The shepherding that builds up the Body of Christ is a mutual shepherding, in which we minister life to one another, we consider one another, we care for one another, we patiently contact one another, and we receive the care and shepherding from others in the Lord.
Oh Lord Jesus, we love You as our dear Shepherd! We open to Your shepherding in our soul and we open to the shepherding of the fellow members of the Body! Amen, Lord, we place ourselves under Your organic shepherding and we are one with You to shepherd others also! How much we need Your shepherding! How much we need the shepherding of the saints around us! Amen, Lord, may we see that we are both sheep and shepherds, shepherding and being shepherded in mutuality! Amen!
This week, our last week in the morning revival on the urgent need for a new revival, we have been prayerfully considering the matter of shepherding according to God.
In the Lord’s recovery today, there’s an urgent need for shepherding. To shepherd is to take all-inclusive, tender care of the flock.
The Shepherd is Christ; He is the good Shepherd, the great Shepherd, the Chief Shepherd, and the Shepherd of our souls.
As the good Shepherd, Christ came so that we may have life and may have it abundantly. As the great Shepherd, Christ was raised up from the dead by God in the blood of an eternal covenant.
Now He is executing His covenant to make us the same as He is to be the New Jerusalem, His corporate expression. As the Chief Shepherd, Christ shepherds His flock through the elders of the churches.
As the Shepherd of our souls, the pneumatic Christ oversees our inward condition, caring for the situation of our inner being.
How we love the Lord as the Shepherd of our souls! For us to shepherd according to God, we need to become one with God, be constituted with God, live God, express God, represent God, and minister God.
We cannot shepherd according to God if we still live in ourselves, according to ourselves, and express ourselves.
We need to live God, express God, and even become God in life, nature, expression, and function in order for us to shepherd according to God. As we shepherd others according to God, we minister God to them.
This means that we experience being broken by God in our outer man so that we may flow Him out.
In 1 Peter 5:2, the apostle Peter charged the elders to shepherd the flock of God according to God.
We are all commissioned by the Lord to shepherd His sheep and feed His lambs. We need to be one with God and live God, express God, and be the acting God in our shepherding of others. May the Lord gain this among us today!
The Shepherding that Builds up the Body of Christ is a Mutual Shepherding: we are both Sheep and Shepherds!
The shepherding that builds up the Body of Christ is not me shepherding you or you shepherding me; it is the mutual shepherding that builds up the Body – me shepherding you and you shepherding me (1 Cor. 12:23-26).
It is not that only some people are shepherding everyone else, and the others simply enjoy the shepherding; that is general Christianity, and this does not work nor does it build up the Body.
We need mutual shepherding. We should not think that only those who are more mature can shepherd the saints, and we have no way to shepherd the older, more advanced saints. Rather, simply asking them how they are doing and sharing something of our enjoyment of Christ with them is a shepherding to the saints, for we all are both sheep and shepherds.
May the Lord save us from being religious in the church life today; may we learn to shepherd in mutuality.
If someone is in their eighties, we should still consider them before the Lord and speak to them, for we receive the shepherding and they are also shepherded as we speak together.
First of all, we all need to be under the organic shepherding of Christ, and secondly, we need to be one with Him to shepherd others (John 21:15-17).
We open to the Lord to be shepherded by Him, and we enjoy His organic shepherding. Then, as we enjoy His shepherding, we don’t only enjoy the Lord and that’s it; we are one with Him to shepherd the saints also, and we are open to others for their shepherding us.
May we ask the Lord to keep us open to His organic shepherding day by day. May we ask the Lord to keep us open to His shepherding through the members of the Body of Christ who cooperate with Christ to shepherd us according to God.
All the believers in Christ, regardless of their growth in life, need shepherding. Whether the saints are young or old, whether they are regular saints in the church life or they bear much responsibility in the church, each one of us needs shepherding.
We all are believers in Christ, and each one of us are at various stages of growth in life. There are some saints who are more mature, and others are at a different stage.
It does not matter where we are: we all need to be shepherded, and we all are learning to shepherd others.
