The Sheep Before The Shearers

This chapter shows Christ’s perfect patience and submission as He bore our sins silently, like a sheep before its shearers. Let us examine His example and ask ourselves: will we, too, surrender our comforts and pride, yielding fully to God’s refining hand?

“Like a sheep before its shearers is silent, so he opened not his mouth.” — Isaiah 53:7 (ESV) Our Lord Jesus took our place so completely that, in this chapter, we are compared to sheep: “All we like sheep have gone astray” (Isaiah 53:6, ESV), and he also is compared to a sheep “As a sheep before its shearers is silent, so he opened not his mouth.” It is remarkable how complete the exchange of positions was between Christ and his people. He became what they were so that they might become what he is. We can easily understand how we are the sheep and he the Shepherd; but to compare the Son of the Most High to a sheep would have been unacceptable presumption if his own Spirit had not chosen this humble picture.

Although this image is gracious, its use here is not unusual. Long before Isaiah’s day, our Lord was foreshadowed in the lamb of the Passover. Later he was proclaimed as “the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world!” (John 1:29, ESV), and even in his glory he is described as the Lamb in the midst of the throne.

In unfolding this divine picture, I invite you first to consider our Saviour’s patience, shown in the image of a sheep silent before its shearers.

Our Lord was brought before the shearers to be stripped of his comfort, stripped of his honour, stripped even of his good name, and at last stripped of his very life; yet under the shearers he was silent like a sheep. Think of how patient he was before Pilate, Herod, and Caiaphas, and upon the cross. There is no record of him crying out in impatience at the pain and shame he suffered at the hands of those wicked men. Not one bitter word escaped him.

Pilate said, “Have you no answer to make? See how many charges they bring against you” (Mark 15:4, ESV). Herod was deeply disappointed because he hoped to see some miracle performed by him. The few words our Lord did speak were gentle and submissive, like the quiet sound of a sheep, yet infinitely full of meaning. He said, “For this purpose I was born and for this purpose I have come into the world—to bear witness to the truth” (John 18:37, ESV), and, “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do” (Luke 23:34, ESV). Apart from this, he remained patient and silent.

Notice first that our Lord was silent and did not open his mouth against his enemies. He did not accuse a single one of cruelty or injustice. They slandered him, but he did not reply. False witnesses rose up, but he did not answer them. You might think he would have spoken when they spat in his face. Could he not have said, “Friend, why are you doing this? For which of my works do you insult me?” But the time for such questions had passed. When they struck him on the face with their hands, it would not have been surprising if he had asked, “Why do you strike me?” But no— he acted as though he did not hear their insults. He brought no accusation before his Father. He needed only to lift his eyes to heaven, and legions of angels would have driven away the mocking soldiers. One flash of a seraph’s wing, and Herod would have perished; Pilate could have fallen under the judgement he deserved as an unjust judge. The hill of the cross could have become like the mouth of a volcano to swallow up the crowd that stood there mocking and jeering at him. But there was no such display of power. Rather, there was a far greater display of power over himself.

He restrained omnipotence itself with a strength beyond measure.

Again, as he spoke no word against his enemies, so he spoke no word against any of us. You remember how Zipporah said to Moses, “Surely you are a bridegroom of blood to me!” (Exodus 4:25, ESV), as she saw her child bleeding. Surely Jesus could have said to his church, “You are a costly bride to me, bringing me all this shame and bloodshed.” But “God gives generously to all without reproach” (James 1:5, ESV). He opened the very fountain of his heart and did not rebuke us. He had counted the full cost beforehand. Therefore he endured the cross, despising the shame.

“This was compassion like a God, That when the Saviour knew, The price of pardon was his blood, His pity never withdrew.” Without doubt he looked across the ages, for his eyes were not dim, even when filled with blood upon the tree. He must have foreseen your indifference and mine, our cold hearts and our unfaithfulness. He could have left behind words such as these: “I am suffering for those who are unworthy of my love. Their love will be a poor return for mine. Though I give my whole heart to them, how lukewarm their love will be towards me. I am weary of them; it grieves me to lay down my life for such a people.” But there is no trace of such a thought. No. “Having loved his own who were in the world, he loved them to the end” (John 13:1, ESV). He did not speak a single word that sounded like regret or complaint for suffering on their behalf, nor any sorrow that he had begun the work.

And as there was no word against his enemies, and no word against you or me, so there was no word against his Father, nor a syllable of complaint about the severity of the punishment laid upon him for our sake. You and I have complained under far lighter troubles, feeling that we have been treated unfairly. We have even dared to cry out to God, “My face is red with weeping, and on my eyelids is deep darkness, although there is no violence in my hands, and my prayer is pure” (Job 16:16–17, ESV). But not so the Saviour. No complaint was found in his mouth. We cannot begin to understand how deeply the Father pressed and crushed him, yet there was no rebellion. “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” (Matthew 27:46, ESV) was a cry of astonished sorrow, not a complaint. It showed true humanity in weakness, but not humanity in revolt. Jeremiah wrote many laments, but Jesus spoke few. Jesus wept, and Jesus sweat great drops of blood, yet he never murmured or rebelled in his heart.

