The importance of being a Good Shepherd
This paper is the third of three discussing the attributes and expectations of being under covenant with our Lord. It is fairly dense, scripturally. But there are few more important recurring themes in the Bible and therefore understanding it is critical.
I want to start with 1 Peter 5 as a foundational text.
To the elders among you, I appeal as a fellow elder and a witness of Christ’s sufferings who also will share in the glory to be revealed: 2 Be shepherds of God’s flock that is under your care, watching over them—not because you must, but because you are willing, as God wants you to be; not pursuing dishonest gain, but eager to serve; 3 not lording it over those entrusted to you, but being examples to the flock. 4 And when the Chief Shepherd appears, you will receive the crown of glory that will never fade away.
5 In the same way, you who are younger, submit yourselves to your elders. All of you, clothe yourselves with humility toward one another, because,
“God opposes the proud
but shows favor to the humble.”
6 Humble yourselves, therefore, under God’s mighty hand, that he may lift you up in due time. 7 Cast all your anxiety on him because he cares for you.
8 Be alert and of sober mind. Your enemy the devil prowls around like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour. 9 Resist him, standing firm in the faith, because you know that the family of believers throughout the world is undergoing the same kind of sufferings.
The reason for starting here is that Peter is making clear there is an expectation on those who are elders – let us say developed in the faith – to be good shepherds. Which begs the question, what does the Bible say about being a good shepherd? Seems important…
Note that there is an implicit suggestion that at some point the sheep can become shepherds. The younger submit to the older, but it stands to reason that the younger at some point will become older. All elders were young once. It is therefore worth being clear that at some point you are expected to become a shepherd and to tend your sheep.
The idea of tending sheep is one that is developed carefully and cleverly throughout the Bible, culminating in the above passage in 1 Peter. It is important that you understand the development of the idea, because it will help you understand how Jesus saw it, when he described himself as the Good Shepherd.
Much of what I am covering in this paper is sourced from “The Good Shepherd” by Kenneth Bailey. It was the last book he wrote before he passed, and had clearly been on his mind for some time. It is an excellent book and very detailed. For those wanting more on this theme, I couldn’t recommend it enough.
It all starts with Psalm 23
One of the most famous Bible passages, many people have this memorised. It starts the idea of the importance of shepherding.
1 The Lord is my shepherd, I lack nothing.
2 He makes me lie down in green pastures,
he leads me beside quiet waters,
3 he refreshes my soul.
He guides me along the right paths
for his name’s sake.
4 Even though I walk
through the darkest valley,[a]
I will fear no evil,
for you are with me;
your rod and your staff,
they comfort me.
5 You prepare a table before me
in the presence of my enemies.
You anoint my head with oil;
my cup overflows.
6 Surely your goodness and love will follow me
all the days of my life,
and I will dwell in the house of the Lord
forever.
Now, there is too much in here to cover it all. But note some immediate themes:
- Because the Lord is my shepherd, “I lack nothing”. The Lord provides for all my needs. This includes laying down in green pastures and leading me by still waters. One of the things shepherds will say is that sheep need still waters to drink – they won’t drink from running water. This is one of a number of nice “touches” in this Psalm that are missed by our culture.
- There is the theme of protection. The Shepherd’s rod and staff provide comfort – the rod in particular is used as a form of protection to ward off predators. The “darkest valley” – sometimes translated the valley of the shadow of death – refers to a particular type of geographical challenge that is difficult to traverse. The shepherd leads his sheep through this, which can be a scary experience without him leading.
- There is theme of celebration. The Lord prepares a table for me among my enemies – he values me enough to consider me worthy of celebrating.
It is worth keeping these themes in mind as we go through the other passages – the Shepherd provides for all the sheep’s needs, he provides protection, and he celebrates.
Old Testament development of the Shepherd idea
I’ve covered two of the three key passages below, because I believe they show the development of an idea that is key to understanding 1 Peter 5. These passages are Jeremiah 23 and Ezekiel 34. They are both set out below.
