Six Powerful Verses

Series: The Lord is My Shepherd (Psalm 23)

Leslie Basham: If you were asked to recite Psalm 23 right now, there’s a good chance that you’d be able to do it. But if you were asked to live according to the principles found in Psalm 23, it might be a little more challenging.

Nancy Leigh DeMoss: There is something about the heart and character of God that relates to every single situation in life that you or I can ever face. In fact, I believe that if we really grasped and believed these six verses alone, it would have a monumental impact on the way we live—because we could face every moment, every situation, every circumstance of life with peace, with joy, with faith, with confidence, and with courage.

Leslie Basham: This is Revive Our Hearts with Nancy Leigh DeMoss for Wednesday, May 17th. When we know a Scripture passage really well, it’s easy to get accustomed to it. How often have we recited Psalm 23 to our children while worrying about bills, health, or relationships? Nancy will help us see this important passage in a fresh way.

Nancy Leigh DeMoss: Those of you who have heard me teach before or have read some of my books know that in my personal quiet time, I like to read through the Scripture.  I’ve made a habit of reading consecutively through the Bible for many years and doing that even a couple times a year over a number of years.

But over the past three months, I’ve done something a little different than normal. I’ve had two passages of Scripture that I have lived in for the past three months. That doesn’t mean I haven’t read anything else, but I’ve just been really soaking in those couple of passages of Scripture because of where I’ve been in my own walk with the Lord and in my pilgrimage with Him. One of those passages is one of the best-known, most-loved, and most-often-quoted passages in all of God’s Word. It’s Psalm 23, the shepherd’s psalm.

And I have to say, as many times as I’ve read Psalm 23 over the years, I had never really pondered it. I’d never considered it deeply. This passage of Scripture God has used to minister so richly and so deeply to my own heart. I want to encourage you over these next few weeks as we study Psalm 23 together to do the same. It may not be the only passage of Scripture or the primary passage of Scripture that you focus on, but I want to encourage you to be reading Psalm 23, perhaps at least just once a day over the next few weeks. We’re just going to really skim the surface of Psalm 23. There’s so much more in it than what we’ll be able to cover during these next days, but God will give you fresh insight and fresh riches from His Word as you meditate on this passage as we study it in the days ahead.

It’s one of the passages of Scripture that all the world recognizes and loves and respects. But it’s not a passage of Scripture that is often well-lived. We’re more familiar with it in our heads and in our minds than we are in our practice.

If you’ve been to funerals, many of them, you’ll recall that it’s often quoted at funerals, and therefore people often think of it as a psalm about dying. But actually, this is not a psalm about dying but about living. It has so much to say about how we live at every season of life.

It’s a psalm written by David, the shepherd-king. We don’t know when he wrote it, except that it was in his later years, as a middle-aged or older man. Some commentators think it may have been during the time of Absalom’s rebellion, when King David’s son rebelled against him, tried to take over the kingdom, and David had to flee from his home.

We don’t know if that’s a fact. But regardless of when it was, David had been through a lot in his life. He had experienced a lot of blessing and a lot of hardship and a lot of pain. At some point as an older man, as he reflected back on all that he’d been through and all that God had done for him and all that God had been to him, the picture came to his mind of the relationship that he had had with his sheep when he was a shepherd boy.

David knew, having been a shepherd, how much sheep need a shepherd. He knew how much he needed a shepherd. He knew that we can’t shepherd ourselves. Sheep are too dumb, too defenseless, too clueless to shepherd themselves, and he knew that we are like those sheep.

Now Psalm 23 falls in the middle of a trio of psalms that are what we call Messianic psalms, psalms that point to Christ, the Messiah. So in this psalm as, well as Psalm 22 and Psalm 24, we have a precious picture of the Lord Jesus and a description of His work in our lives and our relationship with Him.

In Psalm 22 we see Christ as the Good Shepherd. In Psalm 23 we see Him as the Great Shepherd. And in Psalm 24 we see Him as the Chief Shepherd. Those are phrases that come from the New Testament, and they fit well with those psalms.

In Psalm 22 we see a picture of the cross. In Psalm 23 we see a picture of the Christian life once we get to the cross. And in Psalm 24 we see a picture of Christ’s ultimate conquest over all of creation and over all of history. So Psalm 23, right in the middle of those psalms, is a picture of life here and now, real life, real issues, and what Christ is to us as a shepherd at that time.

Now this is an intensely personal psalm. It’s David’s personal testimony. “The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want” (verse 1). He describes who God is to him, what God has done for him. It’s a psalm of relationship. It’s an intimate psalm—a picture of rich, intimate fellowship, communion, union, communication between a shepherd and one of his sheep.

