How are sheep led to the slaughter?
According to the analogy, sheep are led to slaughter by a goat that walks ahead of them down the alleyways to the killing place; then the goat slips out a side door and returns for another bunch. The sheep follow quietly, making no sound, and Paul uses this to picture believers.
Les explains that in the old Chicago meat-packing complex, hogs squealed loudly, but the sheep kill was utter silence. The reason, as he describes it, is that a goat leads the sheep down the alleyways to the place where they are ready to be killed, then slips out a side door and goes back for another bunch. So the sheep go to the slaughter with utter silence, not a sound. Les says this is the analogy Paul draws of the believer, who may someday come to the place where they too go like sheep to the slaughter. Rather than scream and squeal like pigs, believers rest in the fact that this is not the way God works. Even the Lamb of God Himself, as Isaiah said, answered not a word.
As it is written, For thy sake we are killed all the day long; we are accounted as sheep for the slaughter.
More Questions
In Romans 8:36, what does it mean that we are counted as sheep for the slaughter?
Paul's analogy of the believer as a 'sheep for the slaughter' means sheep go to their death in utter silence, and that is the picture of the believer.
Will believers someday be led like sheep to the slaughter?
Because believers are the sheep in Paul's analogy, they may someday come to the place where they too will just go like sheep to the slaughter.