The Shepherd's Voice

Today's Bible Reading: John 10:1-10.

How many voices are shaping your life right now? From notifications and news to expectations, fears, and self-doubt—we live in a world full of voices competing for our attention. And we don’t just hear them… we follow them.

In John 10, Jesus says that not every voice leads to life. Some voices slowly steal. Others loudly accuse. But there is one voice that is different—the voice of the Good Shepherd. The voice that calls you by name. The voice that you recognize. The voice that gives life—abundant life.

Rediscover the One who is still speaking peace, forgiveness, and identity into your life today.

Transcript

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In Matthew 28, Jesus said, Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. To hear his word, to receive his promises, to repent, to believe. That Jesus is the way, the truth, and the life. And that by believing you have life in his name. Now here the good news of Jesus for you. Grace to you and peace from God our Father and from our Lord, our Savior, our good shepherd, Jesus Christ. Amen. How many voices do you think you listen to in a given week? Anybody want to guess? In your head, yeah. Listen to one another, okay? Okay. I had someone in the first service say a hundred. And uh everyone went, whoa. And then he said, Well, I shook 40 people's hands on the way in, so uh I thought, okay, that's an interesting way to look at it. Um but how many voices in a given week do you listen to? Uh the ones that that shape you and and influence you, and they they kind of have a way of sticking with you. Uh it's probably more, probably more than you realize. Uh first, there's that voice that comes from your phone. That's not the voice you were initially thinking of, I know, but there's that voice that comes from your phone, and you get the text message, you get the notification, and what do you do? You immediately reach for it. Uh, the voice of social media, the opinions, the reactions, the comparisons that take place. Then there's the voice of the news, whichever news you watch or listen to, at CNN and NBC, ABC, NPR, Fox, whichever you choose to listen to, they all tell you that these are the things that you should fear, these are the things you should care about. Uh the voice that comes from work, your boss, your coworkers. Uh, there are the deadlines, uh, your performance, uh, the voice of your family, like your spouse or your children. They have spoken or maybe even unspoken expectations for you. Then there's the voice of your past, uh, things that were said to you years ago that still echo with you. You still hear that voice again. Uh, the then there's the voice of your own mind, the self-talk that you have, the doubts that you have, the anxieties that come up. Then there's the voice of guilt reminding you of the things that you've done. And then there's the voice of culture telling you who you should be, what you should think, what you should do. Then there's the voice of success, and that tells you the things that should matter, the things that should count in this life. And then there's the voice of failure telling you what you're not. Uh, would you be willing to put that graphic up there and you can just keep it up there? Um again, we could keep going. Uh, someone in the first service I said said a hundred, which maybe a lot, but maybe it's more. Uh these are just the ones that we're we're naming. There are even more voices than this. Uh, just by a show of hands, just looking at this list of these 11, who here could check off five of these that maybe you listened to this week. Okay? Keep your hands up if you think you can check off 10 of them. I have to read them all. Yeah, we we listen and are influenced by a lot of voices. This is what Jesus says in John 10. The sheep hear his voice and they follow him. But then he goes on and he adds, a stranger, a strange voice, they will not follow, for they don't know the voice of strangers. Now, you should already kind of feel a little bit of a tension here, right? Because we've all admitted what? That we do listen to these voices and probably more than we'd like, probably more than we even realize in a given week. We do know these voices. We do follow these voices. And here, there's some ways that we do follow some of these voices. Uh, the first way that we follow these kinds of voices is with our attention. All right, so we follow them with our attention. So your phone goes off, you get a notification, you get a text, and what's the first thing you do? You reach for it. Because you just have to know. You have to know what the text message says, you have to see what the notification tells you. Or uh the news. You keep turning the news on, you keep checking the news to see if there's an update about some kind of current event that's going on in the community, in society, in the world. And as you turn it on and you read it again, what does it do? It sets the emotional tone for you for the rest of the day. Uh social media. What do you do? You you scroll and you compare and you measure. You measure your life against other people's lives. Uh, we give voices our attention. That's how we follow. Uh we follow these voices with our decisions. Uh success, that voice, uh, says that you need to work hard and you need to work more, and you need to prove yourself, and you need to achieve as much as you possibly can. And so we say yes to everything that will provide us that voice of success and will curb that voice of success. And everything that doesn't give us success, we say no to. Uh, fear says that we should play it safe, that we should be careful, that we should protect ourselves. And so what do we do? We play it safe, we be careful, we protect ourselves when it comes to our relationships and our jobs and our life. Fear tells us to do that, and so we do. Uh, approval says make sure that this person likes you. And so we seek that approval. And so we adjust our actions and the way we speak and the things we do so that we're approved. We listen to the voice and we give them our actions, our decisions. Uh, we follow these voices with our identity. Uh, this one's a little bit more difficult, uh, but when you listen to the voice of failure, and you do it enough, it tells you this is what you aren't, you start to believe that that's true. That I really am not good at this. I really am not gifted. I really am a failure. Or uh the voice of