In the first three verses David talks about the Lord, and it’s very personal. This is something—“The Lord is my shepherd.” But then in verse four it gets even more personal. He begins to talk not only about the Lord but to the Lord. “You are with me.” Knowing and trusting the shepherd’s heart, having that personal relationship with a God who cares makes all the difference in the world.

No matter what season of life you’re in, it makes all the world look different. Let me just read the psalm. Today I just want to introduce it, give you this little overview, and then starting tomorrow we’ll go phrase by phrase through the psalm.

Psalm 23: “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” (verses 1-3).

Let me just say, by the way, those first three verses are really important because if you haven’t been walking with the Shepherd in those seasons of life described in the first three verses, where He’s leading you beside still waters and in green pastures and in paths of righteousness; then when you get to the life experience of verse four, you’ll have a harder time experiencing and trusting the reality of His presence. What does verse four say? “Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death (or “the valley of deep darkness” is the literal translation there), I will fear no evil.”

You’d better know your Shepherd before you get to that point. Then if you come to know Him in the other seasons of life, then you’ll be able to say what David says here, “Even in this valley [of deep darkness], I will fear no evil, for you are with me; your rod and your staff, they comfort me.”

Then verses five and six, there’s a difference between commentators as to whether this is continuing the picture of the shepherd and his sheep or whether this is a different picture now, different metaphor of a gracious host. I think it doesn’t really matter because they both are precious to us.

It says in verse five, “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.”

In that last verse we have our future hope, our long-term hope, not just promises of God for today, rich as they are, but great, huge hope for tomorrow and for the next day and for all my tomorrows and eternal hope. “I will dwell in the house of the LORD forever.”

Now as we read through that psalm, just on first reading you see that here we have a shepherd who is intimately and intricately involved in every detail of the lives of his sheep.

This speaks to us as children of God, as sheep of God—that every season of my life is covered in this psalm—from the point of conversion, through the ups and downs of life, through peaceful times and challenging times, all the way to our death, and beyond that through all the days of eternity.

In all of that whole span of life, through all of this life and through all of eternity, our Shepherd is always there, always at work, always leading His children, always ministering to our needs, for our good and His glory.

I found over these past three months as I’ve meditated on this passage and engrafted it into my heart that God has been renewing my mind. He’s been deepening my trust in His sovereignty, in His wisdom, in His care, His promises, His provision, His protection, His presence.

He’s been grounding my heart more deeply in Who He is—His goodness, His love. There is something about the heart and character of God that relates to every single situation in life that you or I can ever face, and we’ll see that in this psalm.

In fact, I believe that if we really grasped and believed these six verses alone, it would have a monumental impact on the way we live because we could face every moment, every situation, every circumstance of life with peace, with joy, with faith, with confidence, and with courage.

I trust that as you join with us in meditating on this passage over these next weeks that God will do a fresh work of grace in your heart as you trust your Shepherd.

Leslie Basham: Peace, joy, confidence, and courage—some of the qualities Nancy Leigh DeMoss just mentioned. Do they characterize your life? One way to learn to display these qualities more fully is to meditate on Psalm 23 with us. Nancy has encouraged us to read it every day during this teaching series.

Nancy’s going to help us understand this Psalm in a deep way during this study, and maybe you’d like to get more out of other psalms as well. Nancy’s written a workbook called A 30-Day Walk With God in the Psalms. It will take you through one psalm each day in your devotions for thirty days. It will help you study the text, apply it to your life, and guide your prayer. You can get a copy of A 30-Day Walk with God in the Psalms when you make a donation of fifteen dollars or more.

Revive Our Hearts’ fiscal year end is this month, and as we head into summer as a listener-funded ministry outreach, we need as solid of a financial footing as possible. Would you consider doing something over and above for this ministry that’s not just helping you, but women all across the country? Through our broadcasts and web-based media outreaches, we’re touching all kinds of women at all seasons of life, and they’re saying that they need this kind of clear, practical, and God-centered approach of living.

We promise to use every dollar given to go deeper with more women, praying that the Lord would truly revive their hearts as well. Thank you for giving. You can donate online at www.ReviveOurHearts.com. If you’d rather call, dial 1-800-569-5959. When you do, make sure to ask for A 30-Day Walk With God in the Psalms.

Psalm 23 is a popular reading at funerals, but Nancy says it shouldn’t be read at every funeral. We’ll find out why tomorrow when we get together for another Revive Our Hearts.

Revive Our Hearts with Nancy Leigh DeMoss is an outreach of Life Action Ministries.

All Scripture is taken from the English Standard Version.

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