Hi There! This is my first blog for the year of 2023! I've slipped up. Hopefully I will do much better this year than I already have. :)
The last couple of days I've been reading the red letters. I've been in John, reading what the beloved disciple chose to record about our loving savior. Fascinating! His words were very much to the point. Patient, yet stern. In John 10, John tells us that it was during the Festival of Dedication. According to Strongs, this was "a ceremony of great importance to the Jewish people. It originated at the dedication of the temple after its desecration by Antiochus IV Epiphanes. The Jews underwent severe persecution by this ruler. A number of years later a priest named Mattathias led a revolt, later continued by his son Maccabeus, that ended this persecution. Following this victory, the temple was cleansed, and a ceremony was held to mark its rededication. Jewish tradition holds that when the lamps were lit, there was enough oil for one day...yet they burned for eight days." Fascinating, right?
So Jesus was at the temple for the Festival of Dedication, and it was winter. He was walking in Solomon's Colonnade, and the Jews surrounded him. They asked, "how long are you going to keep us in suspense? If you are the Messiah, tell us plainly."
Can't you just see His face? He answers, "I did tell you and you don't believe. The works that I do in my Father's name testify about me. But you don't believe because you are not of my sheep. My sheep hear my voice, I know them, and they follow me." I'm gonna stop right there. It gives me such a feeling to know that HE KNOWS me! The maker of the universe, the creator of all things KNOWS me. I am in awe of this...and so very unworthy.
I want to take a deeper look at the passage that begins with this incredible statement. Jesus says, "My sheep hear my voice, I know them, and they follow me. I give them eternal life, and they will never perish. No one will snatch them out of my hand. My Father, who has given them to me, is greater than all. No one is able to snatch them out of the Father's hand. I and the Father are one."
hear: accept, listen, understand
know: receive knowledge of
follow: to continue to the end; to follow behind or intently after
eternal: long ages/everlasting
life: physical life/existence
perish: to destroy fully
snatch: to seize, carry away by force
Father: creator, preserver, governor of all men and things; watching over them with paternal love and care
one: same, single
So let's see what we have when we put in the Greek definitions of the highlighted words in the passage.
My sheep (accept, listen, understand) my voice, I (receive knowledge of) them, and they (continue to the end [with] me. I give them (everlasting) (existence), and they will never [be](destroyed fully). No one will (seize, carry away by force) them out of my hand. My Father, who has given them to me, is greater than all. No one is able to snatch them out of the Father's hand. I and the (creator, preserver, governor of all men and things; watching over them with paternal love and care) are (the same, single).
James 10:27-30
"I and the creator are the same." So miraculous that He would CHOOSE to come down here...leave His throne and the beauty of heaven...to live as one of us, to die the most gruesome death ever to save us. And He loves us anyway. He made such a sacrifice and I look around me at all the people in today's day that don't even give it a second thought. Yet He patiently waits for them to know or remember. That is love. A love we, as humans, will never fully understand. But we should love because He first loved us.
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