Cornerstone PLUS

Your seat or, near your seat, a little passage. It says John 10 on it. John 10. If you can, spy 1 of those, be helpful. You might need to share them around a little bit there.

Thank you. I'm just gonna read that and then we'll we'll come back to that in a minute. But this is from the Bible. This is 1 of uh-uh Jesus' disciples who lived with Jesus and then wrote about Jesus, after the death and resurrection of Jesus and went out preaching. In fact, John suffered persecution and was, exiled on the isle of Patmos.

So we're reading from this. We're breaking in to a larger passage, and we're coming in at verse 7. Says, therefore, Jesus said again, very truly, I tell you I am the gate for the sheep. All who have come before me are thieves and robbers. But the sheep have not listened to them.

I am the gate. Whoever whoever whoever enters through me will be saved. They will come in and go out and find pasture. The thief comes only to steal and to kill and destroy. I have come that they may have life and have it to the full.

I am the good shepherd the good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep. The hired hand is not the shepherd and does not own the sheep. So when he sees the wolf coming, he banders the sheep and runs away. Then the wolf attacks the flock and scatters it. The man runs away because he is a hired hand and cares nothing for the sheep.

I am the good shepherd. I know my sheep and my sheep know me. Just as the father knows me, and I know the father, I lay my life down for the sheep. I have other sheep that are not of this cheap fold. I must bring them in also.

They too will listen to my voice and they shall be 1 flock and and 1 shepherd. The reason my father loves me is that I lay down my life. Only to take it up again. No 1 takes it from me, but I lay it down of my own accord. I have authority to lay it down and authority to take it up again.

This command I received from my father. We're gonna have a look at those words in just a moment. They are very, very special. But I want us to think a little bit about, comedies and tragedies. Before we get into into that because I think that's a that's what we would call a comedy.

People have said that you can categorize Shakespeare's plays, whether they're a comedy or a tragedy by this. If it ends with a wedding, it's a comedy, And if it ends with a funeral, it's a tragedy. And that by and large is absolutely right. If you look at those those writings of Shakespeare. Now if that is true, if you if if if if his plays are a comedy if they end in a wedding and tragedy if they end in a funeral, then your life is what?

It's a tragedy. Your life is a tragedy. Whatever you've done in your life is a tragedy because it will end in a funeral. Or at least it will end in death. You don't know whether it will end in a funeral.

People might say, I'll just chuck him in the in the bin. But it ends in death. A few weeks ago, the well loved comedian Ken Doddd died. And just before he died, he married his long term partner, and then he died. But it is that way around.

He married and then died. So that would be considered a tragedy. Wasn't the other way around. Now, what you've got to get is in the world of literature, comedy and tragedies have particular and specific meanings. They actually really refer to the whole shape of the story really, not so much the content or even the tone of the story.

But the really the the shape of the story. So Shakespeare's tragedies I'm told have a lot of jokes in them and Shakespeare's comedies have a lot of pain and sadness in them. The distinguishing mark is at the end. Does it end in a funeral or does it end in a wedding? And so 14 of Shakespeare's tragedies and a 14 of Shakespeare's comedies end in a wedding or multiple weddings.

So that's how you define these things. 1 book I was reading, yesterday had a really good, sort of way of remembering this comedy tragedy thing. It says that the comedy is shaped like a smile shaped like a smile. You go down And then you go up like a smile. You descend into darkness and then you come up rising into a new day.

It's a smile. It's nice, isn't it? That's a comedy. That's a smile. Yeah?

So comedy, get get it right. It's not just it's full of jokes. It's not comedy in the way we see it. But it actually ends on a positive note. It you descend and then you end on a rise.

Whereas a tragedy says said this writer is like a frown. It goes up with all kinds of optimism and all kinds of hope and all kinds of sort of prosperity and fame. You go up but then you come down like a sad face. So here's here's here's my question. Is your life a happy face or a sad face?

Is it a comedy? Or is a tragedy? Well, if it's ending in death, it's gotta be a tragedy. Whatever you get. David Glen, 1 of the elders of this church and myself, were were in Belarus last week, and we were invited into a university to speak into 1 of the classes.

It was a fairly small room, but it was crammed packed with with students and other lecturers. It was absolutely packed. I mean, standing room, and there was standing people standing, and there were people sitting on each other's laps and on tables, and and it was it was a it was a packed out, small room. But the students there, the university students were were actually some of the the sort of most attentive, brightest happy students that I can remember ever speaking to in any classroom. I've ever been in any country.

I mean, they really were alive. They were totally opposite to the receptionist. Now, if you've ever been in Belarus, anyone who has any official capacity like a receptionist, you really I'm not trying to be rude, although it probably is. You really don't know whether you're talking to their bottom or their face. I mean, honestly, you don't know.

They are so grumpy. They must be taught to be as grumpy as anything. My question that I asked the young people who were so full of enthusiasm is How do you as enthusiastic young people not turn out like that receptionist? How is that gonna happen to you in Belarus? Because she at 1 time, I guess, was a happy enthusiastic person like you.

