23rd Psalm
The 23rd psalm
The 23rd psalm is
a very well known and much quoted psalm about following God. It talks about the way the Lord takes care of
His people. It also talks about the
trust His people have for Him. The
author uses the symbolism of sheep and a shepherd so that the people of the day
could understand what a relationship with God would and should look like.
We can use this model today
by applying what we know about sheep to ourselves. That is, of course, what the writer was doing
anyway.
The first stanza tells us
that our God is Jehovah Jireh, the God who provides. It says,
“The Lord is my
shepherd”
We need to understand what a
shepherd is to his or her sheep and what the importance of a shepherd is. I’m going to use the example of Moses. He lived 40 years in a palace, and then met
and married a woman whose father had sheep.
Moses became a shepherd. His job
was to lead a great flock of people.
God’s chosen sheep. Moses had to
learn how to watch carefully over them the way a mother watches over her new
baby. He had to understand feeding times
and he needed to know what they could eat that would provide proper nourishment. He had to become aware of what signs a people
show when they are tired and need rest.
He needed to have a keen sense of where a safe and comfortable place
would be for them to rest. He had to
know how long they could travel each day without becoming too tired, or being
injured, or getting sick. He had to know
not only when a person was getting sick, but he had to know what to do about
it. He would need to be very organized
and very attentive to others. Up to this
point, he had other people tending to his every need. Now the tables were turned and this was
something he needed to learn in order to
lead.
“I SHALL NOT WANT”
This verse means exactly what
we just talked about. It means that
because Jesus has chosen to be our shepherd, we won’t lack any good thing. He will provide all of our needs. It means that God promises us that we will
have food, clothing, water, and shelter.
Consider Moses and how he
would make sure that his flock of sheep was in the pasture with the greenest
thickest grass and that there was clean water to drink nearby. This he learned to do for his sheep, but more
importantly, he was learning how to do this for his people.
In the same way, God takes care of
us. As we trust and believe in Him we
will find that our needs are being met.
Sometimes we don’t know how it happens, but it just does. I’ll give you an example. When I was a young wife learning to balance a
budget that involved other people, I would sometimes go too far in one
direction or another. By that I mean
that I might pay so much on all the bills that I would find that we had very
little left for food, or to buy gas for the car. Sometimes, though not often, it went the
other way, so we had money left over for things we needed, but then I’d get the
phone calls about how I had paid the bill, but not the entire amount required. Well, you know what I mean. ANYway, one month I paid everything in full and on
time. I was just beaming! My husband walked in the door and opened the
refrigerator and said, “Honey, what’s for dinner?” My eyes suddenly got very big . OOOPS!
I had forgotten about the groceries!
I didn’t remember that this would have been our week to shop! Well, I started scrounging around and I was
able to come up with something for that day.
It was Friday.
On Saturday after we finished our chores
around the house and yard we sat down to rest.
I began to pray. Worry was
creeping up in my spirit. Suddenly at
6:30pm our doorbell rang. I opened the
door and there stood some of our friends from church with trays of food! My mouth dropped open! I started to smile and hug them and then I
asked them what was going on. They told
me that their group had an event and had made too much food. It wasn’t enough to share with the 400 member
church and they couldn’t figure out what to do with it. Then one of them said, “Hey, how about our
friends? They live just down the street
and they have two small children. They
could eat off of these trays for almost a week!
They had covered the trays of food and come right down the street to our
house with them. GLORY!! God is
faithful. He knew I was going to make
that mistake before I made it. He had
created an over abundance of food, and then had put us on the minds of our
friends from church. We ate happily
every day for a week and we had left-overs.
There was even something different to eat everyday. Hallelujah!
The Lord is My Shepherd! I
shall not want.
God knows what we need. Matthew 6:31-33
31 Therefore
take no thought, saying, What shall we eat? or, What shall we drink? or,
Wherewithal shall we be clothed?
32 (For
after all these things do the Gentiles seek:) for your heavenly Father knoweth
that ye have need of all these things.
33 But
seek ye first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness; and all these things
shall be added unto you.
The next verse, verse 2 of
Psalm 23 says, ”He makes me to lie down
in green pastures.”
There are two things
happening here.
#1 – The shepherd knows when
it is time to rest and he stops the flock and causes them to rest. Parents and preschool teachers must ‘cause’,
or ‘strongly encourage’ their little ones to rest. Otherwise we end up with very cranky little
people who aren’t functioning at peak capacity.
