Introduction:
How Do I Hear the Voice of Jesus? (John 10:1-21)
- You have to Want to listen.
- You have to spend Time listening.
- You have to reduce other Noise.
- How Do I Hear the Voice of Jesus?
- How Do I Know It's Jesus Speaking to Me?
- How do I know I'm one of His sheep?
Knowing His Voice – 3 Evidences the Voice You Hear is Jesus:
- His voice leads to Abundant life. (John 10:7-10)
- His voice is Personal . (John 10:11-15)
- His voice brings Unity . (John 10:16-21)
Sermon Notes (PDF): BLANK
Hint: Highlight blanks above for answers!
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00:42-00:44
Open up your Bibles with me, please, to John 10.
00:45-00:51
And we are starting "Knowing Jesus," part 2.
00:52-00:54
We're going to continue our series in the Gospel of John.
00:55-01:02
And if you have one of those handy binders to keep your notes all collected, we have new covers that just slip in the front.
01:03-01:06
If you don't have one of those, I think there's some available in the back.
01:06-01:10
Brooke is modeling one right now, all Vanna White style or whatever.
01:11-01:14
So make sure you get a binder, get one of these inserts.
01:16-01:19
It helps me certainly taking notes.
01:21-01:23
That's our way of trying to help you in the same way.
01:23-01:24
All right?
01:24-01:32
So I heard somebody say something recently that just -- I'll be honest with you, it just kind of made me sad.
01:33-01:43
And they said one of the hard things about becoming an adult because nobody asks you what your favorite dinosaur is.
01:45-01:47
And that's true, right?
01:49-02:02
And somebody else had said, in the same vein, they said one of the hard things about being an adult was I got new shoes, and nobody asked me if I could run fast in them.
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And that made me sad.
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And I thought of you as I so often do.
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And thought, I'm gonna give you an opportunity right now.
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All right, so on the top of your outline, I want you to write down, if you could be any animal besides a human, what kind of animal would you be?
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Write it down, write it down.
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Come on, don't look at me like that, write it down.
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If you could be any kind of animal other than a human, what kind of animal would you be?
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All right, your answer's locked in.
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All right, Sean Zenko, what kind of animal would you be?
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A lion, well, solid choice, right?
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King of the jungle, solid.
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Stacey Gianetti, how about you?
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A bird.
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The wind, yes.
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Feel the wind in your feathers?
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Solid choice.
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Solid choice.
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Evan, what did you write down?
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A wolf.
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There you go.
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All right, I'm going to give you all a chance now because I don't want anybody leaving like, "He didn't ask me." All right, so on the count of three, everybody shout out your answer.
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You ready?
03:31-03:32
One, two, three.
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[Audience] Chicken.
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Does somebody say a chicken?
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All right, back to adulting.
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That's all fun, but the sad reality for us that we learned from Matt Cole's voice in the video, according to God, what kind of animal are you?
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You're a sheep.
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You and I are sheep, and that doesn't sound anywhere near as fun as being a lion, or a bird, or a wolf, right?
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We were at Iron's Mills Farm yesterday, and we got to see some sheep.
04:20-04:21
They are not glamorous animals.
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Sheep are completely defenseless, and sheep are dumb.
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Sheep are probably the dumbest animal.
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Do you know how I know that?
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What do you call the guy who's paid to babysit the horses?
04:39-04:40
What do you call that guy?
04:40-04:47
"We don't have a guy that just babysits horses." Or what do you call the guy that his job is to babysit cats?
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"Well, we don't really have a guy that babysits cats." And what do you call the guy that you pay to babysit sheep?
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What do you call that guy?
04:55-04:55
"Shepherd!
04:55-05:44
Do you see my point?" dumb and they're defenseless and they need constant guidance and supervision and that is exactly why, church, God says you are a sheep. I am a sheep. And in John chapter 10 this passage that we're looking at today flows straight out of chapter 9, Jesus on the Sabbath healed a man that was born blind and the Pharisees were livid. Why would you do something like that on the Sabbath? So they confronted Jesus about this and in chapter 10 everyone is still there.
05:45-06:00
Jesus, the blind man, the Pharisees, the disciples, the crowd, everybody's still So in this passage, Jesus launches into this extended metaphor about sheep and shepherds and related characters.
