THE LOST SHEEP.
Matthew 18:12-14.
Here we are introduced to the caring shepherd who left his ninety-nine other sheep in order to seek the one that was lost, until he had found it (MATTHEW 18:12-13). This is an image which is familiar from both the Old Testament and the New (Ezekiel 34:11; John 10:11).
I am familiar with the bleating of lost sheep from my 11 year sojourn in the Western Isles of Scotland. Usually it was a lamb that had got the wrong side of the fence by the roadside, or a stubborn ewe grazing on the foreshore that had become separated from her companions by the incoming tide. They were unable to help themselves, and cried out in alarm.
Then a man with a crook would come to the rescue. The stubborn ewe would be waded through water, if necessary, to bring her to safety. The lamb would be lifted from the roadside and carried back into the field in one of the most evocative of Biblical illustrations: ‘He shall gather the lambs with his arm, and carry them in his bosom’ (Isaiah 40:11).
In Luke 15:5, he 'lays it on his shoulders,' rejoicing. Sinners resort to Jesus, and He receives them. He is the Good Shepherd. Jesus tells us that, “it is not the will of your Father which is in heaven, that one of these little ones should perish” (MATTHEW 18:14).