God instituted a day of rest and called it the Sabbath. The word Sabbath, which is Shabbat in Hebrew,
means Holy day of rest. It is Saturday
and the 7th day of the week for the Jewish people. On this day the religious Jews rest and
reflect on the wonders of God.
For Christians, the Holy day
is Sunday because that is the day of the week when Jesus rose from the
dead.
Anyway, back to the
psalm. Rest is important. It’s so important that God made our bodies to
need and use rest at least once in a twenty-four hour period. Then He commanded us to rest on the Sabbath. The shepherd knows when that time is and he
or she, strongly encourages rest.
#2 “In Green Pastures”
green pastures are
relaxing. They have an aroma that is
soothing and a thick, lush carpet of grass is very soothing to lie down
on. Thank heaven that He didn’t say that
he makes us to lie down on the rocky shoals.
That would be miserable, and for some, I’ll include myself in that one,
it would be impossible. Once the sheep
have had enough rest, or maybe even during the time of rest, there is lunch freshly
laid out in front of you - lush green grass.
Once we are rested and our
stomachs are happy, we can move on and we are much more likely to be
cooperative about it. A good shepherd
knows those things about a flock. Good
parents and other awesome adults do, too.
#3 “He
leads me beside the still waters.”
Water is a necessary component of life.
We need it to survive. It is much
easier to drink from a slowly moving stream than from a rushing river. If you
get caught in a swiftly moving current, you are likely to be swept away. We’ve all seen white water rafting
competitions, (and if you haven’t, check one out on the internet so you’ll have
a visual reference). The people barely
have control of those rafts. If someone
or some creature was trying to cross rough white water, or even to stand in it,
chaos would ensue. It’s a dangerous thing
to do. Let me put it in terms of
today. When life is going along
smoothly, with only minor bumps or hiccups, like catching a cold, getting a
flat tire, etc, it’s easy to fix them and keep it moving. That’s like drinking from a bubbling brook,
or a shallow , slow moving, peaceful creek.
When chaos breaks down the door, ie… A major car wreck which totals your
car, or a job lay off with a pink slip, or the foreclosure of your home, that’s
when you’re in white waters. Which kind
of water would you rather walk in? Slowly
eating and enjoying my meal, while I slowly consume a beverage is more my
speed. I like “still waters”.
VERSE 3
“He restores my soul; He leads me in the paths of
righteousness for his name’s sake.”
While we all say that verse,
we hardly ever stop to think about what it really means.
Jehovah Shalom means the God
who s our peace. He restores or
refreshes my soul. He made us and
therefore He is the only one who can restore us fully or refresh us fully. His presence brings us peace. His promises bring us peace. That peace can release joy and
refreshing. When we are at peace, we
aren’t worried, or bothered, or angry, or frustrated. Being refreshed is like being made new. How many of us rush in our homes after a long
day outside, or after a game of tennis, or after a long trip in some vehicle
and jump into the shower? How about when
we run to a pool or the ocean on a 98 degree day and jump into the water? What about running into the shower as soon as
we get out of the sand and salty ocean water?
Why do we do that? It’s refreshing. It restores our sense of balance. It washes away much of the sand, silt, salt,
chlorine, dirt, sweat, anger,
frustration, weariness, and regret and it leaves us restored. Well, we can restore and refresh our skin and
hair, our outer shell, but only God can refresh and restore our soul. He washes it clean with his word and with
His presence. Once we have been with
the Lord in study, praise, prayer and worship, we are renewed. Usually after church on Sunday I feel
different. I fell lighter and
happier. Sometimes people tell me that
they would go into church with a weight and by the time they left, it felt as
though someone had removed a backpack full of bricks from their backs. He
restores my soul.
Line 3 & 4 of verse
3. “He
leads me in the paths of righteousness for his names sake.”
Jehovah M’Kaddesh –
God who makes us clean, righteous, sanctifies us, makes us holy.
A shepherd leads us in the
path that will refresh us and keep us safe and in line with what is right
because it’s for our own good. When a
shepherd takes good care of his flock, people look and say what a good shepherd
he is. They know that he can be trusted
with sheep. People will admire the
condition of his sheep. Likewise, when
outsiders look at the condition of God’s people, they should be able to say,
look at how their God watches over them and provides for them. That is his
name’s sake. His reputation is being
built on the condition of his people.
His name is at stake. No one
would want to join people who are following a God who allows them to starve, be
impoverished, or be brutalized. He is a
God who delivers us from evil, feeds us when we are hungry, clothes us even as
he does the flowers of the field, and gives us inner peace and rest as he
refreshes our souls.
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