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ስብከቶች፤

Subject 16 : The Gospel According to JOHN

[Chapter 10-7] The Lord Is The Good Shepherd (John 10:7-16)

The Lord Is The Good Shepherd
(John 10:7-16)
“Then Jesus said to them again, ‘Most assuredly, I say to you, I am the door of the sheep. All who ever came before me are thieves and robbers, but the sheep did not hear them. I am the door. If anyone enters by me, he will be saved, and will go in and out and find pasture. 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. The good shepherd gives His life for the sheep. But a hireling, he who is not the shepherd, one who does not own the sheep, sees the wolf coming and 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; and I know my sheep, and am known by my own. As the Father knows me, even so I know the Father; and I lay down my life for the sheep. And other sheep I have which are not of this fold; them also I must bring, and they will hear my voice; and there will be one flock and one shepherd.”
 
 
As a sequel to the sermon I preached this morning, I would like to share with you John chapter 10 again this evening. The Lord called Himself the door of the sheep. And He said, “All who ever came before me are thieves and robbers, but the sheep did not hear them.” He also said, “I am the door. If anyone enters by me, he will be saved, and will go in and out and find pasture.”
If we were to summarize John 10:7-10, the core message would be that the Lord is not only the door of the sheep, but also the Shepherd who grants salvation and blessings to people. The Lord also said in 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.” As the Lord said, He is indeed the door of the sheep and our Savior. This Word is something that those who have not met our Lord can neither realize nor understand. The Lord told us that He is the door of the sheep and the good Shepherd, and that whereas the thief comes to kill, steal, and rob the sheep - He came to this earth so that the sheep may have life.
Although we professed to believe in Jesus as our Savior even before we really have met the Lord, when we were told that the Lord was our Shepherd and the door of the sheep, we couldn’t quite understand it, and so we glossed over the matter, thinking to ourselves, “I guess that’s true. Since it’s what the Lord said, it must be true and real rather than a lie.” But now that we have met and are abiding in the Lord who came by the gospel of the water and the Spirit, we can understand what it really means when the Lord said that He was the door of the sheep and the good Shepherd who was laying down His life for us. We can also grasp fully that as the Lord is the door of the sheep, the sheep go in and out, find pasture, and are saved. The Lord is indeed our good Shepherd. Even though some of us may not quite understand all the ins and outs of this passage, the Lord is clearly the good Shepherd and the door of the sheep.
 
 

