Our next speaker is Brother Gary Shepard, and he's from Jacksonville, North Carolina. We're so thankful, Brother Gary, you could be with us again this year. We were greatly blessed by the message last evening. We ask that God would enable you to deliver His Word again tonight that will magnify His name and bless His people. You come preach to us. Not many people know where Jacksonville, North Carolina is. But I expect that a lot more know where the Camp Lejeune Marine Base is. If you get to the Camp Lejeune Marine Base, you'll be at Jacksonville, North Carolina. I'm thankful for this privilege. I do not come and stand in this pulpit lightheartedly at all. Turn with me tonight in the gospel of John, chapter 10. Sometimes I think if I could get any or every person in the world to read one chapter of Scripture. I would get them to read John chapter 10. I want to read some words of our Lord Jesus beginning in verse 11. He says, I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd giveth his life for the sheep. But he that is in hireland, and not the shepherd, whose own the sheep are not, seeth the wolf coming, and leaveth the sheep, and fleeth, and the wolf catcheth them, and scattereth the sheep. The hireling fleeth, because he is an hireling, and careth not for the sheep. I am the good shepherd, and know my sheep, and am known of mine. As the Father knoweth me, even so know I the Father. and I lay down my life for the sheep. And of the sheep I have which are not of this foal, them also I must bring, and they shall hear my voice, and there shall be one foal and one shepherd. Therefore doth my Father love me, because I lay down my life that I might take it again. No man taketh it from me, but I lay it down of myself. I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it again. This commandment have I received of my Father. The Lord Jesus Christ identifies himself here as the Good Shepherd, and he is the one that is responsible for the sheep. If you would hear modern religionists speak in our day, it would seem that they believe that the sheep are responsible for the shepherd. And he shows us here three things that characterize the good shepherd's sacrifice. It was perfect. It was voluntary. It was particular. And every other, by virtue of Christ's own repeated words in these verses, every other so-called shepherd is a thief and a robber. He is a false shepherd, and he is what the Apostle Paul describes as another Jesus. These words are undoubtedly the words of everlasting love. They are the words of the Son of God, the words of the Mediator, of the Priest forever, the words of that great shepherd of the sheep. And so I would have to say that this is the atonement according to Christ. The psalmist said, Thou art fairer than the children of men. Grace is poured into thy lips, therefore God hath blessed thee forever." This is grace being poured from the lips of the only Shepherd and Savior. And so if we listen to what he says, as I said earlier, it will surely show three essential things concerning the sacrifice of Christ. And as I said also, the first thing essential about the sacrifice and offering and death of Christ is that it was perfect. You see, it says here, he says here, that he gives and he lays down what? His life. His perfect, spotless, sinless life. And by virtue of his life being a spotless, sinless, perfect life, it is that unique life. It is the life that was laid down as the one sacrifice for sins forever, and the Apostle tells us that that life, that death, that death that Christ died, He died according to the scriptures. Let me read you just one of the scriptures, the Old Testament scriptures that He was referring to in the book of Leviticus. He says, And whosoever offereth a sacrifice of peace offerings unto the Lord to accomplish his vow, or a freewill offering in thieves or sheep, it shall be perfect to be accepted. There shall be no blemish therein. And so when you look at all those descriptions of those Old Testament sacrifices, whatever they were, they all had one thing in common. They were to be without spot and without blemish. They had to be perfect to be accepted. And so our Lord Jesus describes himself in two or at least two of these verses as this. He says, I am the good shepherd. I am the good shepherd. And what that actually says, it seems that there is a double article there. I am the good shepherd. And so in that very word and statement and description and name that he gives of himself, he shows himself as that perfect sacrifice. That is exactly what all the prophets and all the apostles, long year after year after year, that's what they all said about the Messiah, and that's what they all said about the Messiah when he came in human flesh. Listen in Isaiah 53. Isaiah says, and he made his grave with the wicked and with the rich in his death, because he had done no violence, neither was any deceit in his mouth. You could not say that, I could not say that, and it could not be said of any other person that has ever lived on this earth. When you get to the book of Luke, the angel in the description given, it says, ìThe angel answered and said unto her, The Holy Ghost shall come upon thee, and the power of the highest shall overshadow thee, Therefore also that holy thing which shall be born of thee shall be called the Son of God." One of the apostles preaching in the book