He Restores My Soul

Perhaps you're in a family that does not, nourish your faith. Anyway, we wanna take time to pray for you. We really appreciate all of our college students coming. And I want you to to hear me say, just on behalf of all the pastors and staff here, we love that you have chosen to make Redeemer your home during the time that you're at school. And we want to shepherd and pastor you well, And we want to pray for you.

And so if you are one of our college students, would you stand where you are right now? And I think we'll have a number of them. And church, would you, pray with me for our students? Our father, we thank you for these young men and women here. We thank you that you have brought them to this church, or that they come here to worship you, to learn from your word, to be shaped and filled by your holy spirit, to be sent out and used among their friends in the world.

And, Lord, as they go back home to their family, we ask that you would bless them. May they enjoy their family during this time. For those who are going to, maybe, family who, who don't know you, maybe as parents who don't know you or siblings who don't know you, Lord, I pray that you would fill each one of these students with your word and with your spirit, and and that they would be bold in the proclamation of the gospel, before their family. May their family notice a change in them, something that cannot be explained other than God. And Lord, we ask that you would bring them safely back to us in a couple of months.

I look forward to hearing all the different ways that you have used them. Lord, we pray that you would bless them as they go. We pray this in the strong name of Jesus. Amen. Amen.

Thank you, guys. As you also realize that as it gets colder, we're losing some of our body heat, okay, from here as, so many of our college students, will be leaving. If you have a Bible, I invite you to turn to to Psalm 23. Psalm 23. This is a Psalm, perhaps, you don't even need to turn to in your bible, because maybe you know it by heart.

The 23rd Psalm. It's it's one that many of us grew up hearing. And one of the reasons I thought we would look at this Psalm, actually for two reasons. 1, its main theme is about restoration and how the Lord restores our soul. And when I look around, I see a lot of people who need some restoring, need some rest.

And the second is this, it's really a great summary of the lives of Elijah and Elisha. Really as you go through the Psalm, you can place different events from from Elijah and Elijah throughout the entire Psalm. And so you have things like, you know, the Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want. Elijah did not want. He was he was fed by the ravens.

He was led to the still waters at the brook of Cherith. His soul was restored, if you remember, by the angel coming and and feeding him and giving him rest. The rod and the staff of the Lord comforted him. Remember when he was in the valley, and the enemy's army was surrounding him. Yet he did not fear because the Lord was with him.

And so as we went through that that story, I kept thinking of Psalm 23 over and over. And I thought it would be a great conclusion to that study. So Psalm 23. I'll read the entire psalm. The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want. He makes me lie down in green pastures. He leads me beside still waters. He restores my soul. He leads me in paths of righteousness for His name's sake. Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for You are with me.

Your rod and your staff, they comfort me. You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies. You anoint my head with oil. My cup overflows. Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life, and I shall dwell in the house of the Lord forever. This is the word of the Lord. Pray with me. Father, we thank you for your shepherding over us. How you watch over us. You care for us.

You protect us. And I pray pray that during this time, you would reveal even more of who you are to us. You'd write those things on our hearts. May we find our rest in you. I pray that my words would fall to the ground and blow away and not be remembered anymore.

But Lord, may your words remain, and may they change us. We pray this in the strong name of Jesus. Amen. So as you heard those words of Psalm 23, I bet for many of you, you were transported back to another time and place. Perhaps it was back to when you were a kid, maybe at a summer VBS, forced to memorize those words.

And then to do you know a craft with some cotton balls and some clothes pins, and and to make a sheep. Perhaps you were transported back to your old church, sitting there in that wooden pew listening to your pastor talk about all the different ways that shepherds take care of their sheep. Perhaps you were transported back to a graveside, and you heard those words being spoken over you, giving you comfort in the midst of grief. This is a psalm that has stood the test of time, not just 3000 years of time from when it was written, but it is stood the test of your time, your life. I believe that one of the reasons that we find ourselves continually drawn to this Psalm is because of our need for rest.

