Lessons from John 10: Who Are You?
If you look at Jesus’ public ministry in the Gospel of John, there is one ongoing question that continues to hang in the air.
That question is, “Who are you?”
Jesus continually taught who He was and revealed His power to the people through miracles performed, miracles that no mere man could perform. But it was the Pharisees, the Jewish religious leaders, who refused to believe Jesus was who He said He was. They not only rejected Jesus and the truth about Him, they rejected the evidence of Jesus’ power and authority. They continued to try and kill Him. But because it was not His time to go to the cross, Jesus continually escaped.
When we were last together, we learned that Jesus healed a man who was born blind (John 9). After an interrogation by the Sanhedrin, and being rejected by his parents, the man was thrown out of the synagogue. Yet when Jesus heard what happened, He went and found the man. Jesus asked him, “Do you believe in the Son of Man?” And after asking Jesus, “Who is he, sir? Tell me so that I may believe in Him,” Jesus lovingly revealed Himself to this man as the Son of Man.
At Jesus’ revelation of Himself, the man not only confessed his faith in Jesus, the man worshipped Jesus.
Every Jew would have known from Daniel 7 who the Son of Man was. And when Jesus described Himself as the Son of Man, He was saying that He was fully God. He was the promised Messiah and the Christ. The Sent One! Sent by God the Father Himself.
What we now have here in John 10 is a continuation of the story. Even though we may have a chapter break, it’s an ongoing conversation that we step into here.
When some of the Pharisees who stood nearby overheard this conversation between Jesus and the blind man, their unbelieving questions persisted. “Jesus, who do you say that you are?” “How are you related to God?” “And these miracles you are doing–are they works of God or are they the works of someone who is demon possessed?”
Jesus responded to their questions by using an illustration that the religious leaders and people of Israel would have been very familiar with. It was that of a relationship between a shepherd and his sheep. The very thing that these religious leaders were supposed to be to the Jewish people, and yet they failed.
They failed miserably due to their pride and rebellion against God and the rejection of His Son, Jesus Christ.
God sent Jesus to live amongst them, revealing His divine nature, with the eternal purpose of saving their lives. And yet these were the very men who would soon turn Jesus over unjustly as a criminal. Because of that, Jesus, the greatest Shepherd ever to live, died nailed to a cross for the remission of our sins.
The one who knew no sin bore the sins of the world so that those who place their faith and trust in Him do not have to bear it themselves. They will also inherit entrance into heaven as a result of Jesus’ life, death, resurrection, and ascension.
We will talk more about next week as we look at the life, death, and resurrection of Lazarus. So don’t miss it! That’s just a preview of what’s to come.
Terri Hamman
Faith & Fitness Coach