The Sermon on the Good Shepherd
In this mediated message Jesus talks about his sermon on the Good Shepherd and explains its true teachings. He shows how certain statements and implications were extrapolated from what he said and what John wrote in his gospel. For related information, go to this page and the related articles.
Revelation 14
Jesus Corrects Interpolations and Misconceptions with Regard to
His “Good Shepherd” Sermon in John 10
March 16th 1955.
Received by Dr Samuels
I am here, Jesus.
I should like to write you, if you are in condition, on the passage in the tenth chapter of John’s Gospel on my supposed sermon on the good shepherd. This sermon was given by me in much the tenor it is found in the Gospel of John, except that some material was added to the original as recorded by John which I never said, and which John, as you may readily understand, never wrote; and that is the insistence and repetition of the theme that the good shepherd lays down his life for his sheep.
I never said that the good shepherd lays down his life for his sheep but that he guides and protects his sheep, and shows his sheep the way to the sheepfold; and I simply meant by that, that the sheep were the people of Israel, or simply human souls, and that I was the good shepherd in that I guided them and showed them the way to the Celestial Heavens by teaching them that way by means of the influence to their souls of the Divine Love which, beginning with me, was now open to all who should seek it in earnestness and sincerity.
Never did I say in this sermon of the good shepherd that the Father loves me because I lay down my life for my sheep, nor that I resigned it voluntarily, nor that I could lay it down voluntarily and take it up again, injunctions which I had received from my Father. And if you will analyze these statements a little, you will see the contradictions and absurdity of the statements, which were instituted in order to place emphasis on my death on the cross as the way to salvation and to the Father through the mysterious efficacy of my blood – an idea which pervaded the early Christian church among the articulate Greeks who saw in this conception a mode of salvation which harmonized with their own pagan concepts of salvation through the death of their gods who were then resurrected.
No man can lay down his life voluntarily unless he commits the gross sin of self-destruction, and the hour of a man’s death is known only by the Father. And no man can leave the flesh and take up his fleshly body again, as it is understood in this case and refers to my resurrection; but this, as you know, was accomplished by a materialization and not a true taking up of the fleshly body.
So you see that at every step important material regarding the New Birth and the way to the Father was eliminated and other material interpolated dealing either with an impossible miracle or statements imposing beliefs in the vicarious atonement or the Trinity, and thus vitiated the contents of the Gospels as they were written by my apostles and disciples, and have eliminated almost entirely the way to at-onement with the Father. Thus it has become indispensable for me and the other high spirits to write you the truths of the New Testament and point out the distortions and interpolations where and how they now exist side by side with the true statements therein contained.
I am grateful to you for this opportunity to write you tonight and for your condition which enabled me to make a satisfactory rapport. And with my love to the Doctor and you, and with my blessings to the Father for His Divine Love to come upon you in great portions, I shall close now and sign myself
Jesus of the Bible
and
Master of the Celestial Heavens
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