The Lord Met with Me through the Gospel of the Water and the Spirit

 
I had been a Christian for about 10 years before I was really born again. And before I believed in Christianity, I had believed in Buddhism and even Confucianism. However, when I fell gravely ill and felt that life was meaningless, I believed in Jesus as my Savior. I believed in Jesus because as a gravely ill person facing his certain death, I wanted to tie up the loose ends of my life and solve the problem of sin in my heart. In reality, I didn’t understand Jesus that well, but I hung onto the Lord since everyone told me that Jesus was the Savior of mankind, that He was crucified while shouldering all sins for the wicked and the sinful including me, that He rose from the dead again, and that anyone who believed in Him would be remitted from all sins. And I asked the Lord to forgive all the sins that I had ever committed until then. Although I believed in Jesus because I wanted to be washed from all my sins before dying, my sins were not actually washed away at that time. Yet I still continued to practice Christianity for a further 10 more years.
There is a Korean proverb that says ten years are enough for the mountains and the rivers to change. Nowadays, things change even more rapidly; a year is enough for the hills to disappear, tunnels to be opened, highways to be paved, apartment complexes to be built, and new streets to be laid. Yet even though I had been a Christian for a decade, my heart’s sins did not disappear. Although my heart was elated when I first believed in Jesus, the problem of sin was not solved. So even as I believed in Jesus, I felt a lot of cynicism toward my faith. Despite the fact that I believed in Jesus sincerely and faithfully, whenever I looked into my heart, I saw all my sins still remaining intact, and even while I preached the Word of God to others, I myself struggled tremendously as I was too ashamed of my sinful self.
One day by God grace I eventually realized the gospel of the water and the Spirit written in the Bible, and I was remitted from all my heart’s sins once and for all. I was so happy at that moment that laughter started bubbling up out from the depths of my heart. I realized why God the Father said when the Lord was baptized by John the Baptist and came out of the water, “This is My beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased”(Matthew 3:17). And I also realized why the Lord said just before He was baptized by John the Baptist, “Permit it to be so now, for thus it is fitting for us to fulfill all righteousness.” When I reached this incredibly understanding, I could see the light of truth dawning on my heart. When I understood Matthew 3:13-17, it was like a brilliant and laser-sharp ray of light illuminating my heart from above. It is then that I realized, “The Lord bore all my sins by being baptized by John! Jesus Christ took upon not only my original sin but also my personal sins! He bore each and every sin I’ve ever committed throughout my entire lifetime from my childhood to the present!” I also realized that all the sins that I would come to commit in the future were also included in the sins of the world, and that these sins were all passed onto the Lord as well. Once I grasped this, peace came into my heart.
Before I met the Lord of salvation through the gospel of the water and the Spirit, my understanding was limited, and so I used to think, “The Lord is my Shepherd and my Savior. He alone is the Savior and the Son of God. There are four major religions in the world, but Christianity is not just the best amongst them. Only Jesus is the Truth, God Himself and my Savior.” That was all that I understood, and the sins in my heart could not be removed by any means.
However, once I realized the gospel Truth of the water and the Spirit, the Truth of the remission of sins the Lord gave us, I grasped that the Lord took upon all my sins when I was truly destined to hell. So at that moment, a tiny little ripple broke out in my heart. Before my heart had been so very hard, frustrated and sinful, and I had been tormented inside even as I was laughing outside. But now that I finally obtained the washing of my sins, I let out a sigh of relief and was so happy, saying to myself, “My sins have now really disappeared like this! I have now received the remission of all my sins!”
But even after receiving the remission of sins, I was immediately worried about what to eat, what to drink and what to wear. That’s because my flesh was still facing the problem of basic needs for clothing, food and housing, even though I knew very well that as I now had the Lord at my side, making money in this world was meaningless and the fame of the world and its riches didn’t mean a thing. Moreover, now that I met the Lord I also felt a sense of duty, asking myself, “Shouldn’t I serve the gospel of the Lord? Even though there are many Christians, they don’t know the gospel Truth of the water and the Spirit. Isn’t it then my duty to preach this gospel?” Yet to spread the gospel, I had to solve the problem of the basic needs for clothing, food and housing to support my family, and so I agonized over this issue and struggled a lot.
But one thing was very clear to me, and this was that the Lord had blotted out all my sins and the sins of the entire human race. So I tried to preach the gospel of the water and the Spirit, as I thought to myself, “It’s not right for Christians to continue to agonize over the problem of sin. That’s what the spiritually blind people do. People do not know this Truth. Is it not wrong for Christians to say that they have been remitted only from their original sin, and that they have to offer prayers of repentance to be remitted from their daily personal sins? How foolish they are! How pitiful they are to be imprisoned in their sins even though they believe in Jesus?” So I preached the gospel to everyone I met. Although many people were glad to hear the gospel, there also were some who stood against me. Yet despite this, the Lord has faithfully led me to where I am now.
 
 

