At Lakewood, I’ve been preaching through the I AM statements in the gospel of John. My hope for this series is that it would help those who listen to understand Jesus from His own words. Jesus is the center of Christianity, the center of His church, and hopefully the center of our lives. As such, we must perceive Him as He is so that we might know, worship, and serve Him as we should. In studying for my sermon on John 10:11-21 where Jesus says, “I am the Good Shepherd” I came accross this section from one of C. H. Spurgeon’s sermons. It says beautifully what I am trying to communicate in this series of sermons.
My brethren, who can speak of Jesus but himself? He masters all our eloquence. His perfection exceeds our understanding; the light of his excellence is too bright for us, it blinds our eyes. Our Beloved must be his own mirror. None but Jesus can reveal Jesus. Only he can see himself, and know himself, and understand himself; and therefore none but he can reveal himself. We are most glad that in his tenderness to us he sets himself forth by many choice metaphors, and instructive emblems, by which he would make us know some little of that love which passeth knowledge. With his own hand he fills a golden cup out of the river of his own infinity, and hands it to us that we may drink and be refreshed. Take, then, these words as being doubly refreshing, because they come directly from the Well-beloved’s own mouth, and contain rich revelations of his own all-glorious self. I feel that I must read them again;—“I am the good Shepherd; and I know mine own, and mine own know me, even as the Father knoweth me, and I know the Father; and I lay down my life for the sheep.”
C. H. Spurgeon, “Our Own Dear Shepherd,” in The Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit Sermons, vol. 32 (London: Passmore & Alabaster, 1886), 2–3.
If you’d like to listen or watch the I AM series of sermons, you can check them out here:
https://lakewoodbaptist.com/sermon-series/i-am/
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