according to the spirit of our
age, and I've often heard this from those who oppose the gospel
of God, the gospel of the Scriptures. Claim not to believe in God or
have no respect for the God of scriptures because he quote causes
bad things to happen and doesn't save everybody that he would
actually dare to send a human being to eternal torment because
of sin. They think that's wrong. They
are amazed that God would condemn anyone. But anybody who's been
saved by His grace is amazed that God saves anyone. How can it be that God should
love a soul like me? As I was meditating on this morning's
subject, the thought came to my mind that I can think of a
million reasons why God wouldn't save me. I cannot think of one
reason that he would save me except this, that's the kind
of God he is. He delights in mercy. Who is
a pardoning God like thee, said the prophet, who pardons iniquity
and passes over the transgression of the remnant of his heritage,
for he delights in mercy. That's why we sing Amazing Grace,
because believers are truly amazed by it. People object to the scripture
that says, Jacob have I loved, Esau have I hated. How could
God hate anyone? That doesn't surprise me. All
of us have given him plenty of reason hate us what amazes me
is that he loved Jacob because let's be honest as a
human being Jacob wouldn't any better than he saw and neither
are we but if God loves us if God saves us how amazing is
that And why would anybody be interested in hearing any other
message than that? Many this morning in churches
will sit and listen to messages that will denounce this or that
activity in our government or society. Well, that's easy. That's like trying to find sand
on the seashore. It's not hard to do. They'll listen to that, they'll
listen to a sermon telling them all the things they need to do. And yet the scripture is full,
not of what we must do, but of what God has done. As someone so well put it, the
difference between the truth of the gospel and all other religion
is in two letters. The Gospels, so-called Gospels
of men, the religions of men are all due. The religion of God is done. And that's the only reason that
we have for being here. Because if there's something
yet to do, We are as lost as though God had done nothing at
all. If he doesn't do it all, he may
as well not have done any of it. Well, that one's a freebie. We'll get to the message I planned
on. The great shepherd of the sheep. I like it that when The writer
of Hebrews described our Lord, he really didn't say simply,
the great shepherd of the sheep. He said that great shepherd of
the sheep. As though he would emphasize
this character of our Lord Jesus Christ. The Lord's relationship to us
is described by many metaphors. He is called our father, our
brother, our husband, our friend, our defense attorney, and our
captain, to name a few. But I believe that the metaphor
of shepherd over sheep is the one most commonly used to describe
our Lord's relationship to his people. Now, some reasons that it may
be used more than any other metaphor are this. Sheep is likely the
best metaphor for our relationship to him. He's called a shepherd. Because nothing describes us
better than sheep. And we will get to that in the
message. There's nothing a sheep needs
more than a shepherd. And in point of fact, if a sheep
has a good shepherd, he needs nothing else. And then the word shepherd. is,
well it gathers together nearly all of those things that Christ
is to his people. All those qualities that make
him savior to us are found in the metaphor of a shepherd. Now
in this scripture, our Lord is called that great shepherd of
the sheep. Hebrews was written to Jews. That is, whoever wrote
it, and we don't know who, whoever wrote it, he wrote it with Jews
in mind. Though it's beneficial to all
believers, as all scriptures are beneficial to all believers,
because the error to which these Jews were inclining is an error
that has bothered the church from the very beginning. they
wanted to return to old covenant ways. They were suffering persecution
because of their having confessed that Jesus is the Christ, that
Jesus is the Lord, but they were having suffered persecution from
it, they were tempted to go back to what they had been saved from
so as to avoid the persecution. Now, they did not intend a wholesale
departure from the gospel. They thought they could do both.
They thought, I can be an open Jew and a secret Christian. After all, Jesus was a Jew. Jesus went to the temple, Jesus
observed the feasts, so I can too. And I can blend in, and
they won't know that I count Jesus to be the Messiah. I can
live under the radar, so to speak. And the writer of Hebrews makes
it clear, no, you can't do that. When Jesus Christ came, he put
an end to the old covenant. The book of Hebrews said so.