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Why would He do that?
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Why, as a result of this whole anger over the healing thing, why would He launch into a teaching on shepherding?
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And here's why. This is important for us to understand.
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The Pharisees thought that they were the shepherds of Israel.
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They thought it was their job to keep the sheep of Israel in line.
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But we saw in chapter 9, the reality is the Pharisees didn't care about the sheep at all.
06:37-06:40
All they cared about was enforcing their man-made rules.
06:41-06:51
But when it came to the actual care, the actual nurturing, the actual loving of the sheep, it just wasn't in them.
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So before we look at these verses, since we probably don't have any first century shepherds sitting here this morning, I want to explain something to you quickly so you get the picture.
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In Jesus' day, every village would have a sheepfold.
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Okay?
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Just imagine outside of the village this giant garage for sheep.
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And every night when the shepherds would come back into the village, they would take their little flock and put it into the sheepfold.
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But many shepherds would do that, so you would have this sheepfold that was full of all kinds of sheep from all different flocks, right? And this sheepfold was actually guarded at night by a gatekeeper. He was a guy they hired to cover third shift. So the shepherds would bring all their sheep in and they would go home and the gatekeeper would shut and guard the door. And obviously while the sheep were all in this sheepfold together, they would mingle with one another, right? The sheep weren't like, "Well, I'm not part of that flock, so stay away." They would actually They'd mingle, you know, single, ready to mingle sheep, and they would kind of spread out through the sheepfold.
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And in the morning, the shepherd would go back to the sheepfold, and the gatekeeper would let him in the door, and he would call his sheep out.
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And they knew his voice, like, "Okay, it's my guy, we're out of here." And the shepherd would call his, and his sheep would follow him back out to pasture.
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That's just how it was, okay?
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And everyone that Jesus was speaking to knew that, and I thought it would be a good review for us, because you have to understand that picture to understand what Jesus is saying here.
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All right.
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Everybody up to speed on first century shepherding?
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Because I can start over.
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Okay, if you could be an animal, what kind of animal would you be?
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All right, verse 1.
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Jesus said, "Truly, truly, I say to you, he who does not enter the sheepfold by the door, but climbs in by another way, that man is a thief and a robber.
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He who enters by the door is the shepherd of the sheep.
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To him the gatekeeper opens." The sheep hear his voice, and he calls his own sheep by name, and he leads them out.
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When He has brought out all His own, He goes before them, and the sheep follow Him, for they know His voice.
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The stranger they will not follow.
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They will flee from Him, for they do not know the voice of strangers.
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This figure of speech Jesus used with them, but they did not understand what He was saying to them.
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Let's kind of break it down.
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2, Jesus said, "The one who enters by the door is the shepherd of the sheep." What did he mean by the door?
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Well, a door just refers to a normal, proper entrance into a place, right?
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You probably came into this room through a door, I hope.
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Jesus is just simply talking about himself here.
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He entered the door of the world the way he was expected to, meaning according to the Old Testament.
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What Jesus is saying is he came to the world in the predicted way, the way the Old Testament said the Messiah would enter the world.
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You know, entering through Bethlehem, through a virgin, through all the prophecies that say how the Messiah would enter the world.
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Jesus said, "I showed up the way the Messiah was supposed to show up.
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I came right through the door, so to speak.
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And in verse three, Jesus talks about the gatekeeper.
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The gatekeeper opened the door for the shepherd to enter.
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And who was the gatekeeper?
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Who was the gatekeeper?
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John the Baptist, right?
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John the Baptist was the one who prepared the way for the shepherd to come to the sheep.
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So in other words, to paraphrase everything Jesus said here, I'm just going to give it to you in one sentence so you understand what he's saying.
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Jesus is saying, "I came as prophesied, John the Baptist prepared the way, and I came to call out and save my sheep, my people." He was making this big general statement about himself and his mission.
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And they didn't get it.
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Look at verse four again.
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It says, "The sheep," the end of verse four says, "The sheep follow him," look at this, "for they know his voice." That's what we're gonna talk about today.
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Jesus said that his sheep know his voice.
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That, that is a game-changing claim.
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I want you to think about that.
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Because this year, as last year, what are we going after?
