Bible study on John 10.1-5, 10
Jesus said to the Pharisees:
1 ‘Very truly, I tell you, anyone who does not enter the sheepfold by the gate but climbs in by another way is a thief and a bandit. 2 The one who enters by the gate is the shepherd of the sheep. 3 The gatekeeper opens the gate for him, and the sheep hear his voice. He calls his own sheep by name and leads them out. 4 When he has brought out all his own, he goes ahead of them, and the sheep follow him because they know his voice. 5 They will not follow a stranger, but they will run from him because they do not know the voice of strangers.’ 10 The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy. I came that they may have life, and have it abundantly.’
It’s striking how much of the gospel reading is about calling: the Good shepherd calls his sheep before he can lead them anywhere. He wants to lead them away from danger and towards the good pasture, but to do this he must first call them, and they must choose to follow. God has a calling for each one of us, a purpose for our lives that is ours alone. But it’s important not to lose sight of the fact that even those who are called to positions of leadership are called, first and foremost to follow. Before we are anything else, we are baptized into God’s family, sheep of his flock.
Is someone calling? Is it God?
The gospel talks of sheep who know they sound of their own shepherd’s voice, and will follow no-one else. How do we recognize the call of our shepherd, Jesus Christ? How do we learn to hear God’s voice and to follow it? There are so many other conflicting and seductive things that clamour for our attention that it can be hard sometimes to discern the still small voice of God amid all the noise. How do we tune our ears?
- Listen more attentively: set our hearts on hearing God, make it a priority.
A new mother can recognize her own baby’s cry in a room full of crying babies, and it sounds louder and more urgent than all the others. Why? Because we are programmed to believe that our child is the most important thing in the world. What ways can we find of re-orientating ourselves so that discerning the will of God is uppermost in our hearts and minds?
Called to life
Jesus says, ‘the thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy, but I came that they may have life, and have it abundantly.’ There are many things that call out to us, some of which seem good, but are actually destructive and dangerous. Following the Good Shepherd may sometimes be costly, but it will also ultimately be life-giving and fruitful. So we can discern what is the voice of God by what that voice is urging us to do, and what the ‘fruits’ of it are in our lives.
- Irenaeus of Lyons said, ‘the glory of God is a human being fully alive’. What do you think he meant? What makes you feel fully alive? What stops you feeling fully live?
- How does your life and your sense of vocation reveal the glory of God?
- What things have been particularly fruitful for you recently?
- In what church and social contexts can vocation flourish and bear fruit?
Called in community
Any good shepherd calls his sheep to stick together – if we hear a call to scatter and divide, is it really likely to be from God? Why it so crucial that the calling of the good shepherd is a call that gathers the flock? It sounds silly to say it, but Jesus is not described as the good cat-owner. He is in charge not just of individual sheep but of a flock, which is a community. Our relationship with God as our shepherd is inseparable from our relationship with each other. How is this important in our experience of vocation?
- We learn to hear the voice of our shepherd by belonging to the flock and learning to discern it through the experience and wisdom of our fellow sheep, passed down from ewe to lamb. By being part of a church congregation, which is itself held within the Christian tradition, we gain two thousand years’ and a whole world’s worth of experience in discerning the calling of God. If we don’t listen to God together, we won’t hear him at all.It is only by acting in community like this that we stand any chance of accurately hearing what is the calling of God for us today.
- If God is calling you to a new kind of ministry, he will not be calling you to go it alone. The wisdom of the community gathered here is vital if you are hear God’s call for you. The process of discernment and selection for authorized, licensed and ordained ministry depends on the support of the local church community, because vocation – of any kind at all – does not exist in a vacuum, but amongst God’s people, within the flock, within the church.
Called to be Christ-like
We’ve established that Jesus is not the Good cat-owner, but people do sometimes say that there is a similarity between a dog and their owner.
- Does the idea that people look at Christians to find out what God is like challenge you, scare you, encourage you?
- Do they see a flock that is happy and healthy? Or do they see sheep scattered? Do they see a flock that really does look after its weakest members, or are the lame and the lost left on the margins, out in the cold?
- When people see someone experiencing a sense of vocation, can they see joy there, and think, ‘yes, that is good news’.