Ezekiel 34:2, commentary and pictures

The shepherds are the leaders entrusted with the care of God's people, who are the sheep and flock given into their hands. Their charge is to feed and care for the flock instead of feeding themselves and serving their own interests. To feed themselves is selfish self-indulgence without living connection with Christ, shown in neglecting the weak, the sick, the scattered and the lost, and in ruling with force while starving souls with false teaching and food that tastes of self. To feed the flock is to give the pure truth of God's Word and the righteousness of Christ in plain, searching instruction, with personal visiting, tender love, and faithful warning and correction. Self-feeding shepherds stand under God's woe and are held accountable for ruined souls, while God Himself promises to seek, heal and restore His scattered flock.

Shepherds and Their Charge

The shepherds are Israel's leaders — ministers and laborers, teachers, and men entrusted with responsibility in the church — while the people are the sheep, the flock entrusted to them for care. As ministers they are to bring fruit to the church by receiving grace from God to impart to others, and to reach the high standard their knowledge of the truth requires. When they lack wisdom from God they show incapacity to carry their trust and lead others into false ways.

Their charge is to feed the flock and care for it rather than feed themselves and serve their own interests. That means receiving and giving the spiritual food of God's truth, teaching and tending the flock, attending to pastoral duties, upholding the law and guiding in its plain paths, and giving plain, close, searching, practical instruction that urges change of character and practical godliness. Feeding themselves is selfishness and self-indulgence, using position for self-benefit, confusing people with their own interpretations, and failing to teach the binding claims of God's law and preach the Word clearly.

Their office is that of watchman, guardian, and mouthpiece of God. As watchman the shepherd must see danger and warn the flock, being accountable for harm that follows failure to warn, and he cannot excuse failure by blaming the sheep for leading him astray. As guardian he feeds by hand and ministers comfort and help, working with tenderness and love in heart and home and in all dealings, not by driving or with the uplifted whip. As mouthpiece he is to feel a burden for souls, going forth weeping and praying for conversion and sowing seed that will spring up after many days to God's glory, rather than caring far more for himself than for the poor sheep and reversing the order so the sheep must warn, reprove, exhort, and weep over him. To mislead the people and let the standard of truth trail in the dust is to fail that charge.

Unfaithful Shepherding Exposed

Feeding themselves is selfishness and self-indulgence, revealing lack of deep love for God and for fellow men and lack of living connection with Christ. It is to be consumers and not producers, idle shepherds in various places who bring no fruit to the church because they do not themselves receive grace from God to impart to others, failing to do the work they should do and to reach the high standard their knowledge of truth requires, as seen among laborers in Iowa. It is to seek one's own will and way, so that one is not a safe guardian, and for teachers to neglect duty for pleasure or profit or to put their own honor first. It is failure to seek wisdom from God, leading others into false ways and offering the flock food that tastes strongly of self. It is also rejection of messages that require self-denial and disregard of God's law, when shepherds should receive and give the spiritual food of God's truth and uphold the law and guide the flock in its plain paths.

Unfaithful shepherds neglect the weak, sick, injured, scattered, and lost, ruling with force and cruelty so the flock is scattered and exposed to danger, and they trample good pasture and foul the water, leaving the flock what they have spoiled. They leave the flock without the nourishment and strengthening it needs, and when they refuse the Word and God's commandments the churches under their care become backslidden. They refuse pastoral visitation and personal labor in homes, doing only public preaching, and so stand under rebuke with work only half done, for faithful work cannot be done by proxy nor shifted to wives or others, and no excuse of much preaching or unpleasantness avails. They receive support without visiting or nourishing with the bread of life. Preaching alone is not enough, for a shepherd must give time and attention to souls rather than let temporal matters absorb him, ministering to sinners, visiting believers when sick, inquiring when absent from meetings, acting on knowledge of their spiritual condition, and laboring to restore those who have given up the truth, and failure here leaves members tempted and wandering. They are pastors ignorant of the Scriptures and of the power of God whose religion is mere form, doing comparatively nothing to advance the temporal or spiritual interests of the people and leaving them perishing in ignorance.

They also actively harm the flock, wounding and tearing the poor sheep and leaving them bleeding, tearing God's flock to pieces through opposition, falsehood, insult, prejudice, and jealousy. Ministers who pretend to feed the flock while tearing it to pieces are under woe, and their miserable influence injures the cause and lays deep mental suffering and heavy burden on faithful workers who bear its interests. Instead of nourishing and protecting the flock and seeking the spiritually sick to help them, they poison them with suspicion, criticism, and faultfinding, creating dissension, making the church's work harder, and damaging its character. They harm rather than reform those they have fed, neglecting people left without a true shepherd and failing to give them a fair chance. Unwise shepherds feed poison instead of wholesome food, whereas capable shepherds give clean, thoroughly winnowed food.