Jeremiah 23
“Woe to the shepherds who are destroying and scattering the sheep of my pasture!” declares the Lord. 2 Therefore this is what the Lord, the God of Israel, says to the shepherds who tend my people: “Because you have scattered my flock and driven them away and have not bestowed care on them, I will bestow punishment on you for the evil you have done,” declares the Lord. 3 “I myself will gather the remnant of my flock out of all the countries where I have driven them and will bring them back to their pasture, where they will be fruitful and increase in number. 4 I will place shepherds over them who will tend them, and they will no longer be afraid or terrified, nor will any be missing,” declares the Lord.
5 “The days are coming,” declares the Lord,
“when I will raise up for David[a] a righteous Branch,
a King who will reign wisely
and do what is just and right in the land.
6 In his days Judah will be saved
and Israel will live in safety.
This is the name by which he will be called:
The Lord Our Righteous Savior.
Ezekiel 34
7 “‘Therefore, you shepherds, hear the word of the Lord: 8 As surely as I live, declares the Sovereign Lord, because my flock lacks a shepherd and so has been plundered and has become food for all the wild animals, and because my shepherds did not search for my flock but cared for themselves rather than for my flock, 9 therefore, you shepherds, hear the word of the Lord: 10 This is what the Sovereign Lord says: I am against the shepherds and will hold them accountable for my flock. I will remove them from tending the flock so that the shepherds can no longer feed themselves. I will rescue my flock from their mouths, and it will no longer be food for them.
11 “‘For this is what the Sovereign Lord says: I myself will search for my sheep and look after them. 12 As a shepherd looks after his scattered flock when he is with them, so will I look after my sheep. I will rescue them from all the places where they were scattered on a day of clouds and darkness. 13 I will bring them out from the nations and gather them from the countries, and I will bring them into their own land. I will pasture them on the mountains of Israel, in the ravines and in all the settlements in the land. 14 I will tend them in a good pasture, and the mountain heights of Israel will be their grazing land. There they will lie down in good grazing land, and there they will feed in a rich pasture on the mountains of Israel. 15 I myself will tend my sheep and have them lie down, declares the Sovereign Lord. 16 I will search for the lost and bring back the strays. I will bind up the injured and strengthen the weak, but the sleek and the strong I will destroy. I will shepherd the flock with justice.
17 “‘As for you, my flock, this is what the Sovereign Lord says: I will judge between one sheep and another, and between rams and goats. 18 Is it not enough for you to feed on the good pasture? Must you also trample the rest of your pasture with your feet? Is it not enough for you to drink clear water? Must you also muddy the rest with your feet? 19 Must my flock feed on what you have trampled and drink what you have muddied with your feet?
20 “‘Therefore this is what the Sovereign Lord says to them: See, I myself will judge between the fat sheep and the lean sheep. 21 Because you shove with flank and shoulder, butting all the weak sheep with your horns until you have driven them away, 22 I will save my flock, and they will no longer be plundered. I will judge between one sheep and another. 23 I will place over them one shepherd, my servant David, and he will tend them; he will tend them and be their shepherd. 24 I the Lord will be their God, and my servant David will be prince among them. I the Lord have spoken.
25 “‘I will make a covenant of peace with them and rid the land of savage beasts so that they may live in the wilderness and sleep in the forests in safety. 26 I will make them and the places surrounding my hill a blessing.[a] I will send down showers in season; there will be showers of blessing. 27 The trees will yield their fruit and the ground will yield its crops; the people will be secure in their land. They will know that I am the Lord, when I break the bars of their yoke and rescue them from the hands of those who enslaved them. 28 They will no longer be plundered by the nations, nor will wild animals devour them. They will live in safety, and no one will make them afraid. 29 I will provide for them a land renowned for its crops, and they will no longer be victims of famine in the land or bear the scorn of the nations. 30 Then they will know that I, the Lord their God, am with them and that they, the Israelites, are my people, declares the Sovereign Lord. 31 You are my sheep, the sheep of my pasture, and I am your God, declares the Sovereign Lord.’”
