Pastor Robert Morris - Jesus - The Shepherd

I want you to turn to two passages of scripture John chapter 10 and Psalm 23 we'll start it John 10 so open to John chapter 10 and then put a marker at Psalm 23 if you're only going to go to one scripture go to Psalm 23 because we'll spend most of our time in Psalm 23 and I want to welcome all the campuses and all the affiliate churches we're in a series called Jesus we've talked about how that Jesus is the same yesterday today and forever that he's a builder that he was building before us that he was building when he's on this earth that he is still building today and will build tomorrow in your life we talked about how a few weeks ago two weeks oh he he was a human when he came to search you remember that I went that a great message how the Lord just showed us hey I can relate because I became a human and then last week Pastor John even took us to another level of his humanity and said listen not only did he become a human but he became the lowest-ranked of a human so he could relate to everything that we go through and so this week the title of the message is the shepherd the shepherd that Jesus is a shepherd now the Bible depicts the church in many different ways but let me just give you three of them it depicts the church as a family it depicts the church as a fellowship and it depicts the church as a flock a family a fellowship and the flock and Psalm 100 verse 3 says we are his people and the Sheep of his pasture so we're sheep and he is our Shepherd look at John 10 now verse John chapter 10 verse 10 the thief does not come except to steal and to kill and to destroy I have come that they may have life and that they may have it more abundantly I am The Good Shepherd I like that wording because he didn't say I'm like a shepherd he said I am a shepherd I am a shepherd not only am I a shepherd I'm a Good Shepherd the Good Shepherd gives his life for the Sheep and we know he did that but a hireling who is not the shepherd one who does not own the sheep sees the wolf coming that's referring to Satan so is the thief the thief and the wolf same thing he sees the wolf coming and he leaves the sheep and flees and the wolf catches the sheep and scatters them the hireling flees because he is a hireling and does not care about the Sheep I am The Good Shepherd there he says it again he repeats himself and I know my sheep and am known by my own now I don't know if you've thought about this much but um I'm glad he's a shepherd because I'm a sheep and I don't know how much you know about sheep but they can't do much without a shepherd we need a shepherd and he's a good one so Psalm 23 probably one of the most famous songs and all the Bible if you haven't memorized it you might want to memorize it it's good to memorize scripture and Psalm 23 is very easy to memorize it's just six verses I remember not long after I memorized it I went to the dentist and when the dentist was you know doing his thing in you know to my teeth I remember thinking I wish I had something to take my mind off of this because it's worse if I think about it and so I just memorized Psalm 23 and so I remember just quoting Psalm 23 making sure I could get it in my mind and then going through it piece by piece and allowing the Lord to speak to me and that's actually what we're going to do today I don't know dentists are going to do anything while I'm talking but I'm going to just take you through it and I'm going to outline it and you know how I like three points but I've got three sub points under each point so I'm going to just outline what a good shepherd Jesus is and from Psalm 23 and here's number one he provides this is what a good shepherd does number one he provides a look at the first three verses of Psalm 23 the Lord is my shepherd I shall not want now this word won't is a little confusing because we think of one but what it means in the hebrew is actually lack i shall not lack i won't need anything because the shepherd provides everything I need he makes me to lie down in green pastures he leads me beside the still waters he restores my soul he leads me in the paths of righteousness for his name's sake okay I just want you to notice that David begins this Psalm with that the Lord is a shepherd so he's a provider that's really what he's saying he provides what we need and here at the South Lake campus pastor Josh shared a moment ago he doesn't always give us what we want he gives us what we need when you think about it the Jewish people wanted a political leader but they needed a savior so a Good Shepherd gives you what you need he is a provider and I want to show you these three things beneath this by the way I want to say to all of you I am so so proud of you for receiving the blessed life message and for being givers and Tigers because the first step of faith to unto stating to God that you believe he's your provider is to bring the first 10% to the house of God to tithe that's that is a step of faith when you tie your saying I believe that that you're my provider so let me show you these uh three things under so if you're taking notes you might want to here's the the first one under he provides and it's these two words he makes he makes it look look again at verse two he makes me to lie down in green pastures and he leads me beside the still water green pastures and still waters every believers life should be characterized by these two things and let me give a little definition of them contentment and peace contentment green pastures for sheep would be contentment and steal laughter's represent peace by the way you might not have ever thought about this but this is why this is one of the reasons it's why you attend church but you know that one of the reasons you attend church is so is so you can sit beside the still waters in worship and eat from the green pastures during the word think about that those two reasons and by the way I've said this before I don't want you to be an Internet member now if you're watching my internet don't turn the computer off alright that's