They starve the flock spiritually by rejecting messages requiring self-denial and disregarding God's law instead of upholding it and guiding in its plain paths. They fail to teach the binding claims of God's law and to preach the Word clearly, confusing people with their own interpretations, neglecting the flock and becoming accountable for souls that perish. Their preaching offers anecdotes and cheap ideas instead of the bread of life, leaving hearers spiritually hungry and untouched. They refuse the Word and God's commandments, leaving churches backslidden without nourishment and strengthening. They make no personal, earnest effort to save souls and fail to show with persuasive influence that obedience to the commandments as written is a life-or-death question deciding eternal destiny while forgiveness is within reach, treating testing truth as optional, acting a lie to link with the disobedient, and not exalting righteousness and truth with intense earnestness. They are pastors ignorant of the Scriptures and the power of God whose religion is mere form, refusing pastoral visitation and doing almost nothing for the people, while as religious teachers they take away the key of knowledge, neither entering themselves nor permitting those who would enter.

They shut needed hearers away from truth by refusing their churches to anyone preaching any doctrine other than their denomination's belief, so the warning does not reach the very ones who need it, including the higher classes and in the Alpine cities, though the Lord still cares for His own, the purchase of His blood. They fail to feed with pure provender thoroughly winnowed from chaff, leaving people as sheep without a shepherd, as ignorant of present truth and its relation to them as if without the Word, perplexed and unable to understand the Bible and crying for someone to explain the Scriptures and come help them. They fail to take their share of burdens to ease one weighed down, standing back and excusing themselves while he is crushed beneath censure until God vindicates him, and by their own course adding more burdens, so that unwise as well as false shepherds make the poor sheep suffer. They leave the shepherd to be carried by the sheep in warning and weeping rather than bearing their part. Staying silent about a leader's or associate's wrong to avoid displeasure is feeding self instead of the flock, for faithful shepherds tell a person plainly of his mistake and correct his course with clear light so associates are not left in darkness and led astray, even when he will not acknowledge his course is wrong and will not receive anything not harmonizing with his ideas.

Faithful Feeding Required

Feeding the flock means receiving the spiritual food of God's truth in order to give it to the people, for the shepherd is charged to impart what has been received rather than to use position for self-benefit. That food is the Bread of Life, the Word of God and gospel of truth, the binding claims of the law, and faith and the righteousness of Christ. It is to be given in plain, close, searching, practical instruction that reveals God's character and urges change of character and practical godliness after Christ's example, rather than formal religion without a Saviour. It must be pure provender thoroughly winnowed from chaff and clean, not poison but wholesome food.

Faithful feeding requires giving time and attention to souls instead of letting temporal matters absorb the worker, for preaching alone is not enough and to end labor with public preaching is to leave the work only half done. The shepherd must minister to the needs of sinners, visit believers when sick, inquire when they are absent from meetings, act when told of their spiritual condition, and seek out even one who has stayed away for a year and a half or is in spiritual danger and tempted to give up the truth. Every accessible family is to be visited and the people become acquainted with in their homes, with the worker identifying with those labored for as a channel of light. The weak are to be strengthened at the right time with comforting and establishing words so they become rooted, grounded, and established in the faith, the shepherd binding to the sheep and lambs to properly bind off the work and laboring to restore those who have given up the truth to the fold. This personal work cannot be done by proxy nor shifted upon wives or any other person, and no excuse of much preaching or unpleasantness releases from it; where it is neglected places are lost and members are left tempted and wandering, while where it is done it is the most profitable work and gathers many souls.

True shepherding is done with tenderness and love in heart and home and in all dealings, not by driving nor with the uplifted whip, but as a guardian whose hand feeds and whose heart ministers comfort and help. The shepherd must feel a burden for souls, go forth to labor weeping and praying that souls might be converted, and sow seed that will spring up after many days and bear fruit to God's glory. He is to take a share of burdens to ease one weighed down and crushed beneath censure, rather than standing back and excusing himself or adding more burdens by his own course. He must nourish and protect the flock, seek out those who are spiritually sick to help them rather than poisoning them with suspicion, criticism, and faultfinding, and labor with intensity of feeling even to the farthest limit of strength to save the wounded from those who would tear them.

Feeding includes warning of danger and plain correction, for the shepherd and watchman who sees peril must warn and protect lest the sheep be harmed and scattered, and failure to warn leaves him accountable. He must uphold the law and guide the flock in its plain paths, exalting righteousness and truth and showing with persuasive influence and intense earnestness that obedience to the commandments just as written is a life-or-death question deciding eternal destiny while forgiveness is still within reach. He must faithfully tell a person or leader plainly of his mistake and correct his course when he does what is not right, giving clear light so associates are not left in darkness and led astray. Silence to avoid displeasure is serving self, and is not excused because the one in the wrong will not acknowledge his course is wrong nor receive anything that does not harmonize with his ideas.

