Nothing shatters a pastor’s heart more than this one specific conversation topic. It was the first year of my seminary training and I got to go on a mission trip to Reno, Nevada during the winter break. We knocked on thousands of doors over that week and developed ideas for the congregations there to engage their community. It was halfway through the week that I knocked on Brittany’s door. I’ll never forget, she had this beautiful metal butterfly on the wall adjacent to her front door. As she opened the door, I introduced myself and simply asked if she had a church home, and she said, “Not anymore.” Of course, I followed up with “Why?” and she said, “I found a church I loved. It was all about Jesus, and growing in the Bible. I became a member, but after that, my pastor hardly even cared about me anymore. I felt like just a number.” Sadly, her story isn’t unique in our culture. Gallup released a study in January that showed that only 32% of Americans trust pastors and leaders in the church. People who have been burned by abuse and neglect by shepherds who were called to care for their souls, shepherds called to reflect Jesus, the Good Shepherd to them. How can something like this happen? Glen Packiam writes this in his book The Resilient Pastor, “I am less interested in finding ways to regain our credibility than I am in our willingness to take responsibility for why we’ve lost it. … From small country churches to uber-megachurches, many pastors have been found to be bullies and hypocrites, alcohol abusers, and womanizers. The crisis of credibility is a symptom. The misuse of authority is the root cause.” Is it any wonder why many have anxiety in trusting a pastor, or a member of a church leadership team? Maybe that’s you, and this is where we must look to the Chief Pastor, the Good Shepherd, Jesus. What does the Bible have to say about what a pastor should be?
That’s where the end of 1 Peter comes in. His letter has focused so much on the unique hope of Jesus and he gives one final encouragement for leaders in the church to live in and preach about the hope of Jesus. What does that look like? He writes, “Be shepherds of God’s flock that is under your care, watching over them.” He’s saying, “Feed them with the gospel.” “Nurture them with the long-suffering love of Jesus.” “Protect them from the howls of lies and untruths swirling around the flock.” It’s only fitting Peter would close his letter this way, because this shepherding picture was deeply personal to him.
Remember after Easter, Peter and Jesus are sitting on the beach of the Sea of Galilee, and what does Jesus say to Peter, who felt so unworthy to be a leader in the church he says, “Feed my lambs.” “Take care of my sheep.” “Feed my sheep.” Words that never left Peter even 30 years later. Jesus’ words show what a true pastor is all about. That the sole purpose of an under-shepherd is that Jesus is the takeaway in every interaction he has with his flock and the sheep that are not yet in God’s sheep pen surrounding them. He wants the voice of the Good Shepherd to be heard. It’s why I am so thankful my mom gave me this plaque based on John 12:21, “Sir, we would like to see Jesus.” To be a shepherd of God’s flock, it’s all about Jesus being seen. A pastor who makes this painting by Lucas Cranach a reality. The preacher pointing to Jesus and the congregation taking in the soul-saving sight of the cross, where the purest love is seen and experienced. Who wouldn’t want a pastor like that?
But of course, every under-shepherd is a sinner, and sometimes he too can listen to the howls around him instead of the voice of Jesus. How does this happen? When ministry becomes about money, building projects, and status. Pastors who long for the acclaim of his world: Social media followers, a desire for people to see his brilliance instead of walking away from worship smiling about Jesus’ brilliance and love. But money isn’t the only howl heard that Satan sings specifically to pastors and church leaders. You and I know the sexual abuse that has happened within churches by pastors. Maybe that’s more than just a news scandal to you. Satan knows full well if he take down the shepherd, he can bring more than a few sheep with him, convincing people to say “forget you” to church so the voice of Jesus becomes but a faint whisper in a long distant past.
That’s why it’s stopped being surprising to me when people have anxiety about opening up to a pastor or church leader. The shattered soul that trusted in a person they thought would bring them closer to Jesus only to hurt them and neglect them. This is exactly why Peter quotes Psalm 55:22 when he writes, “Cast all your anxiety on him because he cares for you.” While this certainly applies to every form of anxiety we have, the specific type of anxiety Peter is speaking to here is the worry that a friend will betray you. He brings this form of anxiety into the context of spiritual authority, because he knows how the Satanic lion roars doubt, disrespect, and distrust in the ears of the flock. You know the temptation tones. “He won’t listen to what I have to say, forget this church!” “If this is how our leaders act and lead, I’m done!” But think about how that’s exactly what Satan, the roaring lion wants. For a sheep to leave the flock, to not release their anxiety to Jesus, and go off alone, unprotected, instead of lovingly caring for the under-shepherd. He wants to scatter the flock. This is not excusing the hurt and abuse pastors have done. But if the response is to leave Christianity entirely because of the fear of trusting another church leader ever again, that won’t solve the problem. Because a church should never revolve around the under-shepherd. It must be all about the Good Shepherd.
