When we hear Jesus promising us an abundant life – which is exactly what He does promise – it’s easy to think “Yeah, right!  Must be for someone else.”  But actually … it’s not.  It’s a promise for everyone who decides to follow Him.  Question is – how does it work?  How can you have an “abundant life”?

As we race through life day after day one of the things that I think happens to us is that we somehow get conned or duped into the mantra of the times, ‘the great lie’ I call it. And that great lie goes something like this: If you earn lots of money and you spend it on this and this and this and this and this, this toy, these clothes, that holiday, this dining experience, if you live your life like that, then you’re going to be happy.

Now that lie is as painful for the rich as it is for the poor. For the poor, people who simply don’t have much money, many who don’t even have enough food and shelter, they see this dream of wealth and it aches to think that they have so little and so many others have so much. It’s not fair.

And for the wealthy this lie is just as much a pain but only different. They’re in a position to chase that dream; the only problem is that it’s like a mirage in the desert. When they get there, this place where they thought they’d arrive at, this place where having earned and spent the money on themselves they should be happy, they discover it’s a mirage, it’s a sham.

And so they try again and again and again, many spend their whole lives chasing happiness only to be disappointed at every turn. And before you know it they’re looking back on a wasted life and that is so tragic. So what’s the answer?

I think as we head into yet another new year now’s not a bad time to be asking these questions. What’s life all about? Am I going to be happy this year? And so that’s why today we’re kicking off a series of programs that I’ve called ‘An Abundant Life In Jesus’. Because so many of us have spent so much of our lives chasing happiness, me included. That’s what I was looking for and that’s what I could never find.

So many of us wish we could be happy and yet we don’t really know what happiness is so we go looking for it in all sorts of places. Jesus promised something outrageous to His disciples, to all those who followed hard after Him. He promised them an abundant life, in fact a super abundant life. Sounds fantastic doesn’t it?

Someone once asked me, “Okay but what does that actually mean, an abundant life?” That’s a good question. I mean a super abundant life sounds just perfect but what is it? What does it look like and how can we have it?

Well let’s kick off by having a listen to what Jesus actually said. This passage comes from John chapter 10 beginning at verse 1. He said:

Very truly I tell you anyone who does not enter the sheep fold by the gate but climbs in by another way is a thief and a bandit. The one who enters by the gate is the shepherd of the sheep. The gate keeper opens the gate for him, the sheep hear his voice, he calls his own sheep by name and leads them out.

When he’s brought out all his own he goes ahead of them and the sheep will follow him because they know his voice. They will not follow a stranger but they will run from him because they do not know the voice of strangers. Jesus used this figure of speech with them but they didn’t understand what He was saying to them.

So again Jesus said to them, ‘Very truly I tell you, I am the gate for the sheep. All who came before me were thieves and bandits but the sheep didn’t listen to them. I am the gate, whoever enters by me will be saved and will come in and go out and find pasture.

The thief comes only to steal, kill and destroy. I came that they may have life and have it abundantly. I am the good shepherd, the shepherd lays down his life for his sheep. The hired hand who isn’t the shepherd and doesn’t own the sheep sees a wolf coming and leaves the sheep and runs away and the wolf snatches them and scatters them. The hired hand runs away because a hired hand doesn’t care for the sheep.

I am the good shepherd. I know my own and my own know me just as the Father knows me and I know the Father and I lay down my life for the sheep.

Now that’s a really interesting passage, it’s a beautiful picture; the shepherd and his flock. Back in those days, let me explain, the shepherd normally had a small number of sheep, 50 to 100, and literally he knew each one of them by name. Now sheep, we sometimes think are stupid animals. They’re not, they’re actually quite bright.

They’re problem simply is that they’re short sighted and so that’s why he calls them, they hear his voice and they go to him and then he goes ahead of them and they follow on behind him looking for pasture and water and the shepherd keeps them safe.

