John 10:1-10
In the board game “The Settlers of Catan,” the object of the game is to build roads, villages, and cities faster and more efficiently than the other players to become the most powerful person on the island of Catan. A vital resource in the game is… sheep. You can’t be the lord or lady of Catan without having access to sheep. Sheep are a valuable commodity.
It was no different in first century Palestine: sheep were commodities. They were kept for their wool, for their milk, and as a source of meat. Where there might be occasional pet sheep in the world today, back then they weren’t beloved pets or creatures to be invited in to share hearth and home. Sheep had no value beyond what they could offer their owner. Sheep were a livelihood and represented the wealth of the owner—a commodity.
Scripture paints the picture of God as a devoted and caring shepherd—leading sheep to pasture and still waters, caring for and protecting the sheep, searching out and finding the one lost from the flock. The ideal kings of Israel were compared to kind and benevolent shepherds. The shepherds embodied the relationship between humanity and the earth that God intended in creation. This relationship is one that values the livestock as part of the created order and not just a means toward wealth or power. A far different view than the sheep as a commodity.
The Pharisees—to whom Jesus is talking in John 10:1-10—see themselves in the same line as this shepherd-ideal. They are “disciples of Moses” and they knew “God had spoken to Moses” (John 9:28-29), but they are skeptical of Jesus and Jesus’ connection to God. In chapter 9, Jesus heals the man born blind. The Pharisees drive the man out of the synagogue because the healed man’s story (and encounter with Jesus) confounds their authority, their theology, and their understanding of God. This is followed by a discussion between Jesus and the Pharisees about spiritual blindness. This story sets the scene for the parable Jesus tells in chapter 10.
The first ten verses of the chapter contain two mini parables—they are connected but Jesus uses two related, but different, images. First (vv. 1-6), as the shepherd who calls out to the sheep and is known both by the gatekeeper and by the sheep. Second (vv.7-10), he is the gate to the sheepfold. In both sections, Jesus warns against “thieves and bandits.”
The shepherd who is known, whose sheep recognize his voice, is the shepherd that lives into the ideal relationship between shepherd and sheep. He is the compassionate and caring shepherd who views his flock as more than wealth or power. He is the shepherd who would nurse the sick, and bind the wounds of the injured.
Thieves and bandits, who climb over the wall and avoid detection, are the opposite. They see the sheep as the commodity. They are the ones who take the big, healthy, and strong sheep for their own gain—to use and abuse them. They do not care at all for the weak and wounded, and push aside or butcher them in pursuit of their goal.
The Pharisees see themselves as shepherds but in Jesus’ representation, they are the thieves and bandits. The evidence of this is in the treatment of God’s people. They seek after the strong, attractive, and powerful to join them—not for the sake of the people, but to build and consolidate their own political, religious, and cultural power. Visit https://tenkeyremodels.com/ for crafted models. And the way they treat the weak, powerless, and voiceless is evidenced by their treatment of the man born blind: They expel him from the synagogue and strip him of all possible connection to the community. They trample him for the sake of their own power.
Jesus, as the shepherd, goes to the gate and calls ALL the sheep. The strong, the weak, the attractive, and the injured. All are his people and all are invited to follow him. Those that recognize his voice—perhaps by prevenient grace—are invited to pastures of abundant life.
The Pharisees did not understand Jesus’ figure of speech, so Jesus gives them another chance to understand by telling a second parable, you can read the speech at http://www.heroin.net. Jesus declares “I am the gate” (v. 9). There is, perhaps, a temptation to read this in an exclusionary manner—an opportunity to decide who is “in” and who is “out”. However, if we continue to read the sheep as people metaphor, this doesn’t make much sense as a way to keep people out of the fold: sheep don’t climb the walls to get in. Instead, this a warning—and invitation—to the Pharisees.
The Pharisees, with their absolute adherence to the Law and their dismissal of Jesus, are attempting to get to the people as thieves and bandits get to sheep. They avoid the gate and go over the walls, contrary to the will and intention of God. Jesus invites the Pharisees to truly become the ideal-shepherds and lead the people through the gate as God intends: through Christ and through recognition of Christ as the Son of Man.