Look at your Lord and Saviour lying in quiet surrender beneath the shearers, as they take away everything dear to him, yet he does not open his mouth. Here we see his complete submission. He gave himself fully; there was no holding back. The sacrifice did not need to be tied with ropes to the horns of the altar. How different from you and me. He stood willing to suffer, to be spat upon, to be shamefully treated, and to die, for he was fully surrendered. He was entirely given to do the Father’s will and to accomplish our redemption. There was complete self-control as well. No part of him rose up to demand freedom or to escape the suffering. No part of his body, no thought of his mind, no power of his spirit resisted.

All submitted to the will of God. The whole Christ gave his whole being to God so that he might offer himself perfectly, without blemish, for our redemption. There was not only self-control, but complete focus on his mission. The sheep lying there does not think of the pastures; it yields itself to the shearer. The zeal for God’s house consumed our Lord in Pilate’s hall as much as anywhere else, for there he made the good confession. His only concern was to uphold the honour of God and to save his chosen people. Brothers and sisters, I wish we could reach this point: to surrender our whole spirit to God, to learn self-control, and to give our conquered selves entirely to him.

The calmness and submission of our Lord are illustrated even more clearly if it is true that sheep in the East are more docile than ours. Those who have seen the noise and rough handling at many of our sheep shearings may struggle to believe the testimony of the ancient writer Philo Judaeus, who said that sheep came willingly to be shorn. He wrote that wool-covered rams, heavy with thick fleeces, place themselves into the shepherd’s hands to have their wool cut, as if paying their yearly tribute to man, their natural ruler. The sheep stands in a quiet, bowed posture, unconstrained under the hand of the shearer. This may sound strange to those unfamiliar with the gentle nature of sheep, but he insists it is true. How wonderful was such submission in our Lord’s case. Let us admire it and seek to follow his example.

I have tried, however imperfectly, to describe the patience of our beloved Master. Now, secondly, let us consider our own situation under the same image used of our Lord.

Did I not say at the beginning that because we are sheep, he was willing to compare himself to a sheep? Let us look at it from another angle. Our Lord was a sheep before the shearers, and as he is, so are we in this world. Though we will never be offered like lambs in the temple as an atoning sacrifice, yet for ages the saints have been treated as a flock for slaughter. As it is written, “For your sake we are being killed all the day long; we are regarded as sheep to be slaughtered” (Romans 8:36, ESV). Jesus sends us out as sheep in the midst of wolves (Matthew 10:16, ESV), and we are to see ourselves as living sacrifices, ready to be offered. But I want to focus especially on this second image: we are brought like sheep under the shearer’s hand.

Just as a sheep is taken by the shearer and its wool is cut off, so the Lord sometimes takes his people and shears them, removing their earthly comforts and leaving them stripped.

I wish that when our time comes to go through this shearing, it could be said of us as it was of our Lord, “As a sheep before its shearers is silent, so he opened not his mouth.” I fear we speak far too much and complain endlessly, often without real cause, or for very small reasons. But now let us consider the image itself.

First, remember that a sheep repays its owner for all his care and effort by allowing itself to be shorn. As far as I know, there is nothing else a sheep can do in return. It provides food when it is killed, but while it is alive the one payment it can make to the shepherd is to give its fleece at the proper time. Some of God’s people can offer Christ the tribute of gratitude through active service, and they should do so gladly every day of their lives. But many others cannot do much in active service, and almost the only return they can give to their Lord is to surrender their fleece through suffering when he calls them to suffer, quietly yielding to be stripped of personal comfort when the time comes for patient endurance.

Here comes the shearer. He takes the sheep and begins to cut, cut, cut, cutting away the wool in great handfuls. Affliction is often the large pair of shears. A husband, or perhaps a wife, is taken away. Little children are removed. Property is cut off, and health is gone. Sometimes the shears remove a person’s good name; slander arises and comforts disappear. Well, this is your shearing time, and it may be that you cannot glorify God in any great outward way except by going through this process. If that is so, should we not, like good sheep belonging to Christ, surrender ourselves willingly, saying, “I lay myself down with this intention: that you may take from me anything and everything, and do what you will with me; for I am not my own, for I was bought with a price” (1 Corinthians 6:19–20, ESV)?

Notice that the sheep itself benefits from the act of shearing. Before the sheep are shorn, the wool is long and old, and every bush and briar tears at it until the sheep looks ragged and miserable.

If the wool were left on when the heat of summer came, the sheep would hardly be able to bear it.

