In the second chapter of The 23rd Pastor, I write about the phrase, "The Lord is my shepherd," and apply that to pastoral life. Here are some excerpts …
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Maybe you remember one of
John Denver’s biggest hits: “Thank God, I’m a Country Boy!” I love the song, but I am no country
boy. I spent the first eight years of my
life in Little Rock, Arkansas. I did the
rest of my growing up in Branson, Missouri.
I grew up in a city and a small town.
I never lived on Green Acres. I
visited a farm a time or two. And while
I have known some men who worked with cattle, I have never known a
shepherd. “The Lord is my rancher”—I
could understand that a little better.
Ranchers raise cattle, brand the calves, move them from pasture to
pasture, keep them watered, and when the time is right, they sell them to the
highest bidder so they can make a living, and you and I can enjoy that ribeye
or that hamburger. Maybe that is why
ranchers try not to get too attached to their cattle. “The Lord is my rancher.” No thanks.
“The
Lord is my shepherd.” That’s better.
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Without minimizing the
importance of character and oversight in the pastor’s work, I am suggesting
that the shepherd metaphor gives key
direction to the work of a biblical pastor, especially a 23rd
pastor. The shepherd metaphor becomes
the filter through which our character and oversight passes as we lead the
congregations God entrusts to us. Our
character reflects the character of our Shepherd Lord—minus, of course, his
sinlessness and perfection. Even though
Jesus may be blurred a bit by our faults, shepherd-pastors want the flock to
see glimpses of Jesus in them. We want
to bear in our character his resemblance.
We want to offer our oversight through the heart of a shepherd, so we
lead the flock rather than drive them, we love them rather than use them, we
draw close to them rather than keep them at arm’s length, we get to know them
rather than view them as a necessary nuisance to our work, and we consider
what’s best for the flock rather than what’s best for us. The good shepherd Jesus laid down his life
for the sheep; sometimes we shepherd-pastors must lay down some things of our
own to serve the flock with a shepherd’s care.
When we try
to be a shop-keeper or CEO rather than a shepherd, our character and our
oversight tends to reflect power rather than service, bottom-lines rather than relationships,
self rather than Jesus. In his book, They Smell Like Sheep, Lynn Anderson
recounts an incident from some of his travels in the Holy Land. Anderson and his local guide had spent part
of a day traveling around the region learning about sheep and shepherds. Late in the day, they observed a man cruelly
driving a flock of sheep through the streets of a town. This man yelled at the sheep and whacked them
with a stick whenever they got out of line.
Although the sheep kept moving forward, they were visibly shaken. Anderson commented to his guide that this
harsh, driving man did not conform to the description of the kind, leading
shepherd that his guide had given him throughout the day. “Oh, that man’s not the shepherd,” his guide
replied. “That man’s the butcher.”[1] Shepherd-pastors will never be confused with
butchers.
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I remember the first time I
preached the ordination service for a pastor.
Mike Roy had grown up in the church I served in Greenwood,
Missouri. God called him to ministry. And when he became pastor of a nearby church,
he asked if I would preach the service.
I was honored to do so. It was
during this time that God had been working out this shepherd image in my
heart. That image drove the sermon whose
title was “Be a Real Minister” and whose text was 1 Peter 5:1-5. In encouraging Mike to shepherd his flock
like Jesus shepherds us all, here is part of the charge I offered him that day:
Be a shepherd
who nurtures a relationship to the flock through love. Love the people with whom God calls you to
work. It’s not easy because some aren’t
very easy to love, some don’t love us back, and some may even work against
us. Love them anyway. Don't harangue them or abuse them. Don't speak ill of them. In his book Life Together, Dietrich Bonhoeffer wrote, "A pastor should not
complain about his congregation, certainly never to other people, but also not
to God. A congregation has not been
entrusted to him in order that he should become its accuser before God."[1] You are part of them. When you accuse them you accuse
yourself. So love them with a
Christ-like love. Love them by being
with them. Be with them when the baby comes. Be with them when death barges in. Be with them in the hospital and in the home,
in the cemetery and in the study. Be
with them in good times and in bad.
Imagine them looking over your shoulder and whispering in your ear as
you seek to hear in a Bible text the word they need to hear from God. Keep them in your heart. They will try you sometimes. They may frustrate you often. You will sometimes feel like throwing up your
hands and shaking the dust off your feet.
They may even feel the same about you sometimes. But keep them in your heart. Feel for them what Paul felt for the
Philippian church: “I long for you all,” he wrote to them, “with the affection
of Christ Jesus.” (Phil. 1:8). Love them
because of who they are—the bride of
Christ, the church of the living God—and in
spite of who they are—stubborn sinners, works in progress, but a work that
God began and will continue until the day of Jesus Christ. And in the midst of being with them, show
them Christ and point them to him in all things—even when it’s hard and even
when you don’t feel like it. For the
sheep in the flock and for those still outside, in all things and in every
situation, point them to Christ. Lean on
the staff of the Chief Shepherd and he will help you.
And, my shepherd-pastor friend, he will help you too.
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The 23rd Pastor would make a good gift at Christmas for your pastor. You can find it at Amazon.com. Thanks.
[1]Cited
by Blaine McCormick and David Davenport, Shepherd
Leadership: Wisdom for Leaders from Psalm 23 (San Francisco: Jossey-Bass,
2003), 115.
