This sermon was preached on Sunday
evening, June 23rd, 1985, at the Trinity Baptist Church in
Montville, New Jersey. Now for any of you who are with
us this evening who were not with us this morning, I will
say that our meditation in the Word of God this evening is very
simply the continuation and the completion of a half-preached
sermon this morning. And both of these messages, or
the culmination of the one message, will be found in the official
installation of Dr. Robert Paul Martin to serve the
Lord and his people as an elder in this assembly. Now, in our
study this morning, I sought to establish from the Word of
God as foundational to everything that would follow two basic concepts
that are embedded in the scriptures. First of all, I tried to articulate
the truth of the centrality or the predominance of the shepherd
imagery in defining and describing the nature and function of the
office of an elder. And we looked at passages in
the Old and the New Testaments, which do indeed clearly teach
that of all the various images and analogies of the function
of an elder, The central, the predominant one, the one which
John Owen says incorporates all of the others in one sense, is
the imagery of a shepherd. And then I sought to establish
in the second place the supremacy of Christ as the perfect example
of the shepherd office and function. Having then established those
foundational matters from key passages in Old and New Testaments,
I then proceeded to address but one dimension of the shepherd-flock
relationship, namely, the fundamental bond between the shepherd and
his sheep. And I tried to demonstrate from
the scriptures that in the case of our Lord as the Great Shepherd,
The bond which unites him to his flock is the bond of love
to the flock and accountability to the God whose flock it is. And so with the under shepherds,
we are to take our clue from the Lord Jesus. And if we are
properly to fulfill our tasks, we must be bound to our people
in self denying love. Love that principled affection
that seeks the good of its object, even at great cost to itself,
and also bound to them and our responsibilities to them in the
light of our accountability to God. Hebrews 13, 17b. Now tonight we proceed to take
up the second and third lines of thought. And they are these. We will consider together the
fundamental tasks which the shepherd is to perform with respect to
his sheep. And then if we have time, the
fundamental responsibilities of the sheep to their shepherds. Having now considered the fundamental
bond between the shepherd and his sheep, the bond of love and
accountability, we now attempt to open up the fundamental tasks
which the shepherd is to perform with respect to his sheep. And we'll follow this pattern
of seeing the task in the great shepherd, first of all, and then
by way of analogy and imitation, that task as it is to be carried
out by the under shepherds. And I want to underscore what
I alluded to this morning. that in doing this we do not
go to books which describe the function of ancient or modern
shepherds, and taking our clue from those who describe those
functions, impose them on the Word of God. Rather, we go to
the Word of God for the concept of shepherding as God has revealed
it. And one of the strands of thought
that we saw in several pivotal passages this morning is that
the great shepherd functions as a shepherd from his position
of constituted rule and authority. We saw him as the shepherd king,
the shepherd prince. And so as we think of the functions
of the chief shepherd, we must remember that he performs those
functions as the shepherd king, that is, as one who has been
given right and authority to rule over his people. And likewise,
in every dimension of the task of an under-shepherd, it is assumed
that the under-shepherd is in a place of spiritual rule. That's why the scripture says,
Obey them that have the rule over you. Remember them that
had the rule over you. and imitate their faith. And so the shepherding does not
negate the concept of constituted authority, but the shepherding
imagery becomes the channel, the means by which that rule
is carried out. But we must never forget that
surrounding all of that imagery and its outworking is the clear
teaching of the Word of God that elders, shepherds, are not simply
advisors, but to the extent that they exercise rule by the teaching
of the Word of God, they do so with the very authority of God
standing over them and with them. Our Lord Jesus Christ made this
abundantly clear in several passages. I mention just one of them, John
chapter 13 and verse 20. Verily, verily, I say unto you,
he that receives whomsoever I send receives me, and he that receives
me receives him that sent me. When the Lord Jesus duly authorizes
a messenger and sends him, to receive his messenger is to receive
the one who sent him. To reject the messenger and his
message is to reject the Lord who has sent him. Likewise, when
Christ gives a gift to his church in the person of a duly qualified
pastor, a shepherd, to receive that shepherd is to receive Christ. To reject that shepherd is to
reject Christ who has given him. Well, then, with those general
perspectives conditioning our consideration of the specifics,
now let us turn to the scriptures with this concern. How is a shepherd
to fulfill his responsibility under God in the midst of the
flock of God? Well, first of all, the shepherd
is responsible to provide for the nourishment of the sheep. The shepherd is responsible to
provide for the nourishment of the sheep. Now surely this is
most clearly taught in a passage that all of us are familiar with. Psalm 23, as David celebrates
the reality of Jehovah as his shepherd, You will notice that
the first focal point of emphasis after the general introductory
statement is the emphasis upon the provision of nourishment. Jehovah is my shepherd. I shall not lack anything. That's the general statement.