It would be so overloaded with fleece that it would be as uncomfortable as we are when we keep on our heavy winter clothes far too late in the season. So, brothers and sisters, when the Lord shears us, we do not enjoy the process any more than the sheep do; but first, it is for his glory, and second, it is for our good. Therefore we are bound to submit willingly. There are many things we would have liked to keep which, if we had kept them, would not have been blessings but curses.

A blessing that has gone stale becomes a curse. The manna, though it came from heaven, was good only as long as God commanded it to be kept for the proper time. When it was kept beyond that time, it “bred worms and stank” (Exodus 16:20, ESV), and then it was no blessing at all. Many people would keep their mercies until they rot, but God will not allow it. Up to a certain point, your wealth was a blessing; beyond that point it would not have been, and so the Lord took it away.

Up to that point, your child was a gift; beyond that, it would not have been so, and therefore sickness came and the child died. You may not be able to see it, but it is true: when God removes a blessing from his people, he takes it away because it would not have remained a blessing.

Before sheep are shorn, they are always washed. Have you ever seen the scene when they are driven down to the brook? Men stand in rows leading to the shepherd who waits in the water. The sheep are driven down; the men seize them, throw them into the pool, keep their heads above water, and swirl them round and round to wash the wool before cutting it off. Then you see them come out on the other side trembling, poor creatures, wondering what will happen next. I want to suggest to you, brothers and sisters, that whenever a trial threatens to come upon you, you should ask the Lord to sanctify it to you. If the good Shepherd is about to cut off your wool, ask him to wash it before he removes it. Ask to be cleansed in spirit, soul, and body. Christian people have the good habit of asking a blessing on their meals before eating bread. Is it not even more necessary to ask a blessing on our troubles before we enter them? Your dear child may be near death; will you not, dear parents, come together and ask God to bless even the death of that child, if it must happen? The harvest fails; would it not be right to say, “Lord, sanctify this poverty, this loss, this bad harvest. Make it a means of grace to us”? Why not ask a blessing on the cup of bitterness as well as on the cup of thanksgiving? Ask to be washed before you are shorn, and if the shearing must come, let it be your chief concern to offer clean wool.

After the washing, when the sheep has dried, it loses what was its comfort. It is thrown down, and the shearers begin their work. The poor creature loses its warm fleece. You too will have to part with your comforts. Remember this: the next time you receive a fresh blessing, call it a loan. Poor sheep, there is no wool on your back that will not one day be cut off. Child of God, there is no earthly comfort in your possession that will not either leave you, or you will leave it. Nothing truly belongs to us except our God. “Why,” someone says, “not our sin?” Sin was ours, but Jesus took it upon himself, and it is gone.

Nothing is truly ours but our God, for all his gifts are held on loan and can be recalled at his sovereign will. We foolishly think our mercies belong to us, and when the Lord takes them away, we begin to complain. A loan, it is said, should go home laughing, and so should we rejoice when the Lord takes back what he lent us. All our possessions are brief favours borrowed for a time. As the sheep yields its wool and loses its comfort, so must we give up all our earthly possessions. Or if they remain with us until death, we shall leave them then. We shall not carry a single one of them across the river of death.

The shearers take care not to harm the sheep. They cut as close as possible, but they do not cut the skin. If they can help it, they do not draw blood, not even the smallest amount. When a cut does happen, it is usually because the sheep does not lie still. A careful shearer keeps his shears free from blood. Of this Thomson wrote in his poem The Seasons, and the lines beautifully illustrate the whole subject: “How meek, how patient, the mild creature lies! What softness in its melancholy face, What silent, suffering innocence appears!

Fear not, you gentle flocks! It is not the knife Of dreadful slaughter raised above you; No, it is the shepherd’s careful, guided shears, Who, having borrowed your fleece As payment for his yearly care, Will send you back to the hills light and free.” It is the kicking and struggling that make the shearing difficult. If we are silent before the shearers, no harm will come. The Lord may cut very close. I have known him strip some so completely that they seemed to have nothing left, like Job when he said, “Naked I came from my mother’s womb, and naked shall I return” (Job 1:21, ESV). Yet they have also said with Job, “The Lord gave, and the Lord has taken away; blessed be the name of the Lord” (Job 1:21, ESV).

Notice that shearers always choose the right time. It would be cruel and foolish to begin shearing in winter. There is a saying about God “tempering the wind to the shorn lamb.” Whether or not that is accurate, it would indeed be cruel to shear lambs when bitter winds are blowing. Sheep are shorn in warm, pleasant weather, when they can afford to lose their fleece and are better without it. As summer approaches, shearing time comes. Have you not noticed that when the Lord afflicts us, he chooses the best possible time? He taught his disciples to pray, “Pray that your flight may not be in winter” (Matthew 24:20, ESV). The spirit of that prayer can be seen in the timing of our sorrows. He does not send our heaviest trials at our weakest moments. If your soul is already deeply depressed, the Lord does not add the heaviest burden then. He keeps such loads for times when “the joy of the Lord” is your strength. We often feel that when joy increases, a trial may be near; and when sorrow deepens, deliverance may be approaching. The Lord does not send two burdens at once, or if he does, he gives double strength. His shearing time is chosen with gentle wisdom.