of Acts, he says this, speaking of He, seeing this before spake of the resurrection of Christ, that his soul was not left in hell, neither his flesh did see corruption. So that everywhere you look, evidently, The Spirit of God has made a repeated effort to show the perfection of the Lord Jesus Christ as this sacrifice. When you come to the book of Hebrews, in Hebrews the Apostle says in chapter four, For we have not a high priest which cannot be touched with the feeling of our infirmities. But he was in all points tempted like as we are, yet without sin. Is that plain? If it is not, you can go to Hebrews chapter 7 And hear him say there, for such a high priest became us, or suited us, or fitted us, since we all are sinners. Such a high priest became us who is holy, harmless, undefiled, separate from sinners, and made higher than the heavens. And then a little later, the Apostle Peter, he takes up this message and he, connecting the Lord Jesus Christ and his sacrifice to that Passover lamb and to the other Old Testament sacrifices that pictured Christ. And he says this, he says, for as much as you know, that you were not redeemed with corruptible things as silver and gold from your vain conversation received by tradition from your fathers, but with the precious, the precious. And the apostle says, unto you who believe, he is precious. You are not redeemed by those things, those tokens of the Old Testament, he says, but you were redeemed by the precious blood of Christ as of a lamb without blemish and without spot. And then Peter goes on and he describes him in this way, and you would think after such repeated descriptions, after such definite statements, after assuring us again and again these things concerning Christ that we would believe in. But he says this in 1 Peter 2, speaking of Christ, he says, who did no sin, neither was guile found in his mouth. who when he was reviled, reviled not again. When he suffered, he threatened not, but he committed himself to him that judgeth righteously." And even when Pilate looked him square in the eye, examined him, had every natural reason and every natural inclination in him to try to pin something on the Lord Jesus in order to justify what he was about to do in turning him over to the Jews. He said, I find no fault in him. I find no fault in him. And then when you read in Hebrews chapter 9, this really seals the deal kind of for me. It says that he offered himself. That was not that he made himself available or that he offered himself to men. But speaking of himself and giving himself as an offering and a sacrifice, he offered himself without spot to God. And so that is absolutely essential. That is absolutely vital. That is absolutely the truth as it comes from his own lips and the lips of the prophets, he said, and the lips of the apostles. And every true preacher of the gospel, his sacrifice, the life that he laid down, was until that moment that the instrument of death inflicted that death upon him when he yielded up the ghost, absolutely perfect. No matter how you describe him, no matter what degrees you speak of him, a sinner can never die and therefore save a sinner. He had to be perfect. But then not only was his laying down of his life perfect, the life he laid down was perfect, but also it was voluntary. You see, there are a lot of folks that think in some way when the Lord Jesus Christ died on that cross, when he was crucified at the hands of wicked men, that they took him and did with him against his will. Absolutely not. You see, if he had sinned, or was in any way a personal sinner, he could not have done that. If you break the law, you can't just do what you will before the law is coming after you. You can't say, that you're going to do something willingly and voluntarily when the laws got hold of you, taking you. But he gave his life voluntarily. You see, God would have taken it. Had he not laid it down, because the soul that sinneth it shall die, because the wages of sin is death, he would have taken hold of him. There would be nothing voluntarily about it, because when he hung on the cross, it says he yielded up the ghost. And I'll tell you this, the greatest act of a man in this world demonstrating a free will was when the shepherd laid down his life for the sheep. As a matter of fact, he did this so freely and voluntarily in the two times he makes mention of it. One time he says, I give my life for the sheep. The next time he says, I lay down my life for the sheep. And Isaiah had recorded, he was oppressed and he was afflicted, yet he opened not his mouth. He is brought as a lamb to the slaughter and as a sheep before her shearers is done, so he opened not his mouth. You and I, if we think we're being wronged in any way, We'll mouth it off. We'll let somebody know about it, won't we? And yet, no matter what somebody does to us in this world, no matter how badly we might be treated, and I'm not justifying anybody doing so, but no matter how badly we might be treated, it still would not be what we really deserve. He said, I lay down my life for the sheep. Has to be voluntary. And if you turn over to John, chapter 18, look over in John, chapter 18, beginning in verse three and listen to what it says here. Before he ever was actually hanged on the cross, he had to be taken to the cross. John 18, verse 3, it says, Judas then, having received a band