Certainty and Freedom

John 10:22-30

I agree with the comment that has been made about where we put our focus when there is truth and lies, light and darkness. It is on the truth and the light. The sheep need to warned that there are forces that would try to convince us that God is not real or not really in charge and also loving and so forth. Or how could he love me when I’ve done or failed to do this or that? I get the sense that this whole chapter is leading to verses 29-30. This is what we’re to “get.” Jesus has talked before about his oneness with the Father, that everything he does and says and is has to do with his coming from the Father and his union with the Father, that those who belong to Jesus are given to him by the Father (we are gifts as well as being gifted). Nothing can take away the relationship of the sheep with the Shepherd because it is the Shepherd who establishes the relationship, enables the response and nourishes the relationship, with even greater things in store. In what is yet to come in the Gospel there will be more about the responsibility given to those given to Jesus by the Father. We can freely and joyfully serve and love God and our fellow sheep when we know we are secure in the love of the Shepherd.

Prayer:
Jesus, you are the Word who continues to create new life, the Light who enables us to recognize it, and the Spirit who empowers us to live it. Help us en-joy it. Amen.