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Ezekiel 34:2  (King James Version)
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<< Ezekiel 34:1   Ezekiel 34:3 >>


Ezekiel 34:2-4

In days gone by, sheep were a common symbol of wealth. Whether they were raised for their wool or for their meat—or both—or traded for other items of value, raising sheep used to be a tried-and-true way to make a living. As a man's flocks grew in size, so did his financial security, as well as his status and influence in the community. Sheep used to be a valued resource, one that over time provided great dividends without a lot of expense.

Not much has changed.

Today, physical shepherds are far more rare than spiritual shepherds, making shepherding a booming industry. Mega-churches are springing up in every major city, and the shepherds of these massive flocks are becoming symbols of affluence, and in some cases, even extravagance. Among the various purposes for having such a large following, some shepherds may have a genuine desire to spread their good news to all the world, but one cannot help but notice that, in the process, they are pulling down million-dollar salaries and creating personal empires. All the while, they are serving up McSermons that may satiate but do little to urge the people toward real holiness or point them back to God in a truly meaningful way.

Disturbing as this is, the businesslike approach of valuing of large flocks over healthy sheep has also infiltrated parts of the church of God. We see sheep being enticed to ditch their current shepherd to follow a new one, and the reasons given for doing this reveal the carnal focus. Sheep are being lured, not with good food, clean water, peace, and protection against pestilence, but with promises of being a part of something big and of protection from the Tribulation, along with the "privilege" of being able to support an especially qualified shepherd.

Such leaders see the sheep as mere personnel to serve them, their interests, and their projects, rather than accepting the gravity of their responsibility to care for their health and to dedicate themselves to "equipping of the saints for the work of ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ, till we all come to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to a perfect man, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ" (Ephesians 4:12-13).

God's emphasis is on spiritual health—quality, not quantity. While this priority may contradict the designs of some to build a personal empire, the fact remains that the quantity of true sheep during this time of judgment is a limited number. Because God is only calling a certain number of people right now (John 6:44), only so many true sheep are available for the various shepherds to care for. The question becomes, then, who determines which sheep will be overseen by which shepherd? Considering the great care God has for His physical creation, is it logical to believe that He leaves His far more important spiritual creation to happenstance or the whims of mere men?

Do the individual shepherds determine this, or is this the responsibility of the Chief Shepherd—the One who can truthfully say, "Of those whom You gave Me I have lost none" (John 18:9; compare John 17:12). Clearly, all of the sheep belong to the Chief Shepherd, and those who hear His voice follow Him (John 10:27)—including following Him to whatever human shepherd He knows will be best for what the individual sheep needs. For a shepherd to lose sight of this fact and lure away sheep that have not been given—and if they have been given, they need not be lured—is to be guilty of sheep rustling. During the days of the Old West, rustling was a hanging offense!

Consider the example of Abraham. Abraham and his nephew Lot both kept herds, yet even with the impressive title and standing before God—actually because of it—he did not try to rustle Lot's sheep. He did not assume that all the sheep should be his. He did not try to entice Lot's sheep to come join his flocks. Rather, when there was strife between Abraham's herdsmen and Lot's herdsmen, he proposed they each choose his own land, so there would be no confusion or discord. He even deferred—for the sake of peace—to his nephew and gave him first pick!

Abraham knew that God governs in the affairs of men, and that he was not going to lack any good thing if he put His trust in the Most High. Abraham "believed in the LORD"—believed in His ability to manage His creation; in His sovereignty; in His leadership of His people; and in His promise to supply every need. He believed in all of this rather than try to further enrich himself with more sheep or better land—"and it was counted to him as righteousness" (Genesis 15:6; Galatians 3:6).

David C. Grabbe
Sheep Rustling



Ezekiel 34:1-31

Ezekiel condemns the ministry as a whole for being more concerned for self and paycheck than for the "sheep," the members of the church. Rather than helping, healing, and leading, government was often administered with force and cruelty. Talking the talk was followed far more frequently than walking the walk. God also charges them with defiling the doctrine, which verse 18 pictures as trodden pasture and fouled water. Paul, James, Peter, John, and Jude all warn about "wolves" at the end time infiltrating the flock, introducing another gospel, and rending the sheep.

Is it any wonder respect for the ministry is at low ebb? God Himself is very upset with shepherds who cared more for themselves than for the sheep. Through misuse and abuse, wolves in sheep's clothing ripped and tore the sheep. God and man deplore and reject such a ministry. The ministry today is in sad disarray, distrusted and despised by many. Some ministers are reckoned as hirelings who cared not for the sheep, but only for their paychecks. These men would compromise the truth, even teach what they knew was wrong, to retain their salaries. Zechariah 11:3 describes a forsaken ministry, howling over the loss of their flocks, which they mistreated.

Screaming for "respect for the ministry" will not help. These hurts can only be healed by proper example and time, combined with a forgiving heart, established by God, in those who have been harmed.

Because of these abuses, insidious Laodiceanism, and our natural proclivity to resent any government except our own, we have a church despised and blown apart by God Himself. (Read all of Lamentations, Ezekiel 22:25-29; and 24:21 to confirm who is behind the separation.)

John W. Ritenbaugh (1932-2023)
For the Perfecting of the Saints



Ezekiel 34:1-5

Godly leadership existed in short supply throughout most of Israel's relationship with God. The scriptural record chronicles that an occasional Noah, Abraham, Joseph, Moses, Joshua, David, or another good leader arose among them, but Ezekiel 34 succinctly summarizes Judah's leadership, in particular, as shepherds who ruled for their own well-being rather than the citizens'. Such leadership does not produce good results.

