The “good shepherd” is an important leadership image from Jesus’ experience.\u00a0Jesus referred to the\u00a0metaphor during the Feast of Dedication when the nation celebrated political independence.<\/p>\n
The national significance of the shepherd\u00a0image originates\u00a0from the Hebrew Scripture in the writings of the prophet Ezekiel, among others.<\/p>\n
Ezekiel described how\u00a0bad shepherds feed themselves and ignore the needs of the sheep. They fleece their followers for wool, and kill them for meat. Strays are abandoned (Ezek 34:1-6).<\/p>\n
At the Feast of Dedication, Jesus suggested that he stood (right there in the temple courts) as the antithesis of Ezekiel’s scathing metaphor.\u00a0Jesus was the “good shepherd” (John 10:14).<\/p>\n
One can imagine the reaction of the religious authorities. They\u00a0wanted to finish what they had started at the Feast of Huts, but once again, Jesus retreats.<\/p>\n
In the previous posts, we looked at Jerusalem’s resilient leaders and the preservation they achieved for their nation. The religious leaders of Jesus’ day were part of that tradition.<\/p>\n
So\u00a0was Jesus\u00a0trying to pick a fight with people in power?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The “good shepherd” is an important leadership image from Jesus’ experience.\u00a0Jesus referred to the\u00a0metaphor during the Feast of Dedication when the nation celebrated political independence. The national significance of the shepherd\u00a0image originates\u00a0from the Hebrew Scripture in the writings of the prophet Ezekiel, among others. Ezekiel described how\u00a0bad shepherds feed themselves and ignore the needs of […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-494","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-telling-the-story"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/spendayearwithjesus.com\/djp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/494","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/spendayearwithjesus.com\/djp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/spendayearwithjesus.com\/djp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/spendayearwithjesus.com\/djp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/spendayearwithjesus.com\/djp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=494"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/spendayearwithjesus.com\/djp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/494\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/spendayearwithjesus.com\/djp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=494"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/spendayearwithjesus.com\/djp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=494"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/spendayearwithjesus.com\/djp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=494"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}