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We're going after knowing Jesus, not knowing about Jesus, not knowing some facts about Jesus in case we're on Jeopardy and Jesus is a category.
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That's not what we're going after.
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We're going after knowing Jesus.
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That's what we want, right?
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Jesus makes this claim, He says that His sheep, His people, they know His voice and they follow Him because they can hear Him talking to them.
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Do you believe that?
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The people who know Jesus know His voice.
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And right away there are some people that are going to try to dance around this very clear concept and try to reinterpret it.
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Let's understand it in a different way.
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When Jesus very straightforwardly said, "My sheep know my voice." And listen church, this is way more than just like ink on rice paper.
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Okay? And this isn't some poetic concept.
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Like, "I carry you in my heart of hearts." This is way more than that.
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What Jesus is talking about here is something supernatural.
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Something that can't fully be explained with just human words.
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But according to Jesus, if you're one of His, you're recognized when He talks to you.
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So let's go after that.
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On your outline, "How do I hear the voice of Jesus?" because for some of us, maybe we've struggled with wondering, how do I know it's Jesus talking to me and not my own imagination?
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Have you ever wondered that?
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Like, what was that voice from?
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Was that just me talking to myself in my head?
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Or was that the voice of God speaking to me?
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Which is it? And how do I know?
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Explain that one to us, Jeff.
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"Do you believe that God talks to you?" "Yes, I absolutely do." "Has God ever talked to you, Jeff?" "Yes, He has. He has." And you're like, "Okay, well, explain it to me." And I can't.
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Because it's not audible.
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It's not the way that I'm talking to you right now.
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When the Lord has spoken to me, it has not been like the clouds parted God's like, "Paging Jeff Miller, paging Jeff Miller." "Oh, I'm listening, Lord." It's not like that.
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The only way I can describe it is, it is Spirit communicating to Spirit.
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It's His Holy Spirit communicating with my Spirit in a way that he's conveying a message.
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Like, well, how do I hear the voice of Jesus?
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Just wanna give you three things.
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I want you to jot these down.
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Because if you're not doing like, if you're not going like after all of these things, you're just, you're not hearing.
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Letter A, you have to want to listen, okay?
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You have to want to listen.
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There is a big difference between hearing and listening.
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Big difference between hearing and listening.
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Husbands here, married men.
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Let me ask you a question.
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Has your wife ever informed you that she told you something, and you just completely don't recall hearing that?
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Husbands, raise your hand.
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Some of you look scared to death.
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We are in church.
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They can't hurt you here.
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It might be a long ride home, but they can't hurt you here, husbands.
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Have you ever just... your wife's like, "I told you that!" And you're like, "I so don't remember that." Get on up high, husbands, come on.
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It's happened to us all.
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I'm just seeing which of you are brave enough to admit it.
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Is there...
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But is there a chance, men, is there a chance that your wife meant to tell you and thought she did but actually didn't?
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Is there a chance?
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Did you hear Ryan Stroop said "Amen"? Where's your wife?
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She's working!
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Boy, do we got something to hold over you for the rest of your life.
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Do you think?
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I don't think that's possible.
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But men, for sure, our wives have told us things that we just don't recall hearing them at all.
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Now, the sound of their voice entered our ears.
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Maybe went in one ear and out the other because there was nothing in the middle to stop the sound.
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I mean, I've been guilty of that. I have.
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That Aaron has made sounds in my direction, but I was not tuned in to listen.
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And I've been guilty of that.
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But you see, with Aaron, I want to hear what she has to say.
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I truly do.
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I want to hear what she has to say.
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And that's why I try, when she speaks to me, I really try to listen.
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I try to understand what it is she's communicating to me.
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Why? Because I love her.
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I love her more than anything else on this planet. I do.
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And it's that love that motivates a person to want to hear, to want to listen, and that is absolutely true when it comes to the Lord.
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When you love the Lord, you are motivated by that love to want to hear what He has to say.
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So it has to start there.
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How do I hear the voice of Jesus?
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Well, my first question is, "Well, do you want to?" Do you want to? You have to want to listen.
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Letter B, how do I hear the voice of Jesus?
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You have to spend time listening.
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You have to spend time listening.
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Time, what do you mean time?
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Well, first of all, obviously prayer.
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Prayer time, I would ask you how much of your prayer time is just listening?
