I hope that is the theme of all
that we do, all that's preached and all that's sung and all that's
printed. That is the worthiness of the
Lamb of God, the Lord Jesus Christ. Turn back in your Bibles with
me to John chapter 10. John chapter 10, and I'll just
read A few verses, beginning in verse 22. I want you to think
about where our Lord was, who He had been talking to. It says,
and it was at Jerusalem, the feast of the dedication, and
it was winter. And Jesus walked in the temple
in Solomon's porch, Then came the Jews round about him, and
said unto him, How long dost thou make us to doubt?" Now if
you want to know something of the sinfulness of man, he can
look God in the face and accuse him of his own unbelief. That's just what they've done
here. If thou be the Christ, Tell us plainly. And Jesus answered
them, I told you, and you believe not. The works that I do in my
Father's name, they bear witness of me. But ye believe not, because
you are not of my sheep, as I said unto you. My sheep hear my voice,
and I know them, and they follow Me, and I give unto them eternal
life, and they shall never perish, neither shall any man pluck them
out of My hand. My Father which gave them Me
is greater than all, and no man is able to pluck them out of
My Father's hand." I and my Father are one." Now Christ and these
words that He speaks here are rejected. They are not believed. There are those who imagine that
you can separate Christ from His words, from His doctrines,
and believe on a Christ apart from them. But our Lord says,
whosoever in this sinful and adulterous generation that is
ashamed of me and my words, he said, I'll be ashamed of him
before my Father and all the holy angels. And the doctrines
or the truths, the words that Christ sets forth in this chapter,
they are no more popular or generally accepted now than they were then. It's amazing. If you look back
at verse 19, it says, there was a division Therefore, again,
among the Jews for these sayings." In another place it says, there
was a division because of him. Here it says, there was a division
because of these sayings, these teachings, these doctrines of
Christ, and many of them said, He has a devil and is mad. Why hear ye Him? That said about
the Son of God Himself. That said about the greatest
preacher and teacher ever to walk this earth. And it said
even at this hour about those who seek to preach His gospel. Look down in verse 31. It says,
then, after he said these things, then the Jews took up stones
again to stone him. And Jesus answered them, many
good works have I showed you from my Father, for which of
those works do you stone me? The Jews answered him saying,
For a good work we stone thee not, but for blasphemy." What
a charge to lay at the feet of Christ the God-man. And because that thou, being
a man, makest thyself God. Maketh thyself God. And then if you look at verse
39, it says, "...therefore they sought again to take him, but
he escaped out of their hand." It was not the hour appointed. It was not His hour that He spoke
of that He would lay down His life. And what He said to them
and what He says to us has to do with some of the most basic
and essential truths of the gospel. And the reason why there is such
offense to what is said in these verses and other places in the
gospel, it is because it is in these things that he gets all
the glory. Man wants some glory of his own. He wants a little pat on the
back. He wants to be as God Himself. But it is these truths, these
things as spoken by Christ and His apostles that assure that
He gets all the glory. And the amazing thing is here
that when He speaks in such a humble and condescending manner about
Himself, referring to Himself as a lowly shepherd. That's just one who keeps, and
tends to, and watches after sheep. out in the pasture land. But
so bad and so wicked and so blind and so spiritually dead is mankind
that when the Lord of glory speaks in such gracious language and
condescends to such a low place to show us His truth, You see
how they responded to Him. He didn't say, I'm the King,
though He was. He didn't say a lot of things
that He could have said. He simply said, I am the Good
Shepherd. What an amazing thing that God
Almighty would come to this earth in human flesh The Word that
was God became flesh and dwelt among us and referred to Himself
as a Shepherd. I'm the Good Shepherd. And as we see here, it is not
that men do not hear what's said. There's something in what He
has said, not only here but elsewhere, They clearly have some understanding
that he is referring to himself and ascribing to himself and
to various messianic prophecies the fact that he is God manifest
in the flesh. We don't stone you for all these
good works you've done. We stone you for what you said. And what you said evidently indicates
that you believe yourself to be God. And to us, that's blasphemy. They were blind to the meaning.
