The one who enters by the gate is the shepherd of the sheep.  The gatekeeper opens it for him, and the sheep hear his voice.  He calls his own sheep by name and leads them out.  When he has brought all his own outside, he goes ahead of them.  The sheep follow him because they know his voice.  They will never follow a stranger; instead they will run away from him, because they don’t know the voice of the stranger.

      John 10:2-5

          I used to read the scripture for today and think that the sheep knew more than just the sound of their shepherd’s voice; they knew what their shepherd looked like.  So, it was no wonder that when the shepherd called his sheep they would see this person they were used to seeing and hearing.  But it was much more than that.  In Jesus’ day, there were large sheep pens made of stacked stones with only one entrance.  As shepherds traveled to a nearby city, as many as 10 shepherds would put their sheep in the pen that would be guarded by a gatekeeper who would literally lay in front of the entrance to protect the sheep from thieves or other animals.  As a shepherd returned the next morning, the gatekeeper would allow him to enter the pen and call his sheep.  Picture with me as many as a thousand sheep in this one pen.  As the shepherd called his sheep, they couldn’t see who was calling because of all the other sheep.  All they could do was hear the voice of the one calling.  I imagine it would be an amazing sight to see all of that one shepherd’s sheep making their way through the crowd while the other sheep paid no attention at all.  The sheep would make their way to the gate and the shepherd would lead them out to find pasture to graze in for the day.  Just think about how much time a shepherd spent with his sheep.  He took care of their basic needs for food and water, took care of any wounds suffered at the hands of other animals or dangerous terrain, and he cared for them when they were sick.  But the shepherd also spent time talking to the sheep.  That would make sense.  He was with them more than he was with his own family.  So the sheep would learn to recognize and to trust the voice of their shepherd. 

         I once heard a conference speaker say that there was one call the shepherd made when he was calling his entire herd to him, but there was also an individual call he would use for one specific sheep.  Only that one sheep out of a hundred, or even a thousand, would come to the shepherd.  How incredible is that?  Sometimes there was a group calling, and sometimes there was an individual calling. 

          Now think of how Jesus often refers to us as His sheep.  He sometimes calls us as a group, or as a church, and sometimes He calls to us individually.  I hope you feel the full weight of this statement! Before you read any further, stop and let the magnitude of it sink in. 

          John 10:27-30 says, “My sheep hear My voice, and I know them, and they follow Me.  And I give them eternal life, and they shall never perish; neither shall anyone snatch them out of My hand.  My Father, who has given them to Me, is greater than all; and no one is able to snatch them out of My Father’s hand.  I and My Father are one.”

          I am amazed at how a shepherd can call one of his sheep out of a large herd of possibly a thousand or more, and that one sheep knows it’s his shepherd calling.  But I am even more amazed that Jesus, the Good Shepherd, called to me in a way that was specific and personal.  As a 10-year-old girl, I heard Him call me to follow Him. I was in a revival service with a church full of people and, yet, I knew He was speaking to me personally in that moment.   There wasn’t a group of people at the altar that night.  There was only a young girl who heard her Good Shepherd call out to her.  Out of curiosity, I did a Google search and found that at the time Jesus spoke to me, the world population was around 3,775,700,000.  Yet, I heard His voice and knew He was calling me!  There are just no words to describe how utterly amazing that is!!

          Have you ever heard God speak to your heart in a way that was specific and personal?  If you have, you know that there is nothing on earth that compares.  If you haven’t, put yourself in a position to hear Him.  He is already speaking.  But as Bobby mentioned in last week’s message, there are a lot of voices clamoring for our attention.  

          We must learn to listen for the voice of our Good Shepherd- 

                                             The Voice of Truth.