The LORD Is My Shepherd

The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not be in want.

He makes me lie down in green pastures, he leads me beside quiet waters, he restores my soul.

He guides 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 love will follow me all the days of my life, and I will dwell in the house of the Lord forever. (NIV84)

Have you heard about Shrek the sheep? I’ve told some of you this story before. It’s a true story. I saw it on Facebook! There’s a sheep named Shrek who lives in the mountains of New Zealand. For some reason, Shrek the sheep wandered off from his flock years ago and lived by himself for years. Finally, after six years, his shepherd found him again. Can you guess what Shrek looked like? One really big ball of wool. A sheep living on its own for six years grows a lot of wool!

So what did his shepherd do? He wasn’t upset. He gently brought Shrek home. Then he sheared him. He cut off all that extra wool. Do you know how much wool that one sheep was carrying around? Sixty pounds of wool! Can you imagine that? Walking around every day with sixty pounds of wool hanging on you, holding you down, covering your eyes… What a burden! Do you know how long it took the shepherd to shear it all off? 28 minutes. Six years of burdens gone in just 28 minutes. Imagine having that weight lifted off your back. Shrek was one happy sheep!

Do you know why I’m telling you about Shrek the sheep? Because that’s how you look today. Don’t get me wrong, you look great! There’s no problem with your hair. But I know that on the inside, you’re carrying a lot of burdens. Worries. Guilt. Tension… Shrek’s not the only one weighed down by a lot. Weary and burdened? Is that how you feel? You need a shepherd!

“The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not be in want.” The Bible tells us that Psalm 23 was written by David—King David. David understood what he was talking about when he called God a “Shepherd.” Know why? Can you remember what David’s job was before he became king? A shepherd! As David had watched his sheep day after day, he noticed, “Those sheep are kind of like people. Vulnerable. Wandering. Helpless… Sheep.” But it didn’t stop there. David couldn’t help but notice that God is kind of like a shepherd. Always there. Sacrificing. Protecting. Guiding. Saving. I wonder if one day it just hit him: “The Lord is a Shepherd—kind of like me!”

But David added one little word—“my.” The Lord isn’t just a Shepherd. He’s my Shepherd. That one little word—“my”—makes all the difference. David didn’t just realize that people are like sheep. He was a sheep. David wandered. David sinned. David was helpless and vulnerable and weak. So God wasn’t just a Shepherd for some people over there. “The Lord is my Shepherd.”  When that hits home, if the Lord really is my Shepherd, what also has to be true? “I shall not be in want.” There’s a little equation that’s really helped me in life: Jesus + nothing = everything! The Lord is my Shepherd, and if God is my Shepherd, there is nothing more that I need.

So why don’t we believe that? “What do you mean,” you say. “We all believe that!” “The LORD is my shepherd, I shall not be in want.” Then why are we often so anxious and afraid? Why do we act as if we’re in control of our lives? Sometimes the most well-known words of the Bible are the hardest to believe. If we truly believe that the LORD is our Shepherd, why don’t we trust in the LORD for everything? If we truly believe that the LORD is our Shepherd, why do we think there are so many other things we need? Sometimes the most well-known words of the Bible are the hardest to believe. Today, let the simple words of this psalm lead you to trust in God!

Because your Shepherd’s got it all under his control. “He makes me lie down in green pastures, he leads me beside quiet waters, he restores my soul.” Where is my life leading? Jesus knows. Who is in control of all of this? Jesus is. Where can I find some peace? In Jesus. One of the worst feelings in life is feeling like there’s no purpose. Like there’s no direction. Like everything is meaningless. Like everything is out of control. That’s impossible. Your Shepherd is leading you. Remind yourself of that: “He leads me. He leads me. He leads me beside quiet waters.”

“He restores my soul.” That phrase has stuck out to me more this week than ever before. “He restores my soul.” If God restores my soul, what does my soul need? Restoring. Isn’t that the truth? We don’t just need a Shepherd who’s in control. We don’t just need a Shepherd who leads us. We need a Shepherd who can restore our souls. How does that happen? We’ve figured it out with computers or Wi-Fi: Just unplug it and plug it in again. How often don’t you wish you could do that with your life? Restart it. Take back the last few years—or decades. Restore it to a previous condition, when you didn’t know… When you hadn’t done… When they hadn’t hurt you… It seems impossible. So many regrets. So much pain. How do you restore your soul?

