Parables On Shepherd And Sheep
To see the shepherd leading his sheep was a sight with which all were familiar, and the relations between the two were totally different from what they were, and are, in western lands.
The shepherd led his sheep. He went before and the sheep followed him. They knew their shepherd and trusted him. He also knew them, and he had names for all of them, and they responded when he called. He always had his shepherd’s crook for guidance, but he also had a massive club to deal with any marauder who attacked the flock. “Thy rod and thy staff” they are called in Psalm 23.
The sheep were gathered into the sheepfold at night, and as they entered the “rodding” of the sheep took place. Each was inspected and cuts and bruises attended to, and they were also counted as they entered, any missing were searched for diligently. There was no door to the sheepfold, but when all were safely inside the shepherd lay down across the opening — he was the ‘door’ of the sheepfold.
Jesus gave many parables using shepherds and sheep as illustrations. He told the story of the lost sheep, and he used as an illustration a sheep fallen into a pit on the sabbath day. He compared the separation of good and bad at his judgment seat to the separating of sheep and goats, and his usages of shepherd and sheep in John 9 and 10, while they cannot be described as parables, are most telling illustrations. Let us then look in a little more detail.
Take first the parable of the lost sheep. This is one of a trio of parables, all dealing with ‘the lost’. The lost sheep deals with one in a hundred, the lost coin one in ten, and the lost son one in two (this last parable is better known as “The Prodigal Son”). All occur in Luke, chapter 15. These parables were given because of the attitude of the Pharisees to the ordinary people, and were addressed directly to the Pharisees and Scribes. (This portion of Luke, chapters 13 to 18, is particularly rich in stating to whom Jesus was speaking, which gives us the clue to his meaning.)
The parable of the ‘Lost sheep’ is in Luke 15:1-7. The sheep which strayed is representative of the publican and sinner class, and the 99 were left “in the wilderness” while the shepherd sought for the lost one. The attitude of the Pharisees is amply described in the parable of the Publican and the Pharisee praying in the temple. The Pharisee exuded self-righteousness, thanking God he was not like “this publican” (note, the text says he was praying “with himself” not to God!).
The Scribes and Pharisees were self-righteous and self-satisfied and they despised the common people. “This people that knoweth not the Law is cursed” and “I thank thee I am not as other men”. Jesus said of them: “They that are whole need not a physician, but they that are sick. I came not to call the righteous but sinners to repentance”. In the parable he refers to the 99 as, “the 99 just persons who need no repentance”. But note, the shepherd left them ‘in the wilderness’ and they were much more ‘lost’ than the common people.
In connection with Zacchaeus, Jesus said, “I am come to seek and to save that which was lost”. In this parable he goes after that which was lost until he finds it. When he does find it, not only is there rejoicing among his friends, there is also joy in heaven over the repentant sinner. “Rejoice with me, for I have found my sheep which was lost.” He “layeth it on his shoulders” He does not leave it to get back to the flock by its own efforts, but he helps it very materially by carrying it. He helps the sinner (providing he is repentant) to rehabilitate himself. This aspect is dealt with very fully in the parable of the Prodigal Son.
We feel that perhaps this aspect does not receive the attention it deserves. Both the Father and the Son are very concerned regarding the welfare of those who have become covenantly related to them. They are members of the family of God. We know that “he knoweth our frame, he remembereth that we are dust”.
Of the Son, Paul says, “while we were yet enemies, Christ died for us”. The love of the Father was such that he was prepared to `give’ his only begotten son. The love and obedience of the son was such he could say, “The good shepherd layeth down his life for the sheep”. We are assured that “… the eyes of the Lord run to and fro throughout the whole earth to shew himself strong on behalf of those who put their trust in him”.
We know that Jesus is the great high priest who is touched with the feelings of our infirmities. In the parable of the Lost Coin, the woman swept the house and searched diligently. In the parable of the Prodigal Son, the father was on the look-out, he saw the son “a great way off” and ran to meet him. If only we are prepared to draw nigh to God, he is prepared to draw nigh to us, and there is rejoicing in heaven when this occurs. But this wonderful action by both Father and son is only for repentant sinners who are prepared to forsake their sins and walk in light as children of their Father who is in heaven.
Parable Of The Sheep And The Goats
Sheep and goats are very different in temperament. The sheep are meek and mild, whereas the goats are aggressive. Isaiah 53 compares Jesus to a sheep dumb before her shearers. Alexander the Great, in Daniel 9, is compared to a goat having an outstanding horn, and when the goat saw the ram he was “moved with choler” and furiously and successfully attacked it and overcame it. And so it is in the parable of the Sheep and the Goats at the end of Matthew 25.
Jesus was continually reminding the Jews how they were wasting their priceless opportunities. He warned them, “other sheep I have which are not of this fold”, and that they would “see Abram, Isaac and Jacob and all the prophets in the Kingdom of God and you yourselves thrust out”.
