The LORD Is My Shepherd

You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies. You 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.

Your words are life. So, god, in this moment, 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.

For this year, the last Sunday of every month, we've been taking a look at a different Psalm. The book of Psalms was the prayer book for the people of Israel. It has remained the prayer book for the church to this day. The Psalms are quoted more than any other book of the Bible in the New Testament. Jesus quoted from the Psalms more than any other book.

And, I mean, he literally bled the Psalms on the cross when he's trying to find the expression for what he is feeling, the prayers for how he is feeling. He would go to the Psalter. Tonight, we're gonna look at the most familiar and loved of all the Psalms, the 23rd Psalm. You can't even say Psalm 23. It's the 23rd Psalm.

It's likely that many of you memorize this as a child or at least remember this from childhood. I've used it at many funerals. As a matter of fact, I think every funeral I've ever done, I have read from this beautiful psalm. Interestingly enough though, if you go back and look at the early church, early church history, this psalm didn't have that much importance. It's never quoted in the New Testament.

It's not really referred to much by any of the early church fathers. It didn't have much prominence in church history. It's a fairly recent phenomenon. And I think this actually tells us a lot more about us than it does the song. There's there's something about us now in the way that we live in which we long for rest.

We long to be led. We we wanna be restored. The the idea of of being led to lay down in green pastures and and quiet streams. That just appeals to us in a way had not in past generations. And I think that says something about the way that we live. The Psalm begins by saying, the Lord is my shepherd. I shall not want. And the first three words there are really the key to the entire psalm. The Lord is. When King David wrote the Psalm, he didn't begin by saying, hey, let me tell you who I am.

Let me tell you what I do. He doesn't begin by saying, I am a king, therefore I shall not want. I am powerful, therefore I shall not want. I I have a good education. I'm a man of prestige. I rule. I live in a palace. I have lots of servants, therefore, I shall not want. He begins it by by pointing our attention on the lord. It is the lord is.

It's nothing to do with me. The lord is, and I shall, because of who the lord is. Once you put the lord before you, everything else falls into place, and everything falls into place for the rest of this song. David declares that the lord is his shepherd. And what he means by this is god is the one who nourishes his soul.

God's the one who watches over him, protects him, guides him, loves him. God is his shepherd. And because of this, he will not want. I probably need to explain what to not want means. And I think I need to do this because I know enough Christians who have really misunderstood what it means to not want.

I grew up in a traditional Southern Baptist church in which we sang. Every Day With Jesus is Sweeter Than the Day Before. You know, it was just the hymn you would always sing. Every Day With Jesus is sweeter than the day before. And I used to think that's what this this psalm is talking about.

That's what it means to I shall not want. But the problem is, every day with Jesus is not sweeter than the day before. It's a lie. Some Sundays, are awful for me. Like, as I'm trying to run around, I'm doing all these things, I'm like, this Sunday isn't as good as last Sunday.

And I'm sure for you, like, maybe you wake up on a Monday, and you're like, this is not as sweet as it was yesterday. So some days are just plain awful that they're not always sweeter than the day before. And so to not want to not want does not mean that you have to be happy all of the time. Or even that you have to love your life. Or that you have to try to never be disappointed, deny any kind of heartache.

That's not what it means. I know many Christians who live really in a constant state of denial. No matter what's going on in their life, I mean, they can have colic twin babies, you know, and a horrible job that they're just about to lose and a sinus infection. And I'll ask, you know, how are you doing? And they're like, great. Every day with Jesus is sweeter than before. I'm like, liar. Liar. You're you're you're not filled with the spirit. You're you're filled with delusion.

There there is no way that that that you're perfectly consent, and you're perfectly, just don't want anything to change. There's no way. David's Psalms are often filled with a deep hurt. He wrote far more songs of lament than he did of joy. More songs of grieving than he did of laughter. Often, his Psalms had him crying out, Lord, where are you? God, I hate this situation I'm in. I want to get out of this situation I'm in. When are you gonna come and deliver me? God, now's a good time to do it.

