The Shepherd Guides His Sheep

If you have never felt hopeless, I would like to suggest that very probably the day will come when you will feel that way. Life has many blessings. It also has many trials. Sometimes they are equally proportioned. Sometimes there is more of one than the other. Maybe it’s the doctor telling you things about yourself that you thought could only be true of someone else, and you hear the tragic news that you have a terminal illness. Perhaps it is also the disappointment of friends who have forsaken you, or who have betrayed you. Difficulties come to all of us. It may be loneliness and despair, a sense of frustration because of poverty. I want you to know that as we go along in life and we encounter these obstacles, the Good Shepherd is there. And if you were here last time, you know that we began a series of messages on Psalm 23, one of the most familiar passages in all the Bible, one that I hope that you have memorized. 

Today we come Psalm 23:3-4 where it says, “He restores my soul. He leads me in paths of righteousness for his name’s sake.” As we have been studying we’ve noticed that it is very important for us to understand sheep because that’s the metaphor, that’s the analogy that is being used. The better we understand them, the better we will understand ourselves. 

What does the text tell us the Good Shepherd does for us? Well, first of all we recognize that He restores us. And that word, restore, means to bring us back to our former position. We use the word when we speak of the restoration of health, or the restoration of someone who was in a particular level of work or vocation, and then he’s restored. We use it when someone is away from home. Many of us would like to see little baby Richard restored to the parents who brought him up. That’s the way the word restoration is used. And you’ll notice Psalm 23:3 says, “He restores my soul.” He restores me. He brings me back to other sheep and to the Shepherd. 

Now, as I studied this, I discovered that there are two different kinds of sheep that need restoration. First of all, there are those sheep who need to be turned around because they are going along a wrong path. Sheep are notorious for finding one clump of grass, and then another clump of grass, and pretty soon they leave the rest of the flock behind, and then they are way out in the wilderness somewhere, and they can’t find their way back. Sometimes they follow paths that have been deliberately set up for them by thieves who would like to see them wander, so that they could be captured. Sometimes there are trails that are blown by the wind that look as if they are sheep paths, but they are not, and they lead nowhere. The responsibility of the shepherd is to constantly be bringing them back, to restore them. 

You know, little wonder the Bible likens us unto sheep. It says in Isaiah 53:6, “All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned—every one—to his own way; and the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all.” We live in a time when there is a great deal of emphasis on self-determination. When I do my own thing, I make my own decisions, and I ask the question, “What’s in it for me?”—and then I take it from there. Well, it’s the responsibility of the Shepherd to keep bringing us back. He brings backsliders back into fellowship.

I read this week that a man by the name of Robert Robinson wrote one of my favorite hymns. I have a lot of favorite hymns, but one is: 

“Come, thou Fount of every blessing;
tune my heart to sing thy grace;
streams of mercy, never ceasing,
call for songs of loudest praise.”

Robert Robinson wrote that hymn and then himself backslid. He lived a life of immorality, a life of rebellion, a life of doing his own thing. And one day in his travels he met a Christian woman to whom he was speaking, and she said to him, “You know, I have been particularly blessed by a hymn.” She read those words to him, and that was used by the Holy Spirit of God to reconcile him to his Heavenly Father because he had wandered far away from home. He said to her, “I am the one who wrote those words.” But he said, “I have backslidden so far. Can I even come back to God?” She reminded him of the words that he himself had written: 

“streams of mercy, never ceasing,
call for songs of loudest praise.”

Yes, there was mercy even for him.

The shepherd oftentimes even breaks the leg of a rebellious, wandering sheep. You get a sheep that is constantly going his own way in the vicinity of wolves and other animals, and the shepherd will break the leg of that sheep. Then he will put a splint on it and carry the little lamb close to his heart. And every time he comes to a stream, he has to help the lamb across. He has to help the lamb over rough terrain until the leg is healed. There’s a bonding process that develops between the sheep and the shepherd, and that little lamb will not wander again.

