MORAL FEATURES OF A SHEPHERD
I was thinking of the importance of the shepherd, and the features that mark a shepherd. It is something that in our day is very much needed – those who can exercise shepherd care in the Christian company. Our brother had some practical knowledge of caring for sheep, but he also learned from the Lord the moral features that marked Him as the Shepherd when He was here in this scene. In His life here, the Lord Jesus cared for people, He looked after them with a gentle touch. The Lord said to Peter, “Shepherd my sheep”. The Lord wants us to learn from Him to enable us to help one another. In Peter’s first epistle, the apostle describes the features that are to be seen in shepherds, the gentleness and meekness and humility towards all (chap.5:5-7).
A shepherd would protect his flock. There is much that the enemy would do against the flock if he could. When David was a shepherd, he protected his sheep against the lion and the bear. The enemy would carry away the lambs, carry away the sheep, to destroy, but the gentle yet powerful hand of the Shepherd is able to meet that. The Lord in His shepherd service guards and encourages and keeps His flock. One prominent feature of the shepherd seen in the Lord is genuine affection, genuine feeling for His own. Our brother had a genuine affection for those for whom the Lord had died. You could see that. Many young people have experienced that shepherd feature in him. When a Christian with real shepherd feelings draws alongside you, you know that they are asking about you not just out of a sense of responsibility, but because they genuinely care for you, they love you. That is not merely natural: it is gained by learning from the One who is the chief Shepherd (1 Pet.5:4), the One in whose presence we should stay.
It is interesting that before Peter was given this charge by the Lord, Jesus asked him, “lovest thou me?”. Love for the Lord lies behind shepherd service. We can see that in our brother’s life; how he loved the Lord. As has been said, he served his Master, but it was not only because of a sense of responsibility that he served, but out of love for his Lord and his brethren. It is a charge that is laid upon all of us. Everybody can be a shepherd, everybody can care, everybody can have affection for those that are the Lord’s and care for them. In Acts chapter 20, Paul says of the assembly that God has purchased it “with the blood of his own” (v.28). Someone with shepherd feelings would look at the sheep and see in them that which is precious to Christ and he would look after them; he would shepherd them according to what the chief Shepherd would have in mind. How precious the sheep are to the chief Shepherd.
And so the Lord would encourage us to look after each other, to care for one another, and to love one another. We could see that in our brother in his affection for those he gathered with. He was somebody who would impart something of what he knew of the Lord. That is open to us all. It is the action of a shepherd and it helps to stabilise us. May these simple impressions be for our encouragement, for the Lord’s name’s sake.
Sam Lock
“AS UNKNOWN, AND WELL KNOWN”
2 Corinthians 6:9 (“as unknown, and well known”)
This scripture has been very much in my mind in considering our brother, his life, and his home-going. As has been said, it is not the time nor the place for eulogising, but God is drawing attention to a particular person. In the Lord’s putting that person to sleep, God is drawing attention to them and their features, for His work is completed in that person. God would ask us – are we going to take on the moral features of the person whom the Lord has taken? What has been said as to service and as to shepherding is a challenge for each one of us; it is an exercise as to commitment at a time like this. Each one of us needs to be concerned about that.
I was thinking of the word “unknown”. Think of this scene that the Lord has gone through. There was no love for Him then, and the world does not have a place for Him now – the world does not want Him. The world will not include our brother in its history books. He served here as “unknown”, and that has been called attention to as part of his service. How blessed that is. After all, his Lord was rejected, his Lord and his Master was not given His right place, His true place in this scene. Jesus was “unknown”, so we are thankful that we can be unknown by this world. That is just part of what I want to say.
The other part, the wonderful thing, is “and well known”. Our brother was and is well known in heaven. Are you well known in heaven? I was thinking of Cornelius. There is a monument to Cornelius; it is not a monument on this earth, but there is a monument in heaven: “Thy prayers and thine alms have gone up for a memorial before God”, Acts 10:4. Think of what has been gathered up of the prayers and alms of our brother, the communion of a lifetime of commitment to the Lord Jesus – well known in heaven. It is wonderful to think of how God has appreciated that, how God has appreciated such a life that He would gather up what was accrued in prayer and praise from our brother. That can be you, that there should be from yourself these prayers, that communion and praise, all that there was to delight heaven in a person. These features in our brother did not proceed from what was natural, but from what was formed according to God in him. Think of formation according to God; how precious it is. That formation in our brother was precious in this scene, it was precious to heaven, and well known in heaven.
Our brother had some favourite scriptures. He used to draw attention to one in David’s history, when the ark was in the house of Obed-Edom. You might think, as you look at it, that you could compare our brother to Obed-Edom. But he often drew attention to the fact that something came to the ears of David, and it came by an unknown person (2 Sam.6:12). It brought blessing to David, and our brother used to speak with admiration of that unknown, unnamed person.
I often think of another unnamed person in Scripture – the man with the pitcher of water (Luke 22:10). Two notable persons, Peter and John, notable in the eyes of heaven, were to go into the city. The Lord was directing them, but He did not in that scripture direct them to an address, He directed them to an unknown and unnamed person, a person who has a particular moral feature – that he was a man with a pitcher of water. We could again link that to service, service in relation to the Spirit, bringing in the Spirit’s work and the Spirit’s power to help.
Well, the question is for each one of us whether we can take up such a service as unknown. That would provide an example to be followed. We know that the service is under the Lord’s hand, it is what the Lord has done to secure in such persons, but they would be personal examples that are worth following. It is right to follow. We may be distracted by following what is wrong, but it is right to follow when you see such a person who is leading you in the power of the Spirit: that is the person to follow. The Supper is in view, the place where the Lord is going to be speaking, the place where the Lord is going to make Himself known. It is wonderful that there could be such persons, unknown to this earth, never even named in the scriptures but known to heaven, whom God values and appreciates.