On the one hand, we need shepherding; on the other hand, we are learning to shepherd others.
May the Lord make us willing and open to be shepherded by the saints, and may we also be one with the Lord to shepherd the saints.
We all have defects and shortcomings, and we need others to shepherd us. We all realise that we have many defects inwardly; we have shortcomings, weaknesses, and defects. We need the Lord’s shepherding.
We need the shepherding of the saints. We are both sheep and shepherds, shepherding and being shepherded in mutuality. We need to bear this in mind when we meet with the saints.
We need to learn to open to the Lord and to the saints so that we may receive the shepherding of the Lord in the Body and through the Body.
We also need to learn to shepherd the saints, shepherding in mutuality, so that we may dispense something of the riches of Christ into them.
We are not trying to shepherd others; we simply enjoy the Lord, we open to Him, we allow Him to fill us with His life and shepherd our soul, and then we express the Lord in our shepherding.
It is through this mutual shepherding that the Body builds itself up in love.
Ephesians 4:16 is a wonderful verse telling us that out from Christ all the Body, being joined together and being knit together through every joint of the rich supply and through the operation in the measure of each one part, causes the growth of the Body unto the building up of itself in love.
This is what the Lord wants to gain; first, we grow up into Christ, the Head, in all things (v. 15), and then out from Him all the Body is joined together through the functioning of every member. We mutually shepherd one another; we function in mutuality, and the Body of Christ is built up in love.
The Lord wants to gain this among us, and He needs to gain this. It is when He gains the shepherding in mutuality that He can gain the building up of the organic Body of Christ for Him to return.
May we pray for this. May we open to the Lord for Him to perfect us so that we shepherd in mutuality. May we be open to the Lord and to one another so that, as we shepherd others, we may also be open to them to shepherd us.
Lord Jesus, we want to do all things for the building up of the Body! Amen, Lord, gain the mutual shepherding among us in the church life today! We open to You, Lord, for we need Your organic shepherding. Shepherd us today. Shepherd our soul. We don’t know what we need, but we open to You. Shepherd our soul and keep us under Your organic shepherding. Oh Lord, we love to be here, under Your organic shepherding, and we want to be one with You to shepherd others also! May we see that all the believers need shepherding. May we realise that, regardless of the level of our growth in the divine life, we all need shepherding! Amen, Lord, we all have defects and shortcomings, and we need others to shepherd us. We open to You and we open to the fellow members of the Body to receive the shepherding. Amen, Lord, we want to shepherd others also, for we enjoy the wonderful shepherding of the Lord! May we see that we are both sheep and shepherds, and may we shepherd in mutuality in the church life today! Amen!
Pray, Patiently Care for Others, Rely on them, Open to Receive their Portion, and Shepherd in Mutuality in the Church Life
Before we can minister life to others, we need to have life; before we can minister Christ as life to the saints, we need to enjoy Christ as life and be filled with Him as life.
If we enjoy the Lord as life and partake of His riches in spirit, we don’t even need to try to minister life to others: life flows out of us, and life is ministered through us.
Life is ministered through us when we exercise our spirit to enjoy Christ as life and simply meet with other saints.
Similarly, when we are a praying person, when we learn to bring all things to the Lord in prayer, when we are with others, we will help them to come to the Lord concerning all things and pray.
May we never give the wrong impression to others that we know everything and we are smart; may we have the spirit of a learner and encourage those under our care to go to the Lord in prayer.
We all need to create an atmosphere of prayer whenever we care for others, for the best help we can render others is to help them come to the Lord in prayer.
We must pray and have a prayer life, and then we can help others to also contact the Lord in prayer. But if we are not persons of prayer, if we don’t contact the Lord concerning all things, we will not be able to help others pray.
Oh Lord, may we be those who pray and care for others in prayer and with much prayer! As we care for others, we need much patience.
We shouldn’t expect that, after a few times of visiting someone newly saved or recovered, he will immediately be in a proper condition.
We should drop our expectations and simply learn to care for others with much patience. The Lord is the One who is patient; He is patience, and He is in our spirit.