Now being a shepherd was a tradition. It was handed down from father to son. A real shepherd would literally protect his sheep with his life from wild animals and robbers we’ll look at that tomorrow. So there’s the shepherd with his flock wandering the rocky plateau and in winter he’d bring them into the sheep fold in the town or the village which is what Jesus was talking about. He’d take them in and all the shepherds would basically bring their flocks into the same sheepfold.

The next morning the shepherd, one by one, would come to the front gate, the real shepherd of each flock and because he had a personal relationship the sheep would know his voice and he would call them and they would go only when their shepherd came. Not with a stranger because they didn’t know the stranger’s voice. They would go with their shepherd.

That’s exactly the picture that Jesus paints here. So this is a picture that the people had in their minds in 1st century Israel as Jesus was telling them this story; this winsome picture of the lonely shepherd tending his flock, protecting them with his life.

That’s what Jesus was drawing on in this story but did you notice verse 6 of John chapter 10?

Jesus used this figure of speech with them but they did not understand what He was saying to them.

You and I, we wander through some difficult places in life, we truly do. When we’re young we think we’re invincible, we think huh, we can conquer every mountain, but life soon teaches us that we’re more of a small boat on a great and mighty ocean.

And yes Jesus promises us an abundant life. Again we’ll look at what that means over the next couple of days, but look at the context; the context of this abundant life is as one of His sheep in His flock under the safety and the care of the true shepherd.

See it’s this picture of safety and protection and of a shepherd who did in fact lay down His life to save us – to save us from the ravages of the devil; to save us from our own sin; to save us from God’s judgement.

Storms will come and go, wild animals will come in life to tear at our flesh, thieves will come to kill and destroy, bad things will happen to good people. Is there any one of us who doesn’t have one thing, something in our lives right now that hurts? Something we wish wasn’t there. I mean is there?

Jesus never ever, ever promised His disciples a comfortable ride. In fact quite to the contrary, He said to them, “Guys, if they persecuted me they’re certainly going to persecute you.” And at a time when His disciples were afraid, John chapter 16, verse 33. He said:

I have said these things to you so that in me you may have peace. For in this world you WILL face persecution but take courage I have conquered the world.

The promise of an abundant life comes not as a promise to make all our circumstances and all our relationships and all our finances and all our futures rosy, that was never ever His promise. No, the promise of an abundant life comes to us in the context of sheep wandering the plateau with their shepherd in a dangerous place.

It comes to us in the context of the realities and the rough and the tumble of life as we live our lives under the protection and the safety and the sacrificial love of this one true shepherd – Jesus:

I came that they may have life and have it abundantly.

And because of the world in which we live, that abundant life was purchased for you and me at a price, at a very great price.

Jesus promised each of his disciples – that’s anyone who believes in Him, follows Him, obeys Him – an abundant life.  Yeah, right!!  But in the same breath – in the very same verse in the Bible, He also says that there’s a thief – and all the thief is interested in is to steal, kill and destroy.  Well – if Jesus talked about him – this thief – then maybe it’s worth you and me taking a closer look.

I was speaking recently with a group of people, it was a Church service on a Sunday morning and I asked them this question, “Is there anybody here in this room today who doesn’t have at least one thing going on in their lives that hurts? One thing they wish wasn’t there, one thing that they want God to heal or to change or to solve or to take away?”

If you don’t have at least one such thing in your life raise your hand in the air. There would have been, I’m guessing, over a hundred people in the room. Silence. I cast my eyes around the room, I just allowed the silence to hang there momentarily and not a single hand went up in the air, not one.

These were all people who believed in Jesus. These were all people who had heard Jesus say, John chapter 10, verse 10:

The thief comes only to steal, kill and destroy. I came that they might have life and have it abundantly.

They all heard Jesus promise them an abundant life. Literally what Jesus says here, the original Greek language, it means a super abundant life and yet everybody had something in their lives that was troubling them and you know what it’s like, your whole body can be healthy but you jam your finger in a door and the excruciating pain in that one finger is all you can think about.

The fact that the rest of your life is just fine at that point is pretty much irrelevant; it’s all about that one bit that hurts.

