John 10:16, commentary and pictures

Christ presents Himself as the true Shepherd who knows His own and lays down His life for them to give them abundant life and safe pasture. His other sheep are those beyond Israel then in view, for His love and saving work encircle the world to every nation, tribe and people to its remotest bounds. Them also He must bring, and they shall hear His voice, meaning He calls them to conversion and reconciliation to God, freeing them from the world's hold to follow Him and receive everlasting life. All who respond will be gathered into one flock under one Shepherd, united in Him as He is one with the Father, and that oneness reveals His love and proves His mission to the world. His followers are therefore to cooperate with Him and with heaven in seeking the lost, carrying the message of mercy beginning where they are to the earth's remotest bounds until the scattered are brought in.

Shepherd and Sheep Imagery

John 10:16 belongs to Christ's picture of Himself as the Messiah and true Shepherd who gathers the lost and those driven away, cares for the flock, and draws people to Himself, in contrast to leaders who drive people from the fold. In that picture those who believe in Him are His sheep, and sheep are helpless and dependent creatures whom the Shepherd tends. To be a lamb of His fold is to belong to Him and receive His constant care and watchful guardianship. Those who belong to Him have been purchased through His suffering and are regarded as His own with deep affection, receiving the fragrance of His righteousness, while the lambs of His flock are to be led by faithful shepherds with wisdom, love, and gentle care.

The Shepherd knows His sheep and is known by them, as sheep in the East learn their names and follow the shepherd who leads them to pasture. His followers hear His voice and follow Him closely together, knowing His call and understanding where He wants them to go. He leads without whip or force, and when one strays He calls it back by His voice, and the flock answers by pressing close together behind Him. He is the door of the sheep; by Him anyone entering will be saved and will go in and out and find pasture, while thieves come to steal and kill and destroy and hirelings flee and leave the sheep to the wolf because they care not for the sheep, that they might have life more abundantly.

He is the true Shepherd because He willingly gives His life for the sheep, no one taking it from Him, with power to lay it down and power to take it again by commandment received from His Father, for which the Father loves Him. The same image presents Him as the shepherd who knows His sheep and gives His life for them, including sheep beyond the fold already gathered whom He must bring to hear His voice as one flock under one shepherd. He stays always with His flock to defend them from danger and keep them from the wolves. He seeks the lost, guides scattered sheep back, finds those who are lost and carries them to the fold, and leads them beside green pastures and living waters that refresh and sustain them. His shepherding work is earnest and tireless search, reaching people wherever they can hear Him and calling them to draw near.

The shepherd-and-sheep teaching uses familiar everyday scenes to illustrate immortal truth. By everyday things such as shepherds and sheep He makes eternal truth clear and memorable in a way that reaches the heart. In this way familiar daily life is turned toward spiritual realities and connected with them.

Other Sheep Identified

The other sheep are those beyond the fold then in view, beyond Israel itself. Christ's saving work is not limited to one people or nation, but His love and sympathy reach beyond His own kindred and nation to encircle the world. He laid down His life not for one flock only but for all the sheep of His pasture, Jews and Greeks, Gentiles, slaves and free people, every tribe and nation, Jews and Gentiles in all nations and tongues and peoples to the earth's remotest bounds. He came to gather into His fold all who seek Him and are ready to believe when He is revealed, as seen in the Canaanite woman who belonged among these lost sheep. The whole human family has the gracious invitation to accept and believe in Jesus, and everyone may come as they hear the Shepherd's voice, know the voice of the True Shepherd, and follow Him.

While He speaks He thinks upon souls all over the earth who are misled by false shepherds. They are those He longs to gather as the sheep of His pasture while they are scattered among wolves, on hills and in deserts.

They include faithful people outside the Sabbath-keeping community who have not rejected the light about the Sabbath. When the Sabbath is proclaimed more fully they recognize the truth, join God's people, and endure persecution with them. They include many sincere Christians in the Roman Catholic communion who have not seen the truth because they lack access to the Word, to whom God will bring light so that many will take their place among His people. They include sheep and lambs still in their own churches in large cities and byways who will hear the last message of mercy and leave those churches when they embrace the truth.

They include the erring, the weak and trembling, and even those who have apostatized from the truth, strayed beyond the fold, left the truth, or been wounded and driven away. Leaving serving the Lord is leaving the fold of Christ, and leaving the truth is leaving His fold. Yet such fallen ones are still His sheep whom He must bring in with a special call to come fully into the one fold, and those who have left should be persuaded to come back and may be restored to it.

