Revised Common Lectionary (Semicontinuous)

The shepherd and the sheep

¹¹ “I am the good shepherd,” Jesus continued. “The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep. ¹² But supposing there’s a hired servant, who isn’t himself the shepherd, and who doesn’t himself own the sheep. He will see the wolf coming, and leave the sheep, and run away. Then the wolf will snatch the sheep and scatter them. ¹³ He’ll run away because he’s only a hired servant, and doesn’t care about the sheep.

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?”