Now he descends to particulars. And with Jehovah, the chief shepherd,
as his shepherd, What is the function that Jehovah performs
as David Shepherd? He makes me to lie down in green
pastures. He leads me besides waters of
rest, quiet waters. We're told that sheep will not
drink in troubled or disturbed waters, but only in quiet, still
pools of water. And so here, the function of
the Great Shepherd is to bring the sheep into good pasturage,
and here David says, He makes me to lie down in those pastures. He brings me to the pastures,
He makes me to lie down, and He leads me beside waters of
rest. And when we turn to the New Testament,
or I'm sorry, to further passages in the prophecies about God's
great shepherd in Ezekiel, we find this same emphasis coming
through again, that the great shepherd will be the one who
will feed his sheep. Ezekiel chapter 34 and verse
11. For thus saith the Lord Jehovah,
behold, I myself, even I, will search for my sheep and will
seek them out. Now when he has sought them out
to minister to them, what does he do? Verse 13, I will bring
them out from the peoples and gather them from the countries,
bring them into their own land, and I will feed them upon the
mountains of Israel. by the water courses and in all
the inhabited places of the country. And I will feed them with good
pasture. And upon the mountains of the
height of Israel shall their fold be. There shall they lie
down in good fold. And on fat pasture shall they
feed upon the mountains of Israel. So you see the dominant emphasis
upon the first and fundamental task of the shepherd being that
of feeding his sheep. Well, when we turn to the New
Testament, we find that this is precisely what is said of
the great shepherd, even in the eternal state. Remember now,
we're trying to see the pattern in the great shepherd and derive
our understanding of the task of the under shepherd by way
of analogy from him. And in the book of the Revelation,
In one of those beautiful pictures of the redeemed in the everlasting
state, this is what we read in Revelation chapter 7. Concerning
those who have come out of great tribulation and washed their
robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb, Revelation
7.15. Therefore, are they before the
throne of God and they serve him day and night in his temple
And he that sits on the throne shall spread his tabernacle over
them. They shall hunger no more, neither
thirst any more, neither shall the sun strike upon them nor
any heat. For the lamb that is in the midst
of the throne shall be their shepherd. And what will his first
function be? shall guide them into fountains
of waters of life." And so here we have the picture of the redeemed
in their glorified state being yet guided by the Great Shepherd
who continues to lead them to fountains of refreshment Well,
when we turn to the task of the under-shepherd, we find that
this is precisely the note that is sounded again and again. that
the shepherds are responsible to provide for the nourishment
of the sheep. You'll remember in the prophecies
that we read from Jeremiah this morning that this was to be the
dominant characteristic of those shepherds given under the new
covenant. Jeremiah 3.15, I shall give them
shepherds after my own heart who shall feed them with knowledge
and with understanding. The pastures and the quiet waters
of rest, according to Jeremiah, are knowledge and understanding. They are the food substance of
the souls of the sheep of Christ's pasture under the new covenant. And the same emphasis is found
in Jeremiah 23 and in verse 4, another prophecy that we looked
at from another perspective this morning. I will set up shepherds
over them, who shall feed them." Now, you see, that was the great
curse of the false shepherds. They did not feed the sheep. In the opening words of Ezekiel
34, the indictment covers many aspects of the failure of these
false shepherds. But the prophet begins with this,
prophesy against the shepherds of Israel, prophesy and say unto
them, even to the shepherds, thus saith the Lord Jehovah,
woe unto the shepherds of Israel that do feed themselves. Should not the shepherds feed
the sheep? Now we turn to the definitive