He made it obsolete. It was no longer needed. And
as he suffered outside the city walls in shame and rejection,
so we who believe in him must be willing to go outside the
walls of human religion, of human acceptance, of all the humanity
counts acceptable and praiseworthy. And we must bear His shame. When
our Lord says that we must take up our cross, He did not mean
that we must be willing to bear some medical condition or this
or that trial. What did a cross mean? Well,
it had this significance. Whoever was nailed, whoever was
hung on a cross, whoever was crucified, that means that the
people of that day held them in utter contempt. That the political
powers of that day considered them criminals and their lives
were worthless. But more than this, The Bible
says, the law says, cursed is everyone who is hung on a tree,
meaning by this, they're cursed by God. In those days, they would
execute a person, that is in the days of Moses and afterwards,
if a person had been guilty of certain offenses, they would
not only be stoned to death, after they were stoned, their
bodies would be hung up for display. Not buried with dignity, hung
up. And this actually occurred in
all kinds of societies, not just Jewish ones, but God says such
a one is cursed. Cursed by God. And when we follow our Lord outside
the camp of what is humanly praiseworthy, of the religion that people like
to boast in, and when we Go out with him outside
the camp. What are we to the world? Contemptible,
worthless, criminals. We are under their curse. There is no way to live in this
world openly as a follower of Christ as he's revealed in these
scriptures. and not receive at least some
contempt from the world, in particular, the world of religion. The religious leaders of our
Lord's day hated him, and it's the same today. But this was written to these Hebrews
to prevent them from departing from a wholehearted confession
of Christ, confession of Jesus as the Christ, it was to dissuade them from
such apostasy. So he refers to Jesus, that great
shepherd of the sheep. Why would he say that to Jews?
Well, when God's people, that is His
national people, the Jews. And of course, near as I can
tell from the Scripture, even that's over. The Scriptures make
it rather plain that that covenant made at Sinai, which made Israel
into a nation, a holy nation, a specially privileged
nation, that entire covenant was made obsolete by Jesus Christ,
a new covenant has come in where there is neither Jew nor Gentile.
God does not have a special nation on the earth in this day. But
this was kind of a transitional period between Christ's ascension
and the destruction of Jerusalem and the temple some 40 years
later. And these Jews, you know, they
still had, just like you and me, The traditions of their upbringing
still clung to them, just like those death clothes of Lazarus. Remember
when our Lord raised Lazarus from the dead? Well, he comes
up out of the tomb, but he's still all wrapped up like a mummy.
And what did the Lord say to his disciples? He says, unwrapping,
loose him, loose him from those bands. And these believers, these
were Jewish believers, and yet, like Lazarus, freshly out of
the tomb, they were still wrapped up in their traditions. And you
and I, you know, none of us are born as believers. None of us
are born understanding God, loving God, believing God. We're all
born religious by nature, but somewhere along the line, if
we are God's people, gives us the new birth and causes us to
see things we could not see before, understand things we could not
understand before. Yet, we still got all those death
clothes. It takes a long time to unwrap
them, doesn't it? When I came here, boy, there's
some pretty thick layers of death clothes. That's one by one. People confessed this gospel
of Christ. And yet there were still things
that held you back. Me too. And you know what? They aren't all off yet, are
they? We still have those old death rags hanging on. That old
way of thinking. The legalistic way of thinking.
The way that says, do this and live. Do that and die. Well, these people, in their
traditions, looked to Moses as a shepherd. Maybe they were considering
what Isaiah said. In Isaiah 63, then his people
recalled the days of old, the days of Moses and his people.
Where is he who brought them through the sea with the shepherd
of his flock? Where is he who set his Holy
Spirit among them? Now the Jews would think of that,
and they're thinking of going through the sea, and they remember
who it was stretched out his staff and the seas parted. And
they thought to themselves that Moses was the shepherd of God's
flock. Well, Moses was the shepherd
of God's flock the same way that fellows like me who are called
pastors, and by the way, in the Bible, the word pastor and the
word shepherd are the same word in the original languages. But Moses was a pastor or a shepherd
the same way I am. But he wasn't the shepherd that
really led them anywhere. And I'm not leading you anywhere.
That is, I'm not leading you. I tell you, I preach to you,
I urge you, but you, next time you pray and
give thanks, pray this. Dear God, thank you, Joe, is
not my shepherd, but you are. Because I can't even keep me
going the right direction, much less can I keep you going the
right direction. It was our Lord Jesus who led
them through the sea and led them about in the wilderness,
in the pillar of cloud by day and the pillar of fire by night.
