As the Father knoweth me, even so
know I the Father: and I lay down my life for the sheep." For this cause
was Jesus the Father's Beloved Son--that He was ready to lay down His
life for the sake of the sheep. That the sacrifice He was soon to render
was in fact voluntary, and not a forfeiture under compulsion, is
solemnly affirmed in the Savior's words: "Therefore doth my Father love
me, because I lay down my life, that I might take it again. No man
taketh it from me, but I lay it down of myself. I have power to lay it
down, and I have power to take it again. This commandment have I
received of my Father." The certainty of His death and of His subsequent
resurrection are here reiterated. A natural effect of His immortal
origin, as the earth-born Son of an immortal Sire, was that He was
immune to death except as He surrendered thereto. The life of Jesus the
Christ could not be taken save as He willed and allowed. The power to
lay down His life was inherent in Himself, as was the power to take up
His slain body in an immortalized state.[877] These teachings caused
further division among the Jews. Some pretended to dispose of the matter
by voicing anew the foolish assumption that Jesus was but an insane
demoniac, and that therefore His words were not worthy of attention.
Others with consistency said "These are not the words of him that hath a
devil. Can a devil open the eyes of the blind?" So it was that a few
believed, many doubted though partly convinced, and some condemned.

As part of this profound discourse, Jesus said: "And other sheep I have,
which are not of this fold: them also I must bring, and they shall hear
my voice; and there shall be one fold, and one shepherd."[878] The
"other sheep" here referred to constituted the separated flock or
remnant of the house of Joseph, who, six centuries prior to the birth of
Christ, had been miraculously detached from the Jewish fold in
Palestine, and had been taken beyond the great deep to the American
continent. When to them the resurrected Christ appeared He thus spake:
"And verily, I say unto you, that ye are they of whom I said, other
sheep I have which are not of this fold; them also I must bring, and
they shall hear my voice; and there shall be one fold, and one
shepherd."[879] The Jews had vaguely understood Christ's reference to
other sheep as meaning in some obscure way, the Gentile nations; and
because of their unbelief and consequent inability to rightly
comprehe