passage in the New Testament, and of course it is here that
we see again this emphasis, so much so that the translators
find it difficult to know precisely how to translate it. Acts 20,
28, take heed to the flock of God. The old authorize says,
feed the flock of God. Likewise, in first Peter five
and also in John 20, where our Lord says to Peter, if you love
me, feed or care for my sheep and for my lambs. Well, I don't
want to labor the point, but I wanted to give you enough scripture
to see that when I assert that the fundamental task of the shepherd
is that of providing for the nourishment of the sheep, this
is not simply an attempt to give a prominence to the role of teachers
and preachers, which the word of God does not give. I've given
you, I trust, enough Scriptures from enough perspectives in the
Old and the New Testament to convince you, if your mind is
at all susceptible to the weight of Scripture, that the great
task of shepherding is that of providing the nourishment of
pure teaching and preaching for the sheep of Christ. Now, in
terms of diversity of gift and opportunity, previous training
and preparation, some of the shepherds will have a more concentrated
engagement in the actual public teaching and preaching. But the
requirement for every elder is that he hold fast to the faithful
word that is according to the teaching that he may be able
to exhort in sound doctrine and to refute gainsayers. But the principle that we should
understand as a congregation is that the eldership as a band
of shepherds are responsible to secure the nourishment needed
by the flock of God. That means that they are the
guardians of the teaching and preaching ministries of the Church. That means that to them is committed
the responsibility to see to it that anyone who stands in
a classroom to instruct a 2, a 6, an 8, a 10, or a 14 year
old, or who stands in this pulpit to preach to the whole spectrum
of that which constitutes the congregation, that those who
come before you as teachers will feed you with knowledge and with
understanding. that they will give you nothing
but the truth of God's holy and infallible word. And it is this
responsibility which as elders we feel very keenly. We are conscious
that in some ways we are different from other evangelical churches
in that we give a place and a prominence to teaching that far overshadows
every other activity in our corporate life. And this is not because
Pastor Martin happens to have a high or perhaps even an overly
inflated view of the role of a preacher and a teacher. It's
because together these men have come to the conviction that as
the shepherds of Christ, they are to provide the nourishment
of the pure teaching and preaching of the word of God. And that
responsibility is laid upon us, and it is our love for your souls
that refuses to allow any dilution of biblical truth, or any withholding
of any aspect of the whole counsel of God, because we love you too
much to see your growth stunted by anything else becoming central
in our life, or by anything but truth being brought before you
for the nourishment of your soul. But then in the second place,
the shepherd It's not only responsible to provide nourishment for the
sheep, but the shepherd is responsible to maintain the place of each
sheep within the flock. The shepherd is responsible to
maintain the place of each sheep within the flock. Now, I confess
in my preparation for the ministry that this is a line of truth
that I had never seen so clearly as it has come to me in the study
of these passages. Let's look again to the pattern
in the Great Shepherd. Turn to Ezekiel 34 once more. Against the backdrop of what
the false shepherds did not do, God underscores one of the primary
functions and responsibilities of the true shepherd whom he
himself will bring. What did the false shepherds
fail to do? Ezekiel 34, 4b. God indicts them by saying, neither
have you brought back that which was driven away. Neither have
you sought that which was lost. lost, but with force and rigor
have you ruled over them. And they were scattered because
there was no shepherd. Oh, there were people who had
the name and title shepherd, but they were not shepherds indeed.
