5 The Door
5
The Door
Truly, truly, I say to you, he who does not enter by the door 1 into the fold of the sheep, but climbs up some other way, he is a thief and a robber. But he who enters by the door is a shepherd of the sheep. To him the doorkeeper opens, and the sheep hear his voice, and he calls his own sheep by name and leads them out.… Truly, truly, I say to you, I am the door of the sheep.… I am the door; if anyone enters through Me, he will be saved, and will go in and out and find pasture.
John 10:1–3, 7, 9 NASB
The next day John [the Baptist] saw Jesus coming toward him and said, “Look, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world! … I myself did not know him, but the reason I came baptizing with water was that he might be revealed to Israel.”
John 1:29, 31
The images of the shepherd and the door to the sheepfold are woven together in John 10 because both refer to Jesus. This explains how Jesus can be the door into the fold when He also enters the fold and leads the sheep out of the fold (vv. 2–5, 9). In the language of metaphor, a blending of images is not unusual. For example, Jesus is the bread of life (John 6:35), and yet He gives the bread (Himself) to hungry sinners. He speaks the truth (8:45), but He also is the truth (14:6). He imparts life to believing sinners (6:50–51), and yet He is life (14:6). Jesus Himself is the incarnation of every spiritual blessing He wants to give us, for “in Christ you have been brought to fullness” (Col. 2:10).
If we were to view John 10 as a drama, the program might look like this:
Cast of Characters
Director: God the Father (mentioned thirteen times in John 10)
The Door and the Good Shepherd: Jesus Christ, the Son of God
The False Shepherds: Thieves, robbers, hirelings, strangers (religious leaders who opposed Jesus)
The Sheep: True believers, Jews, and Gentiles
The Gatekeeper (or Porter): John the Baptist
Time and Place
John 10:1–21: The temple in Jerusalem after the celebration of the Festival of Booths and the healing of the blind beggar
John 10:22–39: The temple in Jerusalem during the Festival of Dedication, two and a half months after the events recorded in John 9:1–10:21
Act I
John 10:1–10
Jesus the Door
Act II
John 10:11–21
Jesus the Good Shepherd
Act III
John 10:22–39
Jesus and the True Sheep
For the people of Israel, the Festival of Dedication (Hanukkah) 2 commemorates the rededication of the temple in 165 BC. The Syrian invaders had defiled it, and the Jewish priests reconsecrated it. The festival lasts eight days and is celebrated in December, around the same time as the Christian Christmas. It is also called the Festival of Lights. Each celebrating Jewish family has a special eight-branched 3 oil lamp or candlestick, called a menorah. A new lamp or candle is lit on each day of the festival until all eight are burning. In this way the family is reminded that the light of God’s truth returned to their temple so that the people might worship Jehovah once more.
The Jewish people have always seen their nation as the flock of Jehovah, cared for by the Lord, their Shepherd (Num. 27:15–17; 2 Sam. 24:17; Ps. 23:1; 74:1; 77:20; 78:52; 79:13; 80:1; 100:3; Jer. 23:1–4; Ezek. 34; Matt. 15:24). The image of the flock is also applied to the church (Luke 12:32; Acts 20:28–29; Rom. 8:36; Heb. 13:20–21; 1 Pet. 5:2–3), and spiritual leaders are known as “pastors” (Eph. 4:11), from the Latin word for shepherd.
Let’s consider first the physical aspects of the sheepfold, and then we will better understand the spiritual lessons Jesus wants to convey to us. The sheepfold was an enclosure surrounded by a wall of rocks that was too high for the sheep to jump over. The shepherds sometimes put thorny branches on the tops of the walls to deter thieves from trying to climb over. An opening in the wall allowed the sheep to enter and exit; and at night, the shepherd lay across that opening and became the door of the sheepfold. No animal could get out and no enemy could get in without the shepherd knowing it. On the outskirts of many villages there might be a community sheepfold where all the shepherds brought their flocks each evening. In the morning, the shepherds would call their sheep, and each flock would follow its shepherd out of the sheepfold. The sheep knew the voice of their own shepherd and would follow nobody else.
Knowing these facts, we can now meditate on Jesus Christ as the Door and learn what this truth means to us today. In the next chapter we will consider Jesus Christ the Good Shepherd.