We never outgrow our need to be restored and to find rest. We long for it. I mean, especially now, I mean, in in 2,020, I mean, if if 2,020 hasn't taught us anything, it's it's this, it's revealed to us we desperately need rest. My email box is literally full of emails from weary souls, longing, longing to have the the burdens take on them, longing to no longer feel fatigued. How do we find it?

If you were to go to my house, and many of you have been, if you looked in our backyard, you'll remember that we have a hammock that's set up back there. It sits in the shade of a tree, in between 2 flower beds. It's picturesque. It's absolutely gorgeous back there. And every day when I look out my kitchen window, I see it.

And my thought is this, someday, Someday I'm actually gonna lay down in that hammock. Someday I'm I'm going to rest there because you see, I don't actually ever use the hammock. It's purely just eye candy there. It's just, it's just something I look at and it's a symbol of rest. When I look at it, I hope to someday find rest, but I don't actually ever rest in it.

And I don't think I'm alone in this. Every day I drive by some of the most beautiful homes and and yards in Birmingham, and in many of these yards, you find some kind of, you know, garden bench there, or you find some Adirondack chairs there. And it just looks so inviting. And can I say, in over 20 years of driving through these neighborhoods, I have never once seen anyone sitting in them? Ever.

Those aren't for you to actually sit into rest in, they're they're just a symbol of rest. They just present the beauty of rest, the hope of rest, but they don't actually provide rest for anyone. And I'm sure people are looking outside their kitchen windows at those things and thinking, someday, someday. Now if we are not careful, Psalm 23 will be the exact same thing for us. Psalm 23 and even the gospel itself will become a symbol of the rest we all long for, but we actually don't go and find rest there.

Day after day, we look at it. We can even describe the beauty of the gospel, but we don't rest in it someday. Well can I just say in the midst of a pandemic and social unrest and an election year and and who knows next year or next month, plagues of locusts or, I don't know, murder hornets, whatever it is, Today's the day to find rest? Now we obviously don't have time to walk through this whole Psalm. So what I want to do is just remind us of a few of its truths.

Really, give you a few invitations, a few places, if you will, for you to come and to sit and to rest. So the first is this. It's the opening line. The lord is my shepherd. And really it's the first three words of this psalm that, that are the key to understanding the the rest of it. And that is the lord is. The Lord is. David begins this Psalm by reminding himself of who the Lord is, not who he is. He does not say, I am a wealthy king, I shall not want. I am a mighty warrior, I shall not fear.

No. He realizes that who he is doesn't really matter. You know, when we are in a crisis, though, our first instinct is often to take inventory of our own strengths, our own resources, and we think things like this. I have a good career. I shall not want.

I am young and healthy, I shall not fear. I make good grades in my 401k, they comfort me. But none of these things ultimately matter. There are 2 certainties in life, 1 is that your circumstances will change, and the other is this, the Lord never changes. Those are the only things you can be certain of in this life.

And if this pandemic has taught us anything, is that all of life can change in a moment. The things that you thought were so secure, so safe, you could build your whole life on were literally flipped upside down within a week's time. So David, he begins his psalm with not remembering who he is, but who the Lord is. When our minds are flooded with all the what ifs out there, what if the economy doesn't recover? What if I don't like the changes that the new administration is going to bring in?

What if I get bad news from the doctor? What if my children can't cope well with everything going on, or or don't do well in school? Or what if they cancel school for my kids? I can't go back to home schooling. What if? What if those things happen? Can I say, if your mind is flooded with all the what ifs, put those aside and focus on the I am's? Focus on who God is. He never changes. And he's the starting place for rest.

And what is the Lord? Well we find out here, he is our shepherd, which means he's the one who feeds us. He's the one who watches over us. We are completely safe and content in His presence. Or in other words, we shall not want.

Now the shall not want does not mean that we are happy all of the time, or that we we don't ever go through disappointment. I think a lot of Christians have misunderstood what it means to shall not want over the years. I grew up in a church singing, every day with Jesus is sweeter than the day before. Lies. I don't know whoever whoever wrote that song never experienced 2020.

Okay, because every day has not been sweeter than the day before. It just keeps getting more and more awful. And sometimes that's just life, things are terrible. That's not what it means to shall not want. There were a lot of things in David's life that he would have never chosen, that he absolutely did not like.