okay that's great and if you don't live here that's great that's fine but if you live here uh the internet service is for when you're out of town you're on vacation you're sick kids are sick something like that here's the reason because we need to come together and when we come together something happens in the presence of God you think about it in worship that is sitting beside still waters you can be in the midst of a storm and that storm will come for just a few moments in the midst of worship and then we eat from a green pasture we ii4 our men's summit I interviewed one of our members who's one of the Dallas Cowboys and he said this to all the men he said when I'm in town I'm here I'm in the service and when I'm out of town on the road then I watched on the internet and that's what I want for all of us to do um he he makes and now I want to just key in on these two words just for a moment he makes me lie down in green pastures has he ever had to make you lie down are you a person that you just always have to be doing something always had to be busy I I felt that before and what I've realized is is that he has to make me lie down in green pastures and I'm learning too that it's okay to lie down and it's okay to sit beside still waters it's okay to do that the Lord gave me the analogy that I'm like a fuel truck like an 18-wheeler fuel truck that you see that goes around fills up gas stations and the Lord said you know you do that you you fill up people when you preach and teach your filling others up but he said you hate to go back to the refinery and get filled up yourself now I'm not telling my studying and prayer I love that part but just the resting part he said you don't like to do that because you're just sitting around you feel like you're just doing nothing and the Lord said to me I designed you to rest so that you can do what I need to do so first of all under he provides his he makes here's the second one is he restores verse three says he restores my soul your soul is your mind your will and your emotions now let me say something have you ever have you ever said I was crushed when you know I was crushed when my spouse walked out on me I was crushed when one of my children did this I was crushed when I lost my job what you're actually saying is my soul was crushed and here's what I want you to know I believe in counseling I believe in ministry but it's the Lord that restores our soul through that counseling and through that ministry and he's the only one the Shepherd's the only one who can restore your soul no one else can and then the third under he provides his he leads he leads verse three says he leads being the paths of righteousness for his name's sake uh it's amazing to me how God leads me righteousness means right standing with God I'm puttin right standing with God through grace but I also want to walk in right standing with God oh I want to be pleasing to the Lord I want to stay in close fellowship with the Lord and so he leads me in the right way to go and I want you to know something about this word leads Shepherds never drive sheep they lead sheep by the way sheep are undriveable now you can drive them and sometimes you have to herd them and there are sheep dogs but the best way for sheep is to lead them I have a friend of mine that when he graduated from seminary before he went to pasture his first church he wanted to go live for a year in Israel and so he lived one year in Israel before he pastored I thought that was a great thing to do part of that time he lived with a shepherd and he just helped him and he said that the first time it ever happened it just shocked him the Shepherd said we're going to the lake country to feed the sheep and so they just took off in the Shepherd had this way there's this noise he would make you just come like they don't kind of like that and the sheep would just follow and so they took off and he had between 1,500 and 2,000 sheep and when they got there there were eight to ten other Shepherds there there were 15 to 20,000 sheep in this huge Valley and after a while they'd stay around talked to Shepherds and one of them said you know I need to head back I've got a pretty long way and he made his sound and about 1,500 2,000 sheep lifted their heads up out of all these sheep and this Shepherd starts walking and they start following him and then the next one did it and the next one the next one until this guy his Shepherd was the last one when he lifted his voice up his sheep started following him and this pastor looked back and there was not one sheep left and he said out of all the times we did it never did a sheep follow the wrong Shepherd and never did a sheep get left in the pasture and Jesus said my sheep know my voice and they won't follow another one say he he leads us but he leads us he doesn't drive us he leads us so he he provides here's number two he protects he protects look at verse verses four and five yea though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death this is where I get the protection from I will fear no evil for you are with me your rod and your staff they comfort me you prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies that's where I get the word protection here out of this passage you anoint my head with oil my cup runs over here's what David says even through the valley of the shadow of death now death is the biggest fear for humans and people people sometimes disagree with that and they say no no I'll tell you what I fear I fear snakes no you fear getting bitten by snake and dying no no pastor my biggest fear is Heights no you fear falling and dying it's death and here's what Jesus does he takes the biggest fear we have and he annihilates it because he conquered death and that's what next weekend is all about so there are some things he does let me let me give you these three sub points here under he protects he is with us in the battle he is with us in the battle verse 24 says for you are with me your rod and your staff they comfort me see that the greatest thing is that he's with