Yeah. So how are you not going to turn out like that? How are you not going to turn out to some grumpy cynical old person? How are you? Because life hits you and makes you cynical and grumpy.

Because with all of the prospects and the prosperity and the climbing the ladder, Unfortunately, we have to come down the other side, like a sad face. I actually think it seems impossible. They had no answer that by the way. It seems impossible for us not to write a tragedy. Now, you may be writing stuff and going up in the world because you're young enough to think, yeah, but I'm climbing the ladder.

It's all going well. I've got my dreams. I've got my dreams. But I want to tell you that soon you'll plateau and you'll start coming down. It's almost impossible for us not to write a tragedy.

It's interesting. I was reading another book. And, there are all kinds of popular atheistic, scientists that love to sort of preach this stuff at us. Here's here's 1. He's called Professor Lawrence Krauss.

And, he's a popular atheistic scientist and this is his, this is what he preaches to us. This is what he says. He says the picture that science presents to us is uncomfortable. Because what we have learned is that we are we are more insignificant than we could have ever imagined. And in addition, it turns out that our future is miserable.

Yeah. So he's got a downturned face. That's his message. You are a completely insignificant person. And your future is miserable.

You're going to die. That's really what he's saying. Now, If you really take that stuff, it's very hard to keep a smiling face in any real way, isn't it? And we might try to put put pretense on. But if you're just the flotsam of the cosmos, if you're just building on a sort of tiny insignificant rock that is hurling through into a meaningless, uh-uh, unexistence then then it's very hard to have a smile on your face because death does that to us.

Everything you ever achieve is like a sand castle waiting for the tsunami to come. It'll just be flattened. Now, aren't you happy you came? It does sound really depressing, and it is a downer. And we don't wanna hear these downers.

And it can really hurt. And so we love the idea of an up message I mean, don't you want your life to be a smile, not a sad face? Don't you? Don't you want to be a mister happy, not a mister grumpy? Don't you?

He smiled at me then. That's the first time I've ever seen you smile, actually. But, don't don't don't you want you that? And I guess so. And the truth is we do want that.

And this is where the advertisers know. And so what do the advertisers try to do? They tried to keep us at the beginning of the story on the up. They keep telling us to get more They keep us in the youth, not in old age. All of the photos go around Kingston All of the advertising billboards go around Kingston and look.

All of them are gorgeous looking 17 to 25 olds, all of them. All of the new builds that they're putting up when they show you the pictures of the rooms inside. They all have 17 to sort of 25 year olds drinking coffee. Everything is perfect. They're beautiful people.

Beautiful people. I mean, the sad thing is you don't even see a disabled person on any of those posters. Isn't that amazing? As if if there isn't anyone with any difficulties physically, you certainly don't see an old person I wanted with with Dean to take a photo of some of our old people in this church and blow up big pictures and stick them all over. But I don't think that they would quite like us doing that, but it would be fun to do to see how quickly they'd be pulled down because That's what it's like.

We want our brief moment in the sun and stay there. That's the world's philosophy. The problem is even with a brief moment in the sun, you get sunburn and skin cancer. It's amazing, isn't it? Even the up brings us down.

I became 60 this year on my sixtieth birthday I got an oyster card. I can this is good news. I can travel all over London for nothing and I've been doing it. It's a joy. But also on my fiftieth birthday got an envelope with a free bowel cancer kit with 12 little strips that I have to put poo on and put it in an envelope and send it through royal mail.

It says on the outside of the envelope, please make sure that there is no dirt on the outside of the envelope. I don't know what the what the what the postman is doing. Oh, 1 of those. So with the up of the oyster card comes the down of the bowel bowel cancer. It's extraordinary, isn't it?

Elderly people largely are kept out of sight. The dying are largely kept out of sight. We just see the beginning be up because we're pretending it might turn into a smile and we forget that we turn old and grumpy and die. It's interesting, isn't it? The only old people you really see are those that pretend they're young when they're not.

So the 87 year old that runs the marathon that defies being old and acts like he's a teenager. They're the only ones you see, or the 80 your your your old can break dance on his head, and he is acting like a 20 year old. So we're constantly being distracted, constantly distracting ourselves because the end of the story is a tragedy. It is a tragedy. Now, the message that ruling has come to believe The message that ruling has put her trust in is altogether different.

From every message that has sold us in this world, altogether different. And I want to say this. It it has a legitimate smile to it. This is the hope. It starts at the top and it descends.

It always descends into hopelessness, despair, in her case, cancer, down. But it's at that point that you suddenly see there's resurrection. There's resurrection. It's extraordinary, isn't it? And what really has come to genuinely believe and genuinely put her trust in is is something totally different to the advertisers.

That are just trying to make us to think of the beginning, the youth. It's not a distraction from reality. It's not a drug that covers up the pain. It is the genuine real deal. It really is.

It deals with the problem of death and turns it into a smile. It is resurrection from the dead. It is a wedding celebration after the funeral. It is a tragedy so worked through. It turns the tragedy into a comedy.

