Take Heed to All the Flock

Feed the flock of God which is among you, taking the oversight thereof, not by constraint, but willingly. 1 PETER 5:2

The second half of Paul’s charge governs the second half of Baxter’s book, and he fastened on one word in it: all.

Every single one

Take heed to all the flock. Not the responsive ones, not the ones who attend regularly, not the ones whose conversation is agreeable or whose support is useful. All of them. Baxter took this to mean that a minister is responsible for every individual in his charge by name, and that he cannot discharge that responsibility from a pulpit alone. Preaching addresses a congregation; oversight requires knowing people. He was blunt about the arithmetic. If a parish is too large for its minister to know its members individually, then either he must obtain help or the parish must be divided — but he may not simply preach at a crowd and call it oversight, because that is not what the word means.

And I will set up shepherds over them which shall feed them: and they shall fear no more, nor be dismayed, neither shall they be lacking. JEREMIAH 23:4

The weight of it

Baxter’s motivation was an accountability he could not get out of his mind.

Obey them that have the rule over you, and submit yourselves: for they watch for your souls, as they that must give account. HEBREWS 13:17

When I say unto the wicked, Thou shalt surely die; and thou givest him not warning …his blood will I require at thine hand. EZEKIEL 3:18

The watchman passage in Ezekiel shaped his whole ministry. It is a terrifying text, and Baxter did not soften it. The watchman who fails to warn is held responsible for what follows; the watchman who warns and is ignored is clear. He drew from it a rule that governed his practice: it is not enough to have preached the truth in general to a congregation. A minister must be able to say that he has told each person, personally, what their situation is.

What oversight involves

Baxter set out what he thought the work actually required, and it is a heavy list. Knowing the people — their circumstances, their families, their trades, their temptations, and the state of their souls so far as it can be known. Instructing them individually, which is the subject of the next chapter. Attending particularly to the young, to new converts, and to those under conviction. Visiting the sick and the dying, which he regarded as the point at which a minister earns whatever standing he has. Comforting the distressed, and distinguishing between those who need comfort and those who need warning — which he thought the hardest skill in pastoral work and the one most often got backwards.

Now we exhort you, brethren, warn them that are unruly, comfort the feeble-minded, support the weak, be patient toward all men. 1 THESSALONIANS 5:14

Four categories, four different treatments, in a single verse. Baxter’s point is that a minister who has only one manner will damage three-quarters of his congregation.

Discipline, and its limits

He also pressed the exercise of church discipline, which had largely lapsed in the parishes of his day, and this was among the most contested parts of his programme. His concern was not punitive. He held that admitting to the Lord’s Table people who gave no evidence of faith or repentance was cruel to them — confirming them in a false assurance — as well as damaging to the church’s witness. It is worth adding, since Baxter’s era used discipline in ways later generations have rightly questioned, that the New Testament’s aim throughout is restoration.

Brethren, if a man be overtaken in a fault, ye which are spiritual, restore such an one in the spirit of meekness; considering thyself, lest thou also be tempted. GALATIANS 6:1

Considering thyself. Discipline exercised by people who have forgotten that clause becomes something else very quickly.

The people’s part

One final observation, since congregations read books like this too. Baxter assumed a reciprocal obligation. If the minister is bound to know his people, the people are bound to be knowable — to make themselves available, to answer honestly, to receive instruction, and to support the work so that the man is not so distracted by earning a living that he cannot do it.

And we beseech you, brethren, to know them which labour among you …and to esteem them very highly in love for their work’s sake. 1 THESSALONIANS 5:12–13

A congregation that wants the kind of ministry Baxter describes must be willing to be pastored, which is a more demanding thing than most people expect.

The question this chapter puts to a church leader is simple and quantifiable. Could you write down the names of the people in your care, and say something true about the spiritual condition of each?

Going after the one

There is a duty in the oversight of a congregation which Baxter thought almost universally neglected, and it is the pursuit of those who have drifted away.

Ye have not strengthened the diseased, neither have ye healed that which was sick, neither have ye bound up that which was broken, neither have ye brought again that which was driven away, neither have ye sought that which was lost. EZEKIEL 34:4

That is God’s indictment of the shepherds of Israel, and every clause describes an omission rather than an act of cruelty. They did not drive the sheep away; they simply did not go after them. The Lord’s own picture is more vivid still. A man with a hundred sheep loses one and leaves the ninety-nine to look for it, and when he finds it he carries it home rejoicing.

And when he hath found it, he layeth it on his shoulders, rejoicing. LUKE 15:5

Baxter’s practical observation was that congregations lose people quietly. Nobody announces a departure. Attendance thins, then stops, and after a few weeks the absence has become normal and nobody can quite remember when it began. Six months later it is awkward to make contact, and so nobody does. His counsel was to move early and without accusation. Go, or send someone. Ask how they are rather than why they have not been. Assume difficulty rather than rebellion, because it usually is — illness, shame, a quarrel, a bereavement, a period of doubt they did not know how to mention.

The one who has drifted rarely needs to be told they have drifted. They generally need to discover that somebody noticed.

FOR REFLECTION AND ACTION

1. If you lead, write out the names of those in your charge. Note beside each what you actually know of their spiritual state. The gaps are the work. 2. Identify the person in your congregation you know least and like least. Begin there. 3. Learn the four categories of 1 Thessalonians 5:14 and check whether you treat everyone the same way. 4. If you are a church member, make yourself knowable. Answer honestly when asked, and do not require your leaders to guess. 5. Visit someone who is sick or dying this month. It is where pastoral credibility is earned.

A PRAYER

Lord, You have made me responsible for people, and I have preached at them instead of knowing them.

Forgive me for attending to the responsive and neglecting the difficult. Show me the ones I have quietly written off.

Give me discernment to warn the unruly and comfort the fainthearted, and not to confuse the two.

And keep the weight of it on me — that I watch for souls as one who must give account — without letting that weight crush me. Amen.