Even after Meeting the Lord, I Still Faced Much Hardship

 
As the blind man written in John chapter 9 was driven out of the synagogue, I was also hated and despised by many of my old friends and acquaintances. But I didn’t care. It didn’t matter to me because the Lord was now the true Shepherd of my life. Just as the Lord said that He was the door of the sheep, He indeed became the door of salvation for me. He has become the door of salvation for you as well. As the Lord has become our Savior and our Shepherd, He takes delight in our hearts’ desire to live for His gospel, and He continues to lead us and guide us, even though we are still weak and insufficient, sometimes wandering off and making many mistakes along the way. The Lord answered my prayers when I asked Him for things to use for the gospel of God rather than for my own flesh. God answered all my prayers asking, “Bless me, Lord! I need material means. I need a house to serve the gospel. Please give me a house. I need a job now, Lord; please give me a job.”
I have encountered much hardship while serving the Lord and many difficult crises. When I experienced this I just prayed to God, and the Lord always came to my assistance. There were also many dangerous moments while serving the Lord, and crises that I had to overcome by faith. There were times when my health was not so good, when I faced a lot of urgent works to do for the Kingdom of God. At one time my health got so poor that it made me worry and think, “I am not going to last long like this. Maybe my time is coming soon.”
When the third English volume of my gospel book series came out, I had been so absorbed with the work to the detriment of my health that I came down with spondylitis, a type of arthritis that affects the spine. Apparently, I had this condition for a while, but I was not aware of it, and so I used to just ask my coworkers to massage my back, thinking that my back was getting stiff with old age. One of my coworkers then introduced me to Dr. Hong, a physician practicing traditional Korean medicine, and he gave me acupuncture with gold needles. I thought to myself, “I don’t care if the needles are made of gold or steel. I just hope I can be healed as soon as possible and continue to serve the Lord.” And true to my wish, it worked right away and I felt much better from that evening on. As not only I but also the whole Church prayed for me, I was healed. Although my health is not 100% yet, but it is a whole lot better.
I also had some problem with my throat, and so I went to see a doctor at a local hospital, but he told me that it was no big deal and just gave me a prescription. In reality though, there was a lump that was blocking my throat. Because this problem didn’t go away, I decided to go to a large hospital in Seoul for further diagnosis, and they found out the lump could turn cancerous if left alone. So I had it removed. Apart from this, I’ve had many other health problems as well, but every time God helped me to recover through medication and treatment, and through prayers of the fellow saints I have been able to maintain my health so far. God has also continued to lead His Church and help it.
I can now fully understand what the Lord meant when He said that He was the good Shepherd. I can appreciate it in my everyday life including my own experiences. In Psalm 23:1-2 David sang this incredible Hymn:
“The LORD is my shepherd;
I shall not want.
He makes me to lie down in green pastures;
He leads me beside the still waters.”
David had lived by relying totally on the Lord, and just as God had bestowed His mercy and goodness on him throughout his entire life, I know that God is also bestowing the same blessings upon you and me alike. The Lord is indeed alive, and He is the door of the sheep, our Savior and our Shepherd. He is not only my Shepherd but also your Shepherd. The Lord helps us, protects us and bestows His many blessings on us.
When we read this passage, we can really grasp and appreciate just how much our Lord cares about us. But let’s give some more in-depth consideration to see what it means when the Bible says that the Lord has become our Shepherd. The Lord said, “I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd gives His life for the sheep.” The Lord gave His life to save us from sin. Born on this earth, the Lord took upon all the sins of mankind by being baptized by John the Baptist at the age of 30, and He loved us so much that He gave up His body on the Cross. Enduring all the appalling suffering, persecution and insults, the Lord bled to death on the Cross, shedding all His blood that was in His heart through His pierced hands and feet. He then rose from the dead, thereby becoming our Savior. He did all these things in order to save you and me from sin. Indeed, the Lord lacks nothing to be our Shepherd.
When you found yourself struggling after meeting the Lord, you also had to remove the dross of your heart that was still lingering in many places. You did this because you wanted to follow the Lord properly. The Lord has removed much of our carnal desires and thoughts. To do so He gave us many trials. But He still led us faithfully, for it was our sincere desire to follow Him in our lives by trusting in the righteousness of God. If we first think of the Lord’s pleasure and live by faith seeking His Kingdom and His righteousness, then the Lord will bless us all the time. We now understand that God uses much persecution and hardship to cleanse our hearts, and then gives us blessings according to our faith. This is what the Lord has done to you and me. If there still is much dross in your heart and mine, then the Lord will permit these trials in our lives until it is removed, and through these trials, our faith will be refined and we will be shaped into God’s useful instruments. And we know from our experience that it is from then on, when we thus become useful instruments of God, which the Lord works in our lives even more, helps us even more, and blesses us even more to spread the gospel of the water and the Spirit.
 