I’m reminded of the words of David in Psalm 119, the longest chapter in the Bible, and what a Psalm it is. He says in Psalm 119:67, “Before I was afflicted I went astray, but now I keep your word.” And then four verses later in verse 71 he says, “It is good for me that I was afflicted, that I might learn your statutes.” I’m speaking to someone today who has experienced the affliction of God because you have wandered astray. And the price that you have paid for that wandering, the conviction of sin, the circumstances of life all point to the loving hand of the Shepherd who says, “Come back home where you belong.” 

Now, not all of our afflictions are because of disobedience and wandering. We learned that when we studied the book of Job. Sometimes the Shepherd allows our legs to be broken simply because He wants us to be even closer in His bosom. He wants to restore us. He wants to bring us as close to Himself as possible because that’s the only safe place to be. 

What kind of sheep need to be restored? First of all, those who have wandered and need to be turned around. But there’s another kind that needs restoration, and that is those who need to be turned right side up.

I discovered in my studies that sometimes there are sheep who lie down in a gully, near a valley, and then they stretch out to relax in the sun, and then the center of gravity changes, and as a result they end up on their backs. They begin to paw furiously, but of course going nowhere, and only making their situation worse. In hot weather they can die in a matter of hours. In cold weather they might live an entire week, but they go through this experience, their blood circulation is affected. Only the shepherd can go, turn them back on their side and strengthen their legs so that they can be made upright again. In fact, it’s this terminology, very probably, that David had in mind when he said in Psalm 42:5, “Why are you cast down, O my soul, and why are you in turmoil within me? Hope in God.” Those kind of sheep were called cast down sheep, on their backs, going nowhere. 

Nobody would have been more qualified to write about this than David himself, who had been a cast down sheep. He committed murder and adultery. He lived for nearly one year. He said his sin was ever before him—everyone he talked to. In his mind he began to ask the question, “I wonder if they know?” It was always there. And then one day the prophet Nathan came to him and pointed out his sin to him. And even then, David simply could not see it because no one is as blind as those who have chosen not to see. But when Nathan used that analogy, David realized that he was the sinner. David said, “God, be merciful to me, the sinner,” not exactly in those words, but that was the essence of it. And in Psalm 51:12 he pours out his heart to God, and he says, “Restore to me the joy of your salvation.” And God did it. Consequences didn’t change. Uriah was still dead. Bathsheba had still been sinfully violated. David had to live with those consequences, but his soul was restored to God. That’s the kind of person who needs restoration, someone who has slipped and fallen. 

Now, there are some people who have slipped and fallen, and then there are other people who have fallen because they have been pushed. In American history—most recent history—we’ve gone through a great emphasis on victimization. There’s been such an emphasis on that, people have not been willing to take responsibility for their own responses. I notice that there is a shift in the other direction. People are telling us that we should end the blame game. Remember that graffiti in Philadelphia that was scrawled on the wall that said “Humpty Dumpty was pushed.” Well, maybe Humpty Dumpty was pushed. There is such a thing as people who are going through difficulty today simply because they have been the product of other people’s anger, they have been victims. But, I want you to know today that the Bible says in Psalm 147:3, “He heals the brokenhearted and binds up their wounds.”

The bottom line: If you need restoration today, the Good Shepherd will restore you. He restores you to Himself, and He will restore you back to the sheep where you belong. Some of you know that you belong in this flock. God has a lot of different flocks. But wherever it is that you belong, God is in the business of restoration, of bringing people back. 