King David, who wrote this, he lost his first wife. He also lost his first son who died in infancy. 1 of his daughters was raped. Another one of his sons was murdered. Often he was on the run because the government wanted him dead.

Now if just one of those things had happened to him, you would have thought that's a hard life. But for all of those things to happen, this is a man who experienced a whole lot of hurt in his life, and yet he still could write, I shall not want, or I'm content, or it is well with my soul. Because underneath it all, there was this peace and this security of knowing that God was in control. God was sovereign over his entire life. God was his shepherd.

If you want rest for your weary soul, the starting place is realizing that God is sovereign over your entire life. He watches over you and cares for you. He is your shepherd. This is why in Philippians, we can read the apostle Paul, He him saying that he is content in every situation. Content in every situation.

It's not because he had a great life. I mean, not unless you count imprisonment, stoning, beating, a 139 lashes to be a great life. No. He just knew in the midst of all of it, the Lord was sovereign and the Lord was shepherding him, and he rested in God's care. Alright.

So the first thing that we hear is that the Lord is our shepherd. But what does the shepherd do for his sheep? Well, we read that the shepherd makes the sheep lie down in green pastures. Full disclosure here. I'm I'm not a shepherd.

Not only am I not a shepherd, I don't really know anything about shepherding. Everything I know about shepherding and by everything, I mean, everything I know about shepherding shepherding has come from the internet. Alright. So this might be fake news, I have no idea, but, from what I could read, I think I got sources we could trust. So according to Wikipedia, alright?

Unless you have, you know, alter things. A sheep needs at least these two things. The these are the 2 most important things that a sheep requires in order to actually lay down. Sheep don't naturally just lay down. 2 things are required.

Actually, 2 things need to be removed. Their hunger needs to be removed, and their fear needs to be removed. Hunger and fear must be removed in order for the sheep to lie down. Because it makes sense. If a sheep is hungry, it's gonna keep standing and grazing and wandering around trying to find food.

Or if a sheep is scared, is fearful of wolves or lions, well, it's going to stand alert. So those fears must be removed. So to be able to lie down in a pasture means the shepherd has removed those fears. So let's look at both of them. Our shepherd removes our hunger by feeding us with his word. This is what we are to eat over and over again throughout scripture. God is He describes his word to us as food. His word is honey on our lips. It's bread for our souls. His word is what nourishes us.

And so the question is this, is this what you have been consuming this past year? Because what I have seen in the last 8 months, is that instead of us being well fed and having our fears removed, Christians have just been feeding our fears. We're consuming the wrong things. Saint Augustine, he he said, I have read in Plato and Cicero sayings that are both wise and very beautiful, but I have never read in either of them. Come to me all who are weary and heavy laden and I will give you rest.

Over these last 8 months, I have read many things. I have consumed many things, articles about how effective masks are, about how how droplets, you know, COVID droplets move through a room, you know, you you study the diagram, you you look at the air in takes of your buildings. I've read articles about that, articles about how long COVID can remain active on different surfaces. I have gained a whole lot of information, but I haven't gained a drop of rest. Not at all.

Over the last 8 months, I've read books on race, numerous articles on social injustice, but none of them have provided me rest. I have watched the news about the election, both Fox and MSNBC, so I'm covered. Alright. And I've read many emails forwarded to me by concern people about what's happening politically, but I've yet to read anything that has given me rest. Only fear.

I've gone to Instagram and to Facebook and should've known better. I mean, you can just scroll all day long, but you will never find rest for your soul. Yet Christians consult Facebook twice as often as they consult their Bibles. We long for rest. And we know that in order for rest, we have to have our hunger satisfied, but we keep going to the wrong things and consuming them.

And can I, just for a minute, just call a spade a spade? Some of you are absolutely addicted to the latest news feed or addicted to social media. You've moved way past, I just need to be informed. You've moved way past that and you just want to get your next fix. You've become a full blown addict, endlessly scrolling, lying to yourself, saying that the next bit of information is finally gonna give you comfort.