The shepherd must seek for the people God has in each district, since without pure, winnowed food they are left as sheep without a shepherd, ignorant of present truth and its relation to them, perplexed and unable to understand the Bible for themselves and crying for someone to explain the Scriptures and come over and help them. The Word is to be opened to them line upon line, precept upon precept, here a little and there a little, without discouragement at slow efforts to take it in, since they are as children in understanding. The worker is to wait with long patience as the husbandman waits for the precious fruit of the earth until the early and latter rain. The standard must be lifted in new territories from Cooranbong to Queensland where precious ones are starving for the Word and the harvest is ready, with the Holy Spirit accompanying the presentation, going to the sheep to visit and feed them with the gospel as well as the law and with faith and the righteousness of Christ without waiting for other shepherds to signify their wishes.

Accountability and Consequences

Self-feeding shepherds stand under woe and the rebuke of God, with their work only half done and in rebellion against their charge. To mislead the people and let the standard of truth trail in the dust insults the Lord, and unless there is repentance the candlestick will be removed out of its place. Leading men who dishonor the Lord in this way must be disciplined by disappointment, hardship, and affliction, and unless they learn meekness and lowliness from Christ they are not fitted to teach, for self-righteous example advances nothing.

The result is that the flock is scattered and exposed to danger through neglect of the weak, sick, injured, scattered, and lost, and through rule by force and cruelty with trampled pasture and fouled water. When watchmen serve themselves instead of teaching and tending, the people perish for lack of proper instruction, because unconsecrated watchmen fail to give plain, close, searching, practical instruction urging change of character and practical godliness after Christ's example. Even where there are many churches the community can remain most wicked, because shepherds who feed themselves starve the flock spiritually and kill those entrusted to them. When spiritual shepherds refuse the Word and the commandments, the churches under their care become backslidden, left without nourishment and strengthening. Unfaithful shepherding creates dissension, makes the church's work harder, and damages its character, while places are lost to the cause where personal visiting labor is neglected. Its miserable influence injures the cause and lays deep mental suffering and heavy burdens on faithful workers who bear its interests, makes the poor sheep suffer and bleed through tearing opposition, and reverses the order so the sheep must carry the burden of caring for the shepherd.

God holds these unfaithful shepherds accountable and responsible for the ruin of souls, and a watchman who sees danger and fails to warn cannot excuse himself by blaming the sheep for leading him astray. Ministers who confuse the people with their own interpretations instead of teaching the binding claims of the law and preaching the Word clearly neglect their flock and are accountable to God when souls perish. In the great day when each is judged and receives according to works of obedience or transgression of the law of God's kingdom, the lost will turn upon those who treated testing truth as optional and failed to exalt righteousness and truth with intense earnestness, charging them with deception for not warning of peril. When deception is exposed the people hold the false shepherds who misled them, taught disregard for God's law, and persecuted its keepers responsible for their ruin. Yet those who accept misleading teaching remain responsible for rejecting God's Word, and are held responsible when they lack discernment of what kind of provender is given, while the sin of blind shepherds who withhold invitation and help must not be visited upon the sheep, who have done nothing to deserve neglect.

God promises to seek, restore, heal, and strengthen the flock thus scattered and spoiled. Though men professing to be shepherds shut hearers away from truth by refusing their churches to any doctrine but their denomination's, so warning does not reach the higher classes and the Alpine cities who need it, the Lord of heaven still keeps care for His own, the purchase of His blood. Where unwise shepherds have fed poison instead of wholesome food, God will have capable shepherds give clean, thoroughly winnowed food.

Discernment and Personal Response

God's people must read the chapter carefully so they are not deceived into acting as unfaithful shepherds themselves. One who is tempted to remain under the influence of an apostatized teacher must study it to gain individual knowledge of what the Spirit says to the churches. That knowledge comes through watchfulness and prayer, trust in the living Word, daily conversion, and forming character after the divine similitude instead of continuing to do as one pleases.

Those who are taught must exercise keen discernment to discover what kind of provender is being given to the flock, and God holds souls responsible when they lack that discernment. This spiritual discernment guards against false shepherds and prepares to meet the Lord with joy when He comes in the clouds of heaven with power and glory.

Those who appoint shepherds are responsible for ensuring that the flock is not harmed. Those entrusted with truth must not neglect people left without a true shepherd and must not fail to give them a fair chance.