1.1 Introduction
The shepherd metaphor is an appropriate and useful image for depicting the nature, role, and proper functions of faithful leadership among God’s people. The shepherd-leader motif in Scripture has garnered increasing attention among scholars concerned with the nature and function of pastoral leadership in recent years. The Old Testament utilizes the good shepherd metaphor to convey multiple truths about leadership in Israel. Bailey notes three distinct uses of shepherd imagery in the Old Testament (Bailey 2014: 31-34). The considerable extent of the shepherd-leader motif throughout Scripture provides sufficient insight into the nature and role of spiritual leadership to construct a reasonable profile of a model leader (Laniak 2006; Merkle and Schreiner 2014; Tidball 2008; Bailey 2014; Golding 2006a; Golding 2006b).
As a prelude to other parts of this study, this chapter will discuss the background upon which this study was initiated, the statement of problems that led to this study, the Aim and Objectives of the study. Others are Significance of the study, Scope of work, Research hypothesis and questions, Limitation of the study and Definition of technical terms.
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