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Please remain standing for the reading of God’s Word, the beautiful hymn we just sang.
This evening we continue our consideration of 1 Peter and we find ourselves tonight in
1 Peter chapter 5, the final chapter of this wonderful epistle, this wonderful portion
of God’s Word.
I’m going to read the first seven verses, but we’ll focus this evening and at least
for another week on the first four verses.
So let us hear God’s Holy Word, 1 Peter chapter 5, verses 1 through 7.
Dear friends, hear the Word of God.
So I exhort the elders among you as a fellow elder and a witness of the sufferings of Christ,
as well as a partaker in the glory that is going to be revealed.
Heard the flock of God that is among you, exercising oversight, not under compulsion,
but willingly, as God would have you, nor for shameful gain, but eagerly, not domineering
over those in your charge, but being examples to the flock.
And when the chief shepherd appears, you will receive the unfading crown of glory.
Likewise, you who are younger, be subject to the elders, clothe yourselves, all of you,
with humility toward one another.
For God opposes the proud, but gives grace to the humble.
Humble yourselves therefore under the mighty hand of God, so that at the proper time he
may exalt you, casting all your anxieties on him, because he cares for you.
The grass withers and the flower fades, but the Word of our God endures forever.
Let’s pray for the Lord’s blessing upon the preaching of His Word.
O gracious Lord and Father in heaven, we would ask that by your Spirit and through this portion
of your Word you would shepherd our souls this evening, and we pray that you would give
us insight into the Scriptures tonight.
We pray that your Word would find a lodging place in our souls and bear much spiritual
fruit to your praise and honor and glory in our lives and in all that we do and say
and think.
Lord, we once again ask that you would be with me, your unworthy servant, granting me
grace to declare and speak forth your Word in a way that edifies your people.
We would pray all of these things, Heavenly Father, in Jesus’ name and all of God’s people
said.
Amen.
You may be seated.
Title of my sermon this evening is Shepherd, the Flock of God.
And the key words to listen for tonight, three key words, shepherd, elder, and flock.
Well, dear ones, in the Bible, God’s people are often spoken of as being His sheep.
And God Himself is often described as the Divine Shepherd of His people, His flock.
And so, for example, we sang this Psalm earlier in the service, but the very beginning of
Psalm 80 verse 1 says this, Give ear, O Shepherd of Israel, you who lead Joseph like a flock.
You who are enthroned upon the cherubim, shine forth.
So in that beautiful Psalm, the Lord is addressed as the Shepherd of Israel, the one who leads
Joseph His people like a flock.
And of course, the Lord Jesus Christ described Himself in shepherding language, especially
in the Good Shepherd discourse recorded in John chapter 10.
And so, for example, in John chapter 10 verse 1, the Lord Jesus says, I am the Good Shepherd.
I am.
Ego, Amy.
In other words, He’s claiming to be divine.
He’s claiming to be God.
And as the Lord, as the Shepherd of Israel, Jesus says, I am the Good Shepherd.
The Good Shepherd lays down His life for the sheep.
And back in 1 Peter chapter 2 verse 25, the Apostle Peter says this about our Lord Jesus.
He says, For you were straying like sheep, but have now returned to the Shepherd and
overseer of your souls.
And so the Lord is described as the Shepherd and overseer of the souls of us Christians.
And of course, in our passage for this Lord’s Day evening, the Lord Jesus is also described
in verse 4 as the Chief Shepherd, who will appear and reward His faithful undershepherds
at His glorious and He will reward them with the unfading crown of glory.
Now why this shepherd sheep imagery?
Why is this such common imagery in the Word of God?
Well, friends, much of the Bible, of course, was written within the context of an agricultural
and pastoral setting.
People in Bible times in their daily lives were much more familiar with sheep, with shepherds
and with shepherding activities than we tend to be today in the 21st century here in the
Pittsburgh area.
So it shouldn’t surprise us that the Holy Spirit has chosen to use this kind of intimate
pastoral and shepherding imagery to describe His relationship with His own people.
Now while most of us today do not usually run across sheep or shepherds in our daily
lives, at least I don’t, I don’t know about you, but I don’t, and while our contemporary
world of things like computer technology and industry and concrete and skyscrapers
and superhighways and the internet and social media, our world is very different today from
the agricultural and pastoral world of Bible times.
Nevertheless, even today in the 21st century, we as God’s people can still appreciate and
can still benefit from this rich biblical imagery of God as our shepherd and we as the
sheep of His pasture.
When God the Holy Spirit inspired the Bible readers to use this kind of shepherd sheep
imagery, He knew that it would be of benefit to His people throughout the ages of human
history and not just during Bible times.
He knew that it would be relevant to His people whether or not they happen to live in the
context of a pastoral or shepherding setting.
So with that in mind, what do we learn in this passage?
