¹⁴ “I am the good shepherd. I know my own sheep, and my own know me— ¹⁵ just as the father knows me and I know the father. And I lay down my life for the sheep. ¹⁶ And I have other sheep, too, which don’t belong to this sheepfold. I must bring them, too, and they will hear my voice. Then there will be one flock, and one shepherd.

¹⁷ “That’s why the father loves me, because I lay down my life, so that I can take it again. ¹⁸ Nobody takes it from me; I lay it down of my own accord. I have the right to lay it down, and I have the right to receive it back again. This is the command I received from my father.”

The Messiah and the father

¹⁹ So there was again a division among the Judaeans because of what Jesus had said.

²⁰ “He’s demon-possessed!” some were saying. “He’s raving mad! Why listen to him?”

²¹ “No,” said some others, “that’s not how demon-possessed people talk. Anyway, how could a demon open a blind man’s eyes?”

²² It was the Feast of the Dedication in Jerusalem. It was winter, ²³ and Jesus was walking in the Temple, in Solomon’s Porch. ²⁴ The Judaeans surrounded him.

“How much longer are you going to keep us in suspense?” they asked. “If you are the Messiah, say so out loud!”

²⁵ “I told you,” replied Jesus, “and you didn’t believe. The works which I’m doing in my father’s name give evidence about me. ²⁶ But you don’t believe, because you don’t belong to my sheep.

²⁷ “My sheep hear my voice. I know them, and they follow me. ²⁸ I give them the life of the coming age. They will never, ever perish, and nobody can snatch them out of my hand. ²⁹ My father, who has given them to me, is greater than all, and nobody can snatch them out of my father’s hand. ³⁰ I and the father are one.”