SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 7/18/2018
9:15 AM
My Worship Time Focus: Shepherd the
Flock
Bible Reading & Meditation Reference: Acts 20:28b
Message of the
verse: “and for all the flock, among
which the Holy Spirit has made you overseers, to shepherd the church of God
which He purchased with His own blood.”
Let us begin by looking at 1 Timothy 3:4-5 to show us
that a leader own life along with his families is right with God: “4 He (Church Leader, [Pastor or deacon])
must be one who manages his own household well, keeping his children under
control with all dignity 5 (but if a man does not know how to manage his own
household, how will he take care of the church of God?).” After this the next priority is for those in
his congregation, spiritual caring for the flock of God as seen in the first
part of our verse today. This metaphor
of a flock and shepherd is seen a lot in the Scriptures to describe God’s
relationship to His people. Sheep are
similar to people in many ways and truly need a shepherd to care for them. A little while back I included a part of a trilogy
that talks about the Lord Jesus Christ as being our shepherd as seen in Psalms
22, 23, and 24. Psalm 22 shows the
Shepherd dying for the sheep as also seen in John 10, and then Psalm 23 shows
how the Shepherd lives for the sheep, and then Psalm 24 shows us that the
Shepherd will return for His sheep.
Peter also talks about shepherding the sheep of God and
even talks about the Great Shepherd, the Lord Jesus Christ in his letters. I mentioned that people have some similarities
to sheep as sheep are “helpless, timid, dirty, and in need of constant
protection and care” writes John MacArthur.
As we look into the Old Testament we see that Israel was the flock of
God, and Israel had many shepherds who were not good for them, along with men
like Moses, Joshua, Samuel, David and a few others who were good
shepherds. In the New Testament the
flock of God is the church and Paul is speaking to the Ephesian church leaders
as shepherds in our verse today when he says “to shepherd the church of God
which He purchased with His own blood.”
We have mentioned that Jesus Christ is the Chief Shepherd
as seen in 1 Peter 5:4, and He has take His flock and divided it into many smaller
flocks as seen in 1 Peter 5:2 “the flock of God among you,” and this speaks of
the flock of God that was apportioned to those shepherds as also seen in verse
3 of 1 Peter five where we read “those allotted to your charge.” MacArthur writes “The Holy Spirit sovereignly
raises up overseers, or undershepherds, who are responsible to shepherd their
flocks. Shepherd is from poinatino, a comprehensive term
encompassing the entire task of a shepherd.
The most important part of that task, however, is to feed. In John 21:15-17, Jesus three times
instructed Peter to care for His sheep.
The second time He used poimaino,
but the first and third times bosko,
which has the more restricted meaning of ‘to feed.’ Obviously, then, the primary task of an undershepherd
of the Lord’s flock is to feed the sheep.
Sadly, many undershepherds today fail to do that, seemingly content to
lead their sheep from one barren wasteland to another. The tragic result is a spiritually weak
flock, ready to eat the poisonous weeds of false doctrine, or to follow false
shepherds who deceitfully promise them greener pastures, while leading them to
barren desert.”
There
is a difference opinion of how a church should operate as some think that the
leadership of the church is solely up to the Pastors (Elders) and other Elders
while others believe in what is called congregational rule, that is there is a
Pastor and a deacon board which is elected by the congregation. The Pastor or Pastors along with the deacons
bring forth things that the church is doing such as perhaps building a new
building or similar things and they present it to the congregation for approval
as they vote on it, and if passed then it is done. This is the kind of church that I have always
belonged to and I can say that for the most part it works out good, that is
until a Pastor came along who desired to drive his sheep instead of leading
them, which was time for this sheep to find a new flock to join. My point in all of this is that both of these
systems will work if there are godly men involved, but if there are not godly
men then neither system will work. The
church that I moved to eight years ago works well because there have been godly
men leading it for almost 185 years, and God has blessed if for all those years
as it still stands today. This church
has begun two missionary agencies and has had very man godly Pastors who have
been its shepherds and as mentioned that is the key.
John MacArthur concludes “The undershepherd must have the
same concern for the purity of the church as did the Great Shepherd. Paul certainly did. To the Corinthians he wrote, ‘I am jealous
for you with a godly jealousy; for I betrothed you to one husband, that to
Christ I might present you as a pure virgin’ (2 Cor. 11:2). Those undershepherds who truly value the
church will shepherd their flocks by feeding them the Word of God and
faithfully leading them.”
Spiritual meaning
for my life today: Most every day I
take time to pray for our Pastors and deacons as they have the God given
responsibility of leading our church.
My Steps of Faith for Today: Try and be a good sheep who loves the Lord
and desires to follow Him as a member of His flock.
Answer to yesterday’s Bible
question: “John.”
Today’s Bible
question: “From what prophet did
Hezekiah seek help when the Assyrians besieged Jerusalem?”
Answer in our next SD.
7/18/2018 9:56 AM
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