As we turn our attention to this portion of 1 Peter, this particular portion of the Word
of God where Peter is beginning to wrap up this marvelous epistle, I want us to consider
for a few minutes the shepherd heart of God that is reflected in this passage.
The shepherd heart of God that is reflected in this passage.
We’re not going to get so much into all of the nitty-gritty details of these verses tonight.
We’ll come back to that a little bit more on the next Lord’s Day.
But as we consider this kind of shepherding language that the Holy Spirit inspires Peter
to use in this passage, I want us to consider what that teaches us about the shepherd heart
of our God.
Beloved in Christ, I want you to think about it.
God is our divine shepherd, and we are the sheep of His pasture.
How appropriate this imagery is.
You know, sheep, are sheep highly intelligent animals?
Are they known for their intelligence?
Are they known for their carefulness?
Now sheep can sometimes be rather clueless, even sometimes they can behave rather stupidly.
As fallen sons and daughters of Adam, how sinful and ignorant we are in and of ourselves.
How often we in our sin behave like clueless, stupid sheep who need a shepherd to come and
rescue them and rub ointment upon them and heal them and bring them back into the fold.
How often we in our sin behave in this way.
As you may know, sheep are quite prone to wander off and how prone we are as God’s sheep
to wander from the protection and care of His fold.
Sheep are relatively weak animals, prone to exposure not only from the elements, but also
danger from wild beasts, and in general, prone to harm brought on by their own cluelessness.
Sheep require protection.
Sheep require nurture.
Sheep require guidance.
Sheep require the tender watch care of an alert, protective shepherd.
We who are Christ’s sheep also require protection, nurture, guidance, care, and discipline from
our loving, divine shepherd.
For in this life, we are constantly exposed to spiritual danger and peril from the world,
from our own sinful flesh, our fallen nature, and from the devil himself.
My dear friends in Christ, it is a deep comfort to know that our loving Heavenly Father shepherds
us.
And what a comfort as well to know that the Son of God, our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ,
also shepherds us, for He is the divine shepherd and overseer of our souls.
God, the Father, and Christ Jesus, the Son, shepherd us, His sheep.
And they do so by the Word and through the Holy Spirit who abides within us and who dwells
among us as His people and who leads us by His Word into the pastures of His truth and
grace.
But we also learn in our text for this evening that our chief shepherd, the Lord Jesus Christ,
chooses to use elders or presbyters of His church as under-shepherds, shepherds under
the authority of Christ Himself, the chief shepherd.
In other words, Christ chooses to shepherd His people, His church, His flock, primarily
through the ministry of under-shepherds, presbyters, elders.
And we who are these under-shepherds, I’m sorry, who are these under-shepherds that
Peter is referring to?
Whom does he have in mind?
Well in verse 1, they are simply called the elders.
It says, so I exhort whom?
I exhort the elders among you as a fellow elder.
Notice how Peter describes himself here as a fellow presbyter, a fellow elder.
Even though Peter is an apostle of the Lord Jesus Christ, I talked in my message sermon
this morning about the meaning of apostle.
An apostle is an officially appointed spokesman for the Lord Jesus Christ, one whom Christ
had Himself chosen to be an eyewitness to His resurrection and an official spokesman
who speaks with His authority.
And Paul, Peter rather, was indeed an apostle.
And yet here in this passage, this apostle Peter, he doesn’t throw around his authority
in the sense of saying, hey listen, I’m an apostle, he says, as a fellow elder.
He was an apostle, but he exhorts the elders as, not an apostle, but as a fellow elder
and a witness of the sufferings of Christ.
He reminds them that he witnessed the sufferings of Christ the Good Shepherd who laid down
His life for the sheep.
But not only was he a witness of the sufferings of Christ, he was also a partaker in the glory
that is going to be revealed, going to be revealed when Christ returns at the end of
this age.
Now, in verse one, these under shepherds, as I said, are called elders.
In the Greek, the word is presbyteros, presbyterous rather, which is a word from which we derive
our English word presbyter, presbyter, presbyterian.
This is why we are a Presbyterian church.
One of the reasons why we are a Presbyterian church is because we believe in following
the pattern for church government that is outlined in the word of God, the Bible.
It is a pattern of church government that includes spiritual rule and oversight by church
officers who are described in the Bible as elders or presbyters.
Now I will, without getting too far into the weeds, I just want to say that it’s my conviction
that the particular, the specific elders that Peter has in mind in this particular passage
are what we would normally call pastors or ministers or some denominations call them
teaching elders in particular, although I believe there are other passages in scripture
which indicate that the church officers that we typically call ruling elders also share
with pastors or teaching elders in various shepherding responsibilities and therefore
the principles of this particular passage can also be applied to ruling elders.
