In both the Old and New Testaments sheep are used to describe God’s people.  Jesus was moved with compassion when he looked upon the multitudes because “they fainted and were scattered abroad as sheep having no shepherd.” (Matthew 9:36)  Jesus elevates this illustration to a high degree in John, chapter ten, describing Himself as the “good shepherd” who gives His life for His sheep, sheep who hear His voice and follow Him.  I have never been a farmer or dealt with real sheep, but I’ve read much about them.  I understand that sheep are as dumb as any animal on four legs.  In biblical times as well as contemporary, sheep must be led to pasture and water which they cannot find on their own.  And a sheep lost from the flock doesn’t have sense enough to find its way back.  A sheep is completely dependent on its shepherd.

I can identify with that.  My relationship to Christ is like a dumb sheep’s relationship to its shepherd.  I am totally dependent upon Him in every respect.  I am one of His sheep.  I follow Him, even if I don’t understand sometimes.  I trust Him with all that I am and have, with my life and my future.  I listen for His voice in the scripture and as the Spirit speaks to my spirit, and I try my best to follow Him.  This is as it should be.

For most of my life I’ve felt that Southern Baptists were, not the only sheep, but those who best heard the Shepherd and followed Him more closely than any others.  We were the sheep who understood the freedom found in Christ, who understood his teaching to “render unto Caesar,” who with Paul proclaimed grace over legalism, who with Peter declared the priesthood of every believer, who recognized that for those who have “put on Christ, There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is neither male nor female: for you are all one in Christ Jesus.” (Galatians 3:27-28)

Lately I’ve begun to wonder about rank and file Southern Baptists.  They obediently follow a cadre of men who have led them away from much of what it meant to be a Southern Baptist in the past.  Instead of freedom to follow Christ as He speaks to them in the Bible and by His Spirit, they now must follow only what this cadre of leaders deems permissible and has placed in a creed, the Baptist Faith and Message, 2000.  Rather than freedom as brothers and sisters to conduct their affairs democratically, they must obey the “ruler” of the church, the pastor.  Instead of endorsing freedom for all to worship or not worship as they please, they now must call for government to enforce Christianity, their brand, upon everyone.  Instead of recognizing that in Christ all are equal, they now must place women back into the same inequality suffered a century or more ago.  (The latest salvo was the North American Mission Board’s decision to cease endorsing women as chaplains.)

As I look at many of my fellow Southern Baptists, I assume they are sheep and are obediently following.  My only question, “Whose sheep are they?”  Is the voice they hear that of Jesus or that of a cadre of men who now control the SBC?  Or are they hearing any voice?  Maybe they are just going along to get along.