your past, and maybe something you've done, says you'll never be more than that one thing that you did. And you hear it over and over again, and you start to believe that that's true. That's that's the best I'm ever gonna be because of that choice I made. Or the the voice of guilt says that you are. You are what you've done, and that's it. That's who you are. And so these voices end up sort of living inside of us. Uh we follow these voices with our emotions. Uh they these voices tell you, they tell you what to be anxious about, they tell you what to fear, they tell you the things that should keep you up at night, and so that's what happens. These voices tell you, and so they do keep you up at night, they do cause you to be afraid. This is what Jesus says about all these these voices. As good as they might seem, this is what Jesus says. He says, the thief comes only, don't lose sight of that word, only. Only to steal and kill and destroy. Jesus doesn't say, you know what, there's some really good options here. Just pick one. Pick one. Pick one of these options, and it'll be fine. No, in fact, he draws a line in the sand. He says there's two categories. One category belongs to the shepherd. He gets his own category. And that voice leads to abundant life, and we'll talk about that. And then there's the other category, and that category belongs to the thieves. And their job is to steal. This is their goal, to steal and kill and destroy. In the Greek, uh, when it talks about the thief and the and the robber, uh, Jesus uses two different words there. One is the word, and this should sound familiar because we have similar words in our own English. It's the word kleptase. Anybody hear what word that sounds like? Like a kleptomaniac, somebody who uh has a propensity, uh natural inclination to steal. Alright, so this is somebody who is sneaky and deceitful. So that's the first word kleptase. And the other one, the other one is the word lestus, which is a violent, dangerous robber. Alright, so you got sneaky and violent. Sneaky and violent or sneaky and dangerous. Again, some voices don't look like this. These voices don't all look like this at first. Um, but some of them, they sort of just take from you slowly over time. They don't show up and announce at your door, hey, by the way, I've come to steal all of your stuff. No. They show up and they sound reasonable, they sound familiar, they sound even helpful. They say, hey, go ahead and check that phone one more time because you would not want to miss that notification. You better make sure you check it. Or they say, you know what, compare yourself a little bit to that person. You know what? What that'll do is that'll instill in you this desire to work harder for more stuff. Or just push a little harder. You know, God gave you gifts anyway, right? And so you should use those gifts to the fullest, to the best of your ability. So work harder, put in more time, put in more effort. Or it tells you, you know what, just keep this, just keep this to you, just keep this to yourself, and don't tell anyone about it. Just kind of bottle it up and hide it inside. Little by little, the the kleptase, little by little, it takes. A little peace here, a little contentment, discontentment there, and a little confidence over time. Until one day you realize that you are exhausted and you don't even know why. That's how the kleptase works. It's a subtle thief, quiet, gradual, almost unnoticeable. Uh, but then there's the lestes, uh, the louder voices, uh, the ones that are sharper and they don't sneak. Instead, they strike. They strike like a snake. All right, and they when they hit, they hit home and they hit hard. And so they come up and they announce, they say things like, you know, you're failing. And you're falling behind everyone else, and you're not enough, and you've messed up this life far too much for you to ever recover. That's the the Lestes, the robber. More aggressive, more forceful, more crushing. And here's the danger, especially when you realize that we all admit it, we do follow these voices to some extent. That these voices don't just influence you in the very moment, they form something in you, they form a direction in you and in your life over time. And so you don't feel anxious for a day, you become an anxious person. And you don't compare yourself to the people around you just the one time, you begin to measure your worth and your value and your life by everyone else around you. And you don't just hear that guilt occasionally, you begin to carry it as part of who you are. I'm just a guilty person because I did something a long time ago, and I can't forgive myself, and that person can't forgive me, and God certainly can't forgive me. They don't just affect, these voices don't just affect what you do, they become who you are. And over time, those voices start to sound normal. And so when they start sounding normal, you stop questioning them, and you stop resisting them. You just assume maybe, just maybe, they're right. Maybe this and these voices, what they say, maybe this is the truth. Jesus says, the thief comes only. That's its goal. The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy. And here's the thing: if if the thief, if that voice steals your peace long enough, you stop believing that peace is even possible. And if if it steals your identity long enough, you forget. You forget who you are. And maybe this is where it gets personal because some of these voices, some of these voices, you and I, we've been listening to a for a long time, for years even. So long that they don't feel like just distant voices, like a stranger's voice anymore. In fact, they do, they feel like the truth. Like that's what they're speaking. They're speaking the truth. Jesus said, the sheep, that's you and me. The sheep hear his voice, and he calls his own sheep by name, and they follow him because they know his voice. I love this. Uh, the word for voice in Greek, this is gonna sound familiar too, is the word phone. How cool. It's the word phone. Uh ever everybody uh pull out your uh pull out your phone and put it up in the air, right? Yeah, no, just kidding. That's a voice you don't want to listen to all the time. Um but that that's that's kind of a cool picture when you think about it. Um obviously in our day and age, somebody gives you a call, they give you text, and what happens? You they pull up their number, but it's not just their number anymore. What