We need to be one with the Lord as we shepherd others. It is the continual and patient contact with people that will shepherd them; this, however, takes time.
The church grows through shepherding, and the Body of Christ is built up by mutual shepherding. We need to not only preach the gospel but also care for the new ones by shepherding them with much patience through personal contact.
If we do not continually contact the new ones, the young ones, and the backslidden ones, they may lose their taste for the Lord, and we may lose the taste for preaching the gospel, for we do not have remaining fruit, and they have no one to care for them.
We need shepherding. When we shepherd the new ones and the young ones, we don’t only minister to them but we also open to them. We learn to rely on them, trust in them, and fellowship with them, being open to receive their portion in the Lord.
This doesn’t mean that we learn worldly ways or worldly things that they may practice so that we may shepherd them afterwards.
Rather, this is a mutual shepherding, a mutual reliance on one another, a shepherding in mutuality. We need to open to the Lord and to one another to allow the flow of life to pass through us and flow into us.
As we shepherd in mutuality in this way, both ministering Christ to others and being open to their portion in the Lord, we depend not only on the Lord but also on the members, and the Body is built up in mutuality.
We truly need the Lord’s shepherding, and we also need the shepherding of the saints, even the shepherding of those whom we shepherd.
We share with them concerning our experience of Christ, and we listen and enjoy to their experience of the Lord.
As we pick up the burden to shepherd others, we learn many things, for it is a mutual shepherding, a shepherding in mutuality.
We don’t force others to take our way, nor do we coerce them to do what we want them to do. We learn the Lord’s ways according to His attributes to always minister life and not force others but only shepherd them according to God.
Lord Jesus, we want to be those who pray one with You for the saints and seek to minister Christ to those under our care. Amen, Lord, we open to You. We open to Your organic shepherding today. Dispense more of Yourself into us. Grant us to have the rich supply of life so that we may have something of Christ to minister to others also. Amen, Lord, we open to Your divine dispensing! We open to fellowship with You and to fellowship with the saints. We open to You and we let You flow in us and through us to the ones You want us to shepherd. Lord Jesus, be our patience as we care for the new ones. We take You as our patience as we have continual contact with the new ones. We can’t do it, Lord, but You can. You are the Shepherd in our spirit. May we learn to shepherd in mutuality, relying not only on the Lord but also on those who we shepherd. May we open to You and open to the ones we care for so that we may receive their portion in the Lord! Amen, Lord, may we learn from You not to force others to do what we want to do but to minister Christ to them and give them the free choice to choose the Lord and enjoy Him! Hallelujah! Amen!
References and Hymns on this Topic
- Inspiration for this article/sharing comes from the Word of God, the enjoyment in the ministry, a sharing by brother Ron Kangas on this topic, and portions from, Collected Works of Witness Lee, 1973-1974, vol. 2, “The Normal Way of Fruitbearing and Shepherding for the Building Up of the Church,” pp. 614-616, as quoted in the Holy Word for Morning Revival on, The Great Need for a New Revival (2026 Memorial Day Blending Conference), week 6, “Shepherding according to God” – day 6.
- Hymns on this topic:
– Each fulfills his duty, / Shows his usefulness, / Fervent in the spirit, / Girt with faithfulness. / Knitting and supplying, / Bearing much in grace; / Not a trace of discord, / Christ is giv’n His place. / We, the Church, His Body, / He, the Head, the Son; / By the Spirit’s flowing, / We are joined in one. (Hymns #854 stanzas 5-7)
– Christ is our rest and enjoyment, / Here we have nothing to fear; / Here all the sheep dwell securely, / Kept by His presence so dear. / Glorious church life, / Feasting from such a rich store! / Here where we’re dwelling in oneness / God commands life evermore. (Hymns #1221 stanza 5 and chorus)
– Built up in love together, / Not one would criticize; / To perfect one another, / We all would exercise. / Each one from self delivered, / The natural life forsakes; / In grace each trained in spirit / The Body-life partakes. (Hymns #867 stanza 4)
