shepherd commitment, sheep submitting.

What is your first thoughts when you think about church? I am sure many things come to mind. I love the church. And not for what it does for me or makes me feel. The church is the bride of Christ. The church belongs to God, and He has a way of doing church.

Last Sunday in one28 we got to hear an awesome sermon about the call to shepherd's, sheep, and the body. We studied from 1 Peter 5:1-5, and I thought it was some good truth. For one that has thought and considered going into the ministry, it has made me think about a shepherd's role, a sheep's role, and the coming together of the body of Christ.

The call to the shepherd
Peter is making a call to elders. The role of an elder is pretty clear in Scripture. An elder is more about character approved rather then age approved. Peter is a fellow elder, and also an eye-witness; one who bares, testifies of the work of Christ. Peter makes an urgent call that the elders of the church would shepherd the flock of God. This is a role of stewardship. Elders are ones that exercise oversight, not under compulsion, but willingly, as God would have them; not for shameful gain, but eagerly; not domineering over those in their charge, but being examples to the flock.

The shepherd should not do his work as a job or career. Being a pastor is not about making money and getting as big as you can get in your church. Your purpose as God makes clear in this passage is to shepherd His flock by serving the body. What a high calling a pastor has. For all the sheep out there, what we should labor most in would be praying for our pastor/elders on a weekly basis. They need our prayers more then anything else.

The one thing I think is the most important question for any pastor/elder is "How have you been in the role of stewardship with your family, your wife, your children?" Who cares how well you can preach and put an out-line together if you don't care of your own family. I hope that all churches value more of who their shepherds are at home before what they are on paper. And any church should care, because God cares. 1 Timothy 3:4-6 covers how important the home is for anyone that would want to be a pastor/elder. Read it and get it if your in that role or pursuing that role.

The shepherd is not to drive the flock, but lead. He doesn't drive them from behind, but lead them from the front. This sounds like Jesus. He always was leading the disciples from the front. They are to have an exemplary life. It's God's standard (see qualifications 1 Timothy 3:1-7). Exemplary doesn't mean perfect. I think in anything we do we always must remember that we are sinners, and God is God because we are not.

The blessing in the work of a shepherd is that when Jesus Christ appears those that have been faithful will receive the unfading crown of glory. When the shepherd applies verses 2, 3 they get verse 4. This glory is of no decay. The crown is not as high of a prize as Christ gets from His elders. The glory is what it represents. The same thing is true of our crowns. Our crowns bring God glory because of what they represent.

The call to the sheep
Why does Peter bring up the younger? Jonathan made a connection between age & wisdom. Peter knows that if the sheep will subject themselves to the elders all will work out fine. Even though most elders are older, as a mature Christian the older they are the more wisdom they would have compared to a younger sheep.

Discipleship is always about the mature Christian doing life on life with someone that is not as far along as they would be. Take my life as an example. I have only been saved for 4.5 years. Now I could have the attitude that I am not ready to come along side other believers, but that is just weak sauce. Get involved in others lives and get dirty.

I think if you know who Jesus Christ is and what He has done for you, you are ready to go out and make disciples. God is faithful to continue to grow us in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. But its not let go and let God....that will get you no where. We must do something, anything, and in our doing God will be faithful to work in us and through us.

One of the problems in the church is when a sheep or sheep's don't agree with the decisions of the elders. We have to remember that it is God who has placed them in that role, and just like a child is to submit to their parents, a sheep is to submit to their undershepherd. We must be careful not to blow off the counsel of our elders. As sheep we will not have God's blessing if we do not submit to our leadership. The bigger issue is if you will submit to God. It is His command for His flock to submit to His pastor/elders of His church. He made the rules. The question is will you obey or not obey?

The call to the body
We must have humility toward one another. A proud or arrogant sheep will not last long in the body. Peter reminds us that God opposes the proud, and gives grace to the humble. We can be humble by comparing ourselves with Christ and the truth from Scripture.

I know there is no perfect church. We are sinners coming together. I think there is an element of growing the sheep get from life on life. It is messy. It does get dirty. It is hard work to pursue others with gospel truths and gospel principles. But if we count others as more important then ourselves we will be one step closer to doing church the way it was in the early church. I think we can learn a lot from the early church.

We must get back to our roots of the Christian faith. God will bring a church blessing when they are faithful to obey His Scriptures regarding doing church. We as a shepherd, a sheep and a body we must do our best to present ourselves to God as one approved, a worker who has no need to be ashamed, rightly handling the word of truth. The other thing we must strive for is that as a follower of Christ we would be filled with the Spirit. The result of being filled with the spirit is that we would be submitting to one another out of reverence for Christ.