My wife and I attended the Grantham Church when I was in college. At that time the church was on the Messiah College campus. It was a great church. We heard strong biblical preaching each week, and the worship was structured to reinforce the sermon. The people of the church welcomed us as part of the body. We were commissioned as missionaries at Grantham when we went to join OM, on the ship Logos, in 1982, and we continued attending Grantham when we returned to the States two years later. We loved that church and would have stayed there if the Lord hadn’t led us in a different direction.
In the summer of 1986, we moved to Philadelphia, so I could begin the fall semester at Westminster Theological Seminary. I attended classes in the morning and worked as a security guard in the evening, on the 4-12 shift. Annie was at home with our two oldest sons, who were both under 2 years old. By the end of the first semester, I realized that if I continued in the direction I was going I would be unfit for ministry by the time I finished my program. I and Annie were both exhausted, and we were out of money, so I dropped out of seminary and applied to graduate schools. I quit my security job and started working in a warehouse loading trucks.
By late spring, things looked pretty bleak. I had been accepted into the graduate programs at University of Pennsylvania and Temple University, but we didn’t have any money and weren’t willing to go deeply into debt. In late May, it looked like I wouldn’t be going anywhere. We hated living in Philadelphia. And I hated my job; when my immediate supervisor learned that I had a college degree he got angry and couldn’t understand what I was doing loading trucks. We hadn’t yet found a church where we were comfortable, and we didn’t have any friends in Philadelphia. We had left Grantham several months earlier, believing that the Lord was leading us in a new direction, and now it seemed that He had just left us on our own. It seemed like He had taken us to Philadelphia and then deserted us.
That was how we felt at the end of May. Just a short time later, in early June, I received a letter from Temple University offering me a teaching assistantship, which would enable me to quit my job and attend school full-time in the Fall. This is an area where we often get into trouble as Christians. We go through dark times, times when it feels like God has deserted us. We obey His leading and find ourselves in difficulties that we wouldn’t have encountered if we’d gone our own way. The most dangerous thing, at a time like that, is to trust our feelings. God was with us, in the Spring of 1987, but it didn’t feel that way. He was doing things we weren’t yet aware of. He hadn’t deserted us. God was with us, even though we didn’t see His presence and couldn’t see what He was doing. That’s the message of Psalm 23: God is with us and is committed to taking care of us all through our lives, through all different kinds of experiences.
This psalm describes God with two pictures. In the early part of the psalm, verses 1-4, God is described as a Shepherd. And, in verses 5-6, He is pictured as a gracious host. But the main idea, all through the psalm, is that He is present with His people. The words, “for you are with me,” are at the precise center of the psalm. Excluding the superscription, “A Psalm of David,” which was written hundreds of years after the psalmist wrote this prayer, there are 26 words in Hebrew both before and after these words. Hebrew poets liked to play with words in that way, so it seems likely that the author of this psalm puts these words intentionally at the center as the way of giving them special emphasis (see James Limburg, Psalms, p. 74).
God often comforts and reassures His people by reminding them of His presence. Isaac, the son of Abraham, may have struggled with fearfulness. I’ve often thought so, reading the brief account of his life in Genesis. At one point, after an especially difficult time, God appears to him and says: “I am the God of your father, Abraham…. Do not be afraid, for I am with you and will bless you” (Genesis 26:23-24a, NLT). When everything was going wrong in Joseph’s life, the author of Genesis assures us: “The Lord was with Joseph and blessed him greatly as he served in the home of his Egyptian master” (Genesis 39:2, NLT). Later, after he’s been unjustly thrown into prison, the author says again: “But the Lord was with Joseph there, too, and he granted Joseph favor with the chief jailer” (v. 21). When Jeremiah was called to become a prophet, preaching a message which he knew would be unpopular, God reassured him with these words: “And don’t be afraid of the people, for I will be with you and take care of you” (Jeremiah 1:8). As he carried on his ministry, Jeremiah often didn’t feel like the Lord was with him. But he had this assurance from the beginning, and God was with him to the end, even during the dark times when he was ready to give up hope. Paul faced many difficulties during his ministry as an apostle; he was beaten with rods, flogged, shipwrecked; his ministry in Ephesus and Jerusalem led to riots. Most people would have given up in the face of such things. But while he was in Corinth, God reassured him: “One night the Lord spoke to Paul in a vision and told him, ‘Don’t be afraid! Speak out! Don’t be silent! For I am with you, and no one will harm you because many people in this city belong to me” (Acts 18:9-10, NLT). “I am with you.” That’s the thing this psalmist understands, and he puts it at the very center of the psalm, to give it prominence and emphasize it. God is with us and is committed to taking care of us all through our lives.