And the sheep were scattered because there were no true functioning
shepherds. And what happened when they were
scattered? They became vulnerable. They became food to all the beasts
of the field and were scattered. My sheep wandered through all
the mountains and upon every high hill. Yea, my sheep were
scattered upon all the face of the earth and there was none
that did search or seek after them. You see the picture? Here
are these false shepherds sitting back having a feast on the flesh
of the sheep, utterly unconcerned that the sheep are scattered
and vulnerable to all of the predators that roam about the
mountains. And God says against that backdrop,
this is what I will do when I become shepherd. Verse 11. Thus saith
the Lord Jehovah, behold, I myself, even I will search for my sheep
and will seek them out. And as a shepherd seeks out his
flock in the day that he is among his sheep that are scattered
abroad, So will I seek out my sheep and I will deliver them
out of all places whither they have been scattered in the cloudy
and dark day. I will bring them out from the
peoples and gather them from the countries and bring them
into their own land and I will feed them upon the mountains
of Israel. You see what the true shepherd
does? He cannot stand the thought of a scattered flock. and seeing
the scattered, wounded, torn flock, he says, I will come and
I will go out and I will gather them to myself. Doesn't this
sound like the language of the Lord Jesus in John 10, verse
16? John 10, the chapter in which
our Lord asserts that he is the good shepherd, as we saw this
morning, He says in John 10, 16, other sheep I have which
are not of this fold, them also I must bring and they shall hear
my voice and they shall become one flock, a flock existing in
peace and safety and abundant provision under one shepherd. And you remember the parable
of our Lord in Luke 15, where He speaks of the shepherd who,
when one sheep has been separated from the flock, leaves the ninety
and nine and goes out and seeks it until he brings it back into
identification and integration with the flock. And we have a
similar passage in Matthew 18, 12 to 14. So you see one of the great functions
of the great shepherd is not simply to provide food, as it
were, on an individual basis. The whole concept of the church
as a flock speaks of a corporate identity. A hundred sheep in
a hundred separate pens, separated by a half a mile, would never
be called a flock of sheep upon a mountain. But the imagery is
that the Lord gathers them into proximity to one another and
the shepherd ministers to the individual needs of the flock
as the individual sheep are part of the flock. And when we turn
to the classic passage in the New Testament, we see that this
is made abundantly clear with respect to the church as the
flock of God. that individual growth of the
believer does not exist in isolation from other believers, that he
is fed and nourished as he is kept in the closest relationships
to, in this passage, the body, but according to other passages,
the church viewed as the flock, Ephesians chapter 4. For here
is the passage which speaks of the exalted Christ giving gifts
unto men, and he gives pastors and teachers, verse 11, for the
perfecting of the saints unto the work of ministering, unto
the building up of the body of Christ. till we all attain unto
the unity of the faith and the knowledge of the Son of God,
unto a full-grown man, unto the measure of the stature of the
fullness of Christ, that we be no longer children tossed to
and fro and carried about by every wind of doctrine by the
slight of men in craftiness after the wiles of error, but speaking
truth in love may grow up in all things unto him who is the
head, even Christ, from whom all the body fitly framed and
knit together through that which every joint supplieth according
to the working in due measure of each several part makes the
increase of the body unto the building up of itself in love.
Granted, here is the image of the body But Paul has no problem
in moving from the statement of shepherds and teachers, which
is the pastoral imagery, into that of the body. And the common
denominator is the corporal nature, the corporate nature of the identity
of God's people. And so no little part of the
responsibility of the shepherds in Christ's flock is to maintain
the place of each sheep within the flock, to make sure that
people do not begin to stray to the fringes of the flock.
so that when the flock is seated or lying in green pastures, you
don't have some just far enough away to be out of reach of that
which is provided for their nourishment. And when the shepherd is leading
the flock through treacherous places, that they are together,
that he may lead them, and you don't have those that are out
on the fringes and vulnerable to predators and vulnerable to
other dangers. Now, when we turn to the New
Testament with respect to the task of under shepherds, again,
the emphasis, though not as explicit, surely can be seen in Acts 20
and verse 28. We are commanded to pay close
attention to the flock of God which is among us. And we're
to pay close attention to the flock in the light of the dangers
to which the flock is exposed. And when is the flock most exposed
to danger? When it is scattered. You remember
in Matthew 9, 36, Jesus looked out and saw the multitudes and
it is said, that he saw them as sheep having no shepherd. They were scattered. Again, in
Matthew 26 31, smite the shepherd and the sheep will be scattered
and scattered sheep become vulnerable sheep. Now, do you see what this
says to us as under shepherds and what it says to you, the
people of God, about our concern? what for some, no doubt, is regarded