The Jeremiah passage introduces the idea of bad shepherds. The Lord is angry that bad shepherds have not done what is expected of a good shepherd – specifically they have scattered them and not bestowed care. For this they will be punished. The passage also hints at the a good king being raised up (which we now know to be Jesus). This isn’t in the Shepherd language yet, but it’s adjacent.
This plays well into the Ezekiel passage which is much longer and more involved. But simplistically, it repeats the problem of bad shepherds, but now makes clear that God Himself will come to rescue His sheep.
It also introduces the concept of judging the sheep, which will be repeated later. But the key thing is the Jews will know these passages, and that God intends to come and rescue His sheep Himself. He’s fed up with letting bad shepherds continue to fail His flock.
With this all in mind, let’s move to the NT and look at the words of Jesus.
The Shepherd in the Gospels
We start with Luke 15. This is the passage that precedes the parable of the prodigal son.
15 Now the tax collectors and sinners were all gathering around to hear Jesus. 2 But the Pharisees and the teachers of the law muttered, “This man welcomes sinners and eats with them.”
3 Then Jesus told them this parable: 4 “Suppose one of you has a hundred sheep and loses one of them. Doesn’t he leave the ninety-nine in the open country and go after the lost sheep until he finds it? 5 And when he finds it, he joyfully puts it on his shoulders 6 and goes home. Then he calls his friends and neighbors together and says, ‘Rejoice with me; I have found my lost sheep.’ 7 I tell you that in the same way there will be more rejoicing in heaven over one sinner who repents than over ninety-nine righteous persons who do not need to repent.
It’s clearer what Jesus is saying here, if we think in the context of the OT passages. He is saying, “doesn’t the OT say that a good shepherd will go after his lost flock? Aren’t you meant to be good shepherds? So shouldn’t you be going after the lost? And then celebrating when the lost are found? Rather than complaining that another good shepherd is doing that?”
This ultimately culminates in the prodigal son parable, when the Father says the same thing to the older son - “this brother of yours was dead and is now alive, was lost and is now found”.
It hints strongly at the problem Jesus has with the leaders who should be good shepherds but aren’t.
With this in mind, it’s worth looking at Mark 6 and the feeding of the five thousand.
30 The apostles gathered around Jesus and reported to him all they had done and taught. 31 Then, because so many people were coming and going that they did not even have a chance to eat, he said to them, “Come with me by yourselves to a quiet place and get some rest.”
32 So they went away by themselves in a boat to a solitary place. 33 But many who saw them leaving recognized them and ran on foot from all the towns and got there ahead of them. 34 When Jesus landed and saw a large crowd, he had compassion on them, because they were like sheep without a shepherd. So he began teaching them many things.
35 By this time it was late in the day, so his disciples came to him. “This is a remote place,” they said, “and it’s already very late. 36 Send the people away so that they can go to the surrounding countryside and villages and buy themselves something to eat.”
37 But he answered, “You give them something to eat.”
They said to him, “That would take more than half a year’s wages[e]! Are we to go and spend that much on bread and give it to them to eat?”
38 “How many loaves do you have?” he asked. “Go and see.”
When they found out, they said, “Five—and two fish.”
39 Then Jesus directed them to have all the people sit down in groups on the green grass. 40 So they sat down in groups of hundreds and fifties. 41 Taking the five loaves and the two fish and looking up to heaven, he gave thanks and broke the loaves. Then he gave them to his disciples to distribute to the people. He also divided the two fish among them all. 42 They all ate and were satisfied, 43 and the disciples picked up twelve basketfuls of broken pieces of bread and fish. 44 The number of the men who had eaten was five thousand.
There is much to draw out of this story but I want to focus on one thing. Note that Jesus has compassion on the people because they are like “sheep without a shepherd”. He then has them lie down on green grass – green pastures – and feeds them. He is literally enacting Psalm 23!