I was thinking too of practical service. There were those who served as deacons in the early Acts, as our brother was often engaged in practical service. Persons who are engaged in practical service should be those who are filled with the power of the Spirit. Our brother took up practical service and the Spirit was with him in his service. The Lord would include you, in your locality, in your place. It would include the brethren here, and the family. We are all to take up these matters, to commit ourselves to serve in this way – not famous, not known in this scene but to serve “unknown”, although your prayers, your alms, your service will be well known in heaven.
May we be exercised to take this up, for the Lord’s name’s sake.
David C Brown
Three words given on the occasion of a burial, Edinburgh
19 July 2021
DIVINE TIMING
John 11:1-7,39-44; Mark 1:30,31; Matthew 24:35,36
I have an impression about the Lord’s timing. There have been a number of things that have come to my attention over the recent days. The brethren will remember a preaching by our brother Mr. A. J. Gardiner from 1957, titled ’A Matter of Real Urgency’ which was recently published. Also our brother who spoke to us in the preaching on Lord’s day spoke about those words of the Lord, “Fool, this night thy soul shall be required of thee”, Luke 12:20. Then we looked at this passage in Mark’s gospel on Lord’s day and it speaks, as Mark often does, about the Lord’s actions as taking place ‘straightway’ or ‘immediately’. I had this impression, and perhaps we can all be helped to think about the Lord’s timing.
This world is full of things that we could do with our time. Speaking for myself, we set out plans according to our own thoughts and our own level of patience or impatience. You have certain expectations about when things will happen and how they will happen. But as Christians in our walk down here, we need to be careful that we are subject to the Lord’s timing, guided by what He would have us do and be here as dependent upon Him. We often speak of the dependence of the Lord Jesus on the Father and this comes out in this first scripture. The Lord now has His place in glory and in His place there, He would be watching to see how dependent we are as Christians upon His timing and His direction.
This first scripture has often been spoken about in relation to divine timing and you wonder at it. It says very clearly of the Lord, “he remained two days then in the place where he was”. There was a certain time to elapse before He would move. When He did receive the word to go, the disciples said to Him “even but now the Jews sought to stone thee, and goest thou thither again?” (v.8). Naturally you can understand it, but that had not been the reason He that He waited. He had said, “This sickness is not unto death, but for the glory of God, that the Son of God may be glorified by it”. There was a specific reason and a specific purpose for the Lord waiting those two days. Dear friends, we should be subject to the authority of the Lord, to know His timing in everything. There had been a specific reason here for waiting, and who knows what specific reason He has in our lives to work things out and to bring out what is for the glory of the Lord.
Then these remarkable words about resurrection were uttered by the Lord, but Martha tells Him that her brother Lazarus had been in the grave for four days. Four days had elapsed since he had died. How much natural sorrow would have come into Martha’s life; she would have given up hope, given up any thought of recovery, but the Lord’s timing was perfect. Jesus said, “Father, I thank thee that thou hast heard me; but I knew that thou always hearest me; but on account of the crowd who stand around”. Then He calls his name and Lazarus comes forth. That brought out, dear friends, the perfection of the Lord’s timing. What was seen was the glory of the Father. Resurrection is seen here in relation to an individual, but it looks forward to that future day when all who believe in the Lord Jesus will be raised.
What also comes out here is the liberty that comes about as under the Lord’s timing and direction. “Loose him and let him go”. Lazarus was a beloved friend of the Lord Jesus. You wonder at the liberty that Lazarus and those around him would enjoy as having had this experience of being loosed. He was loosed under the Lord’s direction, according to His timing. What liberty there was for Lazarus as being loosed and let go.
We see a contrast to the Lord’s waiting for these two days in what we read in Mark’s gospel in the number of times the word ‘straightway’ is used. We have often been affected by it; the way in which the Lord comes into the house of the mother-in-law of Simon, and “straightway they speak to him about her”. There is an urgency there from those around Him and He acts quickly and brings about recovery. We were touched by that on Lord’s day, that the recovery was full and complete and immediate. Naturally, you might look upon this and say, ‘The fever has only just left her; is she the right person then to serve us?’ But the fever was gone straightway and completely. The action of the Lord Jesus then was quick and it had an immediate recovery. What we see from this scripture is the thought of service; she served them. She was released immediately from what had bowed her down, she was released to serve the Lord Jesus Himself. It is a contrast with John 11, but the timing here was also the Lord’s perfect timing. Not their timing, it was the Lord’s timing, and what it leads to is one who can serve.
I just refer to those words of the Lord Jesus Himself in Matthew; “But of that day and hour no one knows, not even the angels of the heavens, but my Father alone”. Think of the Lord’s timing in coming for His own and setting on all the events that will lead to His coming publicly to reign for a thousand years. Even the Lord Himself, speaking as a man, says that He does not know when it will be. It is the Father alone. You can see here that what comes out is the dependence of the Lord Himself as bowing to the Father’s timing.
The Lord would act in our lives, He would direct and He would help us. The Lord would encourage us to seek His timing as He is dependent on the Father’s timing for that great and momentous occasion for which we are waiting, coming for His own and then coming in glory and majesty and in power to reign over the earth. What a day that will be, but the timing is in the hands of the Father. As we think about the timing that is in the control of divine Persons, and in the wisdom of divine Persons, our own timing in whatever we do is to be under Their control. May we take encouragement from that, because it is perfect. It must be perfect, and what comes from accepting that is to know liberty in service, and a result for the glory of God.
May it be so for His name’s sake.
Given at a meeting for ministry, Witney
23 May 2021
Rob McKay