That was our Lord Jesus doing that, that great shepherd of
the sheep. And these Jews and all their
tradition probably hadn't caught on to that yet. They were still
hanging on to Moses. So he says, Jesus, He's the great
shepherd of the sheep. He's always been the shepherd
of God's people at all times and in all ages. Never has God
turned the leadership and safety and
care of His chosen people He's never turned that over to fallible
men. He works through them, but he
works in spite of them. Let's take a minute then to consider
the greatness of our shepherd. He's called that great shepherd. He's great in his person, who
he is. David wrote this, the Lord is
my shepherd. Now we understand that in our
English translations, whenever we see the word Lord written
in all capital letters, it's not really from either the Hebrew
or the Greek. It's not the word Lord. It's the name of our God. Which in modern English we say
it's Jehovah. Some say it should be Yahweh. I've looked at. Videos online
where people try to convince us it's this way or that way
it doesn't matter how it's pronounced. It means I am. That's his name. And the one who is the I Am,
the one who spoke to Moses from the burning bush and called himself
Jehovah, he is our shepherd. And our Lord Jesus is that shepherd. From the very first, the deity,
The godness of Jesus Christ has always been denied by unbelievers. In fact, it was his claim to
deity that the enemies of his day, that's what they used to
accuse him and call for his crucifixion. They said, why do you want me
to crucify this man? Well, he being a man makes himself to
be God. They missed it. He, being God, made himself to
be a man. It was the other way around.
He was God before he was ever man. Our Lord Jesus, our Great Shepherd,
He's the one who said, let there be light, and there was light.
He is the one who said, let us make man in our image. He is
the one that breathed into the first man the breath of life,
and man became a living soul. He is the One that sustains the
entire universe by the Word of His power. He is the One who
spoke and it was, He commanded and it stood firm. He's the One
who does as He wills in the armies of heaven and the inhabitants
of the earth and no one can stop Him or even has the right to
question what He does. That's our Shepherd. Now I said
that of all the things a sheep needs, shepherd's the most important,
because if he's got a good shepherd, he's got everything he needs.
Well, imagine having a shepherd like that. I get a little wary of people
saying, well, Jesus wants to. Jesus doesn't want anything.
See, want means to desire and not have. There's nothing that
our Lord Jesus desires that he does not have, because he's God. The Bible says of God, he does
as he wills. He claimed, and that was Nebuchadnezzar's
confession of him after God proved that he had power over Nebuchadnezzar,
but God says of himself, I do all my pleasure. Everything God wants to do. Heavy on the air quotes around
the word want. Everything God wants to do, He does. In the religion of my upbringing,
they get to the end of the service, and then the preachers start
to beg people to make a confession of Christ, and they're saying,
oh, God wants to save you, but you won't let Him. Really now? You can stop God from doing something
He wants to do? He says, I do everything I want
to do. That's why we don't use any kind
of fleshly manipulation here. We preach the gospel to people
knowing this, that God will use gospel preaching to seek, find,
call, and secure every one of His lost sheep. He says in another
place, not a one of them will be lost. He says, I've come to
seek and to save that which is lost. I remember the first time
I ever I've heard it put this way, but it was when I was just
recently out of college, and the pastor of the church, you
know him, Brother Henry Mahan, he said, Jesus Christ came to
seek and to save that which is lost, and he's gonna find every
lost person and he's gonna save every lost person. And then he
says, well, you'll ask me, well, isn't everybody lost? He said,
no, just ask them. People don't think they're lost. But He's going to save every
lost person. If you have not yet been saved
by the grace of God, here's my hope for you today, that today
you'll become lost. In your own eyes, you'll become
lost. Because if you become lost, and that doesn't mean that you're
lost like God doesn't know where you are. It means you're lost
because you don't know where you are. And you don't know how
to get back. If God ever convinces you you're
lost, that means He's coming for you. He's left the 99 in the field
and He's coming for you. I hope you get lost today. Because
if you get lost, I know this, in God's good time, you'll get
found. But the Lord, Jehovah God, our
shepherd. The scriptures are unmistakably
clear on this point. Jesus is Jehovah God. He said to those Pharisees and
Sadducees and all those that hated him, unless you believe
that I am, you will die in your sin. Everybody there knew exactly
what he meant when he said it that way. Some of your modern
English translations, including the one we use, will put the
word he. He'll say, unless you believe
that I am he. But that's not what the original says. The Greek
simply says, unless you believe that I am. What do you mean that
you am? You am what? I am? I am. That's what he meant. And they
understood that. And then he said, Abraham, long
to see my day. And he did see it. He said, what
are you talking about? You aren't yet 50 years old.
