The True Sheep
Our Lord here says that He and His sheep know each other; that His knowledge of them is one of the tokens of the Good Shepherd; and that their knowledge of Him is one of the tokens of the true sheep. Now, what is this knowledge by which His true sheep are known? It is the knowledge of friendship and love. It is something living and personal, arising out of the whole of our inward nature, and filling all our powers and affections. As He knows us, through and through all that we have been and are, all that we desire and need, hope and fear, do and leave undone, all our thoughts, affections, purposes, all our secret acts, all our hidden life, which is hid with Him in God so do His true sheep know him; His love, care, tenderness, mercy, meekness, compassion, patience, gentleness, all His forecasting and prudent watchfulness, His indulgent and pitiful condescension. It is the knowledge of heart with heart, soul with soul, spirit with spirit; a sense of presence and companionship; so that when most alone, we are perceptibly least alone; when most solitary, we are least forsaken. Let us consider how we may attain this knowledge.
I. First, it must be by following Him. "My sheep hear My voice, and they follow Me." By living such a life as He lived. Likeness to Him is the power of knowing Him: nay, rather, it is knowledge itself there is no other. It is by likeness that we know, and by sympathy that we learn. If we would only take the Sermon on the Mount and read it, not as the world has paraphrased it, but as He spoke it; if we would only fulfil it, not as men dispense with it, but as He lived it upon earth, we should begin to know somewhat of those deeper perceptions of his love, tenderness, and compassion which are the peace of His elect.
II. And further than this, there are peculiar faculties of the heart which must be awakened, if we would know Him as He knows us. There can be no true obedience without the discipline of habitual devotion. Meditation is the proof of prayer, and prayer is the life of meditation; and they are therefore inseparable.
III. And lastly, this true knowledge of Him is not a transitory state of feeling. Out of obedience and devotion arises an habitual faith which makes Him, though unseen, yet perceptibly a part of all our life. With this we shall not run great risks of deceiving ourselves. This strong and sustained consciousness of His presence makes all things within the veil more real than those we see. The unseen Head of the Church living and glorified; the mystical body knit in one bythe Holy Ghost; the Good Shepherd tending His one fold on the everlasting hills; the familiar image of His loving countenance; and these, all day long, in the midst of work and in their hour of rest, at home or abroad, among men or in solitude, are spread before the sight of hearts that know Him by love.
H. E. Manning, Sermons,vol. iii., p. 21.
I. Observe, first, that there is a double knowing spoken of here, and that double knowing is distinctly spoken of in the two clauses, there being two correlative clauses, the one depending upon the other. There is (1) the Shepherd's general knowledge of His flock. He sees them all. They are all before Him. He can tell at a glance whether any are missing. He can tell at a glance whether strangers are in the flock. All are before Him. But (2) there is beyond this a particular knowledge. He calls His sheep by name. Each one in his own personality, each one is before Him as though there were no other in this crowded world. The Shepherd, especially in this land, had this intimate knowledge of his sheep. And this knowledge thus intimate was a knowledge of care and love. It was not a love for humanity; it was a love for the separate souls of which humanity is made up. His care bosoms itself upon His love for each one.
II. "I am known of Mine." That second is the answering image of the first, as it is cast from Christ upon the heart of man. As there is a general knowledge of all the sheep, so there is a general knowledge of Christ. You all have it. As there is in Him not only the general knowledge, but also the particular knowledge, so there must be in you, not that general knowledge only, but the personal, unworked, unwrought knowledge of Him, if you take to yourself the comfort of being amongst those He loves. And observe how that branches forth. As love is the very characteristic of His knowledge of His own, so love bred of His love is the very characteristic of this personal knowledge of Him love, that master passion, that to which alone the will of man bows, as the iron casts itself into the liquid stream under the breath of the furnace that which alone can make the hard heart of fallen humanity break into the stream of obedience; personal love to Him, the return of His personal love to you, bred of it. "We love Him because He first loved us." "He loved me, and gave Himself for me." There must be this ring concentric within ring, the general knowledge running out into the particular personal knowledge, and that personal knowledge the knowledge of love.
J. Mackarness, Penny Pulpit,No. 362.
Consider
I. Christ's knowledge of us the Shepherd's knowledge of His sheep. That this knowledge, which passes reciprocally between Christ and believers, is something exceedingly wonderful indeed is evident from the affinity of the line of thought. For these two acts of knowledge are only two links of a chain, which only runs on to other two. And see what these two are. "I am the good Shepherd, and know My sheep, and am known of Mine. As the Father knoweth Me, even so know I the Father: and I lay down My life for the sheep." There is plainly a balance, there is clearly an argument running up. The knowledge which the Son has of the Father, and which the Father has of the Son, is, and it must be, infinite, beyond conception; because it is the knowledge of a Divine mind. It is the knowledge of an eternity of existence; it is the knowledge of perfect love; it is the knowledge of actual oneness of being; and yet, in a breath with that, Christ says, "I know My sheep, and am known of Mine. As the Father knoweth Me, even so know I the Father." If Christ knows His sheep, it follows (1) that He knows who are His sheep. Leave it to Him to exercise His own prerogative. His knowledge is both collective and individual. Each of us stands out, this day, as much the object of Christ's mind, as known and as loved, as if He had nothing else in the whole universe to care about except His flock, and as if in that flock He had no sheep but you.
II. Observe one or two of the consequences which result from this minute individualising knowledge. Remember, Christ knows, not of, but you, and therefore Christ is always looking upon you in a completeness, i.e.with reference to your circumstances; and He will take every little circumstance into consideration. He knows what none else can know: He knows each one's future, and He is always working up to that future; and that future stretches on beyond this world. It is not only that you are being prepared and trained at every step for some path that you are to tread in this life; but you are being prepared for the exact place you are to occupy, and for the exact service you are to render in heaven.
J. Vaughan, Fifty Sermons,4th series, p. 167.