It’s true isn’t it? It is so easy to live our lives focusing on that one bit in our lives that hurts; The difficult relationship, the financial pressure, the problem at work, the worry about what other people are thinking about us. It’s pretty much different for each one of us but when we have that one thing, or perhaps even two or three, that ache that we wish would just go away then it consumes us. It robs us of life.

Now this promise of Jesus to give us an abundant life comes in the context of a much wider story. So let’s have a listen to what He says. John chapter 10 beginning at verse 1, He said:

Truly I tell you anyone who doesn’t enter the sheep fold by the gate but climbs in by another way is a thief and a bandit. The one who enters by the gate is the shepherd of the sheep. The gate keeper opens the gate for him and the sheep hear his voice. He calls his own sheep by name and leads them out. When he’s brought out all his own he goes ahead of them and the sheep will follow him because they know his voice.

They won’t follow a stranger but they’ll run away from him because they do not know the voice of a stranger.’ Jesus used this figure of speech with them but they didn’t understand what He was saying to them

So again Jesus said to them, ‘Very truly I tell you I am the gate for the sheep. All who came before me are thieves and bandits but the sheep did not listen to them. I am the gate, whoever enters by me will be saved and will come in and go out and find pasture. The thief comes only to steal, kill and destroy. I came that they may have life and have it abundantly.

I am the good shepherd, the good shepherd lays down his life for his sheep. The hired hand who isn’t the shepherd and doesn’t own the sheep sees the wolf coming and leaves the sheep and runs away and the wolf snatches them and scatters them.

The hired hand runs away because a hired hand doesn’t care for the sheep. I am the good shepherd. I know my own, my own know me just as the Father knows me and I know the Father and I lay down my life for the sheep.’

This was a very familiar story to those who were listening. They knew the profession of a shepherd was one of honour, one of protecting his sheep. They knew that as a shepherd led his sheep out over the stony plateau of Israel in search of pasture, thieves would often attack to try and steal the sheep. Wild animals would sometimes attack to steal a sheep and eat it for dinner. It was the reality of life for a shepherd.

And a true shepherd’s job was to defend his flock. But let’s focus for a moment in this story on the thief.

The thief comes only to steal, kill and destroy.

Jesus is telling a parable here, a parable that’s meant to reach into our lives. And the thief in this story is the enemy, the devil, the tempter, the deceiver he’s referred to elsewhere. The one who dangles glittery baubles under our noses, trinkets and treasures that are so alluring, so seductive they appear to promise so much. Can he get us to wander off?

And other times he comes simply to attack us through circumstances, through other people. We see that in Job’s story in the Old Testament, how the devil uses financial collapse, sickness, family breakdown, even so called friends to attack Job.

Paul, the Apostle gives us a glimpse into the spiritual realm to tell us what’s going on when we’re under attack from this enemy, this thief who comes to steal and kill and destroy. Ephesians chapter 6 beginning at verse 12 Paul writes:

Our struggle isn’t against enemies of blood and flesh but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers of this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places.

See there’s a spiritual dimension to life and if we ignore that we do so at our peril. There is a devil, he is our enemy and sometimes he comes dressed as an angel of light to deceive us. Other times he sneaks up like a thief or he attacks openly like a wolf. All that is in the Bible and we ignore this, this spiritual dimension of evil at our peril.

But look at it with me again if you will at what Jesus says about Himself:

O again Jesus said to them, ‘Very truly I tell you I’m the gate for the sheep. All who came before me were thieves and bandits but the sheep didn’t listen to them. I’m the gate, whoever enters by me will be saved and will come in and go out and find pasture.’

In summer the shepherds would stay out over night with their flocks. They’d roam further because it was warmer and dotted around the place on the plateau were pens that had been built using dense hedges. So by night the shepherd would lead his sheep into one of these pens but the pens had no gate so he would sleep in the opening, in the gateway.