And he's crying out in his songs, and yet he still doesn't want. There was a lot in David's life he did not like. He lost his first wife. His first son died in infancy. One of his daughters was raped.

Another son was murdered. And so, for him to sing every day is sweeter than the day before would be delusional. That's not that's not what's going on here. To say that we do not want doesn't mean that we have to to deny bad things are happening to us or try to force a smile. To not want means that in whatever circumstance we do find ourselves in, we have this underlying contentment that's there in which we know god will carry us through.

It doesn't mean we we love, absolutely love, and would like to repeat every day of what's going on right now. That does not mean it. But it means that in the midst of this, we have a shepherd who we knew is know is gonna meet our needs. The rest of this psalm really unpacks what to not want looks like. Look at verses 23.

Says he makes me lie down in green pastures. He leads me beside still waters. He restores my soul, and he leads me in paths of righteousness for his name's sake. Now just a little full disclosure here. I know nothing about shepherding. I'm I'm I'm not a shepherd. I just want to put that out there. The information that I'm about to give you about shepherding is not firsthand knowledge. I've just had to read some things about shepherding. And so I did.

I've read a number of things about shepherding, and I found that 2 things are necessary. 2 things are necessary in order for sheep to lie down. And pretty much every little shepherd thing that I read had said that these two things are necessary. Because they don't just lie down any time or anywhere, the conditions have to be just right. And the two things are this.

They need to be well fed and they need to have all fear removed. So if they're no longer hungry and they are no longer scared, sheep will lie down. That's what David's talking about here. He said, you're not going to find contentment. You're not going to find rest until you're at a place where you are well fed and all fear is gone.

Only then can you rest. Now, shepherding in Israel, ancient Israel is a lot different than today. I think now, you know, you have large fences, fenced in fields in which sheep can just go graze. They didn't have that back then. There they had a pen that they would keep the sheep at night, but in the morning they will let the sheep out.

And the shepherd had to lead them to water. The shepherd had to lead them to a field. They couldn't they couldn't find grass on their own. They couldn't find water on their own. Have you ever looked at a sheep up close and personal?

I've lived about a year of my life in Ireland, and so I've I've looked at a sheep pretty closely and there is nothing behind those eyes. Nothing. They're the dumbest animals, and they'll starve to death unless the shepherd leaves leads them. You also don't ever hear people saying or see warning signs like, watch out for deadly sheep, you know, or like, you know, their fangs or their claws. They're defenseless.

They need somebody else to defend them. They need somebody to feed them. They have to have a shepherd or they will die. Well, the food that the lord gives us here and that David is talking about is his very word. The very word of the lord.

This is how we eat. Over and over again throughout the bible, god's word is described to us as food. It is sweeter than honey on our lips. It is described as bread nourishing our soul. And if you're having a hard time finding rest, it it might be because you're trying to eat food that the Lord is not giving you.

You're trying to eat some other type of food that you find, and so you're not finding any rest. You're eating, maybe at this field of performance or this field of comparison in which you think, alright. I'm doing alright. If I'm really performing well or if I compare myself and if you do those things, you feel content. But that won't last, and you're gonna keep trying to do it, trying to do it, and you're gonna still be hungry.

You're gonna wear yourselves out, and I can even look around here and I could tell some of you are like, I want rest. Man, the idea of laying down in green pastures is so appealing, and I'm not getting it. And likely, it's because you're eating food that the lord is not giving you. Listen to these words from Jesus, from John 6. He says, do not labor for food that perishes, but for food that endures to eternal life, which I will give you.

I am the bread of life. Whoever comes to me shall not hunger, and whoever believes in me shall not thirst. Later, he gets even more graphic. He says, truly, truly, I say to you, unless you eat the flesh of the son of man and drink his blood, you have no life in you. Whoever feeds on my flesh and drinks of my blood has eternal life.

