Because in the morning the shepherds would line up and whistle, and each sheep instinctively recognized the call of its particular shepherd. I have even read that if someone tried to impersonate a shepherd by simulating his call, the sheep would sense danger and scatter in panic. Jesus says, "My sheep know my voice."

In this passage Jesus seems to mix his metaphors, because he also says, "I am the gate . . . whoever enters through the gate will be saved . . . " Well Lord, are you the shepherd or are you the gate? The answer is: both. After getting the sheep into the fold and bedded down for the night, the shepherd would then lie down across the doorway to sleep, so no intruders could enter. The shepherd became the gate.

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Jesus is saying, "I'm not only the shepherd, I am also the gateway through whom you must pass into the presence of God."

The implications of this statement are very controversial in our society today. We live in a marketplace of religious options. It seems that nearly every belief subscribed to in the history of human civilization is available for us to believe. And so many people take a "mix and match" approach to religion: "Let's see, I need a God . . . Okay, I'll take the Christian God, New Testament, not Old Testament. Now I need a code of ethics . . . the Eastern concept of karma seems pretty cool. What is it they say, 'may your karma run over your dogma'? Okay, I've got a good mixture, let's try this recipe for a couple weeks." People actually attempt to create a "make your own" salad for the soul. But we are not saved by a recipe — we're saved by a relationship. I can control a recipe by varying the ingredients. My relationship with the shepherd is mysterious and wonderful, and it is beyond my control.

As a central doctrine, Christianity states that a Jewish man who lived in the first century is the sole gateway through whom all people must pass into the presence of God.

Karl Barth called this doctrine the "scandal of particularity." It is the official doctrine of our Presbyterian denomination, formally declared this June at our general assembly meeting in Columbus, Ohio: "We are neither confused nor hesitant to declare [that] Jesus Christ is the only savior and Lord, and all people everywhere are called to place their faith, hope and love in him."

Some may ask, "How can you put down other religions like that?" Jesus' statement is not a declaration against other religions, for the simple reason that no founder of any other religion made the claims Jesus made for himself. Friends, there is simply no parallel figure to Jesus in all of history. Mohammed, Buddha, Confucius, Moses — none were as egomaniacal as this Galilean carpenter. The "I am" statements are a prime example of this. Jesus actually ends the New Testament by saying, "I am the Alpha and the Omega" — the beginning and the end. There is nothing before the letter alpha in the Greek alphabet. If we go back through endless ages to a time when there was nothing — there was already God. Go beyond Omega into a future unimaginable, and God will be there. There is no before God and there is no after God. God is.