He, in effect, became the gate to keep the sheep in over night safe and sound so none would wander off and to keep the thieves and the wild animals out. He would fight any that came with his shepherd staff and his rod, a kind of club with spikes. He was the gate, he was their safety. He gave them protection and so safety and peace.

And that is Jesus in our lives today my friend, make no mistake about it. The thief will come to steal, kill and destroy. To rob us of the abundant life that Jesus has planned. The wild animals will come to tear at our flesh and to corrupt our flesh. And yes we could wander off in our own direction but out there on our own you and I are sitting ducks.

The place of safety is with Jesus. The place of safety is close to our shepherd, the true shepherd who laid down His life for us. Think about it, if we’re constantly being ravaged by the devil how can we possibly be having an abundant life? Yep there are going to be struggles in our lives and when they come, when things hurt the place to go is Jesus, the one true shepherd; the one who lays down His life for His sheep.

He is meant to be our refuge. He can and He will protect us. What a pity, so many suffer through things alone when all along Jesus is waiting. You see the thief only comes to steal and kill and destroy but Jesus came that we may have life and have it abundantly.

If there’s one thing we can all agree on about Jesus, it’s that He didn’t do anything by half measures.  No –– He threw Himself into things and when He said something, He meant it.  So – when He promised us an “abundant life” – the words in the original Greek language literally mean – a super–abundant life!  Told you – He doesn’t do anything by halves!

One of the ways that God explains His relationship with us, is that He’s our Father, and we’re His children.  And actually, when you think about it, a father–child relationship is, or at least should be – an incredible blessing.  So, if God’s our Father, and we’re His children – shouldn’t that be … a blessing?

We’re chatting together this week on the program about living out the abundant life that Jesus promised us. A life overflowing with His grace and mercy, and love and peace, and joy and blessing. By that we don’t always mean abundant finances or complete safety. God has a tendency not to wrap us in cotton wool but to be with us out there in life, in the good times and the bad with His presence, which is what gives us that sense of overflow, that sense of abundance.

It’s funny how most of us in our heart of hearts desire a life that’s, well perfect. Blessed in every way, every relationship perfect, finances perfect, home life perfect, our own sense of self-perfect, everything’s perfect. But life just isn’t like that. In fact as you and I think back on our lives thus far chances are that there are very few times, if ever, where we could tick the box in every part of our lives as having been perfect. Tick, tick, tick, tick, tick.

And yet somehow we yearn secretly, even subconsciously for this time in our lives when everything’s going to be perfect and the mere fact that it isn’t can be so disappointing to so many people. And yet I come back to the fact that Jesus promised this abundant life – not wrapped away somewhere in cotton wool, but out there in this precarious sometimes threatening place that we call ‘life’. This is in fact is what He said. John chapter 10 beginning at verse 1:

Truly I tell you anyone who doesn’t enter the sheepfold by the gate but climbs in by another way is a thief and a bandit. The one who enters by the gate is the shepherd of the sheep. The gatekeeper opens the gate for him, the sheep hear his voice, he calls his own by name and leads them out.

 When he’s brought out all his own he goes ahead of them and the sheep follow him because they know his voice. They won’t follow a stranger but they’ll run away from him because they don’t know his voice.’ Jesus used this figure of speech with them but they did not understand what He was saying.

So again Jesus said to them, ‘Very truly I tell you, I am the gate for the sheep. All who came before me are thieves and bandits but the sheep didn’t listen to them. I am the gate, whoever enters by me will be saved and will come in and go out and find pasture.

The thief comes only to steal, kill and destroy. I came that you may have life and have it abundantly. I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep.

As we saw yesterday the life of a shepherd and the lives of sheep back there in the 1st century were indeed precarious. The shepherd would take his flock out onto the rocky plateau of Israel in search of pasture. There were many threats, thieves, wild animals and it wasn’t unusual for the shepherd to have to defend his sheep sometimes with his own life. And interestingly in that beautiful prayer that Jesus prayed just before He was crucified, He actually said this about you and me to His Father as well, John chapter 17, verses 12 and 15:

While I was with them I protected them in Your name that You have given me. I guarded them and not one of them was lost except the one destined to be lost so that the Scriptures might be fulfilled. I’m not asking You to take them out of the world but I ask You to protect them from the evil one.

