The Gospel of John with Explanations Chapter 10. The circumstances in which John wrote

. A parable about the sheep, showing the essence of the relationship between HIS shepherd and HIS sheep: the shepherd openly enters the sheep pen through the only doors (this is how the sheep pen is designed); the sheep know the voice of their shepherd and follow him when he calls (the sheep pens could contain different flocks of sheep, each flock knew the voice of its shepherd).

If someone comes to them under the guise of their shepherd, then the sheep will recognize the substitution by a different voice and will not follow the stranger if he begins to call them to follow him. The sheep scatter in all directions from a strange shepherd; they are afraid of strangers.

they know his voice.

Metaphor for recognizing the voice of God's shepherd: God, who knows His own, reveals Himself to them through the voice of His shepherd in such a way that they respond to His word correctly. God does not force them to follow Him against their will, but the sheep themselves desire to follow His shepherd.

He who does not enter the sheepfold by the door, but climbs inside, is a thief and a robber.

Jesus came directly from God, without tricks: he was testified to by the prophets, and through John the Baptist, and by God himself through a voice from heaven. On it the predictions of the prophets were fulfilled exactly, and miracles and signs were shown to them. Those who came “through the fence” could not provide direct evidence that they came from God; they only pretended to be someone great. Now there are many different “shepherds” who call people to God in different ways. And in order to avoid getting into trouble and getting into trouble, you need to learn to discern the voice of God. The disciples did not understand what Jesus was talking about. And good. Otherwise, he would not have explained its meaning to us in detail.

10:7 Jesus said to them, “Truly, truly, I say to you, I am the door of the sheep.

So who is Jesus to his sheep?
Shepherd or door? He is also the good shepherd, who knows his sheep. And - the door that opens the way for the sheep from the fold of this world to freedom to God. It’s just that the messenger of God combines several functions. And if Jesus is good as a shepherd, openly entering among his sheep, then how good is he as the door - the WAY to good pastures with God.
Jesus is the very door and the very path that shows the whole world the direction to God. No one comes to the Heavenly Father except through Christ. In what sense is Jesus Christ a door? He is the only one who was able to open the way to God for all humanity, reconciling them with Him through an atoning sacrifice. 10:8 All of them, no matter how many of them came before Me, are thieves and robbers; but the sheep did not listen to them.

Before the appearance of Christ, those who wanted to pose as Christ appeared in Judea, but they were all false prophets and false teachers. That is why God's sheep (those who became Christ's disciples) did not accept them as God's shepherds.

10:9,10 I am the door: whoever enters through Me will be saved, and will go in and out and find pasture.

If one of the shepherds enters the sheepfold
through the door - the way of Christ - he himself will be saved and will find saving pasture for the sheep.
I have heard many times that all paths lead to God, and that everyone comes to him in their own way: some through Buddha, some through Krishna or Muhammad, and some without believing in anything at all. But Jesus said that only he is the “door”, and there is no other way to God except through him: only he redeemed people from sin and death, only he showed the way to the Father, and there is no other name under the sun by which one could man to be saved. This means that not all spiritual paths lead to God. Moreover, TWO spirits in the world are responsible for the spirituality of people: the holy (pure) and the unclean. You need to learn to distinguish between them -1 John 4:1. I have come so that they may have life and have it more abundantly.

Good news:
I came so that they would find life, life to the fullest.
Christ as a shepherd came to open the door to eternal life for the sheep.

in abundance, in its entirety -

Jesus will give people the opportunity not only to live forever, but also to enjoy the fact that they will be able to live forever.
The promise to live forever as, for example, the Jews of the 1st century lived, one could hardly consider it a blessing and be interested in it: it is difficult to live in this century (1 John 5:19). And eternal life in the fullness of the meaning that is prepared for people according to the Creator’s plan - in the heavenly house and in communion with the heavenly Father - this is eternal life with abundance (eternal happiness is also added to eternal life, that excess that people in this century do not have). During the time of eternal life in the Kingdom of God, their life will be extraordinarily good, especially wonderful and much better than in this age (Isa. 65:21-25; 66:12-14). The thief comes only to steal, kill and destroy.
Jesus, as a good and selfless shepherd, came to the “sheep” in order to save them and lead them to God. For this, he even sacrificed himself, giving himself to people without reserve. All other shepherds who are not like Christ in motivation and aspirations (who do not follow the path of Christ) - as a rule, pursue their own selfish goals, therefore they lead people not to God, but after themselves (they are thieves, stealing people from God). By doing this, these shepherds are leading their flock down the wrong path into false service to God, which can ultimately destroy them (Matt. 7:21-23).