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How much of your prayer time is listening?
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Listening to God, listening for God, listening for His Spirit to move and communicate with your spirit.
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How much of your prayer time is being silent before God?
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Or is your prayer time like, "God, I've got this laundry list of prayer requests here, so I'm just going to rattle them off to You and I'll catch You later." You have to spend time listening.
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The other way you spend time listening is through God's Word.
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It's through God's Word.
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God's voice, His Spirit, as He speaks to your spirit, listen, this is so important, He is always in agreement with His Word.
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Okay? God absolutely will not contradict Himself.
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So something you think, "Maybe God said, maybe it wasn't God, was it me, was it my imagination?" Anything that God communicates to you is always going to be in accordance with His Word every time.
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He's not going to tell you something different than what His Word says.
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And that's why in the church, one of the most cringeworthy things that people say is, "The Lord told me to tell you something." Has anybody ever said that to you?
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I see some of you cringing now.
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"The Lord told me to tell you something." Oh, I've had people tell me that.
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Like for example, many years ago I had a woman say, "The Lord told me that you were supposed to meet with me at my house alone." I said, "Oh, did He tell you that?" I said, "You know what's interesting is the Lord did not tell my wife that." No, I did not go to her house.
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I probably didn't have to tell you that.
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I've heard it all, so I could give you a list.
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"The Lord told me to divorce my husband." "The Lord told me it's okay for me to smoke." "The Lord told me..." That's how cults start, by the way.
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Is when you have somebody saying, "Hey, the Lord told me this stuff." And yeah, it's not necessarily stuff that's in here or agrees with this, but "The Lord told me this stuff." That's how cults start, right?
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You look at Islam, you look at the Jehovah's Witnesses, you look at the Mormons, every one of those cults started that way.
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God told me some stuff.
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To know God's voice, you have to know God's Word.
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Because God is not going to speak to you apart from what He has already revealed in His Word.
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And when I say "know the Word," I don't mean, "Oh, I read it occasionally, I memorized a few verses when I was a kid." I mean knowing the Word.
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knowing the Word and knowing the heart of the God who wrote this Word.
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Because church, listen, this is the primary way that God speaks.
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Right here. This is the primary way that God speaks.
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He speaks to you through His Word, with His Spirit, to your spirit, as you go after wanting to listen to Him.
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And He will speak to you.
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His Spirit will speak to yours, and the more you listen to His voice in His Word, the easier His voice will be to recognize, because anything He says is going to agree with what He's already said.
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Okay, but you've got to spend time listening.
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Letter C, how do I hear the voice of Jesus?
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you have to reduce other noise.
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You have to reduce other noise.
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Like, "Okay, Jeff, so you said that Jesus speaks Spirit to Spirit somehow, and I'm just going to tell you, Jeff, I haven't heard Him.
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I haven't heard Jesus speak to my spirit, Jeff.
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What do you say to that?" Well, I would say two things to that.
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Either one, you're not one of His sheep.
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Or two, maybe you just persistently drown Him out.
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Because your spirit is listening to so much other noise.
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What other noise do you mean?
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I'm going to give you three other noises that I mean, and they're alliterated for those of you that love that.
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What other noise? One is sin.
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Sin. If you are living in sin, unrepentant sin, If you're living in sin right now and you know God's told you to repent, but you're just not right now, you're not going to hear His voice because you don't want to hear what He has to say.
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Because you know what He wants to address in your life.
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Like, "Hey, you've got to repent from this. This is wrong." So if you are living in sin right now, You're not hearing the voice of God because you don't want to.
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So there's sin.
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What other noise can drown out God's voice?
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Sin, number two, secular, meaning listening to the world's doctrine, the world's selfish philosophies, the "me first" way of living.
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You listen, you're more concerned with what they say on your talk shows, podcast than you are what God has said in his word. If that's you, then you're drowning out the voice of God. And it's no wonder you can't hear him. And finally sin, secular, and self. Self. Do you know how you drown out the voice of God? Just keep the constant selfish self-talk happening all the time. You know I'm talking about in your head that constant complaining, "I'm so sick of this, and I'm so tired of her and he gets on my nerves and I'm so mad about this and my life stings and that you're constantly doing that you're drowning out hearing the voice of God maybe it's complaining maybe it's anger maybe it's envy whatever this selfish self-talk you're just tuned into your voice instead of being tuned into his voice so how do I hear the voice of Jesus we have to want to listen and you have to spend time listening, and you have to reduce other noise.
