AN HUNDRED SHEEP, AND ONE OF THEM BE GONE ASTRAY

Matthew’s gospel portrays Christ as the great Shepherd-King. His primary mission was to find and feed the lost sheep of Israel, 2. 6 RV; 10. 6. Israel rejected its Shepherd, so He turns to the Gen­tiles, 15. 24, 28. The good Shepherd was smitten in death, but the great Shepherd, now risen, leads His flock, the church, heaven­ward and homeward, 26. 31, 32. The millennial Shepherd-King will muster the nations, dividing sheep and goats, 25. 32. But, in this chapter, the setting is the local church. The chief Shepherd is instructing His under-shepherds.

This is the second of four pictures in chapter 18 in which our Lord discloses the secrets of success in the local church. (1) The child in the family - humility. (2) The sheep in the flock - the need for shepherd care. (3) The brother in the assembly - grace for recovery. (4) The servant in the kingdom - boundless forgive­ness. In each picture, Christ refers to His heavenly Father. For the Father, like the Son, is a Saviour with a shepherd heart. Christ tells us, ‘It is not the will of your Father which is in heaven, that one of these little ones should perish’, v. 14

The crisis of concern is not that ‘one of these little ones’ is stumbled by others, as in the first picture, but that one sheep, of its own volition, ‘be gone astray’. This calls for action, effort and sacrifice. Shepherds amongst the ‘flock of God’ must ‘go’ and ‘seek’ the stray ‘on the mountains’. Success is not always guaranteed. ‘And if so be that he find it’ - sometimes the errant sheep is unwilling to be rescued. But, when a precious one is saved or restored, the shepherd and all heaven, the Father and His angels, rejoice, Luke 15. 7. Many lambs of the flock today are straying. Effort should be made by assembly shepherds to find them. They should be shepherded, not stumbled.

In Luke chapter 15, the similar but distinct parable of the ‘lost sheep’ is linked with those of the ‘lost silver’ and ‘lost son’ in a gospel context. It was spoken in response to the murmuring of scribes and Pharisees that Christ received sinners and ate with them. Here, the one saved sheep is contrasted with ninety-nine just, self-righteous-persons needing no repentance.