us in the battle he's with us and then he makes his statement your rod and your staff they comfort me how are you think about that why would his rod and his staff comfort the Sheep what's really simple because he doesn't use his rod and his staff on us he doesn't hit the Sheep he hits the wolf he uses his rod and his staff on the walk that's why we're comforted when we see the rod and the staff you wouldn't be comforted if he hits you with it you know I never said to my dad your paddle and your belt they comfort me they never comforted me and I needed every spanking I got by the way and I'm yes God chastises us but he doesn't hit us he hit his son for us he bruised it pleased him to bruise his son for us is what the Bible says that's how much he loves you he uses though the rod though to beat let me use textin to beat the snot out of the wolf he takes care of the wolf listen what's the wolf afraid of he's afraid of the shepherd he's not afraid of you a wolf is not afraid of a sheep he's afraid of the shepherd you know what that means you ought to be right beside the shepherd you ought to be right beside his leg you know kind of like those stupid cats are when you go visit I'm sorry I'm sorry I shouldn't have said stupid but you know our cat you know and it gets hair on your pants you know and the end the womb it's always the woman you know the woman thinks that's that she's oh he likes you yeah I like YouTube and I'm not rubbing my back against your leg lady come on so he's with us in the battle right here's number two hey I need to move on he blesses us in the battle he blesses us in the battle this is incredible this is incredible look at verse thought you prepare a table table before me in the presence of my enemies yeah we would prefer that you prepare a table after you kill my enemies but he says in the present you'll know why because he's not afraid of them I want you to see this picture in your mind of Jesus sitting down at a table in the middle of a battlefield with a white tablecloth and candlesticks serving you a great meal with 20-foot angels all around you he's not afraid of indium and you know you've seen it in the movies you know the guys standing there and he's cool James Bond or whatever and somebody comes out of nowhere you know that's Jesus you understand in real life he blesses us even in the middle of a battle okay and please hear me sometimes sometimes sometimes he calms the storm but sometimes he calms the child sometimes he just calms you even in the midst of the storm and here's the the third thing of how he protects us he refreshes us in the battle very next verse verse 5 you anoint my head with oil my cup runs over Aurel it represents two things in scripture obviously the Holy Spirit but I'm saying the the effects of oil let me say it that way refreshing and strength that's what all represents that the effects of it oil refreshes you and strengthens you the Holy Spirit refreshes you and strengthens you so in the midst of the battle he's going to refresh you and strengthen you and the way he strengthens you is your cup runs over it's not like the guy you know in that you see in the movies that with a canteen that says just drink just a little bit just take a little sip Jesus pours your cup until it just runs over he refreshes you now I want I want to say something before I go to 0.3 we're talking about that the Shepherd protects and provides for us let me tell you why that's good news because contrary to your arrogant thoughts you cannot protect yourself and you cannot provide for yourself it is good news that you have a shepherd I came here one of the first times that I was halfway across the world and I just talked to Debbie on the telephone and she told me one of our kids was sick and I thought I can't do anything about it and the Lord said to me so gently I can when you're not there son I'm there and there's something that that all of us as parents feel that we are the protectors and the providers ever feel that I protect them I've provide for them you realize how much peace you would have to understand you're not the protector and you're not the provider I uh my son Josh and James my son law Ethan down here they're all down here in the front row and I remember what starting with Josh that when he got married I said Jim son I want you two to know something you're not the shepherd you don't have to protect and you don't have to provide contrary to popular a philosophy you're not the provider of your home and if you ever start feeling like you have to provide you'll get stressed out now you work you work hard but God's the provider and and with with I have to say with Josh and James it was easier than with Elaine because we're sons now some of you haven't come to this yet some of you have but with sons when sons come home and say dad I found a wife way to go son good job went out in the world lassoed one we go caught one great great way to go buddy but you raise sons to sinned you raise them up send them out you raise daughters to give it's different and Ethan came along fine young man great provider great guy but there was something that I was giving that responsibility to him fathers feel that but guys I want to tell you something please hear me you'll get very stressed out if you don't realize you're just the conduit and he's the protector he's the provider he's the Shepherd are you following me this is better sermon than you think it is by the way this one's you know listen we're talking about Jesus we don't know how good Jesus is and Jesus is the same yesterday today and forever Jesus is your Shepherd and that's good news that's good news here's number three he promises this is good he promises he promises to provide for you and protect you look at verse 6 surely this word surely means certainly it's a it's certain it's a fact as what the word means I wish you had time to explain words to you a little more because I love words so much surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life and I will dwell in the house of the Lord forever let me sum