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So how do I hear the voice of Jesus?
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Here's the bottom line.
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How do I hear the voice of Jesus?
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You just do.
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If, if you are one of His, you just do.
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"Well, how do I know that it's Jesus speaking to me?" You just do.
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If you are one of His, according to Him, you just do.
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Like, "All right, well, that leads me to another question, Jeff.
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How do I know that I'm one of His?
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How do I know that I'm one of His sheep?" And that's easy.
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That's the easiest question of all, because Jesus said His sheep follow Him.
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You're one of His if you follow Him.
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I'm not sure if you cleared this up for me, or if you made it more complicated.
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Well, good news! Jesus elaborates on this whole concept, so will we.
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Alright, so, on your outline, "Knowing His Voice," here's three evidences from Jesus that the voice you hear is Jesus.
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We're going to go through these quickly.
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Number one, write this down.
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His voice leads to abundant life.
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His voice leads to abundant life.
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Look at verses 7-10.
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So Jesus again said to them, they didn't get it, okay?
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He gives this whole analogy, they're like, "We don't know what he's talking about." So Jesus says, "I'm going to take another run at this." So Jesus again said to them, "Truly, truly, I say to you, I am the door of the sheep.
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All who came before Me are thieves and robbers, but the sheep did not listen to them.
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I am the door.
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If anyone enters by Me, he will be saved, and will go in and out and find pasture.
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The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy.
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came that they may have life and have it abundantly." Stop there. Jesus shifts gears a little bit in the analogy, but He's still talking about shepherding. You see, shepherds would take their sheep out into the fields and in the morning the sheep would graze, and in the early afternoon, while the shepherds had their sheep in the fields, they would make these temporary corrals out in the wilderness. And would actually lay across the doorway of that temporary corral.
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That's why Jesus said, verse 7, He said, "I am the door." Like, they totally understood what He was saying.
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The shepherd would lay down over the doorway of the temporary corral while the sheep were resting.
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The shepherd was laying across the doorway.
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Essentially, the shepherd was the door.
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What's the point?
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The shepherd did that to protect the sheep.
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He was saying, "If you wanted the sheep, you're going to have to crawl over me to get them." There is a thief that wants to destroy you.
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Satan.
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The devil.
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He wants to destroy.
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But when you follow Jesus Christ, the devil can't have you.
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The devil can't ever destroy you.
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Why?
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Because he would have to go through Jesus Christ to do that.
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And that's this picture Jesus is giving here to say, "Hey, when you're one of my sheep, and you're under my protection, anybody that's going to touch you, "Hey, you're going to have to go through me.
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You want it done? Bring it." And not only does Jesus our Shepherd give us safety from the enemy, He gives us abundant life.
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Boy, this is a whole other sermon series, but I just want to ask you one question regarding this this morning.
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Right now, as you look at your life, this chapter of your life, where you are, what you're doing, you're with whatever, whatever, whatever. Would you describe your life as being abundant right now? Abundant life is not about money. It's not about position. It's not about how many Twitter followers you have. Abundant life is living in the joy of everything that that only God provides.
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That's abundant life.
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Living in the joy of everything that only God provides.
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Things like freedom.
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Forgiveness.
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Peace.
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A fellowship with Him and with other believers.
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Things that only God provides.
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And you know it's the voice of the Shepherd, Jesus Christ, when these are the things that He's leading you to.
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His voice leads to abundant life.
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Number two, His voice is personal.
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His voice is personal.
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I'm going to explain what that means here in a second.
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Look at verse 11.
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"I am the Good Shepherd." "The Good Shepherd lays down His life for the sheep.
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who is a hired hand and not a shepherd who does not own the sheep, sees the wolf coming and leaves the sheep and flees, and the wolf snatches them and scatters them.
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He flees because he is a hired hand and cares nothing for the sheep.
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I am the good shepherd. I know my own, and my own know me.
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"The Father knows me, and I know the Father, and I lay down my life for the sheep." It's up there.