 
The Lord Is Our Good Shepherd
 
Just as the Lord knows us, we must also know Him. We cannot say that we do not know the Lord. It’s so fortunate and gratifying that the Lord has become our Shepherd. He is our Chief Shepherd. He has met us through the gospel of the water and the Spirit and saved us from all our sins, and as our Shepherd, He is helping us and leading us to the way of righteousness for His name. As we keep the name of the Lord in our hearts, He helps us concretely and holds us steadfast with His guidance. It’s so wonderful that we have a good Shepherd like this with us. Because Lord has become our Savior, it is considered a tremendous joy for us to carry out His work. That’s because we had done so many useless things in this world. And it’s also because we had been completely worthless beings.
There is a popular song in Korea that goes like this, “I drink, I sing and I dance, but all that remains in my heart is sadness.” I haven’t lived in this world as long as some of you, but I know that like words in this song, life is meaningless. It is completely futile. There is nothing but emptiness, as another line goes, “As I look around to find what to do, everything I see turns its back.” Anything we try to do, there always are obstacles to overcome. There are times when we succeed and times when we fail—nothing is guaranteed. The winner may become the loser, and the loser may become the winner.
In the outskirts of a certain town is a motel called “Jackpot.” Perhaps the owner named the motel “Jackpot” to reflect his wish to succeed with his business. This owner may have named his motel wishing for good luck, but we have the Lord who bestows great blessings on us. We have the Shepherd who came by the gospel of the water and the Spirit. Our Lord helps us and blesses all of us.
As I said before, I really enjoy doing God’s work. That’s because the work of the world and me are completely useless. If you were to work as a public servant for 30 years, you would probably retire with a few hundred thousand dollars in your savings account, but all this money means nothing before the Lord. You may work hard at your job, but this means nothing; you may run your business with all your passion, but this has no meaning; and you may make a lot of money, but this doesn’t mean anything. After all, are all these things after all just to secure three meals a day? What a miserable life is this then?
Those who don’t really appreciate all this may think that life is quite easy, but in reality, it is not so easy. In Korea military service is compulsory for all men, and so by the time Korean men start looking for a job after finishing school and serving in the military, most of them are already in their early 30s. And after getting married and having a couple of kids, they are already in their 40s. Life is like a journey of a vagabond. You come into this world empty-handed and you leave empty-handed. For our unmarried sisters as well, it won’t take long before they get married, bear children and then hear others calling them grannies. There is no point in comparing our lives to someone else’s life. All that results from this is a futile sense of superiority or inferiority.
Wealth doesn’t mean much either. Although I have never been a wealthy man, I am so happy that I am now serving the gospel of the water and the Spirit. The haves and ‘the have-nots’ both eat only three meals a day. The rich depart from this world after spending their entire lifetime trying to manage their money to become even wealthier. There are times of success and times of failure. That’s why life is like the sea. It never stays calm. There are good days and bad days, sunny days and cloudy days, and calm days and stormy days — and at the end of all this, life is over.
When I was young, my parents gave all their money to an indigenous Korean religion called Daesonjinrihoe. One of the doctrines of this religion is that when war breaks out, its followers would all ascend to the heavens in their shoes. It’s so ridiculous and utter nonsense. Anyways, because my parents gave all their hard earned money to this religious group, I had a very rough childhood. Until I was 12 years old, my hope was that I would one day eat a full bowl of rice. You may think this rather funny, but I was born into a really poor family. And as I grew up in this poverty, I went through an exceptionally difficult childhood.
However, after I met the Lord through the gospel of the water and the Spirit, I saw that there were many opportunities to make money. If you open your eyes, look around, and make preparations little by little, then you will see many opportunities to make money, though not everyone can succeed all at once. I also saw how others were living. I myself worked as a salaried man for 14 months. I got paid $50 a day for working 8 hours. In 1980’s, this was considered a good wage in Korea. But regardless of whether I get paid $500 or $5,000 a month, can this be even compared to preaching and serving the gospel of the water and the Spirit? Even if someone were to give me a truckload of money, can this be compared to doing God’s work? No, it cannot! I will never exchange my ministry for anything! That’s because no matter how much money I may be offered, not only do I think that my ministry is extremely valuable, but it really is worth every minute of my life. That’s why I feel gratified. It’s so gratifying to me that I am carrying out God’s work.
Whenever our ministry workers get together I say to them, “You should be grateful to God. You should be thankful that you have met the Lord through the gospel of the water and the Spirit and are now serving Him. Do you think you met the Lord through your own effort, by trying to meet Him on your own? Certainly not! You could have never met the Lord on your own. And by yourself you could not have laid the foundation to serve the Lord either. With that kind of attitude and faith is that, you could not possibly serve the Lord even if you wanted to. Not just anyone can serve the gospel of the water and the Spirit. And the very fact that you are able to serve the gospel is something for which you should all be grateful.” Admittedly there are some ministry workers who don’t understand my point. They probably think quietly to themselves, “How can he tell us to be thankful when he gives us so much work? It’s ridiculous!”
In reality, however it is in fact something for which we should all be grateful for. Having found the gospel of the water and the Spirit in our lives, you and I are now working hard to spread this true gospel. If we were not doing this work of spreading the gospel, what would we be doing? Would we not be just working to keep our bodies alive? We would all be working just to earn enough bread to feed ourselves. What a wretched life is this?
Let’s say that you make $200 after working for the whole day. If you work every day without taking any days off, you would make $6,000 in a month. Is this a lot of money? Not really. In some ways, it may seem like a lot of money, but it really is not that much money, only enough to make a living. So let’s say that you go out and work hard to make enough money to feed yourself, buy a house and the furniture to go with it, purchase a car to make your life a bit more comfortable, get some respect from the community, and people now call you ‘the boss.’ All this may seem like a big deal, but it’s actually wretched to work just to keep your body alive. Your life would be on a treadmill, going through the same routine over and over, getting up in the morning to go to work, coming back home to get some sleep, and then starting the whole thing all over again the next morning. At the end of the day, when you look back to your day, you won’t find any joy. There won’t be anything worthwhile.
 