A frown into a smile. And I want to say what she believes is absolutely genuinely true. See, what has happened is We humans, if you read the Bible, decided to cut god off and go it on our own, and we started to rise ourselves up, raise ourselves up as god. We will be god. We will be god, but it brought destruction and death.

Into the sad face. Up, we go up, up, up, look at us. We can do what we like. We can follow our dreams, death. Over you go the arch.

But god can do the other thing. God can go the other way. God can come down, and he did in Jesus. God comes down from the top the majestic 1, he comes down. God comes down.

God becomes a man. God comes into this world as a man. God, the lord Jesus Christ dies. Not only dies. He dies on a cross.

But he rises again. Do you see it? That's the Christian life. That's the Christian message. God coming down to the depths and rising again.

And it's even more than the story of Jesus. Because a Christian is someone who is baptized into Jesus connected with Jesus as he dies and rises again. As I was saying about the water, then really dies and rises again. Down in the water, risen again up into into life. That's what this picture is all about.

And that's what she's come to see. Now, with all of that in mind, let me just quickly show you. John 10, and you'll see it all over the place here. First of all, in John 10, do you see the advertisers the false shepherds, the thieves, the robbers. They're telling you a story that will end in tragedy.

You see it there very simply in verse 7. Therefore, Jesus said again. Very truly I tell you. I am the gate of the sheep. All those who have come before me are thieves and robbers.

But the sheep have not listened to them. Don't listen to those thieves and robbers. They're thieves and robbers. Don't listen to them. I am the gate, whoever enters through me, will be saved.

They will come in and go out and find pasture. Look at verses 12 and to 13. There's little numbers, you'll see, on their 12 and 13. They're the verse numbers. The hired hand is not the shepherd and does not own the sheep.

So when he sees the wolf coming, he abandons the sheep and runs away. And then the wolf attacks the frogs and scatters it, The man runs away because he is a hired hand and he cares nothing for the sheep. He is a thief. There are there are thieves. There are robbers.

Don't listen to them. They're offering you prosperity, but they'll bring you on a downer. They kill. They destroy. They make promises.

All of the promises of this world end in death, the unhappy sad face. Don't listen to them. Their thieves, their robbers, they're stealing from you. They don't care for you. Death day, those advertisers won't be there.

They've got nothing to sell you anymore. They've ripped you off all your life. And they will not be there in your death. They're liars. And this world is telling us stories and telling us about things that will promise us eternal life and it never gives us.

We can't stay young forever. We turn into old people We turn to a funeral. We go to tragedy. It it abandsons us. It runs away from us.

See, what is it you're trusting in? For your life. If it will abandon you at death, your life is a tragedy. But Jesus says I come to bring life. Look at that then.

That's the second thing. So you see the advertisers, the false shepherds, the hired hands, but you see that Jesus had come to bring life. What a staggering sentence verse 10 is? The thieves come to steal and kill and destroy. I have come that you may have life and have it to the full.

Notice he says he's the good shepherd. Look at verse 11. I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep. I am the good shepherd he says in verse 14.

I know my sheep and my sheep know me. If you read through that carefully, you'll see that the good shepherd, he says lays down his life for the sheep. He says it 5 times in those few sentences. Do you see that? The good shepherd.

The 1 that will lead you to life, the good shepherd, he'll lead you. But he came down and laid down his life. Like the smile, he came down and laid down his life. But then he says he took it up again. Did you notice that?

He took it up again. Look at verse 18. No 1 takes it from me. I laid it down on my own accord. I have authority to lay it down and authority to take it up.

He takes it up again. He rises from the dead. That's the smile. That's the story. That's why Rulie believes in Jesus.

And then the third thing I want you to see is it's a gate for you. Look at verse 9. I am the gate, whoever enters through me will be saved. They will come out and go out and find pasture. In other words, they'll be free.

They'll be so free. They'll be saved. And the invitation for you today is that you come through the gate. Instead of your life going on all of the stuff the world offers and turning into a tragedy, come through the gate. Turn your tragedy into a comedy, turn it into a smile so that you know that even death only means the gateway to life.

When you die, you're born into the resurrection world that Jesus has bought for you. It's extraordinary this stuff. And really wants to say, and I want to say with all my heart. We believe this and we want to encourage you to at least start looking at the gate. Try the try the gate.

But better come through. Have you ever done that? Have you ever asked Jesus to be your shepherd who laid down his life for you so that he would take it up again and take you through the gate into a new life. Have you? I mean, that's all Jesus wants us to do is to ask him.

But, you know, just ridiculous pride stops us doing it. Why wouldn't you ask him to turn your sad life into a joyful, happy smile. Let me pray. Father god, you know every single person in this room, you know what ladders we're climbing up, what we're trusting in, And there are so many robbers and thieves that will just take everything away because it ends in death. But you're the good shepherd.

Help us to see that. And experiencing you through your word in Jesus' name. Ma'am,