Normally, a shepherd is a person who leads a flock by serving the sheep through his care for them in many areas of a sheep's life. However, in a context like Ezekiel 34, the terms “shepherd” and “sheep” are being used in a figurative sense. A shepherd is a human leader in some position of authority, and sheep designate human citizens the leader has authority over. It is also helpful to understand that “shepherd” includes far more than the religious ministry. It includes, in short, leadership in government, education, business, entertainment, and media, reaching all the way to parents in the family home.

God created the domesticated sheep to be among the most dependent of all animals. They are so dependent upon the leadership of a human shepherd that it seems a wonder that they survive in the wild at all. Sheep are quite timid by nature, easily frightened, as well as subject to many diseases and easy prey for predators.

In like manner, humans need quality leadership in important areas of life, or because of Satan's influence on the carnal mind, human community life tends to degenerate into a mode of survival of the fittest, resulting in large numbers of people living as little more than slaves of those mightier than they are. For the majority, life in such a community becomes a hopeless existence.

The prophet penned Isaiah 3:12 over a hundred years before Ezekiel 34 was written, but it exposes that community life in Judah was already in severe decline: “As for My people, children are their oppressors, and women rule over them. O My people! Those who lead you cause you to err, and destroy the way of your paths.”

John W. Ritenbaugh
Leadership and Covenants (Part Two)



Ezekiel 34:1-10

God is identifying that, over the course of Israel's history, a chief cause of its despicable behavior and the resulting cultural deterioration was an almost continuous breakdown of leadership. He uses the term “shepherd” to identify the source of the cause, but we need to consider it in more detail because a shepherd is generally associated with a person who leads sheep. We will see that the figurative use of “sheep” is the focus in this context.

In Isaiah 1, God describes Judah as “a people laden with iniquity.” God personified the nation, describing its breakdown as a diseased body: “From the sole of the foot even to the head, there is no soundness in it” (Isaiah 1:6). The nation was corrupt and deceived from the lowliest citizen in the realm all the way to the highest, most powerful governmental leader.

It is easy to assume that in Ezekiel 34 “shepherd” refers only to Judah's religious ministry. Jesus directly refers to Himself in John 10:11 in such a way: “I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd gives His life for the sheep.” However, minister is not the only occupation to which the Bible applies the term. A clear and perhaps surprising example appears in Isaiah 44:28, where God Himself calls Cyrus, a Gentile king, “My shepherd.” In II Samuel 5:2, David is commanded by God to “shepherd My people Israel, and be ruler over Israel.” (See also Numbers 27:15-19.)

Shepherds of literal sheep were providers, guides, protectors, and their constant companions. Thus, they were figures of authority and leadership to the animals under their care. So close is the connection between shepherd and sheep that, to this day, separate flocks can mingle day or night at a well, and a shepherd has only to call his sheep, and they will separate themselves to gather to him. In Genesis 31:38-40, Jacob witnesses to the closeness of a shepherd to his flock, as does Jesus in John 10:5.

The Bible uses the term “shepherd” in Ezekiel 34 to designate anyone responsible for giving guidance to a community. In today's language, in a national sense “shepherds” includes the president or prime minister or royalty, for that matter. It also includes representatives in the legislature and court justices all the way down to the local level. In addition, besides governmental functions, in principal it also includes leaders of corporations and in education, most especially in universities that exist to train the next generation of community leaders. We must not forget the leadership provided by entertainers and media figures. In other words, “shepherd” broadly includes anybody who should be providing righteous leadership over others.

Then comes what might be the most important shepherding category of all, because they are closest to us and have the most meaningful relationship with us—parents. A noteworthy example regarding the impact of parental leadership is that of Adam and Eve. The Bible provides no specific instances of why things turned out as they did, but it is clear that Adam and Eve did not follow through on God's teaching as well as they could have. In the first generation after their sin, they played their roles in producing a murderer.

We find a distinct answer on Adam and Eve's shepherding of Cain when we combine two principles from Scripture. God says in Ezekiel 18:20: “The soul that sins shall die. The son shall not bear the guilt of the father, nor the father bear the guilt of the son. The righteousness of the righteous shall be upon himself, and the wickedness of the wicked shall be upon himself.” To this we add the apostle John's statement in I John 3:11-12: “For this is the message that you heard from the beginning, that we should love one another, not as Cain who was of the wicked one and murdered his brother. And why did he murder him? Because his works were evil and his brother's righteous.”

God's judgment in Genesis 4 does not lay the greatest weight of blame on Cain's first guides and leaders, Adam and Eve. John shows Cain to have been a disciple of Satan. Everyone who sins bears in himself the greatest burden of guilt. There is no doubt that people become enslaved to sinful thinking, but no one can excuse himself from a huge measure of blame.

Righteousness and sin are serious responsibilities; in the end there is no dodging the burden. Every human being has had less-than-perfect family, church, neighborhood, school, and work associations, having been given some measure of guidance through them. But God's Word is clear: God's judgment is fair, and each person is judged individually on the basis of his own record.

John W. Ritenbaugh
Leadership and Covenants (Part One)




Other Forerunner Commentary entries containing Ezekiel 34:2:

Luke 19:10
Revelation 3:7

 

<< Ezekiel 34:1   Ezekiel 34:3 >>



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