He reinforces this idea, in verses 1-4, by picturing God as a shepherd. Shepherds were responsible for the physical survival and welfare of the flocks under their care. One Bible dictionary points out that, “In comparison with goats, which tended to fend for themselves, sheep depended on the shepherd to find pasture for them.... Shepherds also had to provide shelter, medication, aid in lambing time, and provision for lameness and weariness. Without the shepherd the sheep were helpless” ISBE Revised, vol. 4, pp. 463-64). Sheep are dependent upon the shepherd. So the point, in verses 1-4, is that God is dependable. He is with us. He won’t desert us, because He is a good Shepherd, who cares for His sheep, knowing that they depend upon Him.
The psalmist lists some of the things that God, our Shepherd, does for us: 1) He leads us to refreshment and rest. Life in this world can be wearying. Sometimes we feel like we have been drained of all our resources, that we have nothing left to give. Our tendency, when we reach this point, is to draw back spiritually, to turn back to our own resources in search of replenishment. But when we do that, we usually find ourselves even more drained. That’s the effect vacations usually have on me; they leave me more tired than I was at the beginning. TV is the same way. It’s draining, not restorative. When we’re in need of restoration and rest, we need to turn to our great Shepherd, who will lead us beside quiet waters and restore our souls. A vacation may be part of what He uses to accomplish this, but it’s all centered in Him. We don’t take a vacation from Him, we find rest in Him.
2) Our Shepherd also leads us in the right way. He “guides me in paths of righteousness for his name’s sake.” When we depend on our own resources and wisdom we end up going the wrong way. Isaiah says “all we, like sheep, have gone astray.” We are in the habit of going astray, and we live in a world that tells us, over and over again, that this is the right way to go. So we need to turn continually to our great Shepherd for direction. We do that, primarily, by immersing our lives in His Word and in prayer.
3) Our Shepherd also keeps us safe during times of darkness. If you have an NIV Bible, you’ll notice that the translators have a footnote with an alternative translation of the words, “valley of the shadow of death.” The alternate translation is “the darkest valley.” The editors of the New Oxford Annotated Bible offer this translation: “valley of deep darkness.” The New American Bible reads, “Even though I walk in the dark valley I fear no evil.” This is a more common translation of the words in verse 4. For example, Psalm 44:19: “But you crushed us and made us a haunt for jackals and covered us over with deep darkness.” Or Isaiah 9:2: “The people walking in darkness have seen a great light....” Why is this important? The psalmist isn’t only talking here about times when we’re facing death. This world is full of darkness, because it’s under the shadow of death. Our times of darkness are connected with the reality of death in this world. He’s saying that God is with Him during all the dark times of life, those times when we think we’ve lost our way, when we feel like God has deserted us. At all those darkest times of life, God our Shepherd is with us, even though we don’t feel His presence.
