Why “Sheep” Fits More Than We’d Like to Admit
Why What Comes Naturally to Us Is Often What Keeps Us from Following God
Why “Sheep” Fits More Than We’d Like to Admit
Why What Comes Naturally to Us Is Often What Keeps Us from Following God
Sheep drift toward what’s easiest even when it’s killing them, which is why they don’t just need comfort, they need a shepherd who will lead.
There is a reason Scripture calls us sheep, and it is not because we are unintelligent.
It is because we drift.
Sheep are not wicked. They are not malicious. They do not plot rebellion. They simply move toward what feels safe, familiar, and easy. They graze where the grass is shortest to reach. They follow paths already worn. They avoid strain, elevation, and danger. And left unattended, those instincts slowly kill them. Scripture uses this metaphor relentlessly because it fits us with uncomfortable accuracy (Isaiah 53:6; Ezekiel 34:5–6; Matthew 9:36).
Psychologists call this the law of least effort. The human nervous system is wired to conserve energy, reduce friction, and avoid pain. What costs less feels wiser. What feels familiar feels truer. What brings immediate relief masquerades as peace.
This wiring keeps us alive.
It also quietly shapes our faith.
And Scripture, uncomfortably and consistently, refuses to flatter it (Jeremiah 17:9; Proverbs 14:12).
Why belief is easier than faithfulness
Here is the tension modern Christianity rarely names.
Belief is easy. Faithfulness is costly.
Belief can be affirmed without disruption. Faithfulness reorganizes a life. Scripture never treats faith as mere agreement. It treats faith as allegiance that obeys, endures, and remains loyal over time (James 2:17–18; Hebrews 3:14; Revelation 14:12).
Modern Christianity often treats belief as the finish line. Scripture treats belief as the door. What comes after the door is obedience, repentance, endurance, and covenant loyalty (Matthew 7:21; John 14:15; Luke 6:46).
Least-effort religion prefers belief because belief asks very little once affirmed. You can believe and still live unchanged. You can believe and still be ruled by appetite, resentment, fear, money, comfort, and approval.
Scripture never confuses belief with allegiance.
We do.
The rich man who believed but would not follow
One encounter exposes the illusion of easy belief with surgical clarity (Matthew 19:16–22; Mark 10:17–22; Luke 18:18–23).
A wealthy man comes to Yeshua sincere, moral, confident. He wants life. He asks what he still lacks. Yeshua does not question his sincerity. He presses on the one point belief always tries to dodge: who rules you.
“Sell what you have, give to the poor, and follow Me.”
The man walks away sorrowful, because he has great possessions.
This is not a story about money alone. It is a story about the line belief will not cross when comfort is threatened. Yeshua immediately warns that wealth, ease, and insulation can make obedience nearly impossible (Matthew 19:23–24).
He believed enough to approach Yeshua.
He did not believe enough to surrender control.
And what is most unsettling is what Yeshua does not do.
He does not negotiate.
He does not soften the command.
He does not redefine discipleship to keep the seeker.
He lets him walk.
Easy belief wants Jesus without displacement.
The Gospel demands allegiance that costs something real (Luke 9:23; Luke 14:26–33).
Sheep drift. That’s the point.
Sheep do not wake up planning to wander. They drift incrementally, following what feels easiest at every step. Scripture names this drift as a human default: forgetting, substituting, softening, and slowly moving away from dependence (Isaiah 53:6; Hebrews 2:1; Deuteronomy 8:11–14).
Least effort is not moral rebellion. It is instinct. But instinct left unexamined becomes avoidance.
Avoidance of hard texts.
Avoidance of self-examination.
Avoidance of repentance that costs comfort or reputation (2 Corinthians 13:5; Psalm 139:23–24).
This is how spiritual stagnation forms. Not through open rebellion, but through quiet substitution. Language replaces obedience. Knowledge replaces faithfulness. Agreement replaces surrender (2 Timothy 3:5; Titus 1:16).
The sheep feel safe.
The pasture looks green.
The danger is downstream.
Why church becomes popular without becoming demanding
Church can be popular for the same reason fast food is popular. It reduces cost.
When faith is packaged to minimize friction, it scales. Community without accountability. Identity without obedience. Forgiveness without repentance. Worship without surrender. Grace without covenant.
Scripture repeatedly warns about religion that looks alive but is hollow: honoring God with lips while hearts stay far; hearing without doing; learning without obeying (Isaiah 29:13; Matthew 15:8–9; James 1:22).
This is not primarily a people problem. It is a systems problem.
Systems drift toward what grows. What grows is what asks the least. And once success becomes the unspoken metric, discipleship gets edited to keep the machine running (2 Timothy 4:3–4).
Scripture does not aim to create crowds.
It aims to form a people (1 Peter 2:9; Titus 2:11–14).
Least effort is not only behavioral. It is interpretive.
