March 30, 2008
Ministry:
A few passages came before me this morning; the first is Zechariah 13:7: “Awake, O sword, against my shepherd, and against the man that is my fellow, saith the LORD of hosts: smite the shepherd, and the sheep shall be scattered: and I will turn mine hand upon the little ones.” Darby says, “I will turn my hand over upon the little ones.” Here the Lord of hosts is speaking through Zechariah; we know this prophecy and what it is about because we have read about this One in John 10 and how God unsheathed His sword of judgement and plunged it into the heart of the Lord Jesus Christ. If He is the Shepherd, the One to care for the sheep, what will happen to them when they are scattered? We find in this very same verse that the One who will judge will also protect the little ones. And as I thought about this, another passage came to me: another well known story in I Samuel 17. This story has another father and another shepherd. Read vv. 17 & 20. The father sent the son, who was responsible for the sheep. While he was gone, David left the sheep with a keeper. He was going down into the valley of Elah for conflict with the enemy, but he made sure his sheep were safe. This is a picture of the Lord Himself, who went to the valley to gain a victory. How precious these things are when we see how they bring before us the concern for the sheep. Can we see ourselves it in? Love is not mentioned, but in our case, we’ve been reminded, it was a love that was stronger than death.
EG Hymn 324 – Into a tent where a gypsy boy lay,
Prayer
We’ll finish looking at Acts 16 today. Where are we in Paul’s journeys? We have been going through his second journey, on which Silas joined him. Last we saw, they were in Philippi. Read vv. 16–17. As they went to the prayer meeting, a young lady with an evil spirit followed them. Her masters used her to earn money by fortune telling, and she cried that Paul and Silas were servants of God. This happened for a number of days, v. 18, until Paul cast the devil out of her. Her masters were not happy when they saw what Paul had done, so they dragged the apostles to the rulers, claiming they had troubled the city. They whipped Paul and Silas and threw them into prison, putting them in stocks. How do you think they felt? They were probably hurting a lot … do you think they were unhappy? Read I Thessalonians 5:18. We are told to be thankful in everything, knowing it is God’s will. But in v. 25, Paul and Silas sang and praised God in their cell. And God brought an earthquake on the prison, v. 26. Do you know of any other earthquakes in the Bible? There was one when the Lord died; at that time, many graves were opened. There was also an earthquake when He rose from the dead, which rolled the stone away. This earthquake brought miracles too: everyone’s bands were loosed and the doors were thrown open. You would think everyone would try to escape. That’s what the guard thought too, and he was going to kill himself, v. 28, but Paul cried out to him that they were all here. The keeper must have heard Paul and Silas singing and knew they were Christians; he went to them and asked them “What must I do to be saved?” In v. 31, Paul tells him to believe on the Lord to be saved. If Paul and Silas had not been singing, things probably wouldn’t have turned out like they did. The keeper and his family were saved; he took Paul and Silas home for the night, fed them, and cared for them. The next day, the leaders decided to set Paul and Barnabas free. They went to Lydia’s home, where they comforted the brethren, and then went on their way. May we take Paul and Silas as an example, and learn to rejoice and praise the Lord even when it doesn’t seem like things are going well.
I Peter 5:1–7
We saw how the flock talked about here is actually God’s flock, and not any single person’s. We saw how the Chief Shepherd had under-shepherds, the older ones who minister. The care of the flock is a responsibility, and it is given mainly to the elders. But who does the flock of God include? If it includes all believers, there are some I can’t be responsible for since they are not following the truth we believe. Since there are no ordained elders today (as elders were ordained by apostles), the older members of the flock are not responsible for a given geographical area.
V. 3 – “lording” means to be domineering; it would be acting like you own it. Although the elders are to minister to the flock, they do not own it, and are not to simply tell it what to do. As the verse says, they should be models (Darby) for the sheep. It has been said that “What you do speaks so loud I can’t hear what you say.” It’s true that our actions are more important than our words.
v. 4 - We read this morning about how the Lord will bring all his sheep together. It is sad that the flock of God is so separated today. When the Lord comes at the rapture, He will gather the flock together; each sheep is dear to Him and should be to us as well. For those who are faithful, there will be a reward: a crown that will never fade. This should not be our incentive; our goal should be to serve the Lord. It is interesting that he mentions that the crown will not fade; the Christians Peter was writing to would have seen the Olympic games, in which the winner received a crown, a floral wreath, which would fade away in a few days.
In Ezekiel 34:1–7, we have a prophecy against the shepherds of Israel. We don’t hear of shepherds in Leviticus, but these were the people who were in charge of the spiritual well-being of Israel. Those verses give us a list of the things God expected from the leaders of his people. The Jews were God’s people, but we can see how far from Him they were. In all, this is quite a rebuke. God expects the same of us today; His present under-shepherds had the responsibility of guiding the flock. However, He is the Shepherd who is over it all; “The Lord is my shepherd,” (Psalm 23:1). He will always do what is best for the flock. This is a wonderful reality for all of us. We know what sheep are like; how wonderful that He takes the place of a shepherd.
LF Hymn 238 – Our shepherd is the Lord,
Prayer