Abraham's been dead well over a thousand years. What do you
mean he saw your day? And this is what he said now.
Before Abraham was, I am. Now notice he did not say before
Abraham was, I was. Those who deny that Jesus is
Jehovah, and I'm talking about among those groups that call
themselves Christian, there are some who deny that Jesus is indeed
Jehovah God. And they'll say things like,
well, He was a God, but He's not the God. And they'll say
that He preexisted creation, but He's not eternal. They would
have been perfectly fine with Jesus saying, before Abraham
was, I was. But that's not what Jesus said.
Jesus said before Abraham was, I am. Why does God call himself the
I am? Because with him there is no
flow of time. He's the eternal one, the timeless one. And Jesus
took that name to himself. Now there was a beginning to
his humanity. But there was never a beginning
to his divinity. He is God. But he's also a man. And what
a man he is. Sometimes we get so wrapped up
in trying to defend the divinity of our Lord, we forget about
his real and honest humanity. There never has been a man like
the Lord Jesus. Never. Adam wasn't like him. Adam was
created without sin, but he was fallible and fell. Jesus Christ was born without
sin, and he didn't fall. I want you to consider that for
a minute. How many times do you fall a day? You don't have that many fingers
and toes, believe me. Every day in every way. If right now God were to come
to us and say, all right, I'm clearing everything you've done
to this point in my mind no longer exists. Clearing the slates. Now go on and live perfectly.
We wouldn't last long enough to turn around and walk away. Before in our hearts we'd already
blasphemed his name. Until on our hearts we had already
broken every law God ever gave. Jesus Christ never did. When I consider how weak I am
in the face of temptation, both the temptations of trial and
then in the temptation of sin, how weak I am, I am amazed at
the man Christ Jesus. For he was confronted with every temptation According
to the book of Hebrews, chapter four, verse 15, he was confronted
with every temptation just like you and me. Yet he did so without sin. He never thought sin, he never
desired sin, he never did sin. Now even laying aside the concept
that he's God, Just looking at him as a man, isn't that remarkable? I mean, I have high regard for
my father. I think he's one of the finest men who ever walked
the earth. But he's nothing compared to
the Lord Jesus Christ. He would look as wicked as everybody
else standing next to Christ without sin. David said, I came forth from
the womb speaking lies. Christ came forth from the womb
speaking grace and truth. As a man, he had and still has
a physical body. It's glorified, but it's still
a human body. God is forever incarnate. That is, God is forever in the
flesh, in the person of Jesus Christ. Now, as a man with a
physical body, He who made the heavens and the earth became
subject to the restrictions that are natural to living within
this framework of time and space. Now, in His glorified estate,
our Lord, I suppose, well, certainly in His divine nature, He can
be everywhere at once. But in His manhood, He's not. Why? It's a body. It's a physical thing. And a
physical thing can only be in one place at a time. But as he walked the earth, he
became subject to all the weaknesses and frailties natural to physical
beings like you and me. You say, he's God. He didn't
have any limitations. Well then why did he grow tired
and sleep? Why was he ever surprised? The
King James uses the word marveled. He marveled at their unbelief.
It means it surprised him. God's not surprised by anything. Yet Jesus the man was. He had
to eat. He grew hungry. He grew thirsty. That old spiritual, nobody knows
the troubles I've seen. Nobody knows but Jesus. That's our shepherd. Our shepherd knows what it is
to be a sheep. For he is the sheep of Passover
to us. He is the sheep of the sin offering. What a shepherd. There's not
a shepherd on earth that knows what it's like to be a sheep.
But there's a shepherd in heaven that knows what it's like to
be a sheep. And because he in His flesh,
experienced all the frailties and weaknesses and temptations
that we do, He is able to sympathize with us in our struggles. In our struggles of trial. And I almost hate to talk about
this because our Lord has made my life so good. I just feel
like I'm not you know, properly instructed. Not that I'm asking
for this experiential instruction, but I know that many of you have
gone through much more severe trials than I've gone through.
