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In Christ, Mark
In Christ, Mark
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The scriptures. May God bless the reading of His holy word.
The scriptures. May God bless the reading of His holy word.
“I will place over them one Shepherd, my servant David, and
He will tend them; He will tend them and be their shepherd. I the Lord will be
their God, and My servant David will be prince among them. I the Lord have
spoken.”
“‘I will make a covenant of peace with them and rid the land
of savage beasts so that they may live in the wilderness and sleep in the
forests in safety. I will make them and the places surrounding my hill a
blessing. I will send down showers in season; there will be showers of
blessing. The trees will yield their fruit and the ground will yield its crops;
the people will be secure in their land. They will know that I am the Lord,
when I break the bars of their yoke and rescue them from the hands of those who
enslaved them. They will no longer be plundered by the nations, nor will wild
animals devour them. They will live in safety, and no one will make them
afraid. I will provide for them a land renowned for its crops, and they will no
longer be victims of famine in the land or bear the scorn of the nations. Then
they will know that I, the Lord their God, am with them and that they, the
Israelites, are my people, declares the Sovereign Lord. You are My sheep, the
sheep of My pasture, and I am your God, declares the Sovereign Lord.’”
Ezekiel 34:23-31
This ends today’s
reading from God's holy word. Thanks be to God.
Think about the impact that God’s judgment on Judah and
Jerusalem had on His flock. They had enjoyed the green pastures of the land He
promised them for years and years and years, for generations and generations,
but that privilege came with an obligation to live in concert with God’s word,
will, and way, something many of the Israelites failed to do. You see, all the
sheep of God’s flock were not the same and as we saw in yesterday’s devotion,
the Lord was ready to judge one sheep against another and the outcome ended up
scattering the flock to lands well outside of their home. We know this because
the Israelites were hauled away from a destroyed Judah and Jerusalem, taken
into exile and captivity by the Babylonians.
It was the end of an era, a disintegration of what had been
known as the Old Covenant God had made with His people.
What would come next?
We get a glimpse of what God had in store for His flock as
we read the final verses of Ezekiel 34 and finish this four devotion series
covering God’s shepherds and sheep. Look again at our passage here:
“I will place over them one Shepherd, my
servant David, and He will tend them; He will tend them and be their shepherd. I
the Lord will be their God, and My servant David will be prince among them. I
the Lord have spoken.”
“‘I will make a
covenant of peace with them and rid the land of savage beasts so that they may
live in the wilderness and sleep in the forests in safety. I will make them and
the places surrounding my hill a blessing. I will send down showers in season;
there will be showers of blessing. The trees will yield their fruit and the
ground will yield its crops; the people will be secure in their land. They will
know that I am the Lord, when I break the bars of their yoke and rescue them
from the hands of those who enslaved them. They will no longer be plundered by
the nations, nor will wild animals devour them. They will live in safety, and
no one will make them afraid. I will provide for them a land renowned for its
crops, and they will no longer be victims of famine in the land or bear the
scorn of the nations. Then they will know that I, the Lord their God, am with
them and that they, the Israelites, are my people, declares the Sovereign Lord.
You are My sheep, the sheep of My pasture, and I am your God, declares the
Sovereign Lord.’” Ezekiel
34:23-31
Before we dive into this word of God and get to the heart of
what His future promise for His people, we need to go back and examine the
eternal covenant with David, arguably the best of all of Israel’s kings. Look
at these words from God to David as delivered through the prophet Nathan:
“‘When your days are
over and you go to be with your ancestors, I will raise up your offspring to
succeed you, one of your own sons, and I will establish His kingdom. He is the
one who will build a house for Me, and I will establish His throne forever. I
will be his Father, and He will be my Son. I will never take My love away from
Him, as I took it away from your predecessor. I will set Him over My house and
My kingdom forever; His throne will be established forever.’” 1 Chronicles
17:11-14
This was a clear pronouncement of the coming Messiah, Jesus,
the Son God would send to establish God’s kingdom forever, a kingdom He would
rule over with all authority and power forever. God promised it and indeed it
came to be because all of God’s promises come true. And we know of Jesus’
connection to the lineage of David through just looking at the first line of
the listing of His family tree:
“This is the
genealogy of Jesus the Messiah, the son of David, the son of Abraham.” Matthew 1:1
Here, Jesus is pronounced as “the Son of David” and as we
see in our scripture from Ezekiel, Jesus is named David within the verses.
Who else could it be?
David was dead and there was to be no resurrection of him to
lead the Israelites in the future but there was certainly the promise of the
coming of Jesus who would be from the line of David, a “branch from the stump
of Jesse”, David’s father, as Isaiah prophesied:
“A shoot will come up
from the stump of Jesse; from His roots a Branch will bear fruit. The Spirit of
the Lord will rest on Him—the Spirit of wisdom and of understanding, the Spirit
of counsel and of might, the Spirit of the knowledge and fear of the Lord—and He
will delight in the fear of the Lord.” Isaiah 11:1-3a
The people of God, the sheep of His flock, needed an eternal
Shepherd, one who would be able to watch over His people, not just for the
short term but forever. For God so loved each sheep of His flock that he did
not wish for them to perish but to have an opportunity to live in the peace,
love, and care of not just any Shepherd but the Great and Good Shepherd, a
Shepherd who could remove them from their fears and give them a life that would
be defined by abundant blessings, a Shepherd who would one day lead them into
place where they would never again face danger or famine or scorn. Rather, they
would live in nothing but peace and light and love, abiding in the everlasting
pasture of God’s salvation as His sheep.
Think about how these words must have served as a balm to
the tired, injured souls of God’s scattered flock, even though they may have
not completely understood what Ezekiel was saying. Their time away from His
care was not going to endure forever but would one day end, leading to a life
that would be greater than anyone they had experienced in the past as they were
given Jesus, the Good Shepherd who said this about Himself:
“I am the Good Shepherd.
The Good Shepherd lays down His life for the sheep. The hired hand is not the
shepherd and does not own the sheep. So when he sees the wolf coming, he
abandons the sheep and runs away. Then the wolf attacks the flock and scatters
it. The man runs away because he is a hired hand and cares nothing for the
sheep.”
“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. The reason my Father
loves Me is that I lay down my life—only to take it up again. No one takes it
from Me, but I lay it down of My own accord. I have authority to lay it down
and authority to take it up again. This command I received from My Father.” John 10:11-18
Today, we, as Christians, can fully understand what God was
intending to do through His words spoken through Ezekiel, words that lead us to
a place of rejoicing and thanksgiving for the blessed gift of Jesus, The Good
Shepherd who told us how much He loves and cares for us, His flock.
You see for Jesus, His sheep were, are, and will always be
the focus of His attention and affection. He knows all His sheep well and they
know Him but He also acknowledges that there are many sheep who are not yet in His
fold. Note that he is not willing to allow these sheep to be lost forever.
Rather, He is ever working to bring them into His flock as well.
For this Good Shepherd Jesus did not willingly lay down His
life for just a few sheep but for all of them, whether or not they recognize or
acknowledge it. And He longs to have everyone with Him when He returns to usher
His sheep into His eternal pasture and this world ends.
Will you be counted in the number that day, the number
counted in Jesus’ flock?
Amen.
In Christ,
Mark
PS: Feel free to leave a comment and please share this with anyone you feel might be blessed by it.
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