Friday Reading: John 10 10-15
Key Verse: John 10 14
14 I am the Good Shepherd, and I know those that are Mine, and I am known by those who are Mine.
14 I am the Good Shepherd, and I know those that are Mine, and I am known by those who are Mine.
Devotion:
Have you ever been asked to describe God; maybe because you love Him? It’s easy to describe Him in terms of a loving, caring, just God, but describing Him in terms of what He looks like would be quite difficult. It would be the same sort of thing if you were asked to describe what wind looks like. You know it is there because you see the effects of it, but you cannot see wind itself. Thankfully we can compare so many things with God because He is so wonderful. Jesus compared Himself with a Good Shepherd as in this instance.
Have you ever been asked to describe God; maybe because you love Him? It’s easy to describe Him in terms of a loving, caring, just God, but describing Him in terms of what He looks like would be quite difficult. It would be the same sort of thing if you were asked to describe what wind looks like. You know it is there because you see the effects of it, but you cannot see wind itself. Thankfully we can compare so many things with God because He is so wonderful. Jesus compared Himself with a Good Shepherd as in this instance.
It is one thing to look after a flock of sheep, but if a lion or other predator comes along to sniff out your sheep, would you be willing to stand between it and them? Would you be willing to die just to protect your sheep? The answer would most likely be no. But if what you were looking out for was someone in your family, the answer may well change to yes. Jesus promised here that He would be willing to lay down His own life for us, His sheep. We know it is a promise because that is exactly what He did.
When we have a relationship with God, we know that He is real and we know that He is there. We may not see Him nor be able to describe Him, but we know He is there. We may get frightened when we see bad things approaching and we may well run the other way. That does not mean that God is not standing there protecting us; it just means that we did not think about His protection and we ran the other way! If we stopped to think about it and we stood on our faith we would not be running away because we would be depending on that protection because of our faith. Alas, so many of us would run and then think afterwards or wait until we think all hope is lost before yelling out for help. What we need to do is to remain close to our God where He can then protect, guide and love us in the best possible ways.
Points to Ponder:
Who would you trust with your life?
How often do you run before thinking?
Who would you trust with your life?
How often do you run before thinking?