of men and officers from the chief priests and Pharisee, cometh thither with lanterns and torches and weapons. Jesus, therefore, knowing all things that should come upon him, he ran and got away from there as fast as he could. He went forth, and he said unto them, Whom seek ye? They answered him, Jesus of Nazareth. Jesus saith unto him, I am." That's what it says there. Why did he say, I am? He was not only saying that he was the one they were looking for, but he was the I Am. And Judas also, which betrayed him, stood with them. As soon then as he had said unto them, I am he, they went backward and fell to the ground. Why? Because that's all you can do before the I Am. One of the first gospel preachers I ever had to preach for me when I was still hanging on by the threads in a false religion and denomination. And this preacher was preaching for John 18. And he knew the gospel and he preached the gospel. But these folks hadn't heard much of the gospel. And when he came to that point where the Lord Jesus Christ said, I am, and it says they all fell backwards, I was sitting on the front view, and I believe I could feel everyone in there just lean back to the back of their seats. Because here is God manifest in the flesh, freely and willingly doing what he did. bringing himself into this world as a voluntary sacrifice. Then asked them again, Whom seek ye? And they said, Jesus of Nazareth. Jesus answered, I have told you that I am he, if therefore you seek me. Let these go their way. You take me. But you can't have them. You've got to let them go. Turn over to John chapter 19. Look over in John 19 in verse 9. And when he went again, Pilate, talking about the time when Christ is here before Pilate, He went again into the judgment hall and saith unto Jesus, Whence art thou? But Jesus gave him no answer. And then saith Pilate unto him, Speakest thou not unto me? knowest thou not that I have power to crucify thee, and I have power to release thee? Don't you know I'm the one controlling all this? Don't you know I'm the one who holds your fate in my hand to live or to die?" Jesus answered, Thou couldst have no power at all against me. You could exercise your so-called free will all you wanted to, and it would have no power over me, except it were given thee from above. Therefore he that delivered me unto thee hath the greater sin." When you look back in John chapter 10, look at the 15th verse of what Christ says here. He says, As the Father knoweth me, even so know I the Father, and I lay down my life for the sheep. You see, the death of our Savior is an act of divine love. It is an act of premeditated love. And we can talk about the love of God all we want to until we are blue in the face, but until we see the dying of Jesus Christ as an act of love, as an act of his will, as an act of his purpose, as a freely and voluntarily given sacrifice. We don't know anything about love. Look in verse 17. Therefore doth my Father love me, because I lay down my life, that I might take it again. No man taketh it from me, but I lay it down of myself. I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it again. This commandment have I received of my Father." Do you understand that? He said, I have power to lay it down. Nobody takes my life. They took and with wicked hands they crucified Him and they slew Him, but it was all because of what God had before determined to be done. When Pilate and the Jews and the priests, when they all gathered, the Romans, everyone together, they came together though they despised one another, they came to do what they wanted to do, but what they were really doing was what He wanted to be done. Look back in John chapter 19. I've already quoted it, but if you look in verse 30, it says, When Jesus therefore had received the vinegar, he said, It is finished. And he bowed his head and gave up the ghost. This is an amazing thing here. Because we're always hearing people talking about some who take their own life. But there's something we seem to forget. And that is, how many more tried to take their own life? But it didn't work for them. Because there's just one man who has ever taken his own life. He laid it down. He yielded up the ghost. And to show how absolutely, totally in control he was, even just moments before, even in that afflicted state, wounded, it says, he cried with a loud voice. I'm going to let you know something. I've still got life. I've still got power. I still am able to do with you and my own self as I will." And he cried out, and then he gave up the ghost. Luke says, And when Jesus had cried with a loud voice, he said, Father, into thy hand I commend my spirit. And having said thus, he gave up the ghost. Paul writing to the Galatians in chapter 1, speaking of Christ, he says, "...who gave himself for our sins, that he might deliver us from this present evil world according to the will of God and our Father." He goes on in chapter 2 of Galatians, I am crucified with Christ, nevertheless I live, yet not I, but Christ liveth in me, and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God who loved me and gave himself for me. He's the one who gave Himself a ransom for all to be testified in due time. He's the one who gave Himself for us that He might redeem us from all iniquity and purify unto Himself a peculiar people zealous of good works. It had to be voluntary. Well, somebody