almost as a fanatical passion for maintaining the unity of
the spirit in the bond of peace. Do you see what lies behind the
passion to see every member of the flock present every time
the shepherds lead the flock into green pastures and beside
quiet waters? Do you see what lies behind that
passion and yearning that we shall not have one flock that's
here Sunday morning, another flock Sunday night, a different
one Wednesday night? What kind of flock is that? What
kind of flock is that? No, we have this passion and
yearning that the whole flock will be present when the Word
of God is taught in the Sunday school hours. when we meet to
worship and praise and draw near to God and have the Word of God
come to us in our morning hour of worship, and when we meet
to crown the Lord's Day with evening worship and ministry,
and when we gather on Wednesday and once a month, Sunday, Saturday
morning to pray, what lies behind this passion to see the whole
flock together? Is it our reputation? Is it that
we have some numbers to send to the denominational headquarter
to prove we're ministerial successes? No, we don't keep any numbers. We have no headquarters. Dear
people of God, I bear my heart to you. Our passion is your safety. Our passion is your well-being,
not ours. Your well-being. and only ours
insofar as we can say with Paul, we live if you stand fast in
the Lord. Our life is bound up in your
well-being. Believe it or not, that's true,
because God has at least in some little measure touched our hearts
with the spirit of a true shepherd. Listen to the sagacious words
of the late and esteemed Professor John Murray, speaking on this
or writing on this very subject of the shepherd being responsible
to maintain the place of each shepherd within the flock. If an elder watches over his
charge with tender solicitude and love, he will in many cases
prevent the necessity of public censure by the eldership as a
court of the church because his private instructions and admonitions
will be corrective at the earlier stages of defection and deviation. How much of purity and peace
would have been maintained in the Church of Christ and will
be maintained if elders are sensitive to the first steps of delinquency
on the part of the people and bring the word of tender admonition
and reproof to bear upon them before they reach the bypaths
of open and censurable sin? A shepherd, when he sees the
sheep wandering, does not wait until it reaches the well-nigh
inaccessible precipices. The elder must do the same by
the ministry of admonition and warning. Believe me, there is
not an elder sitting here before you tonight, and certainly not
this elder standing before you. who does not have a native aversion
to anything that might precipitate a frown from one of the sheep.
There is not a one of us who likes confrontation, who even
likes the possibility of seeing that look of rejection of a loving
admonition. Well, what is it that enables
us to overcome all of our native disinclination and distaste to
go after a sheep that's beginning to get out on the fringes of
the fold and lovingly and, if necessary, pointedly and urgently
to exhort and admonish and warn and entreat and try to bring
them back in? What is it that makes us overcome
our native reluctance? It's love for the sheep. and
love for the Lord who purchased the sheep with his own precious
blood. You may wish to attribute some
other motive, but God is witness that the motive that we declare
will stand the test of his scrutiny in the last day. Then the task
of a shepherd is not only to secure nourishment for the sheep,
to be responsible to maintain the place of each sheep within
the fold. But thirdly, the shepherd is
responsible to protect the flock from its enemies. The shepherd
is responsible to protect the flock from its enemies. Now,
once again, let's see this in the great shepherd, the Lord
Jesus, Psalm 23. Psalm 23 has this emphasis of
the protection of the shepherd as David celebrates the fact
that the Lord is his shepherd. Listen to the things he can say
about his shepherd. Verse four, though I walk through
the valley of the shadow of death, the valley of deep darkness,
whatever it is, it's a foreboding place that would naturally bring
tremendous fear. He says, I will fear no evil,
for you are with me. And when I look at the rod and
staff of the shepherd and know that that rod has many a time
broken the back of some predator, driven away some would-be devourer,
And when I realized that that staff has many times gone around
my neck or my rump to pull me back into the way, away from
a precipice, away from some other danger, he said, I feel comforted. I feel safe. I have a shepherd
who's got a rod and a staff, and he has them for more than
ornamental purposes. His rod and staff are functional,
not ornamental. And he says, as long as I see
the rod in the staff and I know they're not ornamental but functional,
I feel safe. I'll fear no evil. My shepherd
is with me. That's what the great shepherd
does. And the Lord Jesus underscores this in John chapter 10 when
describing his own work as the great shepherd. He contrasts himself with mere
hirelings. John chapter 10, I am the good
shepherd. Verse 11, the good shepherd lays
down his life for the sheep. He that is a hireling, in other
words, his relation to the sheep is only one of a job. The sheep
exist as far as he's concerned, only as a means to the end that
he get a paycheck. He has no attachment in love
or sense of accountability. All he has is a job. He that
is a harling and not the shepherd, whose own the sheep are not,
he beholds the wolf coming, and what's he do? He said, the wolf's
fangs that can go into the flesh of a sheep could go into my flesh.
I'm getting out of here. I'm getting out of here pronto.