And after Jesus said this, he said people took great offense at that, and actually, all of his disciples except for the 12 left. And even they were they're scratching their heads quite confused. But what Jesus was saying in very graphic terms is you want to be nourished. If you want something that's going to last, you don't go to another person, you don't go to your spouse, you don't go to your job, you don't work for those things because they perish. You come and you feast on me.

Feast on me. And when we look to the cross, we see real flesh, we see real blood that will sustain us. Some of you are so tired right now because you're eating other things. Well, being fed, well fed is one of the things necessary for us to lie down. The the second is to not have any fear.

Once again, look at verse 3. 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.

Now there's a number of things that need to be mentioned here. First off is that word restore. I love the word restore. I think everybody does. You know, I have I have hand lotion that that's supposed to restore my skin or, you know, you buy shampoo to restore your, I don't even know why, what needs restoring, but I like the idea of having my hair restored.

And he uses the word restore here, but it, it can mean a couple of different things. It can mean refresh, and it certainly means refresh, but it's also the same word that's used for repent. And I think we have both of these things in play here. When it says, He restores my soul. He's bringing refreshing as we are repenting.

These two things go together. That as we come to him, he leads us beside to these streams where we can be washed of our sin. If you remember, David was a pretty big time sinner. He, top of my head, committed adultery, committed murder. He blew it big time.

But you find in Psalm 51, when he looks at his condition, he's saying, like, he's just basically wasting away. Then he says that he he repents. He repents, and he says these things. He says that he he when he repented he was led to waters where he was washed. And then he says that his joy might be restored.

And his repentance brought a restoration of joy. It brought refreshment. That's what's being described here. The second thing that I should mention about this text is that, David is now being led on a path of righteousness and the word path there, is used to describe wagon ruts. And so he's being placed on these wagon ruts and the track is very clearly set for him now.

But look where it leads. After he repents, it doesn't lead to this really happy place. He goes to the valley of the shadow of death. And often, we assume that people are in these dark times because of their sin. David now is being led in there because of his repentance. He repents, but now he's being led into this dark time. And the phrase there, the shadow of death. It's really 2 Hebrew words combined. It's, it's death, darkness combined in one word. It's it's like this deathly darkness.

And I kept thinking every time I I would read this, I would think of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. That that's that's not it, but it's this dark, dark, evil situation that you find yourself in. This deathly darkness. The shadow of death. And so it's not just describing death.

Death is certainly something it's describing, but it's also describing any painful, hurtful time that you find yourself walking through. Times you maybe feel depressed, overwhelmed. And it's at this point, the Psalm takes a dramatic turn. And it couldn't be any more shocking. Because up to this point, the Lord has always talked about a third person.

The Lord is my shepherd. I shall not want. He makes me to lie down. And it's always a third person, but then darkness and suffering hits, and it changes to you. I will fear no evil because you are with me. And now, this this kind of And god begins walking him through these deepest dark times. Personally, you are with me. Because what happens in our darkest moments, we don't want some cold abstract theology. What we want is the presence of God. And he meets us here to walk with us.

And god's presence removes the one power that controls all of our lives. And that power is fear, and God's presence removes fear. I was thinking a lot about this this past couple of weeks. David does something here that, very few people do concerning their great fears in life. Everybody has fears.

If you don't, let me give you some. You fear if you're single that you're never going to get married, or perhaps that you're never gonna have children. Then you get married or you have children, then all of a sudden you're scared you're gonna lose them. Somebody told me, you've never really known fear until you've had children. And there's a lot of truth to that, that that fear.

You know, that that's happened to us. You know, when Georgia was born, we thought we were losing her. It happened one time with Caroline in which, we had to call an ambulance. She stopped breathing. And I remember holding her as she turned blue, and I was thinking she was dying.

I have never known such fear. And I just remember praying, God, I know you can, but don't. I know you can, but don't. It's the most scared I've ever been. What we have these fears, and if it's not fear of of losing a loved one, it's fear of losing a job, it's it's fear of losing a house, these these are fears.

