Known by the Shepherd
Gospel Reflection for Tuesday, May 13th 2025 - John 10:22-30
“My sheep hear my voice; I know them, and they follow me”
In today’s Gospel we find Jesus walking in the temple during winter. It is the Feast of the Dedication, also known as Hanukkah, a festival marked by light and joy, celebrating the rededication of the temple after it had been defiled. The temple would have been alive with pilgrims, and prayer.
And in the midst of this holy celebration, Jesus walks in Solomon’s Portico, deliberate, quiet, and watched. A group gathers around Him, skeptical and pressing. “How long are you going to keep us in suspense? If you are the Christ, tell us plainly.”
So He does.
But not with a spectacle. Not with another miracle. Instead, He responds with something deeper. He speaks of relationship, of hearing, knowing, and following. “My sheep hear my voice; I know them and they follow me.”
He doesn’t just describe belief. He describes belonging.
Jesus reveals the Father not only through His words and works but through His very presence. There is something startling about the intimacy of that image. He speaks of knowing and being known, of trust and recognition. Sheep don’t follow logic or argument. They follow the voice they trust. They follow the one who has cared for them.
It’s beautiful imagery that Jesus touched on earlier in the Gospel of John - Him as the Good Shepherd.
Here Jesus is saying: those who belong to Him already know and not because they have Him all figured out, but because they’ve heard His voice. They have been drawn into communion with Him.
And He is the Good Shepherd. He has laid His life down for us.
This is not some vague spirituality. It is deeply incarnational. Jesus is the Good Shepherd who gathers His flock into one fold, not merely as individuals, but through the Church He founded. We recognize His voice not only in personal prayer, but through Sacred Scripture, Sacred Tradition, and the Magisterium that safeguards them.
Then Jesus speaks to the promise that stirs our hope “I will give them eternal life and they shall never perish. No one can take them out of my hand.”
Jesus doesn’t promise answers to every question. He doesn’t promise ease or clarity in every moment. But He does promise this: that the sheep of His fold will have eternal life. That no one can take His sheep out of His hand.
He goes on “My Father, who has given them to me, is greater than all, and no one can take them out of the Father’s hand.”
This covenant between His sheep and Himself, this promise, is sealed not with ink but with His blood.
So when Jesus states “The Father and I are one” there can be no doubt that through grace, we are not just followers, we are sons and daughters of God made to share in divine life. We are brought into the fold of the Good Shepherd who spilled His blood for us, and nothing can take that gift away from us - nothing.
So the question isn’t whether Jesus is the Christ, as so many had demanded Him to answer. Jesus already made that plain. The real question is: are we willing to belong to Him? Will we quiet our hearts enough to know His voice, and follow where He leads?
The feast of the Dedication was taking place in Jerusalem.
It was winter.
And Jesus walked about in the temple area on the Portico of Solomon.
So the Jews gathered around him and said to him,
“How long are you going to keep us in suspense?
If you are the Christ, tell us plainly.”
Jesus answered them, “I told you and you do not believe.
The works I do in my Father’s name testify to me.
But you do not believe, because you are not among my sheep.
My sheep hear my voice;
I know them, and they follow me.
I give them eternal life, and they shall never perish.
No one can take them out of my hand.
My Father, who has given them to me, is greater than all,
and no one can take them out of the Father’s hand.
The Father and I are one.”