But whether or not you agree with that assessment here, and I don’t have time to get into all
the reasons for that, but the point is that ruling elders and teaching elders or ministers,
pastors, what do they do?
They share together the role of under-shepherds.
The task of these under-shepherds, these presbyters, is to shepherd the flock of God by doing what?
Let’s look at verse 2.
It says, what is it that he exhorts them and appeals to them to do as under-shepherds of
Christ?
What does he appeal to these elders to do?
He says, shepherd the flock of God that is among you, exercising oversight.
Oversight, care, spiritual oversight.
They are to shepherd the flock of God.
Then he goes into detail to describe how they are to shepherd the flock of God and things
that they are to avoid in their shepherding of the flock of God.
This was a particularly important exhortation for those who served as elders to Peter’s
original first century readers because remember, friends, these readers that Peter is writing
1 Peter 2, these original first century readers were facing a fiery trial of persecution for
their faith in the Lord Jesus Christ.
Christ’s sheep, his people, always benefit from the spiritual oversight of faithful elders.
But God’s people need special attention and care when they face a fiery trial of persecution
such as that which was being faced by the original first century readers of Peter’s
first epistle.
Beloved, God’s provision of elders to shepherd his people as Christ’s under-shepherds reveals
and displays the shepherd heart of God for his people, for his flock.
Faithful elders and pastors are Christ’s gift to his church, given to shepherd and care
for the sheep whom he laid down his life to redeem.
God’s people, however, again, need special care when they face trials and persecutions.
How much our Lord cares for us, beloved.
Here we see again the shepherd heart of God.
How much our Lord cares for us, his sheep.
How great his heart of love toward his sheep in blessing them with pastors and elders
to shepherd them.
And how weighty the responsibility that rests upon the shoulders of those whom the chief
shepherd has called to be his under-shepherds in the church.
Under-shepherds who are called to shepherd his flock with great love and care.
Under-shepherds who themselves need to be shepherds.
I got some news for you, brothers and sisters.
Elders also need to be pastored and also need to be under authority and under oversight.
A lot of Christians seem to think, oh, well, he’s a pastor, he doesn’t need pastoring.
He’s an elder, he’s fine.
Those are super-spiritual dudes, right?
That’s not how it works.
It’s by grace and grace alone.
Christ chooses to use those who are themselves sheep.
He chooses to gift some of his sheep to serve as his under-shepherds.
And this is how he expresses his shepherd heart for his people.
Let me ask you, dear listener, are you part of God’s flock?
Do you know Christ as your good shepherd?
Christ invites and welcomes and calls all who recognize their sin, all who know their
need for a savior to come to him.
If you come to Christ, trusting him to save you from your sins, trusting that his blood
is sufficient to atone for your sin, if you trust him alone for your salvation, the word
of God says that you are his sheep and he is your good shepherd and he laid down his
life for you, not just to make salvation possible for you, but to actually redeem you, to actually
save you from your sins.
Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and you can be assured you are part of his flock and he
will never leave you out of his sight.
He will never let you ultimately be exposed to wolves that will destroy your souls.
He will keep you in his sovereign care.
Do you know Christ, the good shepherd?
And this brings me to my next and final point.
As we focus especially on verse 4, there’s a lot in this passage to cover.
We’re not going to have time to cover it all tonight, but I want us finally to consider
the identity of Christ as our chief shepherd and the elders of the church as his under
shepherds.
I want us to consider this a little more carefully.
The identity of Christ as our chief shepherd and the elders of the church as his under
shepherds.
It says in verse 4, and when the chief shepherd, that’s Jesus, when he appears, meaning when
he appears at his glorious second advent, at the eschaton, at the parousia, you will
receive the unfading crown of glory.
Not because you merit it or earn it, but it’s a gift of grace.
This is the gracious reward given to faithful under shepherds.
Now by highlighting Christ as the chief shepherd, Peter is emphasizing the fact that the elders
of the church are subordinate to Christ, and that’s very important because there’s a lot
of church leaders today, pastors and elders, who forget this fact.
See when pastors and elders try to usurp the authority or the prerogatives of the chief
shepherd, they end up harming the sheep of Christ.
They lord it over God’s flock, and they expose themselves to the judgment of God.
For example, and I don’t have time to read it tonight, but if you were to read Ezekiel
chapter 34, in that chapter, the Lord Yahweh sharply rebuked the irresponsible spiritual
shepherds of Ezekiel’s day and pronounced to them that he was against them.
If God is for you, who can be against you?
But if God is against you, you’re toast.
Who can be for you?
And that’s a warning to the spiritual shepherds who fleeced and abused the sheep in Ezekiel’s
day.
This is a passage which every under shepherd of Christ needs to take to heart, myself included.
Oh, how many of us who are pastors and elders need to take these truths to heart, and how
you brothers and sisters need to pray for us that we be faithful in our responsibilities.
