All That I Need - Psalm 23

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Psalm 23 isn't just a cozy blanket to wrap around our shoulders when the world gets cold. It describes for us, and points us toward, peace. Peace as God defines it, not just peace as the world defines it. 

Psalm 23 is not escapist poetry, about how to live in denial. ‘Oh, everything's going to be okay if I close my eyes and trust God to look after everything.’  

The Psalmist clearly is okay with acknowledging that everything's not okay in the world. That things are going to happen, and we’ll need to know where we stand and who we are following.  

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Psalm 23 v3 - He guides me in the paths of righteousness for the sake of his name. 

What do I need? I need to know who he is.  

One of my favourite Old Testament books is the book of Ezekiel, a prophet. (He's the one who spent the most time talking back to God.) There's one passage where God compromises: okay, you can do it differently. Like, Ezekiel actually changed God's mind. 

Throughout the book, God speaks through Ezekiel to the people around him.

About Ezekiel himself, about the family of Israel and the journey they’re on. About all of the nations, including the ones that have oppressed Israel, taking them into exile. God speaks about the world—the trees of the field and all of the creatures on earth: “all flesh.” God speaks to us through Ezekiel about everything and everyone.  

Then God speaks about what he's going to do among all of creation and all of people. ‘I am going to set you free. Defeat your enemies. Judge you as you have judged each other. Establish my covenant. God says, I'm going to dry up what is green, and make green what is dry. I'm going to give you sabbaths for rest. I'm going to give you my statutes and laws that you can live according to and build a good nation. I'm going to break the chains of exiles, set slaves free. Rebuild the broken places. Replant fallow ground. Rebuild build the decimated flocks. Put my Spirit in my people. This is what I'm going to do.’  

And he tells us why. I count 71 times in the text of the book of Ezekiel. God tells us why he is going to act.  

Why? 

To make life easier for his favourites? No. 

To exact revenge against his enemies? No. 

The reason God will do these things (which he repeats over and over and over again) is this: Then you will know that I am I AM.  

To teach his people his name: 

• Yahweh God (I am) which communicates to us that he has always been and he always will be, and he is here now. 
• Yahweh Rapha: I am who heals.  
• Yahweh M'Kadesh: I am makes you holy.  
• Yahweh Jireh: I am who provides.  
• Yahweh Rohi: I am who shepherds.  
• Yahweh Shalom: I am who is peace.  
• Yehoshua: Yahweh is salvation.  

That's who he is, and I need to learn who he is so I can tell everybody else who he is. He shepherds me for my own sake, and for the sake of a world that really needs to know who he is. 

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Psalm 23 v4 - Even when I walk through the valley of the death-shadow, I will fear no evil, for you are close beside me.  

What do I need? I need perspective.  

Imagine the valley of the death-shadow as a rocky ravine with steep sides rising as far as you can see. Along the bottom, a rough path of stones and potholes.  

This is not a green meadow for lying down. If there's any plant life at all, it's light-starved and fading.  

This is not a place of restful waters. The waters that carved that ravine were probably muddy rivulets over ages, or rushing storm torrents. Any water there now will be puddles too shallow to drink from.  

This is not a place where a sheep wants to linger because this is where evil lives: earthly evils like illness, distress, injury, and disaster. The shepherd is going through, so we follow.  

We don't just follow him into the valley. We follow him through the valley.  

Hard times are hard times. Bad news is bad news. Life is tough. No point in pretending. 

But hard times and bad news are not the boss of me. Hard times and bad news do not make choices for me. The Lord shepherds me through the darkness, and decides how to lead me.  

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Psalm 23 v5 - You prepare a feast for me in the presence of my enemies.  

What do I need? Something to look forward to. A celebration in a world made right.  

The writer is not imagining a table for one with a white linen tablecloth, and a nice view of the lake.  

What he is picturing is a family table. A community table. Everybody's there. Including, oh yeah, my enemies.  

Perhaps the feast is a victory celebration, where our enemies are disarmed. They are powerless, and we have conquered.  

Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall trouble or distress or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword? ... No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through Him who loved us.  For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor principalities, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord. Romans 8:35-39 

It may be that the writer of Psalm 23 is picturing that victory celebration when all that darkness is left behind, and we celebrate having come through the valley.  

Or perhaps (I think this is even better) the writer imagines dining at this beautiful feast together—dining in safety and in peace—not because our enemies have been defeated, but because our enemies are at the table, too.  

This is what the LORD of Heaven’s Armies says: In those days ten men from different nations and languages of the world will clutch at the sleeve of one Jew. And they will say, ‘Please let us walk with you, for we have heard that God is with you.’ Zechariah 8:23 

Those enemy nations—attackers, oppressors—have recognized who God is, and they're grabbing the sleeve of believers and saying, ‘I'm coming too, because now I know who he is.’ 

Here there is no Greek or Jew, circumcised or uncircumcised, barbarian, Scythian, slave, or free, but Christ is all and is in all. Colossians 3:11

So, Paul says, ‘put on your party clothes!’ 

Dress your hearts with compassion and kindness and humility and gentleness and patience. Colossians 3:12 

Perhaps the writer is looking forward to the day when we can pull up a chair and feast and celebrate, not in spite of the company that we find ourselves in, but in company with enemies made family, because we have all chosen to sit down at Christ's table. 

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This poem is not about living in denial. There are no shortcuts. Jesus meets us at every step. God shepherds us at every step. We must take every step.

Tough times come. And come again. In those difficult moments, it can be the hardest to hear his voice as it is drowned out by our pain. It can be in those moments when it's hardest to see his face, because all we can see is what we need to do, and what we've lost, and those things cast a shadow on his face. All we can do is put one foot in front of the other. 

But it’s important for us to keep this in mind: Jesus, in the darkest, most painful moment of his life, fell back on the words of a Psalm. He was on the cross. He felt abandoned. He was in the dark. He could not hear the voice of his shepherd. He could not see the face of his father so... he fell back on Psalm 22.  

My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? Psalm 22:1

‘Why is this happening to me? Why aren't you doing something to fix this?’ 

It is so important for us to know what the text says, because it is in knowing our scriptures that we are able to find our feet when the rug gets pulled out from under us.  

We can remember, and be reminded, that we are being shepherded. That passages like this on our coffee mugs and t-shirts, on our tapestries are there to remind us of who we are... and whose we are.