10:11-13 I am the good shepherd: the good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep.

Christ considers God's sheep to be his relatives. That is why he is ready to give his life for his sheep. Jesus here predicts that he will die so that God's sheep can be saved.

But a hireling, not a shepherd, whose sheep are not his own, sees the wolf coming, and leaves the sheep and runs; and the wolf plunders the sheep and scatters them.

A mercenary never considers his sheep to be his own.
And no one wants to give their life for someone else’s. Therefore, in case of danger, the mercenary, who does not care what happens to the sheep, thinks only about how to save himself. A mercenary, as a rule, leaves the herd in a critical situation. This shows the principle of the difference between the struggle for one’s own and for another’s – among the shepherds of God’s assembly of different “kinds”: if you treat the assemblies of God’s people as your own, consider them your family , then everyone in them is brothers and sisters, and then you are ready to do a lot for them, even ready to sacrifice his life for their well-being.
If the meeting is perceived as an abstract society or organization of SOME believers from whom you can get some benefit and satisfy your ambitions, then the attitude towards the meeting will be completely different, and there will be no desire to diligently take care of it, therefore the “sheep” are from such a shepherd scatter. 10:14,15 I am the good shepherd; and I know Mine, and Mine know Me. As the Father knows Me, [so] I know the Father;

For Jesus, God's sheep are like his own. Jesus knows them, and God's sheep recognize Christ. According to this verse, it appears that those who are of the right spiritual disposition (who are rightly disposed towards eternal life, Acts 13:48), when they hear the voice of Christ (spiritual teaching consistent with the teaching of Jesus), will surely distinguish it from other “voices.”

and I lay down my life for the sheep.

For his sheep (for all those whom God had entrusted to him, John 17:9) Jesus would give his life. Note - not for all people in general. Jesus will die only for those who love God and desire to become His “sheep” (Matt. 1:21).

10:16 I have other sheep which are not of this fold, and these I must bring: and they will hear My voice, and there will be one flock and one Shepherd.

Many readers of this text think that the sheep of “this fold” are the Jews, and the other sheep from some other fold are the Gentiles.

Here are reflections and Biblical arguments in favor of the fact that we are talking only about the different purposes of the sheep in one flock of God, about the servants of the inner courtyard of the temple of Jehovah (about the class of the priesthood, which should first of all recognize Christ, namely the priests - first all “their own” to God) and about the rest of the people - about the servants of His outer, other court. That is, Jesus here recalls the structure of Jehovah’s temple, consisting of two courtyards (2 Proverbs 33:5; Ezek. 10:3-5; 44:17-19).

Jesus Christ had to find for God not only future heavenly kings and priests (his spiritual “bride” - Rev. 20:6), but also a great multitude of other sheep who would worship God day and night in His spiritual temple for all eternity - Rev. 7:15-17. And among the future inhabitants of heaven, and among the future great multitude of other sheep, there will be both Jews and pagans.

10:17,18 This is why the Father loves Me, because I lay down My life in order to take it again.

Love, as we see, needs reasons and it does not arise out of nowhere. Jehovah did not force Jesus to go to earth as a man and die for people. However, because Jesus was ready to make such a sacrifice without question, God loved this son especially.

No one takes it away from Me, but I myself give it. I have power to lay it down, and I have power to receive it again. I received this commandment from My Father.

Jesus volunteered for this. His father explained to him the full picture of his mission on earth - BEFORE he made a choice: the death of Christ - not forever, but with the subsequent resurrection. Jehovah never gives half-hearted pictures, giving a choice of something. Otherwise, the choice may turn out to be wrong. So do we: if we don’t complete the picture, don’t explain it, or veil it, then we can’t expect anything good from those listening to our incomplete information.

