“Very truly I tell you Pharisees, anyone who does not enter the sheep pen by the gate, but climbs in by some other way, is a thief and a robber. The one who enters by the gate is the shepherd of the sheep. The gatekeeper opens the gate for him, and the sheep listen to his voice. He calls his own sheep by name and leads them out. When he has brought out all his own, he goes on ahead of them, and his sheep follow him because they know his voice. But they will never follow a stranger; in fact, they will run away from him because they do not recognize a stranger’s voice.” Jesus used this figure of speech, but the Pharisees did not understand what he was telling them.
Therefore Jesus said again, “Very truly I tell you, I am the gate for the sheep. All who have come before me are thieves and robbers, but the sheep have not listened to them. I am the gate; whoever enters through me will be saved. They will come in and go out, and find pasture. The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy; I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full.
“I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep. The hired hand is not the shepherd and does not own the sheep. So when he sees the wolf coming, he abandons the sheep and runs away. Then the wolf attacks the flock and scatters it. The man runs away because he is a hired hand and cares nothing for the sheep. John 10:1-13
I didn’t notice this before, but there’s no break between this and John chapter 9, where the man is born blind, healed on the Sabbath, and then forced in front of the pharisees. In fact, this is Jesus’s response to that event and a continuation of his discussion with the pharisees that starts in 9:40. Why is this important? Jesus is attacking the pharisees when he talks about the thieves and robbers, and then again when he talks about the hired hands. And each is directly related to the event that had just happened.
they will never follow a stranger (John 10:5). The pharisees tried everything to get the blind man and his parents to follow them. The threatened them, cursed at them, and tried to persuade him for days. Jesus met him, spoke just a few words and the man instantly started worshiping him. Wow - what a difference! He calls his sheep by his voice and they follow him.
It was Jesus (the gate) that led this man to freedom, but the pharisees bypassed the gate when they were trying to get the sheep. In order to understand this, there are a couple important cultural and contextual clues here… For example, sheep don’t normally stay in a pen with a gatekeeper (John 10:3). They are normally grazing - this must have been at a town or village where many people kept their flocks while they did shopping or attended to other business in the village. That means there are a number of sheep from different owners. But sheep know their master’s voice and when he appears at the gate they jump up and follow.
the hired hand cares nothing for the sheep (John 10:13). Wow, wasn’t that the truth in this case! The pharisees did nothing to help this man, either before or after he was blind. This must have been a serious insult to the pharisees because they were seen as the shepherds of the flock of Israel. In many languages, pastor is literally the same word for shepherd (including in Portuguese). Jesus isn’t just addressing Satan or bad people here - he is addressing the pharisees, which most people thought of as the religious and upstanding people of the time.
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