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"Free evidence is the voice you hear is Jesus, because His voice is personal." He makes a contrast here, comparing the shepherd himself to the hireling.
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Who is the hireling?
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He's just some punk kid in high school needing to earn a few bucks on the side.
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So yeah, alright, you give me a few bucks, I'll help you with the shepherding business.
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That's the hireling.
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He doesn't own the sheep.
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He's just in it for the money.
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Therefore, as Jesus pointed out, when danger comes, you know what that kid says?
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"Oh, that's not my problem.
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They ain't paying me enough to take on wolves, okay?
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Not my problem." The hireling shows that he loves his life more than the sheep, But the shepherd loves the sheep more than his life.
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The love of Jesus Christ knows no limit.
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Would he be willing to die?
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We're going to talk about that more in a second.
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But even more awesome is the fact that his love isn't just some general, generic love.
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Like, okay, I guess I love the lot of you.
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I love the group of you!" That's something you see with Jesus Christ, is His love is always personal.
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And it's always relational.
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Every single time.
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Like, what do you mean?
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Well, study your Bibles.
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Do you realize every single encounter with Jesus is personal and individual?
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Do you notice that?
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Whether it's Nicodemus, the Samaritan woman, Zacchaeus, Matthew, etc., etc., etc., etc.
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That's what Jesus was talking about way back in verse 3, when He says the shepherd calls the sheep by name.
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You realize these first century shepherds, they named their sheep.
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They had names just like we name our dogs, we name our cats.
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You even name your fish, don't you?
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We name our pets.
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And the shepherds, they were no different.
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All their little sheep had names, so they just call them out, and here they came.
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And Jesus said, "Hey, that's how I am with my sheep." He goes, "I know you personally." "I'm sorry, what was your name?" "Oh, Darla, okay, which church were you with?" "Harvest Bible Chapel." "Okay, we take those people. I'm going to look you up there and see." Like, that's not it at all.
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He knows you personally.
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And He's calling you by name.
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Can you hear Him?
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There's a huge difference between an announcement and an invitation.
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Right?
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Like if I stood up here today and I said, hey, any of you want to come to my house for lunch afterwards, just come on over.
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That's an announcement.
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But if I came and I said, Matt, Matt, I want you to come to my house for lunch today.
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All right.
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Parents at a place.
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Do you see the difference?
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Didn't that feel different?
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To call you by name and say, "I want you to come to my house." That's different than if you don't want to come.
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And some people think that's sort of how Jesus does it with salvation.
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You want to get saved, you just come on.
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That's not how He does it at all.
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Jesus comes individually.
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He says, "Hey, you, I know you.
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Ben, I'm calling you to come to myself." His voice is always personal.
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You're like, "Well, what if I'm not one of his sheep?
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How do I know if I am?" Look, I'm not going to get into some Calvinism debate with you on that.
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All I know is this.
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Verse 9, Jesus said, "If anyone enters by Me..." See that word "anyone"? Underline the word "anyone." Are you in anyone?
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If you would classify yourself as being under the heading "anyone," then this is for you.
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If you will receive Him, He's personally inviting you.
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So His voice leads to abundant life, His voice is personal.
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And finally, His voice brings unity.
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His voice brings unity.
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Look at verse 16.
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Jesus said, "And I have other sheep that are not of this fold.
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I must bring them also, and they will listen to My voice.
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So there will be one flock, one shepherd.
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For this reason, the Father loves Me, because I lay down My life, that I may take it up again.
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No one takes it from Me, but I lay it down in My own accord.
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I have authority to lay it down, and I have authority to take it up again.
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This charge I have received from my Father." Jesus' voice goes out to all the sheep.
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Specifically here, He's speaking about us Gentiles.
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Jesus' voice goes out to all the sheep all over the world, all over time.
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The goal was to have just one flock all together, where there's one shepherd.
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You know, this stream, this recording of this church service, you know, it goes global.
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And these messages are listened to all over the earth.
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I get emails from people from everywhere, all over the United States, Uganda, Ghana, Japan.
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Emails, "Hey, you don't know me, but I live here and I listen to your messages every week." And how awesome is it going to be that someday we're all gonna be under one roof worshiping Jesus Christ together.
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There's not going to be the Republican and the Democrat sections.
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We're not gonna get to heaven.