10:19-21 Many of them said: He is possessed by a demon and is going mad;
Why are you listening to Him? Others said: these are not the words of a demoniac;
Can a demon open the eyes of the blind? As we see, not everyone among those listening understood his speech, but some of those who did not understand for some reason decided that Christ was crazy, and someone still drew the correct conclusions that crazy people cannot speak like that. It turns out that in order to sometimes come to the right conclusions, it is not at all necessary to understand everything in absolute terms. Sometimes it is enough to grasp the common sense.

10:22 Then the [feast of] renewal came in Jerusalem, and it was winter. This holiday is now called Chanukah and is celebrated at the end of December, adjacent to Christmas on the calendar. It was a festival of light, reminiscent of the events that took place during the time of Judas Maccabee, who led the Jewish revolt against the Syrian king Antiochus Epiphanes (164 BC). 10:23-26
And Jesus walked in the temple in Solomon's porch.
24 Then the Jews surrounded Him and said to Him: How long will You keep us in bewilderment? if you are the Christ, tell us directly. 25 Jesus answered them: I told you, and you do not believe; the works that I do in the name of My Father, they testify of Me. 26 But you do not believe, for you are not of My sheep, as I told you. The Jews demanded that Christ not keep them in the dark, but declare directly who he is. And what he had told in detail up to that moment about himself, as a good shepherd of God and about why he came, no one heard while listening.

the works that I do in the name of My Father, they testify of Me. But you do not believe, for you are not of My sheep, as I told you. Jesus, notice, does not ask to look into his heart or listen to his words about how much he loves God. He offers to see whether he is from God or not - judging by his deeds and actions. Apart from the sheep of God with ears, eyes and hearts tuned to perceive the “wave” of the spirit of God, it turns out that no one could perceive Jesus Christ as a messenger of God, either by his words or by his deeds

10:27,28
My sheep hear my voice, and I know them;
And I give them eternal life, and they shall never perish; and no one will snatch them out of My hand . It is impossible to wrest such sheep from Jehovah; they hear the voice of the shepherd of God and distinguish this voice by the “timbre” of what is said and by the deeds of the speaker. Therefore, Jesus was not too bothered by the fact that many people did not trust him: those who needed it, those whom the Father designated, heard everything they needed and perceived it correctly.

and they follow me

What can you notice here?
Sheep, for example, Vasya follow Vasya. If Vasya follows Christ, then his sheep also follow Christ. If Vasya goes astray and turns to the side, then Vasya’s sheep will turn to the side after him. The sheep of Christ always adhere to the path of Christ and distinguish when Vasya teaches God, and when he begins to implant his personal teaching. And the sheep of Christ can follow Vasya only as long as Vasya himself follows the path of Christ. And if Vasya turns away from the path of Christ, then the sheep of Christ will not follow him, but will remain on the path of Christ. 10:29 My Father, which gave them to me, is greater than all;
God made sure that those of His sheep were found in Judea who could recognize Jesus Christ as His son and messenger of God. The Father of Christ is greater than all others in the sense that He is the only one who knows the essence of all people on earth, and therefore can accurately determine who exactly Jesus Christ needs in order for his earthly mission to be fulfilled according to the prophecies

and no one can snatch them out of the hand of My Father.

There is no one who can interfere with the fulfillment of God's intentions and prevent His sheep from appearing on earth: if God has chosen someone to fulfill His intentions, no one can interfere with this.

10:30 I and the Father are one.

Everything that Jesus actually showed was what his Father would do here if he ever decided to literally visit this land. That Jesus and his Father - in deeds, in words and in thoughts - ARE ONE whole, that is, like-minded people in the absolute. What Jesus says is, in fact, what the Creator says to them through Jesus Christ.

The commentary to this text of the Geneva Bible is also interesting: Jesus and the Father are not identical persons, but Persons united in Their essence.