He flees. He beholds the wolf coming. And
he leaves the sheep and fleas, and the wolf snatches them and
scatters them. He flees because he is a hireling
and does not have any true care for the sheep. I am the good
shepherd. I know my own and mine own know
me, even as the father knows me and I know the father. And
I lay down my life for the sheep. That great enemy was an avenging
law, the unanswered claims of justice that would have devoured
us. And the Lord Jesus, seeing those
our enemies that could devour us, said, I am prepared to step
in between those unanswered claims of an offended law, that avenging
law, the unanswered claims of justice. And if they demand my
life, that the sheep may be released, I'll lay down my life. Here's
the Lord Jesus, the great shepherd, the protector of his sheep, who
secures their well-being by nothing less than his own voluntary bloodletting. Now we take our clue from the
great shepherd, and we learn that the duty of the under shepherds
is likewise to protect the flock from its enemies. Therefore,
in Acts chapter 20, Paul concentrates upon this very duty, With respect
to the elders at Ephesus, notice the emphasis, Acts 20, 28 and
9. Take heed unto yourselves and
to all the flock in which the Holy Spirit has made you overseers
to shepherd the church of the Lord, which he purchased with
his own blood. I know that after my departing,
grievous wolves shall enter in among you, not sparing the flock,
and from among your own selves shall men arise speaking perverse
things to draw away. You see the concept? Separating
certain sheep from the flock. It's always the tendency of error
to get people out of step with the motif and the spirit and
the oneness of the flock. I'm so different. I'm so exceptional. My needs so abnormal that I cannot
go along with the flock. And then there's somebody ready
to push into the ear of such a person some apparently rational
reason why he or she can afford the luxury of separation from
the flock. Isn't that what the text says?
Perverse men arise to draw away the disciples after them, get
them out of step with the flock, get them out of step with the
direction the true shepherds are given. He's talking to the
shepherds. And he says in the light of this,
verse 31, wherefore, be watchful, be watchful, you shepherds. Don't
be so naive as to think that the memory of my three and a
half years will either preserve the flock from wolves or immunize
them against perverse men. Oh, don't be so naive as to think
that because I, the Apostle Paul, was among you and labored, and
notice he says, for three years, so earnest that day and night
with tears he warned them, That's passion. That's earnestness. Here's a man convinced the dangers
are real. He wasn't playing games. He looked
upon that flock of sheep at Ephesus and he said, I know when I leave.
And because of my advanced experience and my intensified privileges
as an apostle, leaving the Church in the care of you elders whom
the Holy Ghost has now put there to carry on the task, I know
there's no sense of fair play. There's no temporary truces with
the Prince of Darkness. He's going to stir up the devouring
wolves from without, the perverse men from within, you shepherds
always be on your guard. Watch, watch, watch, watch, watch,
watch, watch. Protect the flock from its enemies. That is one of the great responsibilities
of the under shepherds, the wolves that would come from without
and the perverse men that would rise up from within. This is
why all elders must be men of discernment. Titus 1 9 says they
must hold to the faithful word that they may be able not only
to exhort in the sound doctrine, but to convict the gainsayer. Dear people, do you wonder why
those of us who preach and teach publicly and admonish privately
warn you of the influence of the world? expose false teaching,
seek to plead with you not to be careless but ever be watchful,
it's because there is laid upon us this awesome responsibility
to protect you, Christ's flock, from every enemy that would seek
to ravage you. And whether you're aware of the
enemy or not, it makes no difference of his intention. The sheep may
be blissfully unaware that lies down a little bit of a distance
from the main body of the flock, enjoying what he thinks is the
luxury of some independence from the rule of the shepherds. Little
does he know that a few feet away are predators waiting to
pounce upon him, go for his jugular vein and take his life. But the
shepherd, knowing that, cannot afford the luxury of saying,
well, the vast majority of the flock are together, just let
that one go and be devoured, teach him a lesson. No. There
is to be that concern for the slightest indication of the presence
of predators around the flock, and shepherds have arrived. And
that rod is the word of God and there to bring it down upon those
issues to protect the flock. It's not some kind of spiritual
paranoia. It's the responsibility that
has been laid upon us by the chief shepherd. That's why the
explicit duty of the servants of Christ is couched in such
language as this. Preach the Word. Be instant in
season, out of season. Reprove, rebuke with all longs,
suffering and teaching. Paul says, Whom we warn, admonishing
every man, teaching every man, that we may present every man
perfect in Christ. Do you see now why we are committed
