after. The true shepherd will not submit to have his property scattered and lost without a determined attempt to save it. He has e. special and supreme interest in the sheep because they a.re his sheep. Every human being has something of the sheep-nature in him. Jesus looks on everycompany of human beings as a fold wherein sheep of different flocks are gathered together, and he has to get his own flock out of them. We cannot do without some shepherd, and happy iH it for us if we have the good shepherd. He laid down his life for the sheep, seemed to be destroyed by the wolf, bnt really he was engaged in its effectual destruction. He has gained for his sheep broad, even moasureless lands of green pastures and still waters, where the sheep may feed at leisure without a foe and without a fear. In all those lands no ravenoUB beast has his haunt. Nothing shall hurt or destroy in all the holy mountain of the Lord.-Y. Vere. 17, 18.-17u dedicate,iJ life. That the Father loved him Jesus was constantly asserting, and here we have the reason for that love. I. NOTICE THE GE1'-imAL ELEMENT OF DEVOTION, Upon all self-sacrificing devotion the Father must look with a complacent eye. Because, if the spirit of devotion be in a. man at all, the extent and the character of the devotion will depend upon the necessity nnd the claim. A few have become famous in history, not that they were more devoted than the many =amed, but their devotion was shown on more memorable scenes. And when God looks upon his own children, from him who was peculiarly the Son of God downwards, this spirit of devotion in them is needful to give him pleasure. For behind this love of God toward his true children, there is love to the dying world, a love that can only be Batisfied in proportion as that world receives eternal life. And if that world is to receive eternal life, it must be through the self-denying devotion of those who have received it already. Self-denying devotion is of the very essence of the new creature. And since JCSUB stands at the very head of the new creation, we expect to find in him the noblest and most inspiring instance of this devotion. IL N OTJCE THE ELEMENTS PECULIAR TO THE DEVOTION OF JESUS. The peculiar nature and mission of Jesus have to be considered. Jesus could do by his devotion what no ordinary human being could do. He laid down his life that he might take it age.in. His devotion would have been useless but for this ability to take up a.gain what had been laid down. If he had simply laid his life down, and that had been the eild of it, he would have done no more than thousands had done already and thousands have done since. Natural lives have been freely given up that other natural lives might be preserved. Oftener still perhaps they have been risked. But when Jesus laid down his life, the peculiarity lay here, that he did not preserve any other natural life by doing so. Nay more, he who laid down his life made it necessary for others to lay down their lives in turn. Jesus laid down his life to make manifest the reality of eternal life. 1. It had to be made plain that Jesus did really lay down bis life. We may talk of laying down our lives, but that is in spirit rather than realily, for our lives a.re not ours to lay down. Man's natural life may be taken from him at any time. But Jel!w; evidently had a control over hill life which we hnve not. Most important is that declaration, "No man taketh it from me;" nnd most important, too, is that other on. x1. 1 - 67,l TJrn oospgf, ACCOnDJNn TO RT. ,Jl1TI~