 
The Lord Has Enabled Those Who Hunger for Righteousness to Carry Out Many of His Works
 
The Lord said in Mathew chapter 5, “Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, For they shall be filled.” This means that those who truly yearn to do the righteous work of God will be filled. In other words, the Lord will give and entrust them with His work. It is to carry out this righteous work entrusted by the Lord that He fills us. My fellow believers, if you had to spend every hour, every day, every month, and every year only for yourself to ensure your own prosperity rather than doing something worthwhile now, then your life itself would be completely miserable. Some people are happy if only their basic needs for food, clothing and housing are met. Because of that, we call such people “pigs with a full stomach.” They are like beasts. It’s not because they live like beasts that they are no better than beasts, but it’s because they only care about their own greed like pigs. Some philosopher said that he would rather be a hungry Socrates than a pig with a full stomach. There are many starving artists practicing their arts in poverty. Why do they do this? It’s because they consider this more than worthwhile. They don’t practice their arts just to feed themselves and make a living.
A Korean proverb says that when a tiger dies, it leaves its skin, but when a man dies, he leaves his name. What about you then? If you die after spending all your life just to feed yourself, then there will nothing meaningful to inscribe in your epitaph, other than the dates of your birth and death. There won’t be anything to write on your epitaph. You must have something meaningful to write on your epitaph after you pass away, after you go to see God. You must have something good that you’ve done in your life. Try going to a cemetery and read some of the epitaphs there. Some epitaphs are inscribed with the names of all the descendants of the deceased. Those epitaphs just tell the visitors how many offspring the deceased had. Few epitaphs actually say something about the deceased themselves. Hardly any epitaph says that the man buried underneath was a righteous man.
The late Deacon Myoungchan Kim is buried in one of the public cemeteries in this city, and there you will find his tombstone. On that tombstone we inscribed, “Here sleeps the righteous Deacon Myoungchang Kim, waiting for the Lord’s return.” All the born-again Christians who believe in the gospel of the water and the Spirit wait for the Lord’s return in their lives. But many people copy off this epitaph even as they have not been born again. In imitating us, they take out the word “righteous” and inscribe, “Here sleeps Elder so-and-so waiting for the Lord’s return.” To be honest, this is a violation of intellectual property rights. Yet these people don’t really understand the real meaning of Deacon Kim’s epitaph, but instead just think that it sounds good. That’s probably why they can’t use the word “righteous” and just inscribe, “Elder so-and-so, Deacon so-and-so, or Saint so-and-so sleeps here, waiting for the Lord’s return.”
There are two kinds of people in God’s sight. Everyone is either a righteous person or a sinner. Those who have been saved from sin and received the remission of sins by meeting the Lord and believing in the gospel of the water and the Spirit are righteous people, but those who have still have sin even as they believe in Jesus - are sinners. Of course, those who don’t know Jesus at all are also sinners.
There must be something worthwhile to inscribe in our epitaph. That’s why we are so grateful that we’ve come to do God’s work. We are doing what is right. There are many workers here in God’s Church, and they should all thank God. And they should thank me as well, since I’ve given them a lot of work. Isn’t this true? Why don’t you answer? Perhaps you don’t feel like saying anything. Perhaps some of you are thinking, “I am so sick and tired of work! All that he gives me is work and more work!” But my fellow believers think about what would happen if I did not give you any work at all. What would you do if I told you to take time off and do something else? You will probably do various things, but what would that be? They will all be perishable things. You will only do meaningless things. You will end up doing something that has no lasting meaning. Perhaps you will have a good time eating and drinking, and singing and dancing, but there will be nothing left when you wake up the next morning. That’s why you should be thankful to God for entrusting His work to you.
The Lord said, “I am the door. If anyone enters by me, he will be saved, and will go in and out and find pasture” (John 10:9). This means that as the Lord is the Shepherd of the sheep and the door of salvation, those who believe in Him will surely be saved. Salvation is not something that can be attained in any other way. It is attained only by believing in the gospel of the water and the Spirit given by the Lord. You must first be saved by believing in the Lord, and then you will be blessed in body and spirit, attending the Lord’s Church and finding pasture there. Through the Church you will receive the blessings of Heaven and hear the Lord’s Word, which is the bread for your soul, and you will carry out the blessed work of God. That’s what you are supposed to do on this earth. As the Lord is the Shepherd, He will feed us in His sheepfold and His sovereignty. We must truly grasp that the Lord is the door of the sheep and that He is our Shepherd. We should not just end at receiving our salvation. The Lord said that He has given us eternal life. He said that we would find pasture and He would feed us. None other than this is everlasting life.