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He says, okay, the black people sit here, the white people sit here, the Asians sit here.
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There's just gonna be one flock.
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Like, hey, where am I supposed to be?
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Sheep here, sheep here.
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United under one shepherd.
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See, that's the heart of Jesus, and that's the goal of the shepherd, is to bring all of the sheepfold together, so I can tell you for sure, if you're wondering, am I hearing the voice of Jesus?
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He's not going to lead you, or call you to do anything that's going to bring division or hostility to His church.
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Because in the church, there's no room for elitism.
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That means I'm better than you.
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In His church, there's no room for favoritism.
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That means you're better than Him.
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And in His church, there's no room for racism, which means you aren't as good as anyone.
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The voice of Jesus Christ leads to unity with His people under the authority of His work.
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This unity we're talking about, It's really only for Jesus' sheep, by the way, because not every sheep is following the shepherd.
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Let's look at verses 19-21 as we close.
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He says, "There was again a division among the Jews because of these words.
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Many of them said, 'He is a demon and is insane.'" Boy, that's a double whammy, isn't it?
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I mean, I feel bad for somebody that just had one of those conditions.
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They're like, "He's not only spiritually possessed, he's crazy." Look at this question.
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They said, "Why listen to him?" Others said, "These are not the words of one who is oppressed by a demon.
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Can a demon open the eyes of the blind?" I just want to close with looking at that last question.
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As our worship team makes their way forward.
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Last question.
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Why listen to Him?
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Why listen to Him?
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You notice Jesus made a comment several times throughout this passage.
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When He talked about dying, did you notice Jesus didn't say that He'll be killed?
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Did you notice that?
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You notice five times in this passage, Five times Jesus said He will lay down His life.
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Five times He says, "I will lay down My life." Some knock on your head might be listening to this saying, "So what? I can lay down My life." Verse 18, Jesus said, "But He also had the authority to take it up again." Can you do that?
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A man who would make such a claim that he can lay down his life and take his life up - a man who would make a claim like that is either completely insane or completely God.
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And Jesus revealed which one of those He is when He rose from the dead.
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So why listen to Him?
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Because He's like no one else.
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Do I listen to Him?
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Because He does for us what no one else can do.
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As the Shepherd, He saves, He provides, He guides, He gives us abundant life.
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Right now, the Shepherd is still calling His sheep to Himself.
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And if you can hear Him calling you, You have not yet received Him.
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Today's the day, sheep!
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Come to your shepherd.
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I'd like you to bow your heads with me, please.
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Whether you're sitting here in person, or you're watching online, or you're watching the recording of this later, whatever.
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If you can hear the voice of the shepherd, that's the best possible news you'll ever have.
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I know that He's calling you.
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Because His sheep hear His voice.
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And sheep know that the absolute best, safest, and most abundant place they can be is sticking close to that shepherd.
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Father in heaven, as we bow ourselves before You, we thank You for Your Word.
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I know, Father, there are going to be some people that might be ready to quickly explain this away, to dismiss it, to try to redefine it, but the reality is Jesus very plainly said that His sheep hear His voice.
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Father, I'm praying right now for the sheep that hearing the voice of the shepherd would cause us to move, cause us to respond.
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I pray that You would give us a hunger that all we want to do is put ourselves in a position where we hear Your voice.
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There is nothing more important to us, there is nothing sweeter to us, there is nothing more reassuring to us than recognizing the voice of our Shepherd.
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Thank you.
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Thank you God for not being detached and separate, but for being so personal and loving to us.
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Thank you.
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We pray in Jesus' name, Amen.
Small Group Discussion
Read John 10:1-21
What was your big “take-away” from this passage / message?
The Bible says we are sheep. In what ways are we like sheep? (Bonus points for citing the appropriate Bible verses!)
Tell of a time you knew you heard the voice of the Shepherd. What did He say? How did He speak? How did you know it was Jesus (and not just your own imagination)?
How would you respond to a friend, whom you believe is born again, who says, “I don't think Jesus has ever spoken to me.”
Why did Jesus emphasize (5x!) that He was “laying down His life”? Why do you think that was the focal point of His Shepherd metaphor here?
Breakout
Pray for one another to truly listen, and hear, the voice of Jesus. Then pray for the faith to follow Him.