Attitudes Shaped by Grace | Day 40

“They devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and to fellowship, to the breaking of bread and to prayer.” (Acts 2:42, NIV)

Grace and joy to you this morning. Anyone who has spent time around a farm knows the pasture gate. It hangs between two heavy posts, it sags a little more each year, and it has one job. It keeps the flock in the field where the grass is good and keeps whatever hunts at night on the other side of the fence. No farmer ever hung a gate to keep his own lambs out. Every congregation has a gate too, and this morning we ask what it was built for.

What the Gate Guards

After Peter preached on Pentecost, about three thousand people were baptized and added to the church in a single day. Luke tells us in our key verse what they did next, and the first thing on his list is the apostles’ teaching. Fellowship, the breaking of bread, and prayer came alongside it, and all four were shared by people who had received the same Word. The New Testament church did not gather around a mood or a personality. It gathered around what Christ had given the apostles to teach.

That is why congregations have a gate. Most of us walked through it in a confirmation class or an adult instruction class, with a pastor and an open Bible, before we stood and confessed the faith in front of the congregation. Paul tells us what that gate protects. “I appeal to you, brothers and sisters, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that all of you agree with one another in what you say and that there be no divisions among you, but that you be perfectly united in mind and thought.” (1 Corinthians 1:10, NIV). Being united in mind and thought does not mean we all like the same hymns or vote the same way. It means we confess the same Word together. Membership is a congregation saying, this is what we believe the Bible teaches, and we want to be fed by it and held to it together. The Lord’s Supper is received the same way, by those who share that confession, because coming to the table together is itself a confession of one faith. Any faithful pastor is glad to sit down with someone who wants to learn.

Paul also tells us what the gate keeps out. “I urge you, brothers and sisters, to watch out for those who cause divisions and put obstacles in your way that are contrary to the teaching you have learned. Keep away from them.” (Romans 16:17, NIV). The danger Paul names is teaching that departs from the Word. He is not warning against the person with a rough past, the visitor in work boots, or the believer whose faith is still weak. The gate guards the Word because the Holy Spirit creates faith and keeps it alive through the gospel in Word and Sacrament. A gate that lets false teaching wander into the field leaves every sheep inside hungry.

The one who keeps watch at that gate is the pastor God has called through his church. “Have confidence in your leaders and submit to their authority, because they keep watch over you as those who must give an account. Do this so that their work will be a joy, not a burden, for that would be of no benefit to you.” (Hebrews 13:17, NIV). A faithful pastor does not guard the gate by his own preferences. He is bound to the same Word as everyone else, and he answers to God for every soul in his care. When we pray for him and make his work a joy, we are the ones who benefit.

The world hands us two wrong ideas about gates. One says that asking anything of a new member is unloving and that belonging should never ask a question. The other runs the gate like a private club, with unwritten rules about clothes, last names, and how many generations a family has sat in the same pew. The second idea slips into churches more quietly than we would like. At times we have let the gate ask, “Do you look like us?” instead of, “Do you confess what we confess?” We have expected newcomers to prove they fit before we bothered to learn their names. In those moments we valued a familiar room more than the Word the gate was built to guard. Jesus did not post a guard against us. He came looking for us.

The Gate Who Stands Open

A pasture gate swings both ways, and Jesus shows us why. “What do you think? If a man owns a hundred sheep, and one of them wanders away, will he not leave the ninety-nine on the hills and go to look for the one that wandered off? And if he finds it, truly I tell you, he is happier about that one sheep than about the ninety-nine that did not wander off. In the same way your Father in heaven is not willing that any of these little ones should perish.” (Matthew 18:12-14, NIV). Jesus spoke those words just before he taught his disciples how to go privately to a brother who has fallen into sin. In his hands, correction begins with a shepherd on the hillside searching for one sheep, and it ends with joy when that sheep comes home. The Father is not willing that any should perish, and Jesus died for every one of them. When someone we used to see in worship has gone missing, the gate swings outward. The pastor goes gently, the members pray, and someone picks up the phone.

Every gate a congregation keeps points to a greater one. Jesus said, “I am the gate; whoever enters through me will be saved. They will come in and go out, and find pasture.” (John 10:9, NIV). No church roll opens heaven. Jesus does, and he opened it for everyone who has ever lived. The Holy Spirit brings us through that gate by the Word and the Sacraments. The sheep who enter through Jesus come in and go out and find pasture. His gate is not a cage. It is the way to everything the flock needs.

Through this good news the Holy Spirit changes how we stand at the gate. He makes us glad to guard the teaching, because we love the people who need it. He makes us just as glad to throw the welcome wide. When a new member is received, we can be the first to shake their hand after the service and ask them to sit with us. When a familiar face has been missing for a few weeks, we can let the pastor know and make the call ourselves. None of this earns anything from God. It is what a forgiven flock does for one another, to his glory.

All of it rests on Jesus Christ. He is the gate, and he is the one who paid to open it. He laid down his life for the sins of the whole world and rose again on the third day, and no one enters the Father’s pasture except through him. Because of Jesus Christ, every faithful congregation can guard his Word with conviction and still open its gate toward the one sheep out on the hills. The farm gate keeps the flock where the grass is good. Our Savior has done that for us, and he keeps doing it.

Prayer

Heavenly Father, thank you for gathering me into your flock and feeding me with your Word. I confess that I have sometimes stood at the gate of your church guarding my own comfort, measuring newcomers by how well they fit, and forgetting the ones who wandered away. Forgive me for the sake of Jesus Christ, who came looking for me when I was the one far from home.

Lord Jesus, you are the gate, and through you I have been brought in and given pasture. Thank you for the gift of the Holy Spirit, who keeps me in your Word. Bless my pastor as he keeps watch, and make his work a joy. Make me faithful to your teaching and quick to welcome, and give me the courage to go after the one who is missing. In Jesus’ name I pray. Amen.

Thank you for reading this morning. May the Lord soon bring someone through the doors of your church who needs a warm handshake, and may yours be the hand they find. The next devotion tells about a phone that rang during a church service and the two very different responses that followed.

To God be the glory.

Pray, praise, and give thanks, for God is good and His mercy endures forever.

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