of all those Old Testament references and passages where the Messiah
and those who pictured the Messiah, they were pictured and set forth
as being shepherds. David, he was a shepherd. Moses, type of Christ, he was
a shepherd. All the language of Scripture,
where the shepherd would be taking the lambs up in his bosom and
carrying them. Language such as the shepherd
being smitten with the sword of Almighty God's justice. They had no understanding about
that. And what it means is that though
men have some knowledge of these things, and when they are confronted
with these truths and this gospel, they may have some understanding
of what is said on the open outside, but they will not come to Him,
They will not believe on Him, and these truths simply accent
man's natural rebellion. You see, Christ speaks here not
only of being the shepherd, but He speaks of having some sheep,
some sheep. And here we are as proud fallen
sinners. who have such a sense of high
esteem for ourselves and such self-righteous pride that for
anybody to be called just a simple sheep, how degrading. Just a sheep. But our Lord speaks
of a people here, And if you notice, He refers to them all
at this one time as such. He says, they're My sheep, even
before He goes to the cross. Even though He says, there are
some that are not of this fold that I must bring, they're already
and they always have been His sheep. Nothing we do makes us
sheep He said, they're my sheep. And He distinguished at this
very point, at this very hour, as was evidenced by what these
Jews, for the most part, did, that not everybody is one of
His sheep. That's a hard pill to swallow. Look back down in verse 26. He says to these who did not
believe, he says to these who stand there and in their minds
and hearts hold him at such a low degree, he says to these Pharisees
and such, but you believe not because you are not of my sheep,
as I said, Somebody stands up, some commentator, some preacher,
and says, well, that doesn't mean that they couldn't believe. Well, the reason that they don't
believe is because they don't want to believe, and they don't
want to believe because by nature they can't believe. They have
not the gift of faith that God alone can give, and they don't
want it. That's the amazing part. They
don't want it. But he goes on and he tells us,
he makes this distinction, and you can read about that same
distinction between sheep and those who don't believe, which
is sheep and goats in Matthew 25, where he says that he divides
the one on the one hand and the others on the other hand. He
says to those on his right hand, the sheep, come ye blessed of
my Father, Inherit the kingdom that was prepared for you before
the world began. He says to these unbelieving
goats, on the other hand, depart from Me, ye cursed, into that
everlasting fire, joining with the devil and all his angels,
He always makes this distinction. And if you notice how He refers
to the sheep here in verse 27, He speaks of them with a great
possessiveness. He calls them, My sheep. I wonder if you and I, if we
have some interest in the things of our Lord Jesus Christ, if
we have some faith and confidence in Him, What wonder would it
do to our soul, to our life, to our assurance, to our comfort,
if we could look and view ourselves and Christ in this light. He is the shepherd and we are
His sheep. He said, My sheep. They're My
sheep. And I don't know about you, I
know how we are humanly and how we are as far as our loved ones
and our friends and such as that. We view them in a light like
this. They're my children, they're
my grandchildren, she's my wife, he's my husband. And when we
say that, we say it with this in our minds, that we possess
these in a sense, and they are ours to watch out for, they are
ours to protect, they are ours to provide for. Do you think
God is any less? Am I one of His sheep? Am I one
of these that Christ is talking about here when He says, they
are my sheep? Look back in verse 4. It says,
"...and when he putteth forth his own sheep..." They're His
own. They belong to the shepherd.
You look down again in verse 16. He says, "...and other sheep
I have." In other words, he's not simply talking about the
sheep that are present amongst those people, few though they
might be at this particular hour. But he has sheep, he has a people
out of every nation and kindred and tribe and tongue out of every
generation from that day to this day until the end of this age. But he says, I have them. I have
them in my hand. And I have them tight in my hand,
and I myself am tight in my Father's hand, and there is nobody anywhere
at any time and no thing that will ever be able to pluck them
out of my Father's hand. Is that good? Would it do us
good this morning if we could see ourselves as those poor,
weak, feeble sheep, but being cared for and watched after and
protected by that great Shepherd who is also at the same time
God Himself, who is at the same time the King of kings and Lord
of lords, the One who works all things, after the counsel of
His own way." We could say like David. I mean, say it without
a rehearsal. like we do with everything that
has to do with God and worship. It becomes a ritual. It becomes
a ho-hum kind of thing. It becomes so mundane and repetitive. But if we could say from our
hearts, believing it and trusting in it, just what David said when
he said in that 23rd Psalm, the Lord. That's Jehovah. The Lord
is my shepherd. He is my shepherd. If He is my shepherd, then certainly
I am His sheep. And it is up to Him to do just
exactly what David talks about in Psalm 23. He says, the Lord
is my shepherd, I shall not want. What do you think that means?