to keeping our eyes open for any indications of false teaching? It is a horrible, horrible indictment
upon those false shepherds that they sat around eating mutton
while the wolves devoured the flock. In Ezekiel 34, 7 and 8,
it is said of those false shepherds As I live, saith the Lord, surely
for as much as my sheep became a prey and my sheep became food
to all the beast of the field, because there was no shepherd,
neither did my shepherd search for my sheep, but the shepherds
fed themselves and fed not my sheep. They were sitting around
having a feast on mutton while the beast of the field would
having their feast on mutton as well. And I fear that's the
picture of many a soft-handed, spineless reverend and elder
and pastor who sits around feeding himself with the accolades of
people who want to be stroked and coddled and put to sleep
in the midst of danger while one after another is devoured
by the enemy of our souls. Well then, there is a fourth
responsibility that is laid upon the under-shepherds. The shepherd
is responsible to attend to the wounds, diseases, and distresses
with which individual sheep are afflicted. The shepherd is responsible
to attend to the wounds, diseases, and distresses with which the
individual sheep are afflicted. Now again, we look at the great
shepherd, the Lord Jesus. Amidst that backdrop of the indifference
of the false shepherds in Ezekiel 34, God says the true shepherd
whom He will raise up, he will be marked by this activity, verse
16. I will seek that which was lost
and bring back that which was driven away and will bind up
that which was broken, and will strengthen that which was sick. You see, the false shepherds,
God said in verse 4, you have not healed that which was sick,
neither have you bound up that which was broken. God says, I
will do the very thing you failed to do. And surely in the Lord
Jesus spoken of in Isaiah 40 and verse 11, you have one of
the most tender images of this matter of the shepherd entering
in not only to the wounds and diseases, but to the peculiar
distresses of his sheep. Isaiah 40 and verse 11, he will
feed his flock like a shepherd. He will gather the lambs in his
arm, carry them in his bosom. and will gently lead those that
have their young. Here's a ewe taken up with her
little lamb, preoccupied with its needs and its cares, or it
may speak of one that is about to deliver her lamb. In either
case, the shepherd is conscious of that ewe about to deliver,
or the one who has just delivered and who has peculiar distractions
And conscious of that, he condescends to minister to its need. He takes
the lambs in his arm, carries them in his bosom, and gently
leads those that have their young. When we turn to the New Testament
and see the Lord Jesus with his flock, we see him doing that. He attends to their wounds, their
diseases, and their distresses. There are times when they are
fearful, and he says, fear not, little flock. It is your father's
good pleasure to give you the kingdom. There are other times
when they have the disease of unbelief and he rebukes them
and says, Oh, ye of little faith, why did you not believe me? And
then there are other times when they are distressed by things
that don't seem to fit together because they had not yet developed
in their understanding to see what they came to see very clearly
in that post-resurrection ministry of the Lord and after the descent
of the Holy Spirit on Pentecost. And there are times when the
Lord Jesus had to speak to them and bear with them, but we see
Him in that full range of the shepherd ministering to the wounds,
diseases and distresses of his sheep. And that's precisely the
task that God lays upon us. God lays upon us as His under-shepherds
to try to keep our eyes open for the signs of distress, for
spiritual sickness and disease and disorder. And this is why
we seek to make ourselves available. Our standing at the door every
service is not a matter of social custom. There are times when
I'm so exhausted when I finish preaching, the last thing I want
is another hour of giving of myself. Rarely do I get home
before quarter to two on a Lord's Day morning. But I don't begrudge
that. I count it a privilege to be
amongst my sheep. And if some of you wonder why
I won't let you engage me in something that keeps me away,
I want to be there to see my sheep. And my fellow elders are
planted at the other doors to see their sheep. Why? To see
if they can find any signs of distress. And if there are no
signs of distress and all is going well, to rejoice with you
and to rejoice in their own hearts that you have all the appearance
of a healthy sheep. feeding well and growing fat,
inwardly that is, on all the good things of God. But then,
you see, so often the eye is the window of the soul, and if
there's distress, that's why we look you in the eye. We're
not suspicious of you. We're not trying to do a job
on you by looking into your eyeballs. It's the concern of sheep, a
shepherd for their sheep. Because God has laid that responsibility
upon us. And you see, God hasn't made
us omniscient. At least a sheep has sense enough
if it breaks a leg to lie there and bleat loud enough until the
shepherd comes running and sees the broken leg and then can mend
it. Would to God some of you had
the sense of a poor dumb sheep. You got a broken leg and somebody
told you the spiritual thing to do is to act like all is well.
