John chapter 10 verse 9.

I am the gate. Whoever enters through me will be saved. They will come in and go out and find pasture. This is the word of the Lord.

Thank you. God, thank you that you are the one who knows the story behind every face in this room. And I just pray that by the gentle power of your Holy Spirit that you would say,

you would speak to us Lord. To anyone that is even giving you the tiniest crack in the door, would you hospitably come in and speak their exact language through these ancient words that live today Jesus. Amen.

So if you were to read the biography of any famous figure, anyone from Gandhi, Tse Mandela, Tse Martin Luther King Jr., Tse Frederick Douglass, you'll notice a pattern that the biographer tends to write chapter after chapter after chapter on their life. And then there's a little sliver at the end devoted to their death.

But all four of Jesus' biographers reversed the formula. They devote a staggering amount of real estate to his death. John who wrote last after the Gospels of Matthew, Mark and Luke were already in circulation is the most obvious. He gives more than a third of his gospel to Jesus' final 24 hours, a day that Jesus spent on trial and in execution.

A series of legal hearings with different authorities culminating in this cry from the crowds who were stirred up by the priests of all people give us Barabbas. Now Barabbas had taken part in an uprising.

Now this English word uprising is the Greek Lestus, which means robber or rebel. The priests wanted to trade Jesus for a robber. Remember that. It will matter for you later.

John slows the story down tremendously for Jesus' trial, but he also doesn't save the trial for the end. Scholars will point out that John of all the gospel writers tends to put Jesus on trial and seen after scene, intentionally making his readers into something like members of the jury.

So in chapter 1, he presents Jesus as the light that breaks the dark, but also tells us that most people didn't recognize him as the light. The question being, what do you make of him?

And then that pattern continues to fill up an ethereal with the priest Nicodemus, with the Samaritan woman at a well and story after story.

We are presented this Jesus and given the opportunity to make our own evaluation and make of him what we want. Who is this man?

This man who never wrote a book, but about whom more books have been written than anyone who's ever lived. Who is this man who is the furthest thing from royalty and yet more knees have bowed before him than any king?

This man who never got a degree, but whose teachings have been the subject of more study and introspection than any teacher of any variety, this man who never once posed for a photograph, and yet his image has been the subject of more art than any person who's ever lived.

This man whose life was cut tragically short and yet whose life divides history, whose we measure our calendars and the span of our lives based on his short life. Who is this Jesus?

The greatest man who ever lived, more than a man, or the spell binder behind history's most exceptional ruse.

Who is this Jesus? And is he worth paying any attention to and does his life have anything to do with my life? You get to decide.

So we're in the midst of a teaching series in practice that we've titled Knowing God, the seven I am statements of Jesus.

Moses famously stood before a burning bush hearing God speak to him and responded, who are you? What is your name? And God said, I am, or I am who I am.

A name that Jesus then picked up and applied to himself again and again. I am the bread of life. I am the light of the world. That's where we've been so far.

Seven times in John's gospel, Jesus says, I am and then adds a little bit more color and description to that original I am. And up for today is I am the gate.

So as I hope you're starting to get used to by now everywhere else I go on the scripture today is going to be on the screen. However, the passage that we just read from in John chapter 10, I want you to fall along with me on the page.

...