What makes you feel safe? Maybe it’s when you get home after driving through a storm or the ice, and you’re in front of the fire, warm and secure. Where do you look for security? Perhaps it’s money, or a relationship, or your health. There’s nothing wrong with any of those things, but none of them will keep us safe forever. Health will fail, possessions fade and you have to leave them behind. People will let you down.
Ultimate safety/security comes not from us holding
something tightly, but from being tightly held. That is what Jesus offers to His people. Listen to His wonderful words: “I give them eternal life, and they will never perish, and no one will snatch them out of my hand.” (John 10:28). Jesus calls his people “my sheep” (v27).
Imagine you bought a new car, you would have a great interest in that car because you’ve spent a lot of money on it! How much more is Jesus interested in his sheep. Think what it cost him to purchase us! He left the riches of heaven to take on flesh, to die on a cruel cross so that we could be His sheep.
Jesus tells us three things about being his sheep, three things that give us total security. He knows, He gives and He keeps.
It is a wonderful thing to be known by someone, it means that they understand you. Jesus says he knows his people – he knows us. He knows our inmost thoughts, our worst days and our best days. He knows the worst bits about you, the things we can mostly hide from others, and yet still loves us!
He knows us.
Secondly He gives eternal life. When you sit by the bedside of someone you love who is ill, or stand by the graveside of someone who has died, all you want is life, gold, silver, electronic gadgets are nothing in comparison to life.
And Jesus offers eternal life (v28)! An eternity of knowing God and being known by Him, enjoying his new creation, being with loved ones who are also his sheep. They will never perish – here is total security!
And thirdly He keeps. Jesus says “no one will snatch them out of my hand.” Notice what He doesn’t say. It doesn’t say, if my people try really hard and are generally nice people and remember to read their Bibles every day, then they’ll be all right! No He says – no one can snatch them out of my hand!
Our security lies not in our performance, but in His
performance. The Lord Jesus lived the perfect life, died for us, and the moment that we put our trust in him – He has us –eternally, there’s no slipping in between his fingers he has us!
What a wonderful truth. Where are you looking for security? The only place where there is total security is in the Lord Jesus, the one who knows us better than we know ourselves, who gives us the ultimate gift of eternal life in the new heaven and earth, and who keeps us – no one can snatch us from his hand.
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