Jew and Gentile are brought into one spiritual fold in and through Christ. This is the fulfillment of the covenant made with Abraham that all families of the earth would be blessed. No outward privilege or position can secure the spiritual blessings of God's covenant, and no outward disability can keep anyone from those blessings if he meets the conditions. In every place and in all ages he that fears God and works righteousness is accepted with Him, for name or position has no real value with God, and God will receive all who hold the beginning of their confidence firm unto the end.

Little children and youth are lambs of His fold who belong to God under His blessing, peace, and care and must be nurtured and cherished. Christ has a fold for lambs and a flock that includes lambs who are children and youth. Children brought up free from evil habits and sin through prayer, labor, restraint, instruction, and correction with the rod after being made to see their faults and prayed with will yet be counted with the lambs of Christ's fold. The lambs need wise help from parents, encouragement to be obedient and to love righteousness, and every possible advantage to form characters approved by God, including schools where they can learn lessons from the Scriptures of truth in connection with other studies, where religious interests are carefully guarded, and where the lessons of Christ are imparted with clearness and solemnity so they will never be forgotten.

Gathering by His Voice

Them also He must bring, and that bringing is conversion, which is Christ's work alone. He speaks with authority to gather those beyond the existing fold, and as they hear His voice and follow Him they become one flock under one Shepherd. His call breaks the world's hold upon people, freeing them from greed and ambition so that they follow the Saviour.

To hear His voice is to recognize and obey the True Shepherd's voice. It means coming to Him and confessing sins, to be freely received, reconciled to God, and given everlasting life, for no one who comes to Him is cast out. His leading is illustrated by God bringing Israel out of Egypt into the wilderness, separating them from Egypt so they could know God and Christ and learn obedience to their invisible Leader, a discipline that prepared them to be His distinctive people and a testimony to the nations.

They are brought through disciples carrying the message of mercy. That message was to be given to Israel first and then to Jews and Gentiles in all nations, tongues, and peoples to the earth's remotest bounds, so that all who believe are gathered into one church. The work was to begin at Jerusalem and Judea, where Christ lived, suffered, was rejected and condemned, but it was not to stop there nor be confined to one locality; it was to be extended by the early disciples to the earth's remotest bounds and is still to be done in many places.

What God will bring about, human agreements cannot control or prevent, for Christ is the one Shepherd who will gather His sheep into one fold. Yet He does not force anyone into His fold, for people must respond to the light given them, and their decisions have eternal consequences.

Being gathered into the fold means conversion and adoption as sons and daughters of God. Those who belong to His fold show evidence of regeneration in character, words, conduct, and influence, by faith that works by love and purifies the soul. Even a timid baptized boy who could not speak publicly was one of Christ's lambs, and his changed countenance testified to his conversion.

The fold is a place of safety enclosing His flock, and children need help to choose the path that leads into it before it is too late. The church is that fold which encloses His flock and holds His precious people, very precious in His sight, which He longs to see without spot or blemish and yearns after with unspeakable love. Yet mere outward connection with any church will not save, for only personal faith in a personal Saviour brings the soul into spiritual union with Christ, feeding on Him as the bread of life that endures to eternal life, so that everyone who sees the Son and believes on Him may have everlasting life, never die, and be raised up at the last day.

The great Shepherd finally gathers the white-robed ransomed into one fold, and that fold is heaven. There the faithful worker and the soul saved through his labor are together greeted by the Lamb in the midst of the throne and led to the tree of life and to the fountain of living waters to share the glory of the Redeemer. Being gathered there with redeemed souls makes heaven more precious to those who have been faithful with self-denying effort, patience, forbearance, and earnest yearning to save souls from being lost.

One Fold Unity

All His sheep will be united as one flock under one Shepherd, and that unity is the badge of discipleship reflecting the unity of the Father and the Son. Those who stand under His banner are united in their work and share one mind and judgment, and union with Him restores loyalty to the Creator and leads to love for God and His law. Their oneness reveals His love, shows that God sent His Son to save sinners and transform character, and convinces the world of that mission.