Now, all of these things I just described are good things to be concerned about. It's not like I'm asking you just to deny that, you know, and every day is with Jesus, sweeter than before. It's all I'd like. Not even think about it. No.

These are good things to be concerned about. To be concerned whether you're in a loser house or not is a good thing. David was likely concerned about all those things, about family leaving him, deaths in the family, whether he's going to lose his palace or his position. But he never let those concerns turn into fear. They never crossed over.

They simply stayed concerns. And, he did that by by doing a pretty unique thing. You see, when, when we think about losing a wife or we think about losing a child, we try to talk ourselves out of it by saying, you know, that's never going to happen. I mean, the likelihood of that happening is just not going to happen. You know, and, no, I'm not gonna lose my job.

No. This isn't gonna fail. You know, I'm gonna work really hard and we and so we talk ourselves out of it. Or sometimes, we decide that, you know what? I'm just not I'm just not gonna think about it.

You know, you think about the death of a child and what would happen to you. You're like, mom, I can't even go there. But that's not what David does. David takes a different approach, and he does the exact opposite. Instead of saying, oh, this will never happen, or instead of saying, I can't even go there, he wills his mind to go there.

He says, okay. Let's imagine the worst. Let's imagine the worst. Let's imagine that I have to go through the valley of the shadow of death, that a deathly darkness has to surround me. And as he's imagining the darkest of times, it's like, but lord, you'll be with me.

You'll be with me. And and and you'll lead me through this. And it kills his fear. Not by ignoring it, not by saying, Oh, no, no, this is never going to happen. But by actually thinking about us is what, what would happen if this actually happened to me? Lord, you'd be enough. You really could carry me through. I've this is how it it hits me. I was a minister at a college ministry, UCF, for about 10 years. Now minister here.

And and when I was at UCF, I would have fears. You know, these underlying fears of, oh my gosh. What if nobody comes? What what if I find out I'm a horrible communicator? What if I can't make a living out of doing this? And you just have these fears and then, you know, come over here and start redeeming. Yet, you have the exact same fears that are there. And Lauren can have these fears as well. And I have found myself several times saying, Hey, Lauren, don't worry about that. No, no, no, no.

Things are, things are going to be okay. You know, things are gonna be absolutely fine. Or the best advice is always, hey, Lauren, don't worry about that. Like I could just command, don't worry. Okay. Thanks, husband. I am now no longer worried. You know, those are the worst things I can do as a husband. What what I should say is, you know, okay. I don't think that's gonna happen.

But you know what? Lauren, if it does, if, if everybody leaves, if I find I'm a horrible communicator, if we have to sell our house, we have to move someplace else. Have to get another job. If I have to do those things, don't you think the Lord is still enough for us? Don't you think it'll still carry us through? And we think, yes. And all of a sudden that kind of unknown fear I've embraced and God's already carried me through it. And fear no longer has a hold on me.

So here we see the second thing that was necessary for sheep to lie down in green pastures, and that's the absence of fear. In verse 5, David, once again, he gives us an image that's going to piece together those 2 things necessary in order for us to lie down being well fed and protected. And he does this in verse 5. Says, you prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies. And so, there it is.

He's being well fed, but there's enemies all around. There's still people who want to harm him. He's still in a terrible situation, but he says, you know what? I feel so secure, so protected. I can feast in this time and not worry.

He's safe enough to sit down and eat in front of his enemies. And his cup is so full of joy, it is overflowing. Then the Psalm ends with surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life, and I shall dwell in the house of the lord forever. David doesn't have to worry about wrath following him despite his sin. He knows that the mercy of God will follow him, and even in death, he will dwell in the house of the Lord forever.

