Digging into Psalm 23

 

Human beings seem to never be content. No matter how much they "have," they always seem to want more. You'd think that with all of the creature comforts and high standards of living that we enjoy, that we'd be contented. 

But we're not. We find evidence for this in our constant striving for more things and more money. People today never feel like they have enough money, yet they spend it constantly for the newest and most innovative, interesting things. How many people today are living on credit, because they simply MUST have this particular bauble? How many people, too, are living in conflict and stress because of human beings' insatiable lust for sex? How many people are just plain restless all the time? Even many believers are not content - we join unbelievers in lines at the bookstores and listen avidly to podcasts - seeking self-help and psychotherapy that promises to assuage our inner turmoil.

But I seem to recall in our study of II Peter, that God has provided us with everything pertaining to life and to godliness . . . 

for His divine power has granted to us everything pertaining to life and godliness, through the true knowledge of Him who called us by His own glory and excellence. (II Peter 1:3, NASB)

David, the shepherd-king, shows us in Psalm 23 the musings of a contented heart. Our relationship with God is compared to that of a contented, well-cared for sheep. It would have been a familiar analogy in David's day......but many of us have never "met" a sheep or a lamb outside of a petting zoo! It's lucky for us that so many pastors and preachers have studied and spoken and wrote about this psalm. Their consensus is that contentment comes from experiencing all that our Father God, our Good Shepherd, has provided for us.

I reckon it's pretty important -- that first step to contentment is right out there in the open. Easy to see:

The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want. (Psalm 23:1, KJV)

The key to "not wanting" is to have the Lord as our Shepherd. Many people hear this at funerals. Or they hear it recited or as a responsive reading in church. It's very familiar; it's very soothing. But if we don't know the Lord as our personal Shepherd, it is also very meaningless. 

Do you feel I'm being too harsh?

Jesus made it clear that His being a Shepherd was not a blanket truth that applied to everyone. Not every person has Jesus Christ as his or her personal Shepherd. Remember when some of our Savior's opposition said, "If you are the Christ, tell us plainly"? Remember what Jesus told them?

 Jesus answered them, “I told you, and you do not believe. The works that I do in My Father’s name, they bear witness of Me. 26 But you do not believe, because you are not of My sheep, as I said to you. 27 My sheep hear My voice, and I know them, and they follow Me. 28 And I give them eternal life, and they shall never perish; neither shall anyone snatch them out of My hand. (John 10:25-28)

So, according to our Savior, the way to become one of His sheep is to hear His words, to understand them as verified in the things He did, and to believe by following Him.  Always at the core of what Jesus taught and did was the cross - where He took our penalty for our sins. Kinda makes sense that Psalm 23 follows Psalm 22, no? In Psalm 22, we studied our Messiah, forsaken of God as He bore the heavy weight of our sins on the cross.  It's only AFTER that that we read about the Lord being our kindly, caring Shepherd. We must believe in Him as our substitute, God's Son as sacrifice, before we can know Him as our Shepherd Who meets our every need. 

If we know the Savior of Psalm 22, and we trust in His death on the cross for us, and then we are seeking to follow Him, we can say with David, "The Lord, the covenant-keeper, the faithful God, is my Shepherd."

Phillip Keller, in his book, A Shepherd Looks at Psalm 23, tells of a shepherd who kept flocks next to his own. To say that the man was an indifferent shepherd would be to put it mildly. He showed no concern for his flock, and considered them to be just a bunch of dumb animals fit for slaughter. He didn't work on keeping his fields lush and growing, so that they would be well-fed -- in fact, this indifferent shepherd's fields were brown and impoverished, with insufficient shelter to protect them from storms, and with muddy, polluted water to drink. In their weak and sickly condition, they were easy prey for dogs, cougars, and rustlers. Phillip would often see them huddled in groups, staring blankly at the beautiful green pastures where he kept his own flocks. They are a picture of those who are in bondage to sin.

I heard once of a little girl who had tried to memorize Psalm 23:1 in Sunday School, but misquoted it as "The Lord is my Shepherd; I've got all I want."

Well, she actually got it right! If we have the Lord as our Good Shepherd, we can truly say, "I've got all I want." The first step to contentment is to know that the Lord Jesus Christ is our personal Shepherd.