Last week in Bible study we took a break from looking at what it means to be a church and wandered over to one of my favorite passages in the gospel of John, chapter 10. In it Jesus compares himself to a shepherd. The passage has some powerful imagery that gives great insight into our relationship with Christ. However, I think the most powerful imagery is Jesus' description of himself as the gate.
When I hear the word gate, the image that pops into my mind is of the gate in the fence around my backyard, or maybe a gate on one of the horse fences here in Lexington. But when I studied this passage, I found out that scholars say that the shepherd himself would actually lie across the entrance to the sheep pen and his body would serve as the barrier. You literally had to go through the shepherd to get into the pen with the other sheep.
Jesus continues on to talk about how the good shepherd lays down his life for his sheep. How moving to know that Jesus literally laid down his life for me. Now, because I belong to the shepherd, the theif can't touch me without going through him.