So you keep a stiff upper lip. You don't tell anyone. You don't
let your shepherds know. God hasn't made us omniscient.
And we don't have to go around picking up pant legs every Sunday
to see if you've got broken legs. Dear sheep, if you're in trouble,
bleat. I've had people come when their
spiritual sore was full of gangrene, and I said, why did you wait?
And they said, well, you're so busy. I said, look, did I tell
you I was too busy to come? Well, I did. I said, yes, you
assumed, but, but, you assume what is not true. There is no
one in this building that can say he ever sought to have the
personal attention of a shepherd and made his need known, who
was told, we've got no time. Dear sheep of Christ, don't come
running every time you just get a burr on your fur, on your wool. Some of that you can rub off
on a bush. You don't want a chronic dependence on your elders. But
if you need to be stitched up and splinted, come! Bleat loud
enough and let us know that we may come and bind up that which
is broken and seek to heal that which is wounded. I submit that
these are the four great responsibilities laid upon the shepherds to provide
for the nourishment of the sheep, to secure their place in the
fold, to protect them from their enemies, to attend to their wounds,
diseases, and distresses. And we'll have to leave to another
time the responsibility of the sheep to the shepherd, because
I do want to close by giving, first of all, an appeal to you,
Christ's sheep, and then to say a word directly to the one who
will be formally recognized as an under-shepherd in a few moments.
Dear people of God, do you think there's any man in his right
mind who faces a job like this and doesn't want to throw up
his hands and say with Paul, who is sufficient for these things?
If that is but an outline of the task of an under-shepherd,
as seen in the reflection of the Great Shepherd, then we cry
with Paul, who is sufficient for these things. And that's
why each of these men, together we plead with you, cry to God
for us as your shepherds. We are made of the same Adamic
stuff of which you are made. When you struggle with inward
sin, so do we. And when you feel you have all
you can do to keep your own chin and nose above the waters of
the pressure of the world that, like a whirlpool, pulls upon
you and wants to suck you down into its vortex and drown you,
we feel the same pressures. We're not immune to those things. remaining sin in us is as much
vulnerable to temptation as it is in you. And we therefore plead
with you to cry to God for us, that we may know the grace of
Christ in our own hearts, in our own walk with God, that we
may be given wisdom, discernment, sensitivity, continuous baptisms
of love that only God can give us, that we will find our joy
in spending and being spent for the well-being of the flock.
One of the most wonderful and encouraging things that is ever
said around here is when one of the sheep comes to one of
us, the shepherds, and says, you know, Pastor so and so, I
guess the best way I can express my appreciation for what goes
on around here is to say, I feel so safe. I feel so safe. I never have to worry if some
kind of kookishness is going to come over the pulpit or out
of the classroom. I don't have to worry that there's
going to be a latitudinarian attitude that will allow poison
to come in and infect the congregation. I feel safe. And though we thank
you for that encouragement, dear people, it will only be true
so long as we are upheld by the grace of God in our task as undershepherds. Pray for us. If the great apostle
would conclude his own epistles by saying, Brethren, pray for
us, then I feel it fitting that I should conclude on that note
of appeal. And then I say to you, my dear
friend and beloved brother, who will be called by the people
of God from this time on, Pastor Bob or Pastor Bob Martin, May
God enable you, my brother, to lay to heart what has been preached
today and to know from this hour forward new dimensions of that
commitment in love and accountability to this flock, a commitment to
this fourfold task, that together the work of shepherding in this
place will be strengthened to the benefit of this flock of
Christ's sheep and to the glory of the Christ who purchased this
flock. with his own precious blood.
May you be a faithful shepherd to my soul, a faithful shepherd
to the souls of your fellow elders. May we be a faithful shepherd
to your soul. And may we together, my brethren,
by the grace of God, renew our covenant to be true shepherds
to this flock of Christ's precious sheep. Let us pray. Our Father, we thank you for
your holy word and for the instruction that it contains with reference
to these vital issues of the shepherd-flock relationship.
Though we've only scratched the surface in our meditations today,
we do pray that the Holy Spirit will write these things upon
all of our hearts and bring them to remembrance for many days
and years to come. Be with us now in this solemn
and joyful time when we will formally recognize our brother
as your gift to us and joyfully submit to his rule in Christ. Oh Lord, consummate this day
with the sense of your peculiar nearness to every one of our
hearts. We ask in Jesus name, amen.