I am the door. If anyone enters by me, he will be saved and will go in and out and find pasture (John 10:9).
It is easy and common to skip over this reference of Jesus to himself as the door and jump straight to him as the shepherd (also in this passage in John 10). But pause and consider that Jesus says he is not only the shepherd of his sheep but he is also the door. In other words, Jesus is not only the shepherd of the sheep, but he is also the way through which he leads every one of his sheep into the presence and blessing and salvation of God.
What a comprehensive claim Jesus is making in this passage! Not only to be the shepherd of Psalm 23 – “The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want” – but also to be the door through which he as the shepherd leads! Jesus is not only the one who leads to complete sufficiency, but is also himself the only means to it!
Jesus is not only the one who leads to complete sufficiency, but is also himself the only means to it!
This “doorness” of Jesus is exactly what he himself is emphasizing later in John 14:6, “Jesus said to him, I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.” And that is why Paul would say of Jesus in Ephesians 2:18 that “through him we both [Jews and Gentiles — which is everybody!] have access in one Spirit to the Father.”
Many nonbelievers, looking in from the outside, mistakenly think that our great desire as Christians — in our church or with our preaching — is to see people join the church, or read their Bible, or not act in certain ways. And while that is indeed part of our desire, those are merely some of the means God uses in bringing about a greater and ultimate goal: for people to see Jesus Christ as the way, the door to all the blessings and promises of God.
Jesus goes on to say in John 10 that thieving robbers try to get the abundant life, the real salvation from the problems and uncertainties of this world and the next, without the door. But they can’t (no one can) and so they instead end up themselves, and lead others, in self-destruction. That’s why Jesus warns, “The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy. I came that they may have life and have it abundantly” (John 10:10).
If you and I could get the abundant life in God without Jesus Christ, then Jesus wouldn’t have needed to come into the world. Jesus came because the abundant life, the promises and blessings and salvation of God, is not possible without him!
Jesus is still the door, and he is the only door.
Even religious rules and religious talk, like the Pharisees lived and advocated, is just another way of trying to avoid the real and only door to salvation, of trying to climb into God’s presence without going through the person and work of Jesus Christ.
No matter who you are today — a man or woman just now considering the seemingly outrageous claims of Jesus Christ, a boy or girl who maybe always thought that Christianity just meant going to church a lot, or even a believer who once found joy in Jesus but since has sought pleasure outside of Him — Jesus is still the door, and he is the only door.
Regardless of who you are or what your experience has been, consider (or reconsider) that the only path into the presence and blessing and salvation of God is through the doorway of Jesus Christ.