He came to make that oneness real by living the pattern life for all His children and revealing the love that binds them heart to heart. His people are to be under Him alone, not under human claims to kingly power, trusting Him to guide and direct His work while serving together in brotherly fellowship under His law. They are therefore to be united in one great work with combined consecrated effort, with every part of the vineyard worked with regard for the others rather than one group grasping advantages and leaving other fields barren. They show tender respectful regard for one another, cherish the influence that recovers sinners, and display on earth in love and unity a symbol of the heavenly family, striving as good soldiers to win sinners to loyalty while righteous principles soften the untamed disposition. Churches have gifts and power to bless and strengthen one another and to gather sheep and lambs into that fold, enlarging it as believers carry truth to others and bring more people in. This unity is proved in the testing time for admittance into God's family and is measured by the home, where obeying His words and working His works without grieving the Spirit lets a brightly burning lamp give light to those in darkness so that seeing good works they glorify the Father.

All depend on His atonement, and answering His prayer means being one with Him and the Father as He is one with the Father, as joint heirs with Him to the heavenly inheritance. His sheep dishonor Him when they crowd and push one another and create dissension out of inferior things by letting Satan work on the imagination, but that divine relationship leaves no room for Satan's leaven of dissension. It binds believers in holy fellowship with one another, loving as brethren, kind, courteous, patient and forbearing, with souls full of Him flowing out in pure streams of love and goodness toward one another, because unity is strength and brings His sweet peace into the heart. He gives His whole soul to His little flock as their Shepherd and does not fail or grow discouraged amid dissension and strife. While others sleep He spends whole nights in prayer, gaining strength to meet temptation and praying for those who will not pray for themselves, so His followers are not to be intimidated by dissension and strife but to trust in Him and take courage from His example.

Sharing the Gathering Work

Christ has sheep beyond the fold already gathered, and He must bring them in so that they will hear His voice and all belong to one fold under one Shepherd, and His followers are to cooperate with Him in seeking and saving sinners. Those who do not yet know Him are to be helped to become acquainted with Him, with Christ revealed through the life and work of believers, each worker beginning where he is to interest others in the truth, for Christ works through human agents in many places. He is the Good Shepherd who came from heaven to seek and save the lost, and His work calls His followers to labor earnestly for the unsaved. Lost sheep outside the fold must be led back to the Shepherd who gave His life for them, and His laborers cooperate with God in this bringing by laying hold with living faith on divine power to lead them back and turn the wandering to the path of life, working on with no time to lose while the day lasts.

Bringing them in is the duty of all who partake of the divine nature, and those who appreciate the plan of salvation and the infinite price paid for redemption will not live for themselves alone nor be content to save merely their own souls. All heaven is interested in the salvation of souls, and believers on earth cooperate with angels by valuing souls for whom Christ died and feeling intense anxiety that heaven's interest not be in vain and that Christ not have died for them in vain. With firm hold on God for strength and grace they move forward as co-laborers with the Redeemer, and through earnest judicious labor to spread the light of truth they bring many to the fold. Seeking and saving them is the greatest work on earth because Christ paid the infinite price of His own blood for them, whether great or small, rich or poor, bond or free, and everyone who believes in Him as a personal Saviour is under bonds to God to be pure and holy and to do active service as a spiritual worker in this seeking as a sacred duty plainly marked out. If one blessed with light does not diffuse light to others he loses the rich grace bestowed, his own light diminishes and his soul is brought into peril, while those to whom he should have been a shining light miss the labor intended for them through the human instrument, and thus the unsought sheep is not brought back. Souls out of the fold are perishing in sin and Christ gave His life for them, both nigh even in believers' own households and afar off, and they must be brought in by enlarging borders and extending labors with earnest consecrated effort, maintaining living connection with God in a pure holy life ready for the great day soon to come, imbued with the Master's Spirit to see souls all around, a work that leaves no time for criticism or questioning.

Those called to teach the Word should work to bring the lost to Christ and the church, for bringing lost sheep into His fold is sacred work. A minister strengthened by daily communion with God and knowledge of Scripture is fitted to speak words that guide wandering souls into the Shepherd's fold. Ministers are to reach people outside the fold and set them to work for themselves and for others.