10:31
Then again the Jews took up stones to stone Him.
The Jews were extremely irritated by this message from Christ about a close connection with the heavenly Father - with their God. Words about such a close spiritual connection with the heavenly Father - in fact, always irritate many because having such a personal close connection with God is the dream of many, but not everyone comes true. But who is particularly annoyed by this? One who does not yet have such a close connection with the heavenly Father, has not developed a close filial relationship with him and does not believe that this is even possible. Everyone who was able to build their own inner world with the Father and developed a warm relationship with Him lives by this and is happy with it. Those who have not built it destroy the inner world of those who built it. And happy about it.

10:32 I have shown you many good works from My Father; For which of them do you want to stone Me?

Interesting question: what specific GOOD deed do you want to stone me for? And a fool would begin to doubt his own rightness if you asked him THIS way. But the Jews are far from stupid. Jesus debunked their righteousness and showed that their works were not done in God. Did he do a good deed by denouncing the Jews? Yes, good, if you look at it through the eyes of the Creator. Good deeds are those that are beneficial from God's perspective. If the Jews had a desire to become better and closer to God, then they would have a sure chance to improve in what Jesus showed them.

But for the Pharisees this was not a good thing: too much would have to be changed.

10:33
The Jews answered Him, “We do not want to stone You for a good deed, but for blasphemy and because You, being a man, make Yourself God.”
Realizing that beating for a good deed is not good, they hastened to clarify why they were angry with Christ. If you do not delve into the meaning of what Jesus said, then you can easily make him out to be a blasphemer: after all, Jesus equated himself with God, saying “I and the Father are one.” It is quite possible to take Christ’s words literally and accuse him of blasphemy. A very convenient position for those who are looking for something to punish. And the fact that Jesus, speaking about unity with the Father, speaks only about the similarity of the inner essence and that all his actions and deeds absolutely reflect the actions and deeds of God, because they are done with the help of His holy spirit - this truth can be neglected : anyway, few people will understand all this.

10:34
Jesus answered them, Is it not written in your law, I said, Ye are gods?
However, Jesus decided to show the absurdity of the claims of the Jews, relying on those passages of Scripture that were well known to the Jews - Psalm 81. According to this Psalm, God called people “gods” and sons of the Most High, whom He entrusted to righteously judge His people and represent His word on earth.

10:35,36
If He called those to whom the word of God came gods, and the Scripture cannot be broken, do you say to Him whom the Father sanctified and sent into the world, You are blaspheming, because I said, I am the Son of God?
Next, Jesus tries to encourage them to reflect on the fact that being called the son of God compared to “gods” is much more harmless, and, nevertheless, God does not consider that he is committing blasphemy by calling some people gods.
The gods in the Psalm were those of His people whom God commissioned to represent His leadership, judgment and authority on earth - the leaders of His people and the prophets. They should have been guided in everything by HIS WORD, and not by the words of men ( to which was the word of God
).

10:37, 38 If I do not the works of My Father, do not believe Me; and if I do, then when you do not believe Me, believe My works, so that you may know and believe that the Father is in Me and I in Him.

Jesus again and again patiently tries to lead them to the fact that
the Father’s works can only be done by the Father’s son , or at least by the one whom the Father has endowed with the ability to do HIS works ( the Father in Me and I in Him
). The name in this case is not so important: words can and not believing, that's okay. But cases, as a rule, are NOT believed only by those who DO NOT WANT to come to the correct conclusion, those who, for some reason, are satisfied with the correct conclusion. For example, a wife is not satisfied with the correct conclusion that her husband came home from work tired. He doesn’t like it because we have to take into account his fatigue and not burden him with anything. And a wife, for example, urgently needs to load her husband with housework, so she doesn’t want to see his fatigue or believe that her husband is very tired. It's simple.

This is how the Pharisees act: well, let’s say they draw the correct conclusion that Christ is from God, so what? Then you will have to strain and change according to the word of Christ. But I don’t want to. It’s easier NOT to see this and NOT draw the right conclusion.

10:39 Then they again sought to seize Him; but He escaped from their hands

, The Jews should have thought about such a sound argument in defense of the harmlessness of the title “son of God” in comparison with “god” applied to a person. But it is difficult. It turned out to be much easier for them not to see these arguments and not to understand them.

