The Shepherd who leaves the flock...

Often times we see our local church as the entire Kingdom of God. I realize that none of us would actually say this out loud, but I know that I am guilty of these thoughts and so I am going to assume you might be as well. My local church recently went through a few years of rough waters surrounding our senior minister position. We have been looking for a shepherd to lead this local flock for the better part of the last five years. About a year ago I really came to notice how I was praying for our church and the next senior minister. I was very selfish and assumed that God had nothing to be concerned about other than filling our pulpit. Then it hit me! These men are shepherds who leave local flocks but only to go and serve another part of The Great Shepherd's flock. In order for The Great Shepherd to send an undershepherd to us, He had to take that undershepherd away from another part of the flock.

I began to see a picture that I cannot say is completely biblical, so understand that from here on these are my thoughts. I imagined this very large pasture with millions of Sheep, Goats, wolves and Shepheds. The sheep and goats were split into thousands of small groups. Some maybe had 20 others had 2,000 in their number. Most groups had shepherds, but some where without a shepherd. There were wolves spread throughout the pasture, waiting for an opportunity to pick off one of the fold. Then there was a Master Shepherd, who stood on a hill watching over the entire scene. This Master Shepherd had a plan to bring all of the sheep to Himself and He had prepared the undershepherds to bring His plan about.

Application: You see, in this picture my church was one of the groups without an undershepherd. I was worried that we were vulnerable both to the wolves and to ourselves. I wasn't looking at this through God's eyes. He was watching over our fold, He was watching the wolves, and He understood better what the plan was. In order to send us an undershepherd He had to take one away from another fold. Maybe the fact was that there were many wolves surrounding this other fold, while we were realitively safe? Or maybe God was shaping one of our own fold to become our undershepherd? (which praise be to God happened to be the case!)

I think that it is very important for us to see the Kingdom of Christ as a whole, it changes everything! We have a Great Shepherd, that while others come and go, He never leaves us or forsakes us and has plans to one day bring us all to Himself.