But I think of the sorrows that some people face. I think, how
do they bear that? Those who've lost spouses or
children. Those who've had to go through
the horribleness of divorce or grave illness. I think how,
how can they bear that? Well, the world has got to deceive
itself in order to get through stuff like this. But here's what
the believer can say. Whatever I'm experiencing, The
Lord knows it. Brother Don Fortner's funeral,
Bruce Crabtree was preaching and he started making this illustration
and it was from our Lord being able to sympathize with us because
he's been through everything. And he says, everywhere you go,
you will find the footsteps of the Lord Jesus there before you. He walked the path you walked
before you walked it. And he says those steps go all
the way into the tomb. When it comes your time to lay
down this life and enter the tomb, you will find the footsteps
of your shepherd there. He's been there. He knows. He
sympathizes. And as the perfect man, Christ
was able to be our substitute, living for us the life we could
not live, and dying for us the death we dare not die. All of us are going to die. All
of us, at some point, are going to lay aside this physical body. But that's not the only death
there is for human beings. There is the death of suffering
the wrath of God for sin. What the Bible calls the second
death, eternal death. The death of suffering and torment
and agony. People hear from the doctor that
they're gonna die and they get all worried about it. I understand
that, I would too. But the death that they fear
is not the death they should be fearing. To stand before God in your sins. As one said, better to die a
thousand deaths than to die in your sins. You who believe, you who are
the Lord's sheep, you know something? You'll die. but you will not
die in your sins. You think about that. You will not die with a single
charge against you. People say, oh, I got to face
the judgment and learn what God thinks of me. Well, if that's
how it is, I already know how God thinks of you. He thinks
of you as a criminal against his kingdom, as a sinner worthy
of everlasting death. Do you know something? And I'm
not being boastful here. Any believer can say this. I
already know what God thinks of me. He thinks I'm righteous. He thinks I'm without sin. For
He has clothed me in the righteousness of His Son. He has written to
my account all that good that the Lord Jesus Christ did. And
He's also credited to me the death that Christ died. So from
God's viewpoint, I'm justified from all my sin.
The Bible says, he that is dead is freed from sin. And I don't
know why they translated that as freed from sin, because the
word is justified. He that is dead is justified
from sin. And later Paul says, and you
are dead, and your life is hidden in Christ. Do you realize if
you aren't a believer in the Lord Jesus Christ, so far as
God is concerned, you in Adam are dead. Death has already passed on you.
The blood of the Passover sacrifice was applied to you. Not by you,
but by God. And that blood was a testimony.
Judgment's already passed here. And so God went Passover. Christ is our Passover. And His
blood is upon us. And it says this man's already
dead. No more to do here. And we're justified. When the
Bible says, if any man be in Christ, he is a new creation,
that's what it's talking about. It's not talking about the fact
that we have a new nature or anything like that. It's saying
that the very fact that we are in Christ means we died in Christ,
meaning we already suffered the penalty for our sin in Christ.
We were raised with Christ. which means we've been justified.
Because why did God raise Christ from the dead? The sins that
He bore, He put them away. There was no more sin. He doesn't
belong in a tomb. Come on out. And Paul goes on
to say, we are seated. Notice that. He didn't say we
will be. He says we are seated with Him in the heavenly places. I already know. what the verdict
is on me. In Adam, it was guilty, and I
died in the last Adam. In Christ, I am as righteous
as he is, despite the fact I'm such a wicked
person. When I think of that scripture,
it's in the book of Solomon and it's metaphorical speech. But as that man in the book of
Solomon looks upon his beloved wife and he says to her, I see
no fault in you. He was absolutely enthralled
with this woman and saw everything beautiful in her, everything
attractive. He didn't see anything wrong
in her appearance. Believer, I want you to think
of this. When our Savior looks at us,
because that's who the man in Song of Solomon is picturing,
picturing Christ. He looks at us and he says, I
see no flaw in you. I don't see anything wrong with
you. You are altogether lovely. in
my sight. Why? Because He's substituted
for us. He's the God-man. We cannot get our heads wrapped
around this truth. He is not part God and part man.
He is all God-man. And I don't know how the infinite
God becomes fused with a finite man. But I don't have to know how,
because I'm not the one that had to do it. But I know it so. And here's the wonderful thing.