We all need this. I was recently talking with a woman who, on the outside, seemed to be a perfect example of what every Christian should be. Full of grace. Full of trust in God’s Word. As we talked, however, she brought up her past. Long ago, she worked in the oil fields out west. I was impressed. That’s not something women used to do! But she said, “Don’t be impressed. There was a problem. To fit in, I lived like the men did. I drank a lot. I slept around. It destroyed my marriage. It cost me my children.” This was decades ago, but it was so painful. So present. It still weighed down her soul. What does she need? She needs her soul to be restored day by day.

You do too! I bet some of you could tell a similar story. A time in your life—maybe a very long time, maybe it’s right now—when you’ve lived against God. It weighs you down. You need your soul to be restored. All of us do! Even if you’re a life-long Christian, every day we sin. Every day we fall. What do all of us need every day? Our souls to be restored. To be forgiven. Know what your Shepherd does? “He restores your soul.” Jesus doesn’t erase your past. He doesn’t make you do your life over again. He does something better. He says to you: “You are forgiven. For all of it. For fifty years ago. For today. You are forgiven.” “He restores my soul.”

You see, God isn’t just leading us through life on earth. “He guides me in paths of righteousness for his name’s sake.” The greatest guidance that God gives his people is to show us the path of salvation through faith in Jesus. What’s the way to live forever? Jesus said: “I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me” (John 14:6). Faith in Jesus. That’s the path! “I know that my redeemer lives, and that in the end he will stand on the earth. And after my skin has been destroyed, yet in my flesh I will see God; I myself will see him with my own eyes—I, and not another. How my heart yearns within me!” (Job 19:25-27).

That means you don’t have to be afraid of death. “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.” I can picture David saying this as he prepared to fight Goliath. Remember that story? David, a young shepherd boy, against Goliath, nine feet six inches tall and a hardened warrior. As David walked through that valley to meet Goliath, what did he tell himself? “Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for you are with me.” You don’t have to face Goliath. But you do have to face death. What can you tell yourself? “Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for you are with me.”

I was encouraged by what an old pastor used to say: “I am immortal until my work is finished.” Do you know what he meant? You cannot die until God’s work for you is complete. I cannot die until God’s purpose for my life has been fulfilled. Even before you or I were born, our loving God had already written down in his book how each of our days was going to go. You and I are immortal until God’s time. That doesn’t mean life will be easy. That doesn’t mean we’ll live to a ripe, old age. Life might be hard. It might be shorter than we expect. But through it all, you can be confident of this: No one can change what God has planned out for you. “Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for you are with me.”

And there’s so much more! “You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies. You anoint my head with oil; my cup overflows.” If God is with you in the valley of the shadow of death, if you don’t have to be afraid of dying, what do you need to fear? Nothing! David faced lions and Goliath and King Saul. But God was with him, so he could say, “My cup overflows.” People ask if the cup is half empty or half full. That question is a test for how we look at life. What do you think? Is the cup half empty or half full? Give me a break! It’s neither: “My cup overflows.” God is so good! He pours out blessing after blessing after blessing on you.

“Surely goodness and love will follow me all the days of my life, And I will dwell in the house of the Lord forever.” Every day that you are alive is a good thing, because Jesus’ goodness and love will be with you every day. And the day that you die will be a good thing, because you will live in God’s house forever. Whether we live or die, they are both good things! In Bible study today, we heard Paul put it like this, “For me to live is Christ and to die is gain” (Philippians 1:21). It’s a blessing from God to be alive. And it is a blessing from God to be taken out of this world of tears to Jesus’ side in heaven. Whether we live or die, “the Lord is my shepherd, I shall not be in want.” Can you say that with me? “The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not be in want.”

Do you know how we can be sure? 1000 years after David, one of David’s descendants talked about shepherds too. Except, instead of saying, “the Lord is my shepherd,” this man said, “I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep” (John 10:11). Who was that? Jesus. Jesus is the good Shepherd who lay down his life for us—for David, for you, for me—the sheep. To forgive us. To save us. To give us eternal life. How can we be sure of our Shepherd’s love? Look at the cross! “The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep!”

So listen to your Good Shepherd’s invitation: “Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest” (Matthew 11:28). When you’re weary and burdened, Jesus says, “Come to me.” Isn’t that great to hear? When we go to people for help, how often don’t they point us in another direction? “Go to the doctor.” “Go see a specialist.” Not Jesus. What does he say? “Come to me.” The devil’s going to tell you to run. He’s going to tell you to hide from God. What a lie! Shrek the sheep knows the truth: It’s so much better with your Shepherd. No matter what you’ve done, no matter where you’re wandered, no matter how long you’ve been gone, Jesus hasn’t forgotten about you. Jesus loves you. Jesus searches for you. Listen to your Shepherd’s invitation: “Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest.” May God gives us faith to say, “The LORD is my shepherd, I shall not be in want.”