I have a feeling that we lose something of what that really
means in that language of the King James English. It means
that I will not, because of who my shepherd is, I will not, as
one of his sheep, ever be in need of anything. But sometimes sheep are kind
of prone to say things like this. But what about this? Or what
about that?" He said, I'm not being warned. And of the greatest
thing, of the greatest need that any sinner could ever have, which
is righteousness itself, it says, He leads me in the paths of righteousness,
which is this path or these paths that always lead us to the righteousness
of another, to the righteousness of God in Christ, to the righteousness
that He gives as a gift, to the righteousness that He brought
in according to Daniel's prophecy. to the righteousness that He
established, that God imputes to our accounts, charges to our
accounts, holds us in His sight and before His justice as righteous. He leads us in the path of righteousness
and He keeps us. David said, the Lord is my shepherd,
I'll not want. He'll lead me in that plain path
of righteousness through the Lord Jesus Christ. And He said,
even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death. Now you think about this. He's
not simply talking about the hour of death, although He surely
will be with all His sheep in that hour. But it says that He
is with them even when they walk through that valley of the shadow
of death. And what else is this life? There
are things, there are people, there are diseases, there are
calamities, there are things more than you and I could ever
imagine that overshadow us every day. And were it not for the
grace and the power of our Shepherd, They'd consume us. We live in
a day when people fear to tell the truth about anything. We live in an hour where there
is anarchy that is boiling right under the surface of our society. We live in a day when there is
a new disease, a new finding of some dread and terminal disease
every day. But he says, I'll fear no evil.
Why? Because the shepherd's with me.
I'm his sheep. I know we have a responsibility
to be wise. We have a responsibility to be
reasonable. We have a responsibility not
to be foolish. We have a responsibility to obey
the plain commands of Scripture. We have the responsibility to
labor and to be sensible and to be watchful and all these
things, but ultimately and finally, our safety is in the shepherd. You can go back in the Old Testament
as well as the New. And what you find out is that
young and old, under every imaginable circumstance and harm and danger,
The Lord watched over His people, delivered them against the worst
of odds, and the greatest of foes, and the harshest of dangers. He delivered them until that
appointed hour where He'd receive them unto Himself. He's the shepherd
with the sheep. He says, My sheep. How are these
sheep His? Everybody thinks that they are
their own, I'm my own boss, I'm my own captain of my fate, I'm
my own this. But when God saves His people
and brings them to the knowledge of the truth as to who they are
and what He's done for them, they begin to rejoice in the
fact that they are not their own. We're His sheep. How are we His sheep? Well, we're
His sheep by His creative right. Our Lord made this statement,
and I'm sure that it must have really made those rebels boil
in His day. It does in this day, in this
day of free will imagined, in this age of man determining everything. He says, can I not? do with my own what I will. You get mad if somebody comes
along, maybe especially the government, tells you to do with your stuff
what you don't want to do with it. But guess what? Even though
it's yours, even though you don't want to do it, you do it. Why? Because there's a greater
power. That's not true with God. He is the possessor of all things. He is the owner. He holds the
sovereign title deed to everything in this universe, and especially
every person in this universe. He said, all souls are mine. I can do with them what I want.
That strikes at the rebellion of sinners. The fact, the thought
that God can do with me whatever He wants to do, and there'd be
nothing I could do about it, nothing I could say about it,
that's what Nebuchadnezzar found out. He's God. He does according
to His will. in the armies of heaven and among
the inhabitants of earth, and nobody can stay His hand, stop
Him, or even question Him in what He does." Why? Because it
is He that hath made us, and not we ourselves. Now, we struggle
with that sometimes. We struggle with it when it pertains
to us. But my friends, when we as the
Lord's people have enemies and foes and dangers in this world,
isn't it a wonderful thing to know that every person you meet,
whether they be lowly or great, they're the Lord and even the
devil himself. He's God's devil. He has him
on a chain. That means he has a limiting,
restricting hand on him, so as to enable him only to do that
which will finally and ultimately work for his glory, God's glory. And you're good if you hit one
of his sheets. I remember reading a long time ago, it struck me
so, I've never forgotten it. And I experienced it over and
over and over again in my life. But Bunyan was writing about
Pilgrim. When he was going down a way,
he knew he had to go, and there was a gate that he had to go
through, but there beside those gates were lines, he's afraid. You ever see any of those gates
you got to pass through? Just about every day in my life
of late. I see events that are coming,
I see things that are planned and scheduled, things that are
to come and I'm fearful, I'm worried, I'm anxious, I'm frightful
and all these things. But in Bunyan's allegory, when
Pilgrim finally got to those gates. Guess what he found out?
