But go rather to the lost sheep of the house of Israel.
But go rather to the lost sheep of the house of Israel. Until Christ's death, which broke down the middle wall of partition (Ephesians 2:14), the Gospel commission was to the Jews only, who, though the visible people of God, were "lost sheep," not merely in the sense in which all sinners are (Isaiah 53:6; 1 Peter 2:25; with Luke 19:10), but as abandoned and left to wander from the right way by faithless shepherds, (Jeremiah 50:6; Jeremiah 50:17; Ezekiel 34:2-6, etc)