The minister is shepherd of the flock and must care for sheep and lambs by searching out the lost and straying and bringing them back. This shepherd work means not merely presenting truth from the desk but visiting every family to inquire into the spiritual condition of every member, with the soul imbued with the love of God and winning the way to hearts by kindly courtesy, laboring successfully for parents and children by entreating, warning, and encouraging as each case demands, while keeping the church alive and laboring together with members for the conversion of sinners, which brings far better results than if the minister performed all the work alone. Leaving the truth is leaving the fold, yet those who leave can be brought back and restored to it, and the shepherd's work is to minister to sinners' needs, visit believers when sick, inquire after those absent from meetings, and make personal effort to help those known to be in spiritual danger. A shepherd's work is not finished with preaching but includes caring for souls in this same visiting and seeking way.

Christ has sheep beyond the fold who must be brought to Him, and when gathered they rejoice in His fold under the chief Shepherd, a seeking and saving that reaches even places without churches through ministry where people are. He came to a world marred by sin and went to those who needed Him most, and His followers are to copy His example by taking truth where it is not known and caring for the sheep and lambs entrusted to them. Those who first present the truth should continue their efforts until souls who have received it are gathered into His fold. God's lost sheep are scattered in many places and need to be reached, yet the work of bringing them the truth is being neglected. Christ has people still outside His fold, and His followers are to work with His help to bring them to Him.

Sheep and lambs still in their own churches in large cities and byways will hear the last message of mercy and leave those churches when they embrace the truth, and they must be called into the fold immediately by providing a place where they can assemble to worship God, which requires building meetinghouses and not leaving them without a place to gather. Those who come out need a humble place prepared for worship and assembling together, so meetinghouses must be built for each new company as soon as it comes out, simple and neat buildings that give character to the important truths advocated. People as sheep brought into the fold to worship together need a place where they can assemble.

Bringing children into His fold is part of this gathering, for His fold is where His lambs belong. Little children in the home are lambs of His fold under His blessing and peace, and therefore they must be nurtured and cherished, with parents giving them needed attention even if work on the farm and care of inanimate things must be neglected. Eight children were converted and brought into His fold, showing the fold as the community of those gathered to Him. Children are urged to seek God and accept the salvation freely offered so that He may lead them to belong to Him and gather them into His own fold. Parents are to lead their children into His fold by entrusting them to Him and working with Him as their characters are formed. Parents connected with Christ make salvation the first concern, training obedience to parents and God in purity and holiness and cooperating with the Holy Spirit, and by tender care shaped by His love children become lambs in His fold, as seen when seeking children turned from sin.

A mother who rules her children with harshness and lacks patience and self-control fails to bless and save them and gains no souls for the fold. A mother's patient kind example and discipline can help lead her children to His fold, while harsh uncontrolled treatment trains, rules, and ruins them, and such mothers are unlikely to gather anyone to Him. Children are lambs of His flock who belong to God, and indulgent parenting that leaves self-indulgence and disobedience uncorrected, or overbearing inconsiderate correction that makes their lives miserable and destroys respect for father, mother, brothers, and sisters, prepares those lambs for Satan to work his will upon them. The flock includes lambs who are children and youth, who need wise help from parents, encouragement to be obedient and to love righteousness, and every possible advantage to form characters approved by God, including schools where they learn lessons from the Scriptures of truth in connection with other studies, where religious interests are carefully guarded, and where the lessons of Christ are imparted with clearness and solemnity so they will never be forgotten.

God calls lost people back to His fold, and nature rightly studied together with Scripture can help guide them to Him, for creation speaks of its Creator and the Holy Spirit uses its lessons to impress spiritual truth on the heart. Followers are to consider whom they have gathered to His fold, for bringing others to Him is fruit of their influence and service. His people as sheep in His care must be guarded and those who stray sought so they are not lost. People wandering in error can be brought into His fold when no longer misled from the plain meaning of Scripture. He welcomes sheep into His fold, and that welcome supports opening the door of hope to one who pleads to return, accepting confessions and giving another opportunity to serve even when there is no clear evidence of changed character. Those still gathered around the fold but struggling to overcome should not be driven away but encouraged and strengthened with every help available.

Jesus gives a special call to the erring, the weak and trembling, and even those who have apostatized to come fully into the fold, for those outside through error, weakness, or apostasy are still His sheep whom He must bring in. The Great Shepherd cares for sheep strayed beyond the fold and must bring them back, and His followers must show the same continuing care, compassion, patience, and tenderness toward erring people, seeking them rather than abandoning them when they resist counsel or leave. This lays a special duty on believers to go and search for these lost sheep.