Abraham Kuyper was the prime minister of Holland, the founder of the Free University of Amsterdam, and he was also a theologian and a preacher. The first serious theological book I ever read was his book, The Work of the Holy Spirit. I was a fairly young Christian, and I felt guilty reading it. Everything I’d heard about theologians was bad; I’d heard that they weren’t interested in living as true Christians but were only concerned with arguing and studying about insignificant details. I’d heard that Theology was irrelevant and divisive. But I forced myself to keep going, and I learned that the things I’d been told were false. Here’s something I read in that book, on the work of the Holy Spirit as Comforter: “Comfort is a deposited treasure from which I can borrow; it is like the sacrifice of Christ in whom is all my comfort, because on Calvary He opened to all the house of Israel a fountain for sin and uncleanness. But a comforter is a person, who, when I can not go to the fountain nor even see it, goes for me and fills his pitcher and puts the refreshing drops to my burning lips” (vol. 3, ch. 22). When we’re walking through the valley of deep darkness we can’t see where we’re going and we lose sight of God’s precious promises. We don’t know where to turn for comfort. But we’re not on our own. The Comforter goes to the fountain for us, fills His pitcher, and brings us the refreshment we so desperately need.
There is a great example of this from the life of Jeremiah. In the book of Lamentations, he is grieving over the fall of Jerusalem. The temple has been destroyed, and the people have been deported to Babylon. God's people have been subjected to terrible suffering and cruelty at the hands of the Babylonians. In chapter three we find him at the end of himself. "I have been deprived of peace; I have forgotten what prosperity is. So I say, `My splendor is gone, and all I had hoped from the Lord'" (vv.17‑18). He is overwhelmed with grief, and has given up hope even in God. Then, three verses later, he says this: "Yet this I call to mind, and therefore I have hope; Because of the Lord's great love we are not consumed, for his compassions never fail. They are new every morning; great is your faithfulness" (vv.21‑23). What brought about this change? Why did he call these things to mind? Was Jeremiah capable of reviving himself at this point? No, he was experiencing the work of the Comforter. The Holy Spirit has reminded him of the truth and has renewed his hope. The psalmist, in verse 4, is saying the same thing. God, our great Shepherd, is with us when we go through times of darkness. We’re not on our own, and even when we lose sight of the truth, even when we lose hope, He comforts us with his rod and staff as our Shepherd. We are helpless without Him, like sheep without a shepherd. But He has promised to be with us always, even to the end of the age.
In verses 5-6, the psalmist uses another image: he pictures God as a gracious Host showing hospitality to His people. Despite the peacefulness and confidence of this psalm, it’s clear that the author is not experiencing easy times. He’s weary and in need of rest and refreshment; he’s going through a dark valley; and even in verse 5, when he’s experiencing God’s gracious hospitality, there are enemies present. God is with him and is committed to caring for him all through his life, but that doesn’t keep him from experiencing difficulties.
The psalmist says three things in verse 5, all of which revolve around the comfort he finds in worship: 1) “You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies.” God is giving him good things in the midst of his difficulties. His enemies have only evil in mind, but God is there, doing good things for him. That enables him to keep going. His enemies are speaking evil of him, telling lies about him, but God is blessing him in their presence, showing that He rejects their assessment of him. 2) “You anoint my head with oil.” In Scripture, oil is a symbol of God’s spirit, and the anointing oil was used to set a person apart as a priest. “There is a quality of warmth and ease in God’s community which contrasts with the icy coldness and hard surfaces of people who jostle each other in mobs and crowds. But more particularly here the oil is an anointing oil, marking the person as a priest.... When we see the other as God’s anointed, our relationships are profoundly affected” (A Long Obedience, pp. 174-75). The psalmist is anointed with the oil of the Holy Spirit, and he is part of a community of other people who have this same anointing. He doesn’t speak directly about the community of God’s people here, but the anointing was something that took place in the temple, with the community gathered. He’s assuming a context of corporate worship. The table God prepares is not for him alone; it’s for him as part of the body. It’s in the context of corporate worship that he experiences this refreshment, in company with others who have also experienced the anointing of God’s Spirit. 3) “My cup overflows.” Listen to this invitation that Jesus gave: “‘If anyone is thirsty, let him come to me and drink. Whoever believes in me, as the Scripture has said, streams of living water will flow from within him.’ By this he meant the Spirit, whom those who believed in him were later to receive” (John 7:37-39). When we come to Jesus, as part of His body, He pours out His Spirit upon us, and we’re able to say, with the psalmist, “my cup overflows.” He prepares a rich feast for us, in the presence of our enemies.