up Psalm 23:4 you all this and eternity - that's what that just said all this and I get to go to heaven - alright let me give you the three things and I'm just so given to you I'm not gonna comment on all three but its goodness mercy and eternal life that's what verse six says that's what he promises that is what God promises goodness mercy and eternal life and listen this it says surely goodness and mercy shall follow me this really not follow is not a good translation of this word it this word in the Hebrew means chase is that many times it's actually translated chase surely goodness and mercy shall chase me I want to tell you something goodness and mercy has been chasing you your whole life if you just slow down and by the way if you're running from God I want you to know something judgment God's judgment is not chasing you God's goodness is chasing you just stop running just just stop running every one of us that we've had this happened to listen one day when I was 19 in a motel room I just stopped running and God's goodness called me and His mercy taught me goodness and mercy well chase you your whole life and this is the promise let me show you a couple of scriptures 1st John 2:25 and this is the promise that he has promised us eternal life that's a promise if you did if you missed out on the grace series you need to hear it because so many people still don't believe we're saved by grace and grace alone this is the promise that he has promised us eternal life Hebrews 10:23 let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering for he who promised its faithful let me say one more thing about our Shepherd remember we talked about him becoming human our Shepherd became a sheep but don't forget what happened to our Shepherd when he became a sheep Isaiah 53 verse 7 says he was led as a lamb to the slaughter by the way preview next week's message the lamb he's the lamb he's the Lamb of God and I'm going to show you a scripture that I you mean you know how I love the Old Testament I don't believe is anything show me the new I can't show you the old I just love it a type of it Jesus came among us I want you remember that he came among us right he became one of us but he came among us and I want you to think about the day he was among us the time he was among us and the day he was crucified do you remember what happened that day it became a dark day a cloudy and dark day and we told my Jesus as a shepherd right and we're the Sheep I want to show you one my favorite verses in the Old Testament Ezekiel 34 verse 12 says as a shepherd seeks out his flock on the day he is among his scattered sheep so will I seek out my sheep and deliver them from all the places where they were scattered on a cloudy and a dark day as heck to it Jesus said listen I'm coming I'm gonna come now all my sheep that have been scattered I'm gonna deliver you from everything that's held you in bondage and you'll know when I do it because it'll be a cloudy and a dark day that thing he's a good shepherd the Good Shepherd gives his life for the Sheep I want you to bow your heads and close your eyes don't you just take a moment like we do at the end of every message every campus every affiliate Church just take them on and just say Holy Spirit what he's saying to me just take a moment just say Holy Spirit what are you saying to me one of the things that the Lord might be speaking to all of us is about stress anxiety worry fear I want you to know you have a good shepherd you have a good shepherd he promises to protect you and provide for you I hope you can remember that he promises to protect you and provide for you our job by the way though is to know his voice and follow him so let the Holy Spirit speak to you we want to pray for you no matter which campus you're attending if you're in an overflow room we want to pray for you so in just a moment at every campus we're gonna have one more worship song and if you need prayer for any area of your life any area of your life job finances health family your relationship with God if you need prayer for any area of your life as soon as we stand up at every campus you just stand up we will all stand up just a moment and during this worship song with that no one leave unless you have emergency we understand that but if you if you need prayer for any area then then you just flick to the aisle of the room where you are or the campus where you are and just come to the front and there are only people here the pray freeze that every campus at every overflow route will be here we'll be available to pray for you we want to pray for you so don't leave without being prayed for everybody needs prayer go never be embarrassed for coming for prayer because we all need prayer so if you need prayer for any area of your life as soon as we stand up you just stand up step out and come and let us pray for your right Holy Spirit I pray you'll draw every person at every campus that needs prayer I was 19 years old when I gave my life to the Lord and everything changed I didn't have any desire to go back to that old life I wanted to walk with the Lord and learn more about him and some people helped me to learn the Bible and to learn how to pray and to learn about my new life in Christ and that's what we want to do for you I am so excited that you've given your life to the Lord he's forgiven all of your sins and you're on your way to heaven but we need to learn some things now about the Bible about prayer about some basics of the Christian life so that you can be victorious and live for the Lord like I know you want to so we've designed a class called fresh start and I want to encourage you to sign up for this class because we want to help you grow in your walk with the Lord now I love you and I'm so proud of you

Channel: gatewaychurchtv

Views: 56,558

Rating: 4.7877097 out of 5

Keywords: gatewaypeople, Gateway Church, Pastor Robert, Robert Morris, Southlake, Texas, DFW, Lord, God, Jesus, Christ, Church, The Shepherd

Id: 3KZpuyFy7Ts

Length: 29min 45sec (1785 seconds)

Published: Wed Apr 01 2015