Shepherd

I recently started reading a book.

I am loving it, mainly because it has really opened my eyes and helped me to a deeper understanding of David's words.

The other day I posted the following quote as my facebook status.
"Just as sheep will blindly, habitually, stupidly follow one another along the same little trails until they become ruts that erode into gigantic gullies, so we humans cling to the same habits that we have seen ruin other lives."

Phillip Keller was referring to Psalm 23:3 where David says "He leads me in paths of righteousness for his name's sake."

Keller was talking about how sheep have to be led from one grazing ground to another. If the sheep are not led by their shepherd, they will graze a feeding ground until they have ruined it. Not only that, but they contaminate the grazing field so that they make themselves sick. He goes on to say that we, like the sheep, need to be led by Christ.
"The difficult point is that most of us don't want to come. We don't want to follow. We don't want to be led in the paths of righteousness. Somehow it goes against our grain. We actually prefer to turn to our own way even though it may take us straight into trouble." Says Keller.

A woman I have known my whole life commented that it sounded like Proverbs 26:11 "As a dog returns to its vomit, so a fool repeats his folly."

This past weekend, while travelling for work, my roommate turned on "Freedom Writers" on MTV.
If you haven't seen it the basic story line is that this woman starts teaching in a school system where some students are given opportunity, and some aren't, and it's mainly based on ethnicity.

The teacher has to deal with racial hatred and gang issues. She starts talking about the holocaust with the students, only one of them has ever even heard of it. She starts describing the Nazis as the most powerful gang ever, she tells them about the massive amounts of people they killed, the genocide that happened. She takes the students on a field trip to a holocaust museum and invites holocaust survivors to dinner with the students.
The students begin to realize that the things they are going through and participating in are nothing new. They realize that they can make choices not to follow the others who have gone before them in their community and made choices that lead to death, they could be agents for change.
In their community everyone is different, separated into groups, and yet at the same time, the reality they begin to see is that they have a lot in common. Because their community is so homogeneous in their thinking, they know no other way.
Then this crazy teacher, whose ideas are completely foreign to them, comes along, and opens their eyes to the possibilities. Instead of being sheep who stay where they are at and destroy themselves and each other, they can be led to a new grazing field, or instead of being like a dog and returning to the vomit, they can make different choices.

As I think about being led by Christ, I am reminded that there are several different mediums He uses to lead us.
Obviously, there is His Word. Paul tells us in Colossians 3:16 Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly as you teach and admonish one another with all wisdom and as you sing psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs with gratitude in your hearts to God.

And there is the Holy Spirit. Jesus says in John 16:13 that the Holy Spirit will come and guide us into all truth.

And then there are our elders, Titus 2 starts out the following way, "You must teach what is in accord with sound doctrine. Teach the older men to be temperate, worthy of respect, self-controlled, and sound in faith, in love, and in endurance. Likewise, teach the older women to be reverent in the way they live, not to be slanderers or addicted to much wine, but to teach what is good. Then they can train the younger women to love their husbands and children, to be self-controlled and pure, to be busy at home, to be kind, and to be subject to their husbands, so that no one will malign the word of God..."

I find it important to note that first the older men and women have to be taught what is in accord with sound doctrine before they are ready to lead the younger men and women.

There is a trend in many churches here in the United States that Bible studies and small groups are arranged based on age and marital status. There is the group for the young married people, and there is the group for young married people with small children. There are the groups for the young single never married people, and the groups for the older divorces single again people. Then there are the groups for the middle aged people, and the groups for the elderly people.

While there is something to be said for having people in your life who are in the same place in life, I wonder if we as a church are stifling growth. It is easy to foster relationships between people who are in the same place in life, those relationships, those relationships form naturally. Generally speaking, relationships across generations are less likely to form without placing people in situations where they are more encouraged.

Am I open to Christ's leading? Am I putting myself under the leadership of those who are prepared to lead others?