He Calls His Own Sheep by Name

Whom He predestined, these He also called; whom He called, these He also justified, and whom He justified, these He also glorified (Romans 3:30).

Daniel had a little playmate named Emily. On a summer’s day, all the children would be out playing and around a certain time of the night Emily’s mother would step out on the porch of her house and yell, “Emily” and then let out a long whistle. Just a little bit later I’d see Emily run down the street toward home. She knew her mother’s call and she responded.

Now image one evening Emily’s mother stepped out of the house, called for Emily and let loose a long whistle. Hearing the call, I slipped on my shoes, ran out of the house and showed up right in front of Emily’s mother. She’d look at me and say, “Well Richard, it’s nice to see you tonight. What can I do for you?“

She’d think I’d totally lost my marbles if I told her I’d heard her call and came running fast as I could. See, her call wasn’t for me. It was for her daughter, for Emily. She called her own.

Throughout the Bible is a wonderful theme of God calling His people. Whether it was Abram in the big city of Ur or Moses at a burning bush in the desert, a little boy named Samuel, or an old fisherman named Peter, God always calls His own by name. Jesus put it like this: He who enters by the door is the shepherd of the sheep. To him the doorkeeper opens, and the sheep hear his voice; and he calls his own sheep by name and leads them out (John 10:4). While everyone can hear the voice of the Shepherd in the proclamation of the gospel, only His own sheep respond, and they respond to Him straight away.

Today, if you will hear His voice, do not harden your hearts as in the rebellion (Hebrews 3:15).

God Will Provide

It pleased the Lord to bruise Him; He has put Him to grief. When You make His soul an offering for sin … and the Lord has laid on Him the iniquity of us all (Isaiah 53:10, 6).

Martin Luther called the Old Testament the picture book of the New Testament. But the person and work of Jesus is clearly portrayed in the stories of the Old Testament, if only we look!

Abraham was an idol maker and worshiper (Joshua 24:2). God called him away from his kin, culture, and country by a promise unto a land in which Abraham would be both blessed and be a blessing to the world (Genesis 12:1; Galatians 3:7-9).

In the land, standing between Bethel, the house of God, and Ai, the heap of ruins, Abraham built his first altar and called on the name of the Lord (Genesis 12:8). It was there that years later God restated His promise to give Abraham a son, and at the age of 75 Abraham believed in the Lord, and He accounted it to him for righteousness  (Genesis 15:6; Romans 4:9, 22; Galatians 3:6; James 2:23).

Many years passed and God commanded Abraham to take Isaac, his son of promise, the only–begotten son whom you love (Genesis 22:2; John 3:16) to a mount and give him as a sacrifice. Isaac was between 25 (Josephus) and 33 (Clarke) years old when he walked with his father up Mount Moriah. This is the same place where 900 years later, Solomon would build the Jewish temple (2 Chronicles 3:1). It’s also the exact place where David saw the pre-Incarnate Christ and God graciously spared the people from judgment (2 Samuel 24:16-17).

On the trek up Moriah, Isaac willingly bore the wood, while Abraham carried the means of sacrifice (Genesis 22:6; Isaiah 53:4-6, 10). Of his own will, Isaac laid upon the altar to be slain by his father. By faith, Abraham trusted God to provide His own lamb as a substitute (Genesis 22:8), and by faith he offered Isaac, trusting God who gave a son by promise to keep that son even by raising him from the dead (Hebrews 11:17). God stopped Abraham from sacrificing Isaac, by sending a ram to be slain in his stead (Genesis  22:11-14).

Isaac is a symbol of Jesus. The only difference being that Jesus was literally sacrificed to pay the penalty for the sins of the world.

• Taken from my sermon Standing on the Promises, which can be heard by clicking here.