What do we know about the Good Shepherd? He’s exactly how Peter describes a shepherd should be, “Be shepherds of God’s flock that is under your care, watching over them—not because you must, but because you are willing, as God wants you to be; not pursuing dishonest gain, but eager to serve; not lording it over those entrusted to you, but being examples to the flock.” Jesus is the shepherd who is always attentive to you, and he does so because he wants to. And if there was anyone who could lord over you and me, it’s Jesus. But instead he is eager to serve you. He loves you proactively, always thinking about the eternal. Because you are his crown, his eternal legacy, to lead you dear sheep of God into the pastures of heaven that never end, and to enjoy hearing his voice forever, laughing on glory’s side. This is Good Shepherd who laid down his life for his sheep, and took it back up again on Easter, showing the roaring lion is on a leash, and Jesus will always stand before you and he will deliver the knockout strike when he comes back.
This is why pastors and church leaders long not to “arrive” so people notice them, but rather that more and more sheep can arrive beside Jesus. Paul David Tripp puts it like this, “Tender, heartfelt worship is hard for a person who thinks of himself as having arrived. No one celebrates the presence and grace of the Lord Jesus Christ more than the person who has embraced his desperate and daily need of it.” Which is precisely why under-shepherds like me need to be shepherded by you also. I and our church leaders need your prayers, your wisdom, your love, and your joy. Because we know what thatroaring lion is capable of.
Peter and Christians at his time knew it too. Until recently when I would 1 Peter 5:8, “Be alert and of sober mind. Your enemy the devil prowls around like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour.” I used to picture a Pride Rock type, African savannah with Satan lurking in the high grass. But that’s not what Peter’s readers would have imagined. They would have seen an arena. A lion stalking, as the dust from his paws, brushed past their eyes. The paralyzing fear that the end was near, our Christian ancestors who stared down lions ready to devour them. The temptation to concede, to give up their faith, to walk away from the Good Shepherd was strong. It’s what Satan does. History is filled with spiritual cemeteries of churches who faced the Satanic lion and conceded the truth of the Scriptures that Christians of old died to preserve, all the while, forgetting that our Shepherd is a lion too, the Lion of Judah, who like C.S. Lewis wrote, “Course he isn't safe. But he's good. He's the King, I tell you.”
He is the ultimate pastor, with fierce lion-like love for you, who will always protect you and he did so by giving the ultimate sacrifice, because he was driven for a crown that doesn’t fade. So too are we dear sheep of God. It’s one of many reasons I love being your pastor. It’s why I consider it one of the greatest honors of my life to strive by God’s grace for you to get a glimpse of Jesus through me. It’s why it melted me when Ellie said to me one Sunday afternoon when I got home, “Dad, you smell like people.” We are in Jesus’ flock together, smelling like each other, because we are in the pasture, listening to the Good Shepherd’s voice. We stand together so we can “resist him, standing firm in the faith, because you know that the family of believers throughout the world is undergoing the same kind of sufferings.” Satan can never corner you, not with Jesus before you and your sheep beside you. It’s Jesus’ voice, the one you hear in the gospel, the one that refreshes you as you remember the waters of baptism, who satisfies you with his own body and blood, and it’s that Chief Shepherd who reminds us what our true crown will be.
Look at what Peter says, “And when the Chief Shepherd appears, you will receive the crown of glory that will never fade away.” The crown we receive is much like his, a legacy of souls who we brought Jesus to, to fill his heavenly pasture. Souls we never give up on, just like that mom I mentioned to you on Mother’s Day, who now has her daughters sitting at her side in church again after years and years. Because compared to that crown of people, our suffering is but an intense and painful moment which fades as time goes on, flooded by the joy of what our Good Shepherd has done.
That’s why as your under-shepherd longing with all I am that my wife, my kids, and you dear sheep of Jesus see him more and more through me, that I leave you with this. I know a vote stands before us, and for some of you that feels like a valley of grieving and for some a wide open space of joy. But in all of this, hear the one voice that calms all anxiety, and what does he have to say to us today, “I am the good shepherd; I know my sheep and my sheep know me— just as the Father knows me and I know the Father—and I lay down my life for the sheep. I have other sheep that are not of this sheep pen. I must bring them also. They too will listen to my voice, and there shall be one flock and one shepherd.” With joy, we will follow our Shepherd to the end, welcoming his little lambs, and his older sheep into his fold, and what a pasture Jesus has prepared for us! Amen.
