Isaiah 40:11 He shall feed his flock like a shepherd: he shall gather the lambs with his arm, and carry them in his bosom… I. OLD TESTAMENT ILLUSTRATIONS of the manner in which the Lord Jesus Christ discharges the office of feeding His flock like a shepherd. 1. Out of five great types we begin with Abel, the shepherd slain. Abel was a type of the Saviour, in that, being a shepherd, he sanctified his work to the glory of God, and offered sacrifice of blood upon the altar of the Lord, and the Lord had respect unto Abel and his offering. Farther down the page of sacred history we find another shepherd. He is a more instructive type of the Saviour, perhaps, than the first, but in Abel we discover a truth which is absent in all others. Abel is the only one of the typical shepherds who dies at the foot of the altar, he is the only sacrificing shepherd; and herein you see Jesus Christ in the very earliest ages set forth to mankind as the slaughtered Victim. 2. Now we turn to Jacob, the toiling shepherd. Here is a type of the Good Shepherd, not as dying, but as keeping sheep with a view to get unto Himself a flock. Jacob's labour was of the most arduous character. It is sweet to dwell upon the spiritual parallel of Laban having required all the sheep at Jacob's hand. If they were torn of beasts he must make it good; if any of them died, he must stand as surety for the whole. And did not the Saviour stand just so while He was here below? Was not His toil for His Church just the toil of one who felt that He was under suretyship obligations to bring every one of them safe to the hand of Him who had committed them to His charge? When Jacob had received a reward for all his toil out of the flock which he himself tended, he then conducted both his family and his flock away from Laban. Jacob coming back from Laban to the Promised Land is a true picture of Jesus Christ coming up from the world, followed by His Church, to enter into that better Canaan which has been given to us by a covenant of salt for ever. 3. Joseph is a type of Jesus reigning in the Egypt of this world for the good of His own people, while they are here below. Jesus Christ is King over Egypt's realm. Observe the likeness between Joseph and Jesus in this respect. Joseph was of very singular advantage to the Egyptians. They must have starved in the years of famine, if his prescient eye had not foreseen the famine, and stored up the plenty of the seven previous years. And Jesus Christ is of great service even to this wicked world. It is by Him that it is preserved. 4. Moses, when he kept sheep, kept them in the wilderness, far away from all other flocks; and when he became a shepherd over God's people Israel, his business was not to preserve them in Egypt, but to conduct them out of it. Here, then, is a representation of Jesus Christ as the Shepherd of a separated people. Jesus, like Moses, might have been a king. As Moses refused to be called the son of Pharaoh's daughter, so Jesus Christ said, "Get thee behind Me, Satan," to all the pomp and glory of this present world, and preferred to take part with His despised people, who were crushed down by the reigning powers in the Egypt of His days. Now, Moses began his mission by going to Pharaoh, and saying, "Thus saith the Lord, Let My people go, that they may serve Me." Jesus Christ begins as the Shepherd of the separate ones by demanding that they should be let go from the bondage of their natural estate. Our main point is the great exodus of Moses. Every heir of heaven is brought right out of Egypt, led through the Red Sea of Jesus Christ's blood, baptized into Jesus, and brought out into the separated position in the wilderness. It is easy to see how Moses was a shepherd to the people while in the wilderness. 5. David. This shepherd represents Jesus Christ, not at all as the others, but as King in the midst of His Church. David, like Jesus Christ, begins his life with trials. II. NEW TESTAMENT DESCRIPTIONS. III. IMPRESSIVE APPLICATIONS. 1. One of comfort and satisfaction to you who are poor, needy, weary, troubled lambs or sheep of the flock. "He shall gather the lambs with His arms, and carry them in His bosom, and shall gently lead those that are with young." The lambs have not the value of mature sheep, yet they are the most thought of under the great Shepherd. They might fetch the least price in the market, but they have the greatest portion of His heart. The weaklings and the sickly of the flock are the special objects of the Saviour's care. 2. A second application containing comfort and warning too. Sinner! our Lord Jesus Christ now represents Himself as being a Shepherd who is come to seek and to save that which was lost. Such is Jesus now, looking after stray sheep. Where are you? 3. So we shall conclude with these words, which may be for both saint and sinner. Let it never be forgotten that Jesus Christ is pre-eminently to be preached as the suffering One. (Zechariah 13:7). You shall know about the toiling Shepherd by-and-by; the Shepherd reigning in Egypt, the Joseph you shall know soon; the Shepherd of the separated flock, you shall follow ere long; the Shepherd reigning in Jerusalem, the David you shall rejoice to serve; but now you have to do with the Shepherd bleeding and dying. ( C. H. Spurgeon.) Parallel Verses KJV: He shall feed his flock like a shepherd: he shall gather the lambs with his arm, and carry them in his bosom, and shall gently lead those that are with young. |
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