says, I don't really have a problem with that. Well, you might with this one. That's the third thing. And the third thing was it had to be definite. It had to be particular. He says, I give my life for the sheep. Now, let me just try to explain something here to myself. Not everybody is a sheep of God. When he saves a sinner, he does not take a goat and make him into a sheep. He looked at those Pharisees and he said to them, you believe not because you are not of my sheep. You see, his is a vicarious sacrifice. You ever hear somebody referring to the Pope as the vicar of Christ? What he's saying is he's the substitute for Christ. That's what that means. Because the death of Christ is vicarious. He dies for, in the place of, instead of, the sheep. I'm going to tell you something. Tomorrow morning, every preacher in the whole world may stand up and say, God loves you and Christ died for every one of you. And all the people may say a hearty amen. They may even take a vote and say, this is our doctrine. This is what's really true. We believe that Christ died for every person without exception. But you know what Jesus is still going to be saying? You think about this. I lay down my life for the sheep. Then somebody comes along and they come up with what they call the sufficiency-efficiency view of the atonement. Fullerism. Never a bigger lie perpetuated upon men in this world than that lie, to try to say that the death of Christ is sufficient for all, but it's only going to be efficient for those who believe. Well, let me ask you something. Who does that really put the salvation of sinners? Whose hand does that really put it in? Those who believe. What really makes effectual the death of Christ? You know what makes it effectual? The death of Christ. I don't know how to explain it anymore. It's not anything that is done after his death that makes it effectual or ineffectual, that makes it successful or not successful. The fact that he lays down his life for the sheep, that's the atonement according to Christ. And my friends, I've been there. I'm telling you what, I used to have an old red Bible. When I was in religion, if you didn't have a red Bible, you weren't really anything anyway. I meant the blood. How stupid. But I take these passages, give me one that said all, or all men, or every one, and I just make me a little note to assure myself that it didn't really say what it said elsewhere. But in the context of most every one of those passages, our Lord, by the Spirit of God, is showing us that salvation was not just to Jew, but it was to the salvation of a remnant according to the election of grace out of Jew and Gentile. Not just paupers, but kings and paupers and male and female and young and old. and learned it and unlearned it. Here, he's broken down all the barriers. He's the Savior of the world. In other words, he's the only Savior there is for anyone in the world. And usually, the death of the shepherd would be the death of the sheep. But in this case, the death of the shepherd is the life for the sheep. I give my life for the sheep. Oh, David, he said it so long ago, and it's probably the first few verses of Scripture I was ever introduced to in some old Bible school or something like that. And David said, The Lord is my shepherd. Do you know what follows that? I shall not walk. I shall not be in need of anything and most especially of anything in the matter of my soul's salvation because he's my shepherd. And I'll not be in want because he laid down his perfect life voluntarily for me in my place. In Matthew 20 it says, even as the Son of Man came not to be ministered unto, but to minister and to give his life a ransom instead of or in exchange for many. It could have been any, but it wasn't. That is that many sheep. I lay down my life for the sheep. Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends. Somebody said, well, we were enemies when Christ died for us. Wait, no, wait just a minute. The sheep were never Christ's enemies. They're his friends. Doesn't Paul say that while we were yet enemies, Christ died for us? He goes and he tells us exactly what he means by that. In Colossians, he said, you were enemies in your minds by wicked works. God was in Christ reconciling us to himself. He didn't have to be reconciled. He has not been mad at His people. He loved them with an everlasting love. If God loves you tonight, He has always loved you. Do you know that? He loves His people with an everlasting love. Before you even had a clue about God, before you had a breath of life in this world, before you ever existed, before the world was, He loved you with an everlasting love. How do you know? Because he said so. And because he laid down his life for the sheep. Isaiah, wrote in Isaiah 53, 8, speaking for God, God says, for the transgression of my people was he stricken. You can say what you want to, he died for. It won't change that. For the transgression of my people was he stricken. But one of the most powerful of all to me, if you could ever just get hold of one verse, if you could ever believe what God says, is when the angel tells Joseph the reason why he should be called Jesus. Thou shalt call his name Jesus, for because he shall save his people from their sins." All their sins. He'll do it by himself. He'll do it by giving himself a sacrifice. And whenever you read in Ephesians 5, I read