In this parable of the Sheep and the Goats, Jesus says, “… when the son of man sits on his glorious throne… before him will be gathered all the nations, and he will separate them one from another, as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats… ” The whole wording of this parable goes against the idea that this is a separation of nations, for it is intensely individual. Is it not rather an emphasis that when this judgment takes place it will be anything but exclusive to Jewry, but rather it will involve those out of every kindred, tribe, and tongue, as Revelation 5:9 tells us so clearly?
Let us note on what approval depends. Not on anything spectacular like “stopping the mouth of lions” or “putting to flight the armies of the alien” or anything of that nature. If salvation depended upon the achievement of things like that, the number of the redeemed would be few indeed.
The items Jesus emphasises are within the reach of the humblest, and they are representative, not merely of those enumerated, but the whole range of ordinary everyday deeds of kindness — a slice of bread and butter, a cup of cold water (or a cup of tea), a visit to the sick, or to those in prison, a welcome to the stranger, or giving of some clothing to the needy — these are things that all can do.
But not only so, they are so habitual to the doer that individual acts cannot be recalled — life is full of them. It is only the isolated things in life that stand out, the ordinary things just merge into life and are forgotten. The approved, therefore, ask in amazement, when Christ says “I was hungry” or “I was thirsty” etc., “When saw we thee hungry, or thirsty” etc., and Jesus says, “Inasmuch as ye did it to the least of these my brethren ye did it unto me”.
We are apt to forget that when we do things for our brethren and sisters we are doing them to the Lord. Jesus could ask Saul the Pharisee on the Damascus road, “Saul, Saul, why persecutest thou me?” It was his brethren and sisters Saul was persecuting, but they were members of his body of which he was the head. As God himself says, “In all their affliction I was afflicted… “
Equally, as the parable goes on to point out, failure to do these things to the brethren and sisters of the Lord is a failure to do them to the Lord himself. As the Lord says, “Inasmuch as ye did it not to the least of these my brethren ye did it not to me”. They were amazed — they had not thought of it that way before. Service to our brethren is service to the Lord, and when we stand before him we shall receive rewards which will, doubtless, be equally surprising. “The righteous will go away into life eternal.” Paul says, “… to those who by patience in well doing seek for glory, honour and immortality, God will render eternal life”.
We note the ‘patience in well doing’, then the ‘seeking for’, for glory, honour and immortality, which items are evidently what compose ‘eternal life’. God is not slack concerning his promises; and it is beyond our imagination to conceive what the time will be like when beauty replaces ashes, the oil of joy for mourning and the garment of praise for the spirit of heaviness.
But what of the rejected? They will go away `into eternal punishment’. It will be a life sentence. Just as the life for faithfulness will last forever, so will the punishment also last forever. As Jude says of some “suffering the vengeance of eternal fire”. The fire went out long ago, but its results remain. And so with the rejected. The Lord’s decree will be absolute, and their lot will be absolute oblivion —just as though they had not been. No second chance or anything of that nature. They will sink into a death which will be permanent —yes, eternal!
For the approved, Jesus said, “Inherit the Kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world”. God, by his foreknowledge, knows who will be faithful and who will not. As Paul says in Ephesians 1:4, ” God has chosen us in him before the foundation of the world… ” The redeemed will have the pleasure and privilege of helping the Lord Jesus in the administration of the re-established Kingdom of God — “Kings and priests” is the expression used, “and we shall reign on the earth”.
There will be a tremendous work to be done. A cruel, brutal, depraved and godless world is to be taught the ways and requirements of God.
Righteousness has to prevail and all the wonderful Old Testament prophecies will then be realised — peace achieved, warfare abolished, famine gone, pollution solved, disease under control, oppression cured, and (mortal) life greatly extended. One religion will be established over all the earth. All this is embodied in the promise “Inherit the Kingdom prepared from the foundation of the world”.
What will be abolished in that Kingdom is epitomised in the fate of the wicked — “Eternal fire, prepared for the devil and his angels”. Sin will be greatly diminished during the millennium, and then, at the end, sin, disease, mortality, even death itself, will be utterly destroyed, and such is symbolised by the Lake of Fire, and sin etc. is symbolised by “The devil and his angels”.
This parable of the Sheep and the Goats was the last one Jesus gave, and was a most fitting conclusion. Events began to crowd upon him, and within a very short space of time he also brought to a marvellous conclusion his parables of the Shepherd and his Sheep when he had foretold “The good shepherd layeth down his life for his sheep” being the exhibition of “greater love hath no man than laying down his life for his friends”.
Knowing all his sheep by name, even though many sleep in the dust of the earth, he will call, and they will answer like Lazarus of old, when Jesus called, “Lazarus, come forth” and he came forth. But when Jesus calls in the future it will not be to a renewal of mortal life, but rather, if approved, to participation in “that life that knows no ending”.
The Solution