Sheep or Goat?

Yes, every one of them that are Israelites, as explicitly stated in verse 30-31:

30 Then they will know that I, the Lord their God, am with them and that they, the Israelites, are my people, declares the Sovereign Lord.
31 You are my sheep, the sheep of my pasture, and I am your God, declares the Sovereign Lord.’”

As far as goats being changed into sheep, no, you don't see that analogy explicitly stated in scripture.

 

I don't see goats being changed to sheep as plausible. Elect are sheep, all else are goats.

 

...nor for a tare to become wheat...

 

Outwardly, through circumcision of the flesh and a particular DNA? Or inwardly, through a circumcision not made with hands, spiritually?

 

At the time the scripture was written it was addressed to Jews who had been outwardly circumcised and carried a particular DNA. That was the audience. It is indisputable.

 

I understand this in this way. The sheep are those God sanctifies with His truth (John 17:17) the goats are the ones who resist the Holy Spirit and so not being such (Titus 2:11; Acts of the Apostles 7:51). The sheep keep their names in the book (Revelation 3:5) the goats did not (Revelation 20:15). The sheep remain in the true vine, the goats did not (John 15:6).

 

God has no obligation to the goats. His obligation to His sheep is to bring them into His family. The Holy Spirit is more than capable of doing that.

Heb 12:8 KJV - But if ye be without chastisement, whereof all are partakers, then are ye bastards, and not sons.

 

The reason they are goats (Titus 2:11; Acts of the Apostles 7:51; Matthew 7:21-23). His sheep are sheep without merit on their part. The goats are trusting in merit, Matthrwe 7:22.

 

Lets see if I understand this thread?

The lost are goats and His sheep are saved.

When we are conceived in sin, and made sinners, we start out as lost goats.

But when God puts us in Christ, and we undergo the circumcision of Christ, then arise in Christ a new creation we become His Sheep.

So far so good.

 

The issue is the lost are goats and the saved are His Sheep.

Under the Old Covenant how did folks become His Sheep. Through faith according to Hebrews 11:1-2

 

@Iconoclast , you are correct about goats and sheep. A goat cannot become a sheep. In scripture, goats will always be goats. Even the Elect who are still children of wrath (Ephesians 2:3) are not described as goats.

 

Just for laughs shall we point out the hermeneutical absurdity of taking an illustration device from passage and applying it in another passage.

A lost person becomes a saved person when God redeems them.

“Don’t read into ‘rams and he-goats’ (Ezekiel 34:17) the New Testament image of ‘sheep and goats’ as found in Matthew 25:31–46, because in Bible times, it was customary for shepherds to have both sheep and goats in the flocks.” (Wiersbe)

The issue in the passage is that the Shepherds have exploited God's people. God says He is against the Shepherds. Now if we would transfer that device into a passage in the New Testament, we would claim God is also against the good Shepherd. Which of course is as nonsensical as claiming the lost cannot be saved.

 

Thank you very much!

Exactly. People are not born good and corrupted by society as political liberals believe. We are all lost until we become saved. John 3:16 says that by friend Whosoever can be saved.