The drift is not only that people resist obedience. It is that we want Scripture itself to stop confronting us.
So we import frameworks that make the Bible manageable.
We turn covenant warnings into abstractions.
We turn repentance into a feeling.
We turn obedience into an optional outcome.
We turn faith into agreement and call it maturity.
Scripture warns about reshaping God’s Word to make it safer and more palatable (Jeremiah 6:14; 2 Corinthians 4:2; 2 Peter 3:16).
The easiest theology is not always the simplest.
It is the one that gives certainty without surrender.
Any system becomes spiritually dangerous the moment it allows moral control while promising spiritual security (Matthew 23:23–28).
Seminary formation and the softening of the call
Most pastors are trained to stabilize communities, not confront drift.
Seminary education emphasizes sermon construction, pastoral sensitivity, conflict management, and theological systems that can be taught broadly without fracturing institutions. Much of this is necessary. None of it is inherently corrupt.
But it creates a gravitational pull that must be named: say what can be received, not always what must be obeyed.
Commands that threaten comfort are softened.
Texts that demand costly repentance are reframed as ideals.
Discipleship becomes a concept rather than a practice.
Over time, the definition of faithful believer shifts from one who obeys to one who agrees.
That shift is not neutral.
It is dangerous.
A word to shepherds
This must be said plainly, and it must be said fairly.
Not every pastor is compromising. Not every church is selling out. There are faithful shepherds who fear God more than budgets and boards.
But the pressure is real. And the responsibility is real.
Scripture places greater weight on teachers, not less (James 3:1). Shepherds are not called to keep sheep comfortable. They are called to keep them alive (Ezekiel 34:2–4; Acts 20:28–31; 1 Peter 5:2–4).
Paul warned Timothy that people would seek teachers who say what they want to hear, turning away from truth toward what is pleasing (2 Timothy 4:3–4). That warning is pastoral, not theoretical.
If your preaching never brings people to the moment where comfort must be surrendered, control must be yielded, and something real must die, you are not preparing disciples. You are preparing consumers who will walk away the moment obedience costs them their idol.
Yeshua did not chase the rich man to renegotiate discipleship.
That silence is the warning.
Easy versus hard is about who rules
The easy road is easy because I remain in charge.
I decide which commands matter.
I decide which sins are struggles.
I decide which teachings are cultural.
This is why the easy road is crowded (Matthew 7:13–14).
The hard road is hard because it removes authorship. It confronts the truth we resist:
“I am not my own” (1 Corinthians 6:19–20).
That truth is not poetic.
It is invasive.
Comfort is the quiet rival god
Comfort shields us from urgency, dependence, and repentance. It allows delay. Delay of obedience. Delay of truth.
Yeshua warned that the deceitfulness of wealth and ease can choke the Word (Mark 4:19). Scripture warns of loving pleasure more than God (2 Timothy 3:4).
Comfort demands sacrifices.
Courage.
Discipline.
Obedience when obedience is inconvenient.
Scripture confronts ease not because God hates pleasure, but because God hates slavery (Galatians 5:1).
The real test
Scripture keeps asking a simple question:
What has your faith cost you?
If the answer is nothing, it is not faith. It is agreement.
Faith costs comfort.
Faith costs habits.
Faith costs reputation.
The call of Messiah is not “add Me to your life,” but “lose your life and find it” (Matthew 16:24–26).
Anything that costs nothing can be kept forever without transformation.
Why the narrow way stays narrow
Reality has shape. Covenant has form. Obedience has boundaries.
Most roads lead back to self-rule with religious language. One road leads out of self entirely.
That road is narrow not because God is stingy, but because truth leaves no room for excuses (Matthew 7:13–14; John 14:6).
The question that remains
Where are you drifting because it feels easy?
Where are you calling comfort wisdom?
Where are you calling delay patience?
Where are you calling disobedience grace?
God exposes this not to shame you, but to lead you (Romans 2:4).
The easy path feels merciful now and hollow later.
The narrow path feels costly now and alive later.
You will pay either way.
The only question is what you will pay with.
May the shalom of our Abba guard you —
shalom v’shalvah.
Your brother in The Way,
Sergio
AMEN! another fantastic message with which i fully agree.
while the primary reason why we are called “sheep” might certainly have to do with our drifting (something i had not considered in the past), i still cannot help but acknowledge the fact that sheep are very dumb animals. most animals created for food do seem to be on the unintelligent side as compared with many of those not created for food. this is not a hard fast rule, but it does seem to often apply.
so i believe there is some degree of truth to that aspect of the metaphor — especially when considering the vast difference between human “intelligence” and God-kind INTELLIGENCE. ;-)
regardless, thank you for pointing out this drifting aspect of the metaphor. if i use that in a future message to our congregation, i'll try to remember very hard to give you credit for it. ;-)
Godbless... 🙏🏼😎❤️♾️