my life and my doctrine

Last night at St Matthias I was preaching on John 10.1-21 – Jesus the Good Shepherd. It reminds about how great a shepherd Jesus is, because he lay down his life for us. He did this when we were facing the threat of death. He did this for our sake, not his own, because he cares for his sheep. He did this willingly, not under compulsion or coercion.

Though the passage is primarily about the shepherd, the sheep aren’t totally passive. Sheep don’t follow thieves or robbers. Sheep follow their shepherd. And sheep know and hear the shepherd’s voice.

So, I mentioned that as sheep, the best way to hear our shepherd’s voice is to read his word. I publicly shared my new year’s resolution to read through the Bible in one year, and asked if others are keen to join me. (It’s only the 3rd, you can catch up!)

A few people have mentioned reading through the Bible in chronological order. I’m going to use the Blue Letter Bible reading plan that takes us through the Bible in the order the events historically took place ‘according to recent historical research’. I’ve also been pointed to this progress chart, which I’ll keep in my Bible to ‘check off’ chapters as they are read.

I also said in my sermon that I’m not likely to be a systematic few chapters every day kind of person. I expect I’ll do this in fits and starts. It’ll be fun and exciting to begin with. It’ll be a challenge at times. It’ll be easy to let it slide. However, I hope that this will be something I share with you about here, and maybe even you will come on this journey with me. Please let me know if you do, not so that I can check up on you, but that we may encourage each other to keep hearing the shepherd’s voice, in order to better follow this good shepherd.