The lions were chained. The lions were chained. He went
through those gates. He didn't have to worry about
them. They growled loud. They snarled and they spit and
they did all things that lions do to show themselves fierce,
king of beasts. But that's all they were, is
beasts. That's all the natural man is, beasts. That's all these
trials and these troubles for God's people, all these enemies,
all these things that rise up against them. They roar and they
scare us like lions because we know we have to go that way,
but He has them on His chain. He's the Creator, Owner. Paul
writes in Colossians, he says this, "...for by Him, were all
things created that are in heaven and that are in earth, visible
and invisible, whether they be thrones or dominions or principalities
or powers." Who's he talking about there? He's talking about
the Lord Jesus Christ. He says, "...for by Him were
all things created. All things were created by Him
and for Him. You look out there in this world,
if it's a created thing, it was created by God and it was created
for Him, in Christ, everything. And all His sheep, they're His
possession and they're His by right of creation. But not only
that, They are His by a gift and a donation. They were given
to Him. All of God's people, all of God's
elect, they are shown over and over again as a people from among
men, from among Adam's fallen race, They're shown as a people
that were given to Christ by the Father before the world ever
began in what is called the everlasting covenant. God is not going to
take them back. Christ is not going to lose them.
They're His by donation. They're given to Him. Turn back
to John chapter 6. And look down at John chapter
6 and verse 37. Now here He is. This is our Lord
again with this same basic crowd who reject everything He says,
reject every truth, every doctrine He sets forth. And yet it says,
you've seen Me and you believe not. But look at verse 37, "...all
that the Father giveth me," all that the Father has given me,
"...shall come to me, and him that comes to me I will in no
wise cast out." I think that's one of those triple negatives
in the Hebrews. He says, "...and him that comes
to me I will never, no never, no never cast him out." Who's
going to come to Him? All of them. These that the Father
hath given Him. He says in verse 39, And this
is the Father's will, which hath sent Me, that of all which He
hath given Me, I should lose nothing, but should raise it
up again at the last day." He's talking about people there. He's
talking about people who are sinners, who will live and die,
but they'll be raised up. He'll raise them up at the last
day. Why? Because they're given to
Him. That means they're entrusted
into His care. That means that God He is everything,
not only in God's glory, but in our salvation on earth. The safe keeping of the shepherd.
Turn over to John 17. I love the language of John 17.
Men can boast free will. They can talk about what this
one does and that one doesn't. They can talk about what their
comforts are and their assurances are and point every time to themselves. But now listen to the language
of God in John chapter 17, verse 2. He speaks of the Son being glorified
by the Father, and the Father glorifying the Son. He says,
"...as Thou hast given Him power over all flesh, that He should
give eternal life to as many as Thou hast given Him." What
do you get with these sheep? "...who in themselves are so
worthless, so stupid, so easily defiled, so easily lost. You say, well, why are they saved
then? Because they're His sheep. Because
He cleans them. Because He washes them. Because
He carries them in His bosom. They're given Him by the Father.
Look down at verse 6. I have manifested thy name unto
the men which thou gavest me out of the world. Thine they
were, and thou gavest them me, and they have kept thy word."
They believe. Why? Because they're His sheep.
He keeps them. He watches over them. He speaks
of them with special terms of affection and possession. They're
My sheep. Look down in verse 9. I pray
for them, I pray not for the world, but for them which Thou
hast given Me, for they are Thine." They belong to the Father and
to the Son and to the Spirit at the same time. They are given
to Christ and Christ is given to them. You say, explain that
to me. Sorry, I can't do it. But that's what it says. Look
down in verse 14. I have given them thy word, and
the world hath hated them, because they're not of the world, even
as I'm not of the world." They're given to Christ, and they're
His gift. They're heirs of the divine inheritance,
but they're also spoken of as the inheritance of God Himself.