But it’s never enough merely to experience comfort in the present. We need assurance of God’s gracious care in the future, and we need to know that life will not always be what it is now. We won’t always be going through times of deep darkness which threaten to overwhelm us. We won’t always be living in the midst of enemies. The psalmist takes comfort in the gracious care he’s experienced from God, and it enables him to say this about his future: “Surely goodness and love will follow me all the days of my life, and I will dwell in the house of the Lord forever.” Listen to how this verse reads in The Message: “Your beauty and love chase after me every day of my life. I’m back home in the house of God for the rest of my life.” Often the Psalmists complain of enemies pursuing them. But here the image is reversed. Goodness and mercy, beauty and love, are chasing after him, and they’ll continue to pursue him all through his life.
Psalm 27, another psalm attributed to David, expresses this longing: “One thing I ask of the Lord, this is what I seek: that I may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life, to gaze upon the beauty of the Lord and to seek him in his temple.” He longs to know God and to worship in His temple, and this is the thing he pursues: a life centered around the reality of God’s presence. In Psalm 23, he is the one being pursued. God’s Word calls us to seek and to hunger after Him. But it doesn’t depend on our seeking. We get distracted and lose our way in the darkness. We go off on tangents. We get sick, and we don’t have the energy to order our lives the way we want to. But He is seeking us, as our Shepherd. He pursues us, to invite us to the great feast at His table.
Matthew, in his gospel, quotes from the book of Isaiah, to show that Jesus’ birth was in fulfillment of Old Testament prophecy: “All this took place to fulfill what the Lord had said through the prophet: ‘The virgin will be with child and will give birth to a son, and they will call him Immanuel’–which means, ‘God with us’” (Matthew 1:22-23). That’s the meaning of Jesus’ Incarnation: “God is with us.” At the end of the same gospel, after giving the Great Commission, commanding the apostles to make disciples of all nations, Jesus gives this promise: “And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age” (Matthew 28:20). That’s the thing I forgot in the spring of 1987. God is with us, even during those dark times when everything is going wrong and we can’t feel His presence.
God, our Shepherd, won’t keep us out of the valley of deep darkness, but He will walk through it with us and His rod and staff will comfort us, often without our awareness of what is going on. We’ll feel like we’re on our own, like He’s deserted us and is no longer blessing us as He has in the past. But somehow we’ll get to the other side of the valley and we’ll find that He was there all the time, and that we’ve gotten through only by His help. He is with us, watching out for us, carrying us when our faith is weak, seeking us when we lose our way, refreshing us with His presence at the times we least expect it.
In the light of all this, let’s make it our aim to walk with Him, whatever else is going on in our lives. Pray this Psalm regularly. It would have helped me, in the spring of 1987, to have been praying this Psalm, but it never occurred to me to do so. Praying the Psalms would have reminded me of the truth at a time when I was floundering. Pray this psalm, along with the rest of the psalter, and immerse yourself in God’s Word, reminding yourself often of God’s promises to be with His people. And be regular in corporate worship; when we gather together as God’s people to worship, we’re anticipating the worship we’ll experience around God’s throne in heaven. Even more, we’re taking part in the worship that is happening right now before God’s throne. The refreshment that God gives us when we gather in His presence anticipates the Marriage Feast of the Lamb: “Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and there was no longer any sea. I saw the Holy City, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride beautifully dressed for her husband. And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, ‘Now the dwelling of God is with men, and he will live with them. They will be his people and God himself will be with them and be their God. He will wipe every tear from their eyes. There will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away.’ He who was seated on the throne said, ‘I am making everything new!’ Then he said, ‘Write this down, for these words are trustworthy and true’” (Revelation 21:1-5). This is what we have to look forward to, and our great Shepherd is caring for us, watching over us, until we arrive safely in His presence. Let’s make it the main business of our lives to walk with Him.
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