So first of all, the text says in Psalm 23:3: “He restores my soul.” And then it says in verse 4, “He leads me (or guides me) in paths of righteousness for his name’s sake.” Just that one verse actually is the focus of our attention today. He leads us in right paths. Sheep are notorious creatures of habit. They’ll take a path and they will use it so often it will become a rut. They will overgraze the pastures and the fields. They will wander. They know nothing about taking good care of pastureland. It’s the responsibility of the shepherd to lead them in good paths, in right paths. And as I was thinking about that this past week it dawned on me that the Good Shepherd leads us in the best paths, not necessarily the easiest paths. Remember also that the Good Shepherd has to overcome the innate resistance and stubbornness of the sheep to be properly led. That is one of His greatest problems. But once He does have our attention, He leads us in righteous paths for His name’s sake. 

As somebody who has talked to people for years and tried to help them in their troubles, you sometimes say to them, “Did you ever consult the Shepherd before you made that decision?” Sometimes the answer is, “No, because I already knew what the Good Shepherd would think of the decision I was going to make.” Sometimes it was just benign neglect, and then we get off from that one clump of grass to another clump of grass, and we wander so far away, and then we wonder where the Shepherd is. Well, when we are in His presence He leads us, the text says, in right paths. 

Now, you think about this. How much do sheep know in relationship to how much a shepherd knows? Very little. And a human shepherd can only know the beginning of the life of a sheep, approximately the entire life of the sheep, and he knows where the best grazing land is, and where the best watering holes are. Sometimes he has to lead them through the wilderness to get to those good paths. I want you to think for a moment about the Good Shepherd, Christ. He not only sees your birth, and your lineage, and your vocation, your beginning, and your end here on earth. He sees the entire spectrum of eternity, and that’s why He is so qualified to lead us. He leads us with heavenly values, not down the easiest path, but the path that is actually best for us. He leads us in right paths. 

Also, let me say that He leads us in paths that have already been used. No shepherd ever says to the sheep, “Now, I want you to investigate this grazing land, and then later on tell me what you think of it.” All of the grass to which a shepherd leads his sheep is grass that has already been tested. The trail has already been blazed by others and certainly has been blazed by the Shepherd. You’ll notice what is says in John 10:4, when He puts forth His own sheep “He goes before them.” You are never shoved. You are never pushed. You are always led. He is there first. 

Rick Olson is sitting right up here. And I notice he is very much awake right now [laughter]. He’s been a missionary in Romania, and what an outstanding young man he is. Some of us had the privilege of visiting him when we were in Romania. Long before Rick left a few years ago, God was already in Romania as the Good Shepherd making preparation for his arrival. God is the best travel agent because wherever He asks you to go, He’s already been there, and He’s already making arrangements and for your arrival. And whatever it is that God ever takes us through, the Shepherd goes through that first. 

Are you experiencing rejection by the friends that have betrayed you, and it has hurt so deeply? Be encouraged, the Good Shepherd experienced that also_, “My own familiar friend hath lifted up his heal against me.” Is it poverty that is causing the great distress? It is about the Son of Man about whom it is said, “[He] has nowhere to lay his head” (Matthew 8:20). He had no place that He could call home. He knows the loneliness. He knows the despair. He knows the limitations of your trial. He understands it. Is it death? And not just any death, not just a natural death, but a violent death, someone rising up against you and killing you mercilessly, thoughtlessly. That has happened to the Good Shepherd as well. The Bible says that Jesus Christ, nailed to the cross by sinners, even though He had done nothing amiss. Again, Jesus is also likened unto a sheep in Isaiah 53:7 where it says, “[He is] like a lamb that is led to the slaughter, and like a sheep that before its shearers is silent, so he opened not his mouth.” Jesus went through all that for us, and now He says, “Wherever I lead you I want you to know that I’ve been there ahead of you.” Notice what Psalm 23 says, “He restores us.” He restores those who need to be turned around, and those who need to be turned right-side up. And then He leads us in righteous paths. 

Let me help us summarize what it is that I am saying today by reminding you of three truths that grow out of this particular verse. First of all, that the needy sheep has the particular interest of the Shepherd. The more needy you are the more focused the Shepherd’s eyes are on you. He comes in at the end of the day and He counts the sheep. If there’s one missing, what does Jesus say? He goes and He finds that missing sheep. Not the 99 that are safely in the fold, but He finds the one that has wandered the farthest away. 