They're the children of the King, Look down also in verse 11. And now I am no more in the world,
but these are in the world. And I come to thee, Holy Father,
keep through thine own name those whom thou hast given me, that
they may be one as we are. They'll be one together. They're
a flock. They may be viewed by the world
as a little flock. The world may look at them like
David's brothers looked at him when they said, oh, what are
you doing here in the battle when you've left tending to those
few sheep? They're his sheep. They're the
gift. And his glory does not lie in how many he saves as the
shepherd. His glory lies in the fact that
he saves all the sheep, all those given to him by the Father. They're
His by gift. And then thirdly, they're His
by redemption. I know there are a lot of people
in our day, they don't want to hear anything about what they
call a mercantile redemption. They don't want to hear anything
about Christ paying something or shedding His blood to buy
something. But if that is not the case,
we need to throw a whole lot of words out of the Bible that
have that very meaning, redeem, redemption being won. Paul said to those believers
at Corinth, he said, you're bought with a price. You're not your
own. Why? You're bought with a price. Therefore glorify God in your
body, soul, and spirit, which are God's. Period. There is no Christianity wherein
we are self-rulers, self-possessors. We belong to the shepherd. He watches over his sheep. If
you look down in John chapter 10 at verse 11, I believe it
is, this is what redemption is about. Redeemed meaning to buy
back by the paying of a price. He says, I am the Good Shepherd,
and the Good Shepherd gives His life for the sheep. You can just
argue about universal redemption all you want to, until you're
blue in the face, until you go out into eternity and meet the
God of particular redemption, but it won't change a thing.
I know who died, I know what He paid, and I know who He bought. the sheep. I lay down my life
for the sheep. He gives His life a ransom for
the many. Look down also in verse 15, as
the Father knoweth me, even so know I the Father, and I lay
down my life for the sheep. That's so plain. Why won't men
and women believe that? Because they don't want to. They
don't want to. But if you ever find out who
you are, if you ever find out what the cost is of redeeming
your soul from hell, if you ever find out what the price and payment
for sin that is required by divine justice is, you'll be mighty
happy. You'll be praying, May I be found
among your sheep." They're your sheep, you bought them. In Revelation,
they sing this song, saying, Thou art worthy to take the book
and to open the seals thereof, for Thou hast slain and has redeemed
us to God. When Christ died on the cross,
when the shepherd laid down his life for the sheep, He did not
do it in order to make every one of mankind redeemable. That's what's preached in our
day. No. He redeemed the sheep. He redeemed them to God. Why? Because they were like those
lost sheep described in the Scripture. All we like sheep have gone astray. They were lost sheep. sold under
sin, sold out so far as every debt imaginable to the justice
of Almighty God. There's only one way to save
them, and that's to redeem them. You remember old Hosea's wife?
She's down there in the slave market, a slave, because she
had left Hosea, she had run in the street and played the harlot. She, in her blindness, imagined
that even the gifts that were left at her door to sustain her
life, she thought that those gifts came from her lovers. And
look at her now. She's down there on that slave
market. She looks like an old, worn out, weathered hooker. An
old junkie, druggie, crackhead. That's our picture. The Bible
says that Hosea is the one who said he'd redeem her freely.
He'd go down to that slave market and suffer the embarrassment,
just like our Lord in a far greater manner did when He came to this
earth in our humanity, yet without sin, and went into the very,
very slave market of sin to redeem us. He went in there and He paid
the price that was asked for her freedom. Thou hast redeemed
us to God. Not redeemed us to a chance or
an opportunity or a privilege or whatever you want to call
it. All the way to God. Why? Because this is God buying
for God. Thou hast redeemed us to God
by Thy blood. That's the price. Perfect blood. That means a perfect life. A sinless sacrifice laid down
as the price of our redemption. Redeemed us by Thy blood. out of every kindred and tongue
and people, and there he is by redemption. And there he is by
voluntary submission. You see, there is no such thing
as free will in the Bible, except as it pertains to God. But it
does say something about a freed will, when he says, thy people. Could have said thy sheep just
as easy. Thy people shall be willing. in the day of thy power."