Now this psalm, of course, points us to our lord Jesus, who is our shepherd. He's the one who feeds us. He's the one who protects us. I want you to turn to Mark chapter 6, where I think we really see this clearly. Jesus fulfilling this. It's one of my favorite texts. Mark chapter 6. As we look at the miracle of Jesus of feeding the 5,000, it's the only miracle that's recorded in all four gospels, so you should probably start. It's a pretty big one. And, let me begin on verse 31.

Says, and he said to them, come away by yourselves to a desolate place and rest a while. So, just right off the bat, this is what this is about. Okay? Follow me and I'm going to give you rest. The rest you're longing for.

Come and want to find a place to rest. For many were coming and going, and they had no leisure even to eat. And they went away in the boat to a desolate place by themselves. Now, many saw them going and recognized them, and they ran there on foot from all the towns and got there ahead of them. When he went to a shore, he saw a great crowd and he had compassion on them because they were like sheep without a shepherd.

Right there. So Jesus is is looking out. There's all of these people here and first thing he thinks is, these these are sheep. They they they're lost. They they they need a shepherd. He has great compassion on them, And all shepherd means in Hebrew is the feeder. And so, the very first thing he does is he begins feeding them. It says, and he began to teach. He began to teach them many things. And so, he's giving them the word of God.

You've come here. You want to find rest? You're like sheep without a shepherd. Well, let me be your shepherd. Let me give you my words to nurse you.

When it grew late, his disciples came to him and said, this is a desolate place and the hour is now late. Send them away to go into the surrounding countryside and villages and buy themselves something to eat. But he answered them, you give them something to eat. And they said to him, shall we go and buy 200 denari worth of bread and give it to them to eat? And he said to them, how many loaves do you have?

Go and see. And when they had found out, they said 5 and 2 fish. Then he commanded them all to sit down in groups on the green grass. I mean, right there, we went through Mark a number of months ago, the whole book of Mark, and I said that Mark never wastes a word. It's the shortest gospel. He is a very just kinda shoot straight and quick. Why say green? Why not they just lie down on the grass? But he says, no. They had them lie down on the green grass.

It's because he's trying to tell you something here. This is Psalm 23 being unfolded before you. The shepherd has come, and he's making now his people lie down in green pastures. And taking the 5 loaves and the 2 fish, he looked up to heaven and said a blessing and broke the loaves and gave them to his disciples to set before the people. And he divided the 2 fish among them all, and they all ate and were satisfied.

He prepares a table for them, even in the presence of their enemies. And they took up 12 baskets full of broken pieces of the fish. And those who ate the loaves were 5 1,000 men. It's interesting that Mark here uses men. He counts by men. He's not being sexist here. He's trying to make a point. The area where this miracle is happening was a hotbed for zealots. The Israelites, you know, they were under Roman oppression. They wanted to fight.

They wanted to get rid of this oppression, and this was where all the zealots were. And when Jesus goes out into the middle of nowhere, and all of a sudden, 5,000 strong abled men show up, what it's saying is, he's now got an army. He's got an army. And so now, he could go out, he could change the world, he can he can, overthrow all the oppression, he can conquer Rome, he could do all this, and notice how Jesus goes about changing the world. He doesn't come like this mighty warrior.

He comes as a shepherd. He says, this is what the world needs. This is how you change the world as you feed people the gospel. You feed sheep. You meet their physical needs, and you meet their spiritual needs. That that's that's how you bring out a revolution. That's how you change the world. That's how people can find true rest, and not just conquest. John chapter 10, Jesus says these words, that he is the good shepherd. The good shepherd who lays down his life for the sheep.

Jesus is the one who did not just walk through the shadow of death. He's the one who walked into death and came out victorious. Jesus didn't drink from the cup of joy. It wasn't overflowing. He drank from the cup of wrath that we might have our cup overflowing.

And it's on the cross that we see so beautifully goodness and mercy following us. When we see our shepherd laying down his life for the sheep, That's where we find rest for our souls, and we know that we will dwell in his house forever. And we wanna celebrate that tonight as we partake of the Lord's supper. We wanna remember the good shepherd who laid down his life for the sheep.