If I speak today to someone who has been broken down because of moral involvement and moral sin, if I speak to someone today who has been isolated from families and friends because of despair and loneliness, if I speak to someone today who is cast down, let me invite you to hope in God because the Shepherd who knows your name is the one who is interested in you. Today He says, “Be restored.” You’ve been lost, but you can be found. 

Secondly, I need to remind you that the reputation of the shepherd—and this is important—the reputation of the shepherd is just as important as the leading of the sheep. Notice what the Bible says there in the last part of Psalm 23:3: “He leads me in paths of righteousness for his name’s sake.” Can you imagine a shepherd who purchases a flock of sheep and then will not take care of them? Shepherds are made a laughing stock. They are criticized if they have sheep that have not had proper care, and shepherds pay a great deal of time and energy to their reputation. It’s important for them.

Listen, Jesus purchased us at high cost. He died for us. We have been redeemed, and we have been bought by the Good Shepherd. The Good Shepherd lays down His life for the sheep, the Bible says. And so do you think He’s going to abandon us? Do you think that He will ever disown us? Would He ever say to Himself, “I purchased some sheep who are now not worth the trouble? They are stubborn. They wander. They do their own thing. They betray me. They don’t act like my sheep.” Do you think that will ever happen? No, He leads us in righteous paths for His name’s sake. Christ’s name is important, and His reputation is involved in our commitment or lack thereof. I want you to remember that. 

And finally, and most importantly, the Shepherd always seeks the sheep. Sheep never go looking for the Shepherd. They never say to themselves, “You know, I’m lost. I’m going to try to find the shepherd.” Almost always it is the other way around, and certainly that’s true in relationship to our Good Shepherd, the Lord Jesus Christ. It is always the Shepherd who goes hunting for the sheep.

One day Jesus was criticized for spending so much time with some of the sinners that were there in the city of Jerusalem and Judea. In order to justify spending time with harlots and tax gatherers, He said, “You know there was a shepherd who had 99 sheep, but he left them in the fold and then he went out and he found the one sheep, and when he brought him back he rejoiced.” Here Jesus was saying that these people are like those who have wandered very far away. In fact, if we may stretch the analogy a bit, strictly speaking they were not even His sheep yet. But He said, “I went out and I found them.” The Good Shepherd leaves the 99 with someone with whom He trusts, and then He goes out in the wilderness, and He seeks, and He finds, and He comes across this little lamb that is caught in the bushes. The little lamb is lost, and He puts him on His arm and He brings him back to the fold. “Now,” said Jesus, “that’s what the Good Shepherd does.” He does the seeking; we never do. 

Now, oftentimes when you hear testimonies, you’ll hear some people say this, “I found the Lord as my Savior back in 1985.” Now, we understand what they mean, but strictly speaking that’s not very good theology. It is the Shepherd who found you in 1985. You weren’t looking for Him. He came looking for you. “No man can come except the Spirit draw him.” You say, “Oh yes, but I was seeking God.” Yes, the reason that you were seeking God is because God was first seeking you. Left to themselves, we as sheep will never turn to God. God comes hunting for us. And of course, He knows our address, and He finds us. 

Here at The Moody Church on Fridays we have staff devotions with the pastoral staff and the office staff together, and since I led it this week, I told the staff that were present a story. I had just skimmed a book this past week. I don’t have time to read any more, I can only skim. I skimmed a book on the life of John Newton. Now you have to get the picture. Here’s someone who is brought up in a semi-Christian home, though with a very harsh father, and Newton becomes involved in the slave trade, goes to Africa, decides that he’s going to jettison everything that he ever learned about Christianity, though he had learned some verses of Scripture as a youth. And while he is in Africa, he chooses to become a hardened sinner, an atheist, he says. He had convinced himself that there was no God so that he could do whatever he wished. He had been warned about immorality but now decided to commit immorality. 