God, in joining Himself to human flesh, made a revelation of Himself
to us, and a revelation of Himself that we can understand. Now,
if God had sent down a set of theological books in which He
carefully described His nature in being, We would just read
it and scratch our head. I don't know what we're talking
about here. This is above my ability to understand. And so what did he do? He didn't
represent himself in a series of theological descriptions.
He made himself in the form of man and said, this is me. Philip said to him, show us the
Father and that'll be enough for us. And the Lord said, Philip,
if I've been with you so long, anyone who's seen me has seen
the Father. That old phrase, spit and image,
sounds like a silly phrase, but really it's just, it's mostly,
I think, a Southern phrase. And when you understand how Southerners
talk, you'll understand that the real words are spirit and
image. As you say, spit and image. and
he comes out spitting image. The Lord Jesus Christ is the
spirit and image of his father. You know Christ, you know the
father. You wanna know what God's like?
Whatever Jesus Christ is like, that's what God's like. And I
can understand that. Well, he's also called the good
shepherd. I could make another whole sermon out of what I got
here and maybe I will but I'll just briefly tell you a couple
of things and we'll close. In John chapter 10 he says I
am the good shepherd. The good shepherd. Lays down
his life. For the sheep. I look at men who count themselves
as shepherds of God's people today. I look at so many of them
and they're fleecing the sheep. They're living off the sheep. Jesus said, I'm the good shepherd.
I lay down my life for the sheep. The three characteristics of
sheep that stand out, and why it's so good to describe us this
way, it's that, number one, sheep are stupid and prone to wander.
Two, they're defenseless. Three, they're very fearful. We have a shepherd who's wise. We have a shepherd who is strong
to defend. We have a shepherd with a voice
we can hear and know who can calm our fears. In John 10, he
says, I know my sheep, and my sheep know me. My sheep know
my voice, and they follow me. He supplies all our needs. You
can look at Psalm 23 for that. Jehovah is my shepherd. I shall
not want that is I shall not lack anything you might wish
for more than you have but I'll guarantee you you've got everything
right now you have everything that could possibly be good for
you anymore it'd be a trouble to you any less you'd be in want
but we have a shepherd so wise and so loving and kind he gives
to every one of his sheep everything that would be good for them He said, I'd sure like to be
a sheep of a shepherd like that. Well, I have to be honest to
say that we don't make ourselves to be sheep. The Lord said to
those religious leaders, you don't believe me because you're
not of my sheep. He didn't say, you're not my
sheep because you don't believe. He says, you don't believe because
you're not my sheep. The Lord chose his sheep for the foundation
of the world. So you can't make yourself a
sheep, but here's something I know. You know, those are the workings
of God that we really have nothing to do with. What do we have to
do with? The promises of God. And the promises says this, look
unto Him and be saved. The promises say, you who are
weary, come to me, I'll give you rest. Those are the promises,
that's what we work with. But here's how you can know whether
you are a sheep or a goat. Brother Walter Groover, while
he was a missionary in Mexico, before the Lord took him home,
he said when he first went down there, and that was in the mid-60s,
he said he found out that there were goats down there that looked
a whole lot like sheep. And Walter says, well, how can
you tell the difference between them and sheep? He says, well,
you have to look at the one leading them. He said, now if it's sheep, the
shepherds out front leading them, because sheep follow. And then
he pointed, did you see over there? That's goats. And the
goat herders behind them throwing rocks at them, trying to get
them to go the way he thinks they ought to go. Now, most of human religion is
a bunch of goats, and they have a God that throws rocks at them
to get them to go the way he wants them to go, because they're
stubborn rebels, and that's the only way you can get them to
go that way. But our Lord says, he's a good shepherd, and he
says, I go before them. He's out front. If you're following
your shepherd, then you are a sheep. But if the only way you are willing
to do the things that God says we should do or things that Christ
says we should do is if you are bribed or threatened, you're
acting like a goat and you're not being led, you're being driven. that great shepherd of the sheep.
God give us grace to think on that son and give him praise
that he is such a wonderful shepherd. He lays down his life, he gave
it up, and even now stands between us and every danger to our souls. Someone came up to a believer. I read this from Spurgeon, so
it's at least 130 years ago. Came up to this guy and asked
him, he said, well, are you saved? The man looked at him and said,
well, is Christ still on the throne? The fellow said, yeah.
He said, well, then I'm saved. My shepherd's on the throne.
Well, I could go on, because I love this subject, and I'll
quit.