June 18, 2015
By Dr. Lani Wilson
Good Day, fasting and praying group!
We thank God for another week that was never promised to us. To hear the young Warriors say after Game 6 that they give God the credit and go to chapel after games is a joy. Go, Warriors! Oakland is overdue. “Can anything good come out of Oakland?” Yes, decidedly.
As we lift up our church and the church in the world, can we focus on a new word laid down for us as we fast and pray? Gate. Yup. Gate. Seems so obvious but as usual, it probably won’t be. The word “gate” is most notable for us who call ourselves “Christians” in John 10, specifically verses 2-5 (TMB). He is talking to Jews who were just not “getting” what He was trying to say. This entire passage, according to John, came about after Jesus had cured the blind man and heard that the Pharisees had driven the newly-sighted man out of the temple.
The shepherd walks right up to the gate. The gatekeeper opens the gate to him and the sheep recognize his voice.
He calls his own sheep by name and leads them out. When he gets them all out, he leads them and they follow because
they are familiar with his voice. They won’t follow a stranger’s voice but will scatter because they aren’t used to the sound of it."
Of course, Jesus uses pastoral language because his audience is a simple, agrarian people. In these verses we have the shepherd, the gatekeeper, and the sheep; let’s call this “Version 1.” Apparently, they must have looked dumbfounded and thus, He tries to tell them for the second time who He is, His identity, place, and function in God’s new divine architecture. This time in verses 7-10 He is more concrete in his explanation (TMB).
So he tried again. "I’ll be explicit, then. I am the Gate for the sheep. All those others are up to no good-sheep stealers,
every one of them. But the sheep didn’t listen to them. I am the Gate. Anyone who goes through me will be cared for-will
freely go in and out, and find pasture. A thief is only there to steal and kill and destroy. I came so they can have real and
eternal life, more and better life than they ever dreamed of.
In these abovementioned verses (7-10) we have the gate, the sheep, and the thief. Let’s call this “Version 2.”