And you can't rest. You are consuming the wrong things. We live in a culture where I am certain more Christians can quote the first and second amendments than the first and second commandments. We are being discipled by the wrong things. And we wonder why we don't feel safe or we can't find rest.

Saint Augustine, once again, he said, our hearts are restless until they find rest in Christ. Now for some of you, it's been so long since you've gone to God's word. You you don't even know where to start. You don't even know how to start. Can I just encourage you, maybe maybe this week, fast from all the other things you've been eating?

Consuming all those articles, social media, all those news feeds. Maybe you could fast from that and pick up the gospel of John and just slowly read through it and see if you don't find rest for your soul. Okay. So we need to have our hunger removed. Next, we need to have our fears removed.

We need to feel safe. A sheep will not rest unless they feel completely safe. Now our safety does not come, if you notice here, does not come from the removal of enemies. It comes from the presence of our shepherd. Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for you are with me.

Of course, this is what we saw last week when we looked through, you know, the studied Elisha as he walked out of his house all alone and he confronted an entire army. How could he do that? Because he realized he wasn't alone. His fears were removed. The Lord was with him.

And notice here, you know, every commentator points this out. But that in this Psalm, David moves from talking about God to talking to God. He moves from the 3rd person to the second person here. When we walk through the valley, when we go through times of persecution, times of suffering, we cease to talk about God in the abstract, and instead we just start talking to God. We begin praying to him.

I will fear no evil for now you are with me. And then he prepares a table for us in the presence of our enemies. Think about that. Sheep surrounded by wolves and lions, yet they are so comforted by the presence of their shepherd, they will lay down and eat. Yet the enemy never goes away.

The enemy never goes away. We do not wait for our enemies to leave before we take rest. We do not wait for the pandemic to go away. We do not wait for the election to be settled. We do not wait for the recession to end.

We don't wait for whatever thorn it is in our side to be removed. No. We rest in the presence of our enemies. When my children were little and they would get scared, they'd come over and they'd try to get as close to me as possible. Often, they would just, you know, parents who know this, they just grab onto your leg, kinda get behind you and just grab onto your leg.

And then they'd feel comforted. Not because the scary thing went away, but because they were so near to their protector. They no longer had to fear. And we do the same with the Lord. Often he's not gonna remove that enemy from your life, but what he's gonna do is he's going to remove your fear of that enemy through his presence.

Hear me, Christians. As children of God, we fear nothing. We fear absolutely nothing. And the reason we don't fear anything is because of the gospel by which we are saved by. That's the ultimate safety we find is through the gospel.

Jesus, he says he is the good shepherd. He's actually the the one that David is talking about. He is the good shepherd, and he laid down his life to protect his sheep. He laid down his life, so that we might lay down in green pastures. And if you are not laying down in green pastures, you don't believe He laid down His life for you.

We're to rest in the gospel before us. And Jesus gave his life to protect us from something far greater than wolves or lions, or anything else we might face. At the cost of his life, he has protected us from the greatest enemies out there, sin and death itself. We are no longer stalked by those old enemies. They have actually been replaced.

They no longer stalk and follow us. Instead, we find surely goodness and mercy shall follow us, Not sin and death all the days of our life. Goodness and mercy are now hunting us down. Do you believe that? Do you feel that?

That goodness and mercy are running after you trying to catch you that that when you fall goodness and mercy bump up to you and help you back up. That's the good news of the gospel. It's why we don't fear. Jesus is our good shepherd. Now the question is this, is he just the hammock that you're going to look at, or is he gonna actually be the person you go to and find rest?

Rest for your weary soul. Come to Jesus, all who are weary and heavy laden, and he will give you rest. Pray with me. Father, forgive us for consuming so many other things, but neglecting true food. We eat the bread of anxious toil, and then we wonder why we have anxiety.

Forgive us for trusting in things that will perish and then we wonder why we are fearful. Lord, I pray that we would run. Run to our Good Shepherd, knowing that your presence is all we need to lie down and be restored. And I pray that during this time, you would do that, Jesus. It's your name we pray. Amen.