His mouth, his swearing was so vile that even some of the hardened sinners and sailors with whom he worked did not want to work with him. In fact, there was a time when he was in Africa when he kind of was willing to give a prize to someone who thought of some new way of sinning that he, John Newton, had not yet tried. 

But he’s on his way back now in the North Atlantic, and the date is March 10, 1748, and they are in a ship that is called the Greyhound. A huge storm comes up. The waves begin to go over the ship. He and another man began to man the pumps. Others of the sailors were trying to scoop up the water. Some of the cargo was already lost, and now the gale became absolutely violent, and every time the ship was in that hollow, waiting for the next wave, they thought that the very next moment the ship would be dashed to pieces. And Newton said something to the captain, and then said, “If this will not do, may the Lord have mercy on us.” And the minute those words came out of his mouth he realized that he had, in effect, spoken a prayer. The storm became so violent that he and another man strapped themselves to the pump for fear that the water could bring them overboard. 

While he was thinking about the verses of Scripture he had learned, this verse from Proverbs 1, came to him. God is speaking. He said, “Because I have called and you refused to listen… I also will laugh at your calamity; I will mock when terror strikes you” (Proverbs 1:24-27). He thought, “I can’t turn to God now because is there grace even for me? God is mocking as the ship is being battered and destroyed.” Well, as the story goes, the storm eventually ended, and by the way, it took them nearly 28 days, long after they had run out of food, in order to find land. But it was when the storm abated, he found a New Testament that was on the ship, and he began to read, and he read through the Gospels, and then the light dawned that Jesus Christ was indeed who He said He was, and Newton savingly believed. Well, no wonder he was qualified to sing and to write the most beloved hymn, one of the most beloved hymns we could ever possibly sing. 

“Amazing grace, how sweet the sound, 

That saved a wretch like me. 

I once was lost and now am found, 

Was blind but now I see.”

How does it go? 

“Through many dangers, toil and snares 

We have already come.” 

And I forget the rest of the line because I had not intended to quote that part to you, but you know how it ends up. 

“When we’ve been there ten thousand years, 

Bright shining as the sun. 

We’ve no less days to sing His praise 

Than when we first begun.”

Let me ask you something. Who was searching for who? Was it the sheep that said, “I need a shepherd?” No, when the sun was shining, and when the money was there, and when there was health and strength, the sheep was not looking for a shepherd. But what the Shepherd did is take that sheep through a series of experiences, stripping him of his self-confidence, and leading him back to the faith of his mother who taught him those verses of Scripture. The Shepherd was finding a lost sheep. 

Now there are two categories of lost sheep. There are those who are not really sheep at all­ just like Newton on that boat, perhaps running from God, running from everything that you think and know you should be doing. Or maybe not running but wandering and considering faith in Jesus Christ because the Shepherd is at work in your heart. But then there are those of you who know the Shepherd. You remember the love of His voice. You remember responding to His call. You remember the intimacy that you had with Him years ago, and now possibly you need to be turned around. You’ve gone from one clump of grass to the other, and your trail leads nowhere, or you need to be turned right side up. The Shepherd says to you and to me today, “Be restored.” “He restores my soul. He leads me in paths of righteousness for his name’s sake” (Psalm 23:3).

Be encouraged. The Shepherd loves His sheep and longs for closeness and intimacy. And He’s there, speaking to you now. 

And if you will, let us pray. 

And our Father, we do want to thank You that we have often sung:

“Prone to wander, Lord, I feel it, 

Prone to leave the God I love. 

Here’s my heart, oh take and seal it. 

Seal it for Thy courts above.”

Father, for those who are listening who have wandered away from the flock and wandered away from You, make this a day of restoration. We pray that You will pick them up, clean them up, restore them, bring them back. I pray that each one who is listening will know that there is more grace in Your heart than there is sin in their past. In Jesus’ name, Amen.