When the Spirit of God comes to these sheep, tangled in the
briars of their sin and this world, and frees them and reveals
Christ not only to them in the Gospel, but in them, and sets
them free in their experience. He says, they're taught of God,
and they come to me. And they give themselves over
wholly freely, affectionately to the shepherd. And they say,
like that bridegroom says in the Song of Solomon, I am my
beloved. He's mine. He's mine. The Lord
is my shepherd. Well, I've got to stop. But I
do want you to know two things. He says of these sheep, and you
can use all the illustrations you want to say what a Christian
will do and what he won't do, but the truth is, even the Lord's
sheep still stumble and fall and make mistakes and sin, and
in this flesh they struggle like The Apostle describes in Romans
7, but he said, they hear my voice. They're a hard-headed
lot, but they hear His voice. They hear His voice. How does
He speak? He hath in these last days spoken
unto us, the sheep, by His Son. He speaks to us by His Word. God speaks to His people by His
Word. Now, if a preacher of the Gospel
is preaching the Gospel, He speaks using that human instrument,
but they're brought to believe not on the one who speaks it,
but on the one of whom it speaks. A lot of preachers have failed,
and I may be the next one. May be the next one, but I'll
tell you this. If I fail, if I fall, it will not diminish
the veracity, the truthfulness of this Gospel, of this Word,
not one bit. Don't you put your confidence
in me. Don't you hover around me like
these little preacher worshipers, and preacher followers, and preacher
exalters, and say like those foolish Corinthians did, I'm
of Apollos, and I'm of Paul, and I'm of Cephas, and I'm this
one, all that stuff. Don't do that. I didn't die for
anybody. I can't save anybody, and only
by the grace of God can I stand before you and tell you what
He says. You believe Him, and if you're
His sheep, you will. You won't believe on Him to get
life, but you'll believe on Him because He gives you life. He
that liveth and believeth has eternal life. He said, they hear
my voice, and I give unto them eternal life. I give it to them. That's to know God. And they'll
never... I love the sound of that. They
shall never... They will not die an eternal
death in judgment of their sins. The shepherds already died that
death. They will not face the wrath
of God. We'll be saved from wrath through
Him. Those were His sheep. Wouldn't it be wonderful if we
could wake up in the morning with that sure truth believed
in our heart? How many things would it affect
about our day as we say? Do you have a good day? The truth
of the matter is the Lord's sheep, they never have a bad day because
He works all things together for their good. In His glory
did my sheep hear my voice and they followed me. When they're
seen in heaven, They're described as those that follow the Lamb
with us wherever He goeth. If His doctrine goes against
the grain of my flesh, which it will, I've still got to follow
Him there. If identifying with Him before
this world, if it takes me in a dangerous place, I've still
got to follow Him there. If things in this world become
so bad that they're unbelievable, I'm still going to follow Him,
because I still have my shepherd. My unchanging, sovereign, saving,
keeping, blessing, and even shepherd, and even in the midst of these
things, He'll take me off to the side. Find me a little green
pasture somewhere where I can sit down at His feet. and hear
His Word. He'll bless His Word to my heart. I'll feed on that bread that
sustains those green pastures of His Word. I'm telling you
right now, if you're one of His sheep, don't you expect to find
any hope any relief, any comfort anywhere in this world except
in the shepherd. There are situations in our country,
all around us here, in our families, in our circles of friends that
at this hour are so unbelievably bad in our eyes. I don't diminish
them one bit. They are awful. There are situations and circumstances
that if you and I left to ourselves or these individuals, whatever
it is, if they're left to what they want to do, our hours are
short. But the Bible says of our shepherd
that even the heart of the king is in his hands. And like rivers
of water, He turns it, He makes it to flow whatever course and
way that He will. Those lines are chained. We're
under the safe care of the Shepherd. Lord, let me see You more clearly. Let me trust You more fully. Let me plead that salvation that
is through Your blood and Your righteousness more completely,
that I might have hope. Maybe that's what I ought to
call this, hope for the sheep. Where's our hope? It's in the
shepherd. Our Father, we thank you this
morning for our dear shepherd who gave his life for us, who
loves us with an everlasting love, who gives to us freely
all things. who keeps us by His mighty, saving,
keeping hand, who gathers us as a flock, carries us in His
bosom, provides all our needs, all our righteousness, all our
security, That's why he's the great shepherd. He's the shepherd
and bishop of our souls. He's the chief shepherd. We thank
you for it and for your grace and mercy to us in him. Keep
us in these days. Help us. We're your sheep. You're our shepherd. We pray
in your name. Amen.