Mark wrote this very deliberately, in that it makes clear that the church later understood the link between what Jesus did and the good shepherd narrative, and contrasted with bad shepherds narrative in the OT (as this story follows directly from the bad shepherd – Herod – murdering John the Baptist).
And then we come to John 10…
So many incredibly important texts are in John, and this is no exception. In this text, Jesus moves from hinting and enacting the good shepherd to making absolutely clear that He is the good shepherd foretold in the prophets.
“Very truly I tell you Pharisees, anyone who does not enter the sheep pen by the gate, but climbs in by some other way, is a thief and a robber. 2 The one who enters by the gate is the shepherd of the sheep. 3 The gatekeeper opens the gate for him, and the sheep listen to his voice. He calls his own sheep by name and leads them out. 4 When he has brought out all his own, he goes on ahead of them, and his sheep follow him because they know his voice. 5 But they will never follow a stranger; in fact, they will run away from him because they do not recognize a stranger’s voice.” 6 Jesus used this figure of speech, but the Pharisees did not understand what he was telling them.
7 Therefore Jesus said again, “Very truly I tell you, I am the gate for the sheep. 8 All who have come before me are thieves and robbers, but the sheep have not listened to them. 9 I am the gate; whoever enters through me will be saved.[a] They will come in and go out, and find pasture. 10 The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy; I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full.
11 “I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep. 12 The hired hand is not the shepherd and does not own the sheep. So when he sees the wolf coming, he abandons the sheep and runs away. Then the wolf attacks the flock and scatters it. 13 The man runs away because he is a hired hand and cares nothing for the sheep.
14 “I am the good shepherd; I know my sheep and my sheep know me— 15 just as the Father knows me and I know the Father—and I lay down my life for the sheep. 16 I have other sheep that are not of this sheep pen. I must bring them also. They too will listen to my voice, and there shall be one flock and one shepherd. 17 The reason my Father loves me is that I lay down my life—only to take it up again. 18 No one takes it from me, but I lay it down of my own accord. I have authority to lay it down and authority to take it up again. This command I received from my Father.”
There is so much in this passage, but the following is worth drawing out:
- Jesus makes very clear that the sheep hear the voice of the shepherd. The point being that if the Pharisees are not responding to his voice, they are not part of the flock.
- Jesus links strongly being the good shepherd to self-sacrifice. There is a cost to being a good shepherd.
- Jesus makes clear that there are other sheep, not in this sheep pen, that also belong to Him. He is alluding to the gentiles, who became part of the flock as the early church grew.
Summary – bringing the themes together
If you go back to the beginning and re-read 1 Peter 5 – hopefully you can see that the expectations of those who are mature in the faith to be good shepherds is tied back to some Biblical ideas around what being a good shepherd is.
Importantly, the following themes are key, because they are confirmed by Jesus (and if you are His sheep, you will hear His words):
- You are meant to look after all of the needs of the sheep for whom you are responsible.
- You are responsible for the protection of those sheep.
- You must be prepared to self-sacrifice/pay a personal price on behalf of your sheep.
- You should want to celebrate when your sheep are saved.
By implication, you should be raising up those in your flock to become shepherds.
If it wasn’t obvious, do not under any circumstances become a bad shepherd. The sentiment here in the OT is neglect for the needs of your flock, because you are tending to your own needs.
This idea of being a good shepherd is critical to maturity in the faith. You are meant to be mature enough to tend your flock’s actual needs, as opposed to what they believe their needs to be. Preparedness to self-sacrifice is central. The role of shepherd in culture was a relatively low class role, so in addition to all of the above comes a need to humble yourself.
Being a good shepherd is central to the expectations for being in covenant with the Lord. You need to be what He has designed you to be. You then apply that gifting to shepherding the flock you are given, when the time comes to step into being a good shepherd – until the Chief Shepherd returns.