It sometimes seems that anybody whose profession of faith comes into question gets considered largely the same way. They were those who purported to be sheep, but now we have determined they were wolves all along. They claimed to be godly believers following Jesus but we’ve now found them out and they are in fact ungodly folk trying to devour the sheep.

It is certainly true there are wolves out there. Jesus warns us it is so (Matthew 7:15; Luke 10:3, Acts 20:29; etc). There are those who purport to love the sheep, who claim to be a follower of Jesus, who are actually just out for themselves and ready to devour and use whatever sheep come their way. It is also worth saying such people are not only found in church leadership, but both within and without the church membership too. Any who seek to use the sheep for their own self-serving ends might be considered wolves.

But we have to be careful that we don’t assume everyone who evidently shows themselves not to be sheep must, therefore, be a wolf. The Bible speaks of another category of person who will exist in the church too; namely, goats. Goats, as you can imagine, are not quite as aggressive or dangerous as wolves. But neither are they sheep who truly belong in the sheepfold. And it absolutely stands to reason that if ravenous wolves can come in who look quite a lot like sheep, it is hardly surprising that less aggressive and damaging goats might manage to look quite sheepy at times too.

But that being the case, there is a necessary difference between goats and wolves. Both are the same inasmuch as they aren’t sheep and do not belong in the sheepfold. But wolves are those who come in and seek to devour the sheep whereas goats are those who come in and simply are not sheep. Wolves seek to be damaging and ruinous for entirely self-serving reasons. Goats aren’t actively trying to ruin anything, they aren’t necessarily aiming to devour or abuse anyone for personal gain, they have just wandered into a place where they don’t belong. This latter group may even say and do some things that really aren’t very helpful. After all, they’re not supposed to be where they are and that in itself tends to cause some problems when they go about doing what goats naturally do. But they aren’t doing it maliciously; they’re just being what they are and doing it where they ought not to do it. Wolves, on the other hand, attack and devour sheep by nature.

We could also think about others who might cause damage and hurt in the church too. I don’t want to focus on them here because I want to think about those who do not and should not belong. But there is also a group of sheep – often damaged sheep – who end up causing some damage of their own. But these are different to the other two groups because they rightly belong in the fold. I just note their existence here.

When it comes to those who don’t belong – particularly those that have caused us heartache and headaches – the temptation is to always label such people as wolves. After all, they have damaged the church and, therefore, the sheep. Their sin has probably been on display causing the issues. Their removal from the church (that is, the sheepfold) was the appropriate course of action and, having done so, the damage has stopped being done. Such people can often seem quite woolfy to us.

The problem is, goats who were never meant to be in the sheepfold will also lumber around doing damage of their own. They won’t devour the sheep – goats don’t tend to eat sheep – but they might go round headbutting a few of them. Their own sin – because goats are ultimately unbelievers who don’t belong – will be on display and will inevitably cause damage. It can be very easy when we’re on the receiving end of that damage to determine that these must be aggressive wolves in sheep’s clothing, when they are actually goats dressing up as sheep instead.

It’s worth also noting, sinful sheep can cause their own damage too. Damaging sin and being hurt by the consequences of sin is a trait that exists amongst wolves, goats and sheep alike. That is a universal problem. The difference between wolves and goats is that one is looking to ruin others for self-serving gain whilst the other is not necessarily being malicious. The difference between sheep and goats is that on top of neither necessarily being malicious, sinful sheep repent of their sin and want to be more like their shepherd. Goats may or may not aim to change their behaviour, but if they do they won’t look to Jesus as the source of grace and the basis of change. They are more likely to express regret and look within. Sheep will express repentance, look to Jesus for forgiveness and seek the Spirit’s help to make them more like Christ.

Why does any of this matter? It helps to understand what people are. Wolves, goats and sheep are all different, acting differently for different reasons. Which means how we deal with them, what we might expect from them, how we might expect change in them and what that ought to look like in practice will all differ too. It is all too easy to write off everyone who has caused any damage as a wolf and reckon them, much like the Pharisees, to be so hardened to Christ that they have a settled rejection of him who seek only to devour sheep. It feels easier when we’ve been hurt by them to view it this way and it provides a kind of justification to not bother with them hereafter; we can hand them over to Satan and wash our hands of them. But if they are actually goats, what room are we leaving for the work of the Spirit who is expert in making new creations? Isn’t he the one who changes goats into sheep? Isn’t there room – as in 1 Corinthians 5 – that even one who has been ‘handed over to Satan’ may be forgiven if he is repentant (which 2 Corinthians 2:4-11 is potentially speaking about)? Though it may be harder and longer to tell, might God even turn a wolf into sheep (*cough* Paul *ahem*)?

It is worth knowing that not everybody who we must put out of the church is a wolf. Nor even do we quite have license to argue ‘once a wolf, always a wolf’. In the end, we must treat people as what they are and then pray that God, by a miraculous work of his Spirit, will make them into new creations: that is, that he might make sheep out of wolves and goats.