There is something else to remember. As with the sheep, new wool grows. Whenever the Lord removes earthly comforts with one hand—one, two, three—he restores with the other hand six, twenty, a hundred. We cry and complain about the small loss, yet that loss is necessary so that we may receive a greater gain. Yes, it will be so. We shall have reason to rejoice, for “weeping may tarry for the night, but joy comes with the morning” (Psalm 30:5, ESV). If we lose one position, another awaits us. If we are driven from one place, a better refuge is prepared. Providence opens a second door when it closes the first. If the Lord took away the manna from Israel, it was because they ate the produce of the land of Canaan. If the water from the rock did not follow them any longer, it was because they drank from the Jordan and from the streams. O sheep of the Lord’s fold, new wool is coming. Therefore do not be anxious about the shearing. I have said these things briefly so that we may come to the final point.

Let us try to follow the example of our blessed Lord when our time comes to be shorn. Let us be silent before the shearers, submissive and still, as he was.

Everything I have said gives a reason for doing so. Our shearing through affliction glorifies God, honours the Shepherd, and benefits ourselves. The Lord measures and tempers our trials and sends them at the right time. In many ways I have shown that it is wise to submit as the sheep does, and that the more completely we do so, the better.

We struggle far too much, and we often excuse ourselves for doing so. Sometimes we say, “This is too painful; I cannot be patient. I could have borne anything but this.” When a father disciplines his child, does he choose something pleasant? No. The pain is part of the discipline. In the same way, the bitterness of sorrow is part of our correction. “By the wounds a heart is healed” (see Proverbs 20:30, ESV). Do not complain because your trial feels sharp and unusual. That would be like saying, “If everything goes my way, I will submit; but if it does not, I will rebel.” That is not the spirit of a child of God.

Sometimes we complain about our weakness. “Lord, if I were stronger I would not mind this heavy loss; but I am frail, like a dry leaf blown by the storm.” But who decides what trial suits you—God or you? Since the Lord judges this trial suitable for your weakness, you can be sure it is so. Lie still. Lie still. “But my grief comes from a cruel source,” you say. “This trouble did not come directly from God. It came through my cousin or my brother, who should have treated me better.

If it had been an enemy, I could have borne it.” My brother, trial does not truly come from an enemy. God stands behind all your trouble. Look past secondary causes to the great First Cause. It is a serious mistake to focus on the human instrument that strikes us and forget the hand that holds the rod. If I strike a dog, he bites the stick. Poor creature, he knows no better. If he could think more clearly, he would either bite me or quietly accept the blow. You must not start biting the stick. It is your heavenly Father who uses it. Whether the rod is made of ebony or thorn, it is in his hand. It is best to stop trying to choose our trials and to leave everything in the hands of infinite wisdom.

The heart of my message is this: believer, yield yourself. Lie quietly in God’s hands. Do not struggle. There is no point in struggling. If the great Shearer intends to shear, he will do so. As I said before, when the sheep struggles, it may be cut by the shears. If we struggle against God, we may receive two blows instead of one. In truth, there is not half as much pain in a trial as there is in fighting against it. The Eastern farmer uses a goad to guide the ox. The gentle prod does little harm, but if the ox kicks, it drives the goad into itself and bleeds. So it is with us. It is hard “to kick against the goads” (Acts 26:14, ESV). We suffer more through rebellion than we would if we submitted to the will of God.

What good comes from worrying? We cannot make “one hair white or black” (Matthew 5:36, ESV). You who are troubled cannot change the weather by your sighing.

Have you ever earned a penny by fretting, or put bread on the table by complaining? Complaining wastes breath, and worrying wastes time. To lie quietly in God’s hand brings blessing to the soul.

I wish I were more calm and self-controlled. I long to say continually, “Lord, do what you will, when you will, as you will, with me your servant. Give me honour or dishonour, wealth or poverty, sickness or health, joy or sorrow, and I will gladly receive it from your hand.” A person is not far from the gates of heaven when he is fully submissive to the Lord’s will.

You who have been shorn have, I trust, received comfort through the blessed Spirit of God. May God bless you. And may the sinner also humble himself under the mighty hand of God. “Humble yourselves, therefore, under the mighty hand of God” (1 Peter 5:6, ESV). Submit yourselves to God (James 4:7, ESV). Let every thought be brought captive to him (2 Corinthians 10:5, ESV), and may the Lord send his blessing, for Christ’s sake. Amen.