this every time I marry a couple. where Paul said, Husbands, love your wives, even as Christ also loved the church and gave himself for it. Well, I'm telling you, that either teaches particular redemption or free love. How would you like to apply the notion of universal redemption to your husband and his relationship with other women? That'd be like the 60s. If you can't love the one you love, love the one you're with. Is that the way it goes? Husbands, love your wives as Christ loved the church and gave himself for it. The church for his bride. He chose his bride. He loves his bride. He died for his bride. He gave himself to satisfy divine justice in their place. And if one of them goes to hell, for whatever reason it might be, he won't be just. He stood in my stead. If he died in my place, if he satisfied justice, paid it all on my behalf, and God sends me to hell, what kind of God is that? Absolutely unjust. Paul, when he is giving instruction to those Ephesian elders in Acts 20, he says, Take heed therefore unto yourselves and to all the flock over the which the Holy Ghost hath made you overseers, to feed the church of God which he purchased with his own blood. That is powerful. Who did he purchase with his own blood? The church. I'm not talking about an organization. I'm talking about the church, which is His body, over which He is the head. He did so to obtain their eternal redemption, to gain forgiveness for them in the matter of their sins. And so, in Zechariah, the prophet said, Awake, O sword, against my shepherd, and against the man that is my fellow, saith the Lord of hosts, smite the shepherd, and the sheep shall be scattered, and I will turn my hand upon the little ones. What Tim read in Ezekiel 34, he said, these lying, sleeping, self-promoting so-called shepherds of the sheep. They eat the fat. They wear the wool. They scatter the sheep. But he said, I'll gather them out. You read in Luke chapter 15, there's that shepherd going after the lost sheep. He's not out on a goat hunt. He gathers the lost sheep, He lays those lambs in His bosom and He rejoices and He invites us to rejoice with Him. Oh, I love it when He makes manifest one of His sheep. And when you look over in Matthew 25, I'm going to hush and hurry, but look in Matthew chapter 25 at verse 32. Now this is when the Son of Man shall come in His glory, and all the holy angels with Him. Then shall He sit upon the throne of His glory." Somebody said, well, that will be decision time. Oh, no, it won't. It will just be separating, division time. gathered all nations, and he shall separate them one from another, as a shepherd divides his sheep from the goats, and he shall set the sheep on his right hand, but the goats on his left." At that hour, he won't make either one of them the other. He'll just divide them. He is going to make manifest who the sheep are and the goats are. Then shall the King say unto them on his right hand, The sheep, come ye blessed of my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world. You can have a Johnny come lately Jesus if you want to. But I will take the eternal Son of God. Look at verse 41. Then shall he say also unto them on the left hand, the goats, depart from me ye cursed into everlasting fire prepared for the devil and his angels. You see what Christ says about his own death and sacrifice shows it was a total success. And the reason why he has to be the finisher and the accomplisher of it, why he has to lay down his life and therefore save the sheep, is because whoever makes it a success is the one that gets all the glory. But how does he say that the sheep are distinguished. They don't become sheep by doing this. But look at what he says back in John chapter 10, verse 16, and of the sheep I have which are not of this fold, them also I must bring, and they shall hear my voice." Look at verse 24. Then came the Jews round about him, and said unto him, How long dost thou make us doubt? If thou be the Christ, tell us plainly. Jesus answered them, I told you, and you believe not. The works that I do in my Father's name, they bear witness, but you believe not. Because you're not of my sheep, as I said unto you. My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me." They don't just follow a particular doctrine or a denomination or a theology. No, he said, they follow me. They don't follow a preacher. except, as Paul said, as long as he was a follower of Christ. The sheep hear what the shepherd says, most particularly about his death and sacrifice, and they follow him. There are some marvelous things going on. Sometimes where I'm at, small groups, I kind of lose perspective of things. But I'm telling you what, every once in a while I get an email. I get a call from somebody in the north of England, from a lovely couple in the south of England, from somebody in Pennsylvania, somebody in Washington State, somebody in this place and that place and the other. I never heard of them before. They say, I've been listening to your messages and some of Brother James or Brother Bird or whoever. I've been listening to some of the messages you got on Sermon Audio. I just wanted to call and thank you for that message. That's what I believe. They heard the shepherd's voice. in that Word that gives him all the glory. And they follow him. They follow him. God help us to hear his voice and follow him. Thank you.