That we can live forever with a perfect and immortal body means that we have received tremendous blessings. When our imperfect bodies are transformed into perfect and spiritual bodies to never fall ill again by become like God, we will never get old nor be imperfect again. It’s a tremendous blessing for us to live forever in such a condition enjoying splendor and glory. That’s how wonderful it is to believe in Jesus, and to receive the remission of sins and obtain everlasting life by believing in Jesus Christ, the door of salvation and in the gospel of the water and the Spirit. Our present lives are not all and there is eternal life.
The Lord has also granted us the Millennial Kingdom. He said that we will reign for a thousand years. We will find out the details of our reign when we get there. But the Lord also said clearly that after this Millennial Kingdom, He will give us the eternal Kingdom of God to enjoy ‘everlasting life’. Do you believers believe in this? It’s hard to imagine this because none of us has actually experienced everlasting life, but think about what it will be like when we are able to live forever as perfect beings. Imagine living forever as perfect beings, suffering no sickness and having no imperfection at all neither in our thoughts, nor in hearts, nor in our faith. And imagine enjoying splendor and glory. It’s a wonderful blessing! The Lord says that because He is the door of the sheep and the Shepherd, those who come into Him will go in and out, receive salvation, and find pasture. In other words, they will receive eternal life. They will never thirst again nor die, but attain everlasting life.
The Lord will return to this earth soon, but we do not know exactly when. Nevertheless, He will come again for sure. At that time, those born-again Christians who had died and been buried in the ground will be transformed into perfect bodies and be lifted into the air, and then the righteous who are still alive will receive the Lord in the air, exactly as it is written in the Bible: “For the Lord Himself will descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of an archangel, and with the trumpet of God. And the dead in Christ will rise first. Then we who are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air. And thus we shall always be with the Lord” (1 Thessalonians 4:16-17). Then the Lord will make the new heavens and the new earth for us - to live there for a thousand years.
However, those whose hearts still remain sinful even as they profess to believe in Jesus—that is, those who claim to believe in Jesus even as they refuse to believe in the gospel of the water and the Spirit nor realize that Jesus is the door of the Sheep, the Savior, and the door of salvation—will not be able to receive Jesus on that day. After a thousand years, at the end of our splendid and glorious reign, God will resurrect them and bring them before the ‘white throne’ of judgment. Revelation chapter 21 says that those whose names are written in the Book of Life will receive everlasting life, but the rest will be cast into the everlasting fire of hell. The Bible says that this is the second death, meaning that every sinner will suffer forever.
Everyone must believe in Jesus Christ, who is the door of salvation and the door of the sheep, and thereby attain salvation and reach the pasture of everlasting life. Otherwise all will suffer forever. Once a sinner dies physically, both his soul and body will be cast into hell after the Millennial Kingdom, and that’s why it’s called the second death. That’s why the blessings awaiting you and me as God’s redeemed people are so wonderful. These blessings cannot be compared to any privileges enjoyed by even the most powerful rulers of the world. Such privileges last only as long as they hold onto their power. In contrast, we will enjoy our privileges for eternity. That’s why we are so grateful to God.
Jesus also said in verse 16, “And other sheep I have which are not of this fold; them also I must bring, and they will hear my voice; and there will be one flock and one shepherd.” This means that we must guide those who are still lost and wandering about. These people must indeed meet the righteous, hear the Truth about the gospel of the water and the Spirit in detail, come into the sheepfold of God, and receive the same blessings that we have received as the forerunners of faith.
What is the reason for our existence on this earth? What’s the reason for us to be born on this earth? Man is born in order to meet the Lord, to be saved and to attain everlasting life. There is a single common purpose for which you are born, and it is for you to meet the Lord and be remitted from all your sins. If you fail do so then you were born all in vain. Like Judas Iscariot, it would have been better for you—not to be born at all.
Let us then lead all those who still have not come into the sheepfold, preach the gospel of the water and the Spirit to them, make them one flock with us in the sheepfold, and enable them to receive and enjoy the same blessings that we have received.
 
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