does it have? It's got their name, it's got their phone number, it's got their where they do business, it's got their address, it's got everything on there. But there was a point in time when somebody would call you, and that number would ring, and what'd you do? You'd pick it up and you'd say, hello? And you'd have that two or three second break where you'd go, uh is it spam? I hope it's not. Uh, and then they you'd realize it's not spam. That's your mom, that's your dad, that's your spouse, that's your children, that's your best friend from high school. Even though you haven't talked to them in 10 years, you can still tell it by their voice. That's that's phone. Uh, it's not just this idea of noise or sound, but it's recognition. And that's what Jesus is describing here. That you pick up that phone and you say, ah, I know it. That's the shepherd's voice. I know what the shepherd sounds like. And you might be wondering, oh, how do I know what the shepherd sounds like? Well, God's word. God's word is all about the shepherd's voice. That's the shepherd's voice written all over it for you and for me. And so when you pick it up, you could say, ah, that that's the kind of things that the shepherd, that's the kind of things that he would say to me. And so Jesus is not saying, sort through these options, eliminate the ones that don't make sense, the ones that are bad. He's saying there's only one option. There's two categories. There's the thieves, and then there's the shepherd. Now, I know that there's family up there, all right, and I know there's work up there. You should probably still listen to your spouse. You should probably still listen to your boss. But even they don't get the ultimate authority. That belongs to the shepherd. Jesus is saying, You know my voice. You know the things that I say about you. You know the things that I say about your life, your value, your worth, your identity, your purpose. Um, here's the key. When it comes to phone, when it comes to voice, the voice that you recognize most, that's the voice that you're going to follow, and you're going to pattern and routine your life after. And so Jesus is saying, pattern and routine your life after the shepherd. Uh and so here's the beauty of this. Jesus goes on to say, okay, so let's say you do. Let's say you do. Listen to the voice of the shepherd. What's going to be the result of that? Jesus says here in John 10, 10, he says, I came that they, talking about the sheep, talking about you. I came that you may have life, and he goes further than that, and have it abundantly. This has become sort of a theme verse for us here. Uh that uh we went through our renewed committee, and this is one of the byproducts of that renewed committee was that this is what Jesus cares about. This is the heart of the shepherd. That people have abundant life. And so that means that that's what we care about as a church. And so this isn't about um putting butts in the seat. Pardon my language. This isn't about just filling up space or having you be here. This is about Jesus wants people to have abundant life. And so you know what that means? We want people, we want you and me, we want each other to have abundant life. And so abundant life is life that is anchored in something deeper than our current circumstances. Abundant life is not something that's constantly tossed around by every other voice. Abundant life is not waking up every day and wondering, hmm, I wonder what my identity is going to be today. No, I already know it because the shepherd's already declared what my identity is in him. Abundant life is where your peace is not determined by the things that are happening in your family or in your community or in the world. It's in Jesus. And so uh we we decided and we talked about this as a church. And here are the four things we talked about that abundant life in Jesus means we want people to experience Jesus every day. Not just on Sundays, again, it's a good thing to be here. We're glad you're here. I'm glad you're here. Um, because we're supposed to stay in this habit because we need each other, because the church is meant to do just this. All right, but experiencing Jesus every day is every day, I want to hear from who? The voice of the shepherd. All right? Abundant life in Jesus is about growing in faith together. That we ask questions with one another, that we grow in God's word. We understand what the voice of the shepherd sound like. Let's get to know him. Abundant life is living with purpose, purpose that is not just about myself, but purpose that looks outside of myself and it looks out to my community, it looks out to people in need around me, and it strives to serve and to care and to love for others. Abundant life is about belonging. That no matter what any of these voices ever tell me and ever tell you, that you belong. And you belong where? Jesus says it. In the sheepfold. You belong with a good shepherd. Go back to that question. How many questions, how many uh voices are you listening to? There's your phone. Okay, we don't think about listening to these voices, but we do. We let them shape us. Your phone, social media, the news, our current events, your work, your family, your past, your own mind, guilt, culture, success, failure. We let these voices live rent free. Without a care in the world. But there's only one voice. There's only one voice that should really matter. And that's the voice that, by the way, calls you by name. Because none of these, none of these know you and call you by name. None of them. None of these voices gave up their life on the cross for you. None of these voices rose from the dead for you. None of these voices have the power to save or have the power to declare to you that you are forgiven and that you are redeemed and you are loved fully in Christ Jesus. That's Flone. That's the voice of the good shepherd. And he continually calls you and I back. And you know it's him. Because his voice sounds familiar. He says the same kind of things. That he loves you. And that he forgives you. And that there is no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. And that you're his. No matter what. And here's the best part you have abundant life. A full life. For now and also through eternity. You have abundant life. But only in the good shepherd. So don't listen to these other voices. Don't let them live rent-free. Listen to the phone. Listen to the voice of the shepherd. In Jesus' name. Amen.