In other words, “Dad, let’s not take them out of all these situations and wrap them in cotton wool but rather let’s be there with them and protect them from the evil one.” Do you see how different God’s perspective is? His promise is for an abundant life not a perfect one and I have to tell you as I sat and thought about that a lot it makes an enormous amount of sense to me.

I’m a father, I have children, I love them dearly. When they were young they lived with my wife Jacqui and me in our house under our care and our protection with our provision as is right. That’s why God gives us children and that’s why He gives children parents. But there comes a time and in fact it starts quite early, where as they grow up we as good parents give them more and more responsibility for themselves.

Because one of the main parts of growing up is shifting the responsibility for their care from the parents to the children as they become capable of accepting that responsibility. Not always easy and it’s one of the reasons that teenage years can be so stressful because often teenagers and I know this was true of me as a teenager, they want to behave like children and be treated like adults.

In other words they still want their parents to do all the things they ever did for them when they were kids and incapable of doing them back then, whilst at the same time giving them all the freedoms that an adult has. Tension with a capital ‘T’; children in effect want the best of both worlds, the perfect life. Sound familiar?

And it’s the same often in our relationship with God. We want Him to fix everything, make everything perfect in our lives whilst at the same time we do things that don’t honour Him and those things, which He calls sin, actually have consequences. And yet He’s the perfect Father, have a listen, Romans chapter 8 beginning at verse 12:

So then brothers and sisters we are dead as not to the flesh, to live in accordance to the flesh, for if we live according to the flesh you will die. But if by the Spirit you’ll put to death the deeds of the body you will live. For all who are led by the Spirit of God are children of God, for you didn’t receive a spirit of slavery to fall back into fear but you’ve received a spirit of adoption.

When we cry ‘Abba Father’, it is that very Spirit bearing witness with our spirit that we are children of God and if children then heirs, heirs of God and joint heirs with Christ. If in fact we suffer with Him so that we may also be glorified with Him.

It’s a beautiful passage. One of the most beautiful passages in the Bible because it puts everything into perspective for me. Sometimes in the cut and thrust and hurts of life we lose our heavenly perspective, we lose sight of the fact that God is indeed our Father, in fact Jesus called Him ‘Abba’ which literally means Dad. If we live our lives for Him, if we choose to be led by the Spirit of God rather than by the desires of our flesh then we are children of God. And deep down if we’ll let Him the Spirit of God witnesses to us that we are His children, the children of the living God.

That means something. It means what Jesus prayed for you and me back there in the Garden of Gethsemane. It means God’s protection from the evil one rather than being wrapped completely in cotton wool. Do you see the difference? God wants us to be out there in life just as you and I as parents want our children to be out there in life and we’ll help them and protect them where we can but they need to grow up, they need to live their lives and they need to suffer the consequences of the things they do wrong because its the only way that they learn.

I for one would hate to be wrapped in cotton wool by God. I want to experience life and all that it’s meant to be and that means sometimes, well sometimes we get hurt but all along God is my Father. Father’s know this, when our children grow up we don’t stop being their father, we don’t stop being there to help and to advise when they need, we don’t stop caring for them and one day they will receive their inheritance from us.

Same with our Dad God, we are and always will be His children and His protection is always available to us from the evil one. Can I tell you something? Somewhere in that knowledge, deep within, lies a source of His abundance in my life. He loves me, He wants me to know Him and to honour Him and to be all that He made me to be, to experience every day that He wrote for me in His book even before any of them ever existed.

That’s where abundance begins, as a child of the Father who is God who created us and created us to live a life in all its abundance.

Life can be a grind, and frankly that can get us down.  We all know that.  And so our view of what life is, and what it should be, becomes all twisted – inside out and upside down.  So it’s time to get things right way up again.  It’s time to discover what God has to say about the life He wants for you.