There was a dear retired minister who used to attend services in the church that I pastored
many years ago in New Jersey.
He was a retired Bible Presbyterian pastor, and I remember I was talking to this dear
brother.
He has since gone home to his reward, but I remember talking to him once during coffee
time, and he had a habit when he held the coffee cup of kind of, to make a point, he
would emphasize it, and so I’m trying to keep from getting sprayed by all the coffee.
But in any case, we were talking about grace, and this brother was named Bob.
Brother Bob said to me, yeah, I always tell my people, I need more grace than you.
And what he meant by that is he recognized that, look, I stand before the people of God,
I expound the word of God, the Bible says as a teacher of the word, I will face a more
serious judgment, so I need more grace, because I have more responsibility.
And that really stuck with me.
Friends, we who are pastors and elders, we must always remember that Christ is himself
our chief shepherd.
We all need to remember that.
And we who are pastors and elders always need to remember that we are only servants, only
under shepherds.
Only God knows how many pastors and elders there are who lorded over the God’s flock,
who basically set themselves up as virtual popes over their local congregations.
That’s not the way Christ designed his church to operate.
Beloved, it is a sad reality in Christ’s church that there have been and there continue to
be pastors and elders in the churches who serve in the church for less than noble or
godly motives.
I’m not saying that that is something we should overlook or excuse when it becomes obvious,
but sometimes false shepherds or irresponsible shepherds go under the radar and don’t get
noticed until it’s too late.
No doubt there are some who serve because they’re basically control freaks who enjoy
micromanaging and controlling other people’s lives.
There are others who serve in these offices who are motivated by greed in desiring to
exploit the financial resources of their congregations.
Still others serve because of ego, because they view the ministry as a way of building
up their own little theological empire or personality cult.
We talked this morning from 1 Corinthians 1 about the danger of personality cults in
the church of the Lord Jesus Christ.
Friends in this fallen world there have always been and in this present evil age there will
continue to be false and irresponsible under shepherds who sneak into positions of leadership
in the church under false pretenses.
And the chief shepherd, the Lord Jesus Christ, will most certainly bring such false and irresponsible
shepherds into judgment if by God’s grace, if they do not repent by God’s grace.
However friends, the fact that there are some false and irresponsible shepherds in the church
of Jesus Christ does not give the sheep of Christ an excuse to show a lack of respect
for or to ignore the legitimate authority of true and faithful under shepherds that
Christ raises up in his church to exercise spiritual oversight over his sheep.
In fact, again this is going to come at the risk of sounding self-serving, but I would
remind all of us beloved that the word of God does command us to honor and obey in the
Lord the spiritual elders of the church even though your elders are imperfect sinners who
themselves need to be shepherded.
Remember that Hebrews 13-17 is in the Bible.
Let me just briefly read that passage.
Hebrews 13 verse 17 it says this, obey your leaders, he’s talking about church leaders,
he’s talking about elders and pastors, obey your leaders and submit to them for they are
keeping watch over your souls.
Let me just point out, he’s assuming faithful shepherds who actually do care for the
souls of their flock, those who will have to give an account, he says obey your leaders
and submit to them, not with blind obedience, not with unquestioning obedience, that’s
not what he’s saying, but he’s saying obey them, your general attitude should be one
of obedience, obey your leaders and submit to them for they are keeping watch over your
souls as it’s those who have to give an account.
Let them do this with joy and not with groaning for that would be of no advantage to you.
Couple closing points of application.
Remember friends that our Lord Jesus Christ, he is himself the chief shepherd of his people
and as his sheep we are responsible to follow our chief shepherd in trust and obedience.
Let us make it our aim to follow Christ our good shepherd as his faithful, trusting, obedient
and submissive sheep and he will keep us and protect us from the wolves and he will keep
us and guide us and lead us beside the still waters.
But dear ones, just as all of us are responsible as Christ’s sheep to faithfully follow our
chief shepherd, so our chief shepherd also wills for us to follow the biblical lead
and direction which he administers through his faithful under shepherds, through the
presbyters and elders whom he’s raised up to shepherd and feed to lead and to guide
his flock into the green pastures of his word.
Pray for your pastor and your elders and let us all seek to be faithful sheep of Christ
trusting in him our chief shepherd, following him out of gratitude for his gift of salvation.
Amen.
Let us pray.
Our gracious Lord and Father in heaven, we thank you and praise you Lord God that Christ
is indeed our good shepherd and that he laid down his life for us.
We pray that by your grace we would be filled with such gratitude that we would be willing
to lay down our lives for our brethren.
We ask all these things, Heavenly Father, in Jesus’ name, and all of God’s people said,
Amen.
As we prepare to celebrate the Lord’s Supper together, I’d invite us to rise and let’s
sing together 337, Ah, Holy Jesus, how hast thou offended, 337.