But the simplest thing in such ambiguous situations, when you have to fight with conscience and expediency, is to destroy the one who brings disturbances into the well-functioning life of a worshiper of Jehovah, who is completely satisfied with himself. This is what the Pharisees tried to do with Christ every time: Then they again sought to seize Him

10:40
But He escaped from their hands, and went again beyond the Jordan to the place where John had first baptized, and remained there.
Jesus Christ again did not aggravate relations and go into open confrontation with the Jews. His hour had not yet come, he still had a lot to do on earth, and it didn’t matter that he was not understood: there was no point in continuing to try to induce the Jews to believe in what they categorically refused to believe.

10:41,42 Many came to Him and said that John had not performed any miracle, but everything that John said about Him was true.

Interestingly, it is said about John the Baptist that he will come in the spirit and power of Elijah - Luke 1:17, who performs many literal miracles in his time. However, John himself did not repeat a single miracle of Elijah and did not perform a single literal miracle of his own.

However, John performed spiritual miracles, turning the hearts of the Jews to Jesus through preaching about the coming Christ. Because of this, many believed in Jesus and accepted him as the son of God: And many there believed in Him.

That is why it is said that many who came to Jesus then only understood that John was telling the truth about Christ. And before, without seeing the works of Christ, it was difficult to believe in what John the Baptist prophesied.

Although, by and large, it still turned out that literal miracles were of little use, for Jesus performed so many miracles, but still they did not believe him - John 12:37. But a spiritual miracle is more valuable: it can save the life of someone who accepts the Christ of God and show him the way to the light of the Kingdom of God.

The Gospel of John: Meaning in the Word

In the New Testament, after the Gospels of Matthew, Mark and Luke, comes the Gospel of John. Its author is the holy Apostle John, who was one of the first to be called among the disciples: He saw the other two brothers, James Zebedee and John his brother, in a boat with Zebedee their father, mending their nets, and called them. And they immediately left the boat and their father and followed Him (Matthew 4:21-22).

First theologian

At first

If the holy apostle and evangelist John the Theologian were asked the question: “What is the meaning of life?”, he would certainly answer that the meaning of not only life, but everything in general is in the Word. The first lines of John's Gospel solemnly proclaim: In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. It was in the beginning with God. Everything came into being through Him, and without Him nothing came into being that came into being (John 1 :1-3). It is interesting that the first verse of the fourth Gospel is consonant with the first verse of the book of Genesis, with which the Holy Scripture of the Old Testament begins: In the beginning God created... (Genesis 1: 1). Both Genesis and the Gospel of John speak about creation: God creates and the Word gives rise to everything that exists, nothing can exist without the Word. In the Greek original of the Gospel of John, two complex terms were used that were already used in ancient philosophy: “arche” (beginning, control) and “logos” (word, speech, meaning). So, “arche” is not just the beginning, “arche” is what determines the further existence and development of things. “Logos” is not just a word, it is God the Word Himself, the Son of God, through whom God calls the world into existence. Therefore, all creation has its origin and existence in God, is determined and governed by God, and only in God does it find its true meaning. The life of the world is God.

For what

The Gospel of John is centered around three phrases: the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, full of grace and truth (John 1:14 ); For God so loved the world that he gave His only begotten Son, so that whoever believes in Him should not perish, but have eternal life (John 3:16 ); I came so that they might have life and have it more abundantly (John 10:10 ). God the Word, the Son of God became flesh. What does this mean? This means that God became like the rest of us - a man.

Let us turn once again to the ancient Greeks. In ancient Greek philosophy, the flesh is something lower, something from which one must free oneself; the body, the flesh, is the prison in which the human soul is imprisoned. The Gospel of John literally overturns these ideas. God became flesh, man, to save man. The Son of God became flesh because God the Father loved His creation so much that the Son's life was given for the life of the whole world. Through the incarnation of the Son of God, the world received not just life, but life abundantly. Abundant life is the absence of any lack, because God makes up for everything, makes up for any weakness and sorrow.