What the BIble Says About the Shepherd -- Do Not Forget Your Calling to Fully Love the Sheep

In a haunting portion of Holy Scripture, in Ezekiel 34, The Lord calls out the leaders of the people of Israel in exile. He says:

You have not strengthened the weak or healed the sick or bound up the injured.You have not brought back the strays or searched for the lost. You have ruled them harshly and brutally. So they were scattered because there was no shepherd, and when they were scattered they became food for all the wild animals. My sheep wandered over all the mountains and on every high hill. They were scattered over the whole earth, and no one searched or looked for them. Ezekiel 34:4-8

It comes through the centuries to us as a check list for pastors and elders and all leaders of churches. How are we doing on compassionately reaching out to the hurting, the confused, and the lost. Are we reaching out in love and treating them as a shepherd tenderly treats his or her sheep?

The Pastor is usually known as the shepherd; in fact, pastor is the Latin word for herdsman or shepherd. The 23rd Psalm says, “The Lord is my Shepherd.” This beautiful piece of literature, which is deeply embedded in its Old Testament milieu, has also proven meaningful to people of many different religious traditions.
“Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I fear no evil; for you are with me – your rod and your staff, they comfort me.” The rhythm and the words seem to evoke a comforting and soothing presence, even in the midst of danger or loss.

“You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies; you anoint my head with oil; my cup overflows.” The Lord, the shepherd, is a gracious host, preparing a table of generous sustenance and blessing even when one is in the midst of enemies.

The 23rd Psalm presents a protective and empowering picture of God as a shepherd to God’s people, and it is daunting that one of the titles ordained folks like me are known by is Pastor – shepherd. Ours is a great responsibility -- sometimes the weight of it seems overwhelming. The prophet Jeremiah underlined the weight of the calling when he said, “Thus saith the Lord: ‘Woe to the shepherds who destroy and scatter the sheep of my pasture.’”Jeremiah 23:1

The story from the Gospel of John highlights the difference between the thief who comes only to steal and kill and destroy, (John 10:10)and the Good Shepherd, who comes to lead and protect the sheep.

In all these texts, the good shepherd protects and empowers the flock; the bad shepherd is too harsh and forgets his true calling. Sometimes the voices of the culture may lead pastors astray. Sometimes it is the well-meaning, but misguided voices of the congregation, echoing positions taken by past pastors that may no longer apply in the current situation. It is easy to get off the message that God has given you as your core theme. God in Ezekiel and Jeremiah tells us to stop it, to get on our knees and repent, and to return to the call He has given us with renewed commitment.

It is in the area of marriages that I have struggled. In my first three pastorates I held the view, shared by my session boards, that you married anyone who legitimately wanted to come to the Lord to be married, whether they were living together or not. Marriage is a sin-stopper. It puts a couple on the right track.

In my current pastorate, I tried to uphold the standards set by a previous pastor, some that were and are firmly held by current members of the congregation. I have tried, oh Lord, I have tried, and I have spent many sleepless nights. Sometimes I think it would be so much easier not to celebrate any marriages at all. But that is not possible, so I have sought to uphold these standards and still be as loving as possible.

The problem is that such standards are artificial and legalistic and so hard to implement fairly. And upholding artificial conditional standards gets in the way of loving unconditionally, and such unconditional love is the Jesus way.

And how do you judge someone as more worthy of a wedding in their home church than someone else? Just because two people have different addresses, does it mean that they are not "living together" at least part of the time. And how can you prove that their has been no premarital sex? I daresay there have been lots of brides who have gone down the ailse with another person growing inside them.

Two of my heroes are President Ronald Reagan and his wife Nancy. Reagan was divorced when he remarried in 1952 to actress Nancy Davis at a time when she was already become pregnant. Their marriage was on March 4, while daughter Patti was born on October 21 of the same year. God blessed the Reagan's marriage despite this fact.

Take another person that many people respect -- the Reverend and lawyer Pat Robertson. When he ran for President (and he finished second in the Iowa caucuses, polling ahead of future president George H. W. Bush),Time magazine dug up Robertson's marriage license, and found that he was married in August of 1954, about ten weeks before his first son's birthday. Robertson said he and his wife had always celebrates their anniversary in March, on his own birthday, "because our son was conceived that day."

By Reverend Pat's thinking, everyone who has a child before marriage, or has one on the way, was "married" by God at the child's conception. I post this fact, not because I wish to put down Reverend Pat, since I admire much that he has done for the Lord, but to show that God can still use a person who makes mistakes in their life. There are many more examples like this -- perhaps you know some from personal friends and experiences. Remember, we are all sinners saved by grace. As a good friend of mine reminds me -- when you point that finger, three are pointing back at you.

I now see that some of my efforts in "raising a standard" were hurtful to ones who needed love and compassion, not finger-pointing. I now see that when I was thinking I was throwing them a lifeline, I was tossing them a rock.

So it is that I repent. In some areas of my ministry, since I came to my current call, in an effort to align with what I thought were church standards set in place by other pastors in another time, I have at times been too Pharisaic, too legalistic, too judgmental. For that I apologize to God, to the people, and to myself.

God gave Billy Graham and Dwight L. Moody core salvation messages. He gave Mother Teresa one of great pastoral care for the poor and the sick. He has given me the core message of the transcendent power of love and the miraculous power of prayer and the deeper things of God.

That is where I must major. That is where I am called -- to glorify God and point to His love, mercy and grace, and to win those lost and hurt back to the Lord with examples of that great love He gives us, not kick them in the teeth or beat them with a judgement stick. For the times I may have done that, I apologize. I must let God deal with their hearts, even as I give my heart to them as a shepherd. May I live as an apostle of His love all the rest of my life. May I be a loving shepherd.

Clearly, I am not the only one who misses it sometimes, who may have heard other voices and reacted in error. All of us need to help each other in recognizing and differentiating between the voice of the thief-the stranger, and the voice of Jesus – the Good Shepherd. And a strong faith should give us the courage to act with compassion and love as Jesus did. May the grace of Jesus Christ-the Good Shepherd, guide and protect you, now and always. Amen.