On the Feast of Dedication—a festival of the Jews, Jesus is in the temple area, walking in a colonnade. The Jews gather around him and say, “How long will you keep us in suspense? If you are the Christ, tell us plainly.”
“I did tell you, but you do not believe. The miracles I do in my Father’s name speak for me, but you do not believe because you are not my sheep. My sheep listen to my voice; I know them, and they follow me. I and the Father are one.”
Then the Jews pick up stones to stone him.
“I have shown you many great miracles from the Father. For which of these do you stone me?”
“We are not stoning you for any of these, but for blasphemy, because you, a mere man, claim to be God.”
Jesus answers them again: “Do not believe me unless I do what my Father does. But if I do it, even though you do not believe me, believe the works, that you may know and understand that the Father is in me, and I in the Father.”
The Jews did not recognize Jesus’ divinity. They believed that if He was God, He must be seated on heaven’s throne in the glorious form. That’s why they never understood God who appeared as a man according to the Bible’s prophecy. It was their mistake to confine God in their own ideas.
People can hear the voice of the true Shepherd only when they believe in God the Bible testifies about, not in God their own thoughts and prejudices created.
“My sheep listen to my voice; I know them, and they follow me.” John 10:27