THE ALL SUFFICIENT SHEPHERD
Part II
Psalm 23:1 The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want. 2 He makes me lie down in green pastures. He leads me beside still waters. 3 He restores my soul. He leads me in paths of righteousness for his name’s sake. 4 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. 5 You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies; you anoint my head with oil; my cup overflows. 6 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 Part I of The All Sufficient Shepherd we mentioned that Psalm 23 has a simple message, we also mentioned that it is perhaps the most well-known of the psalms. There are thousands of people who know the words of Psalm 23 by heart, probably from childhood. In fact, I would be willing to say that the familiarity of this psalm is like hearing the plan of salvation, the gospel over and over again while attending church over a life time. To most people who have gone to church all their lives, they have heard the gospel so often that its message has become dangerously familiar. Dangerously familiar like the constant drip of rain dropping down the gutter down spout, after a while you just ignore the drum of the water hitting the bottom of the downspout. After a while you do not even hear it, you may not even hear the rain coming down. When this happens familiarity has lulled a person to sleep and they miss the true meaning of the psalm, and worse than that, the true meaning of the gospel. What is so uncommon about having heard Psalm 23 recited, memorized, and cataloged by believers over the many generations? Nothing really, this is a good thing. But this good thing may have a downside as well, its familiarity may cause us to overlook its deeper message and application to life and godliness. It may become a trivialized version of a nice Psalm for kids or a good Psalm to place on display in a picture frame.
Familiar passages do not necessarily become trivialized in one’s mind because of familiarity, often they are happily recalled and recited in one’s heart. They are a source of comfort and encouragement. However, the danger of familiarity with Psalm 23 may cause us to look at it too casually. We have heard it before many times, we already know it by heart, it is forever etched in our brain. There is a casualness that often takes over with routine, the ordinary, our eyes running over Psalm 23 like our eyes running over the pages of Scripture. We don’t stop long enough to contemplate its deeper truth for us, we are only getting a glimpse, and not a gaze of its content, a casual reading where substance is sacrificed by the surplus of familiarity with the Bible and its content. Who is the Shepherd, what is He doing, how should I be impacted by this passage, how can I reproduce truth found in this passage in unique ways in my life? Often questions like these are lost in the fog of familiarity.
Familiarity is the quality or state of being familiar, closely acquainted, easily recognized, having personal or intimate knowledge. When someone becomes familiar with something, they usually respond in a habitual way toward that which they are familiar. You are familiar with your hometown; you know its roads and places of interest as well as its terrain. We are familiar with family and friends; we know their movements, likes and dislikes. We have become familiar with the Bible, with passages and narratives, we have become accustomed to well-known chapters in the Bible like Psalm 23. Our habit is to take for granted the familiar, to become accustom with the familiar, and not pay attention to its nuances, robbing ourselves of the growing nature of relationships and relationship with everything that we experience in life.
Because Psalm 23 is so familiar, and its message so simple, we may race over the deeper truths in its content and vitally important message for us. We might unintentionally become dismissive because we have heard it before, because we already know it. There should be concern about too much familiarity with this Psalm, and I might add with our Christianity in general. Things that become instantly recognizable can fall into a slot of becoming plain, ordinary, dull and unexciting. Sometimes we are not even cognizant of the ho-hum rut we have fallen into with the familiar. I fear that if we do not wake up out of the slumber of familiarity, we are in danger of losing the freshness and preciousness of a true relationship with the Lord and with His Word. We will continue to live dangerously close to being lulled to sleep in our relationship with the Lord and His Word. Both our relationship with the Lord and His Word will become mundane.
Being familiar with things is not always bad, we have good habits that are associated with familiarity. They are formed at work and in other places in life. Not all familiarity is harmful, it is good to have a comprehensive knowledge of things in life that are now familiar and comfortable. It is good to be in church hearing God’s word preached and taught, it’s good to consistently be in the study of God’s Word, in the habit of growing with other Christians. We have become familiar with the Bible, its doctrine, with its narratives and shaping influences. The trap is not so much in the process of becoming familiar as it is in the danger of stagnation because of familiarity. When we become use to something sometimes our full attention is diminished because it becomes routine. Our human nature agrees with habit forming repetition, we condition ourselves to automatically respond to things in life, sometimes without even thinking. We should be cautious, by occasionally stepping back to see if our Christian life has become overly routine, even given over to a sense of duty rather than desire.
When prayer time shifts from an everyday intimate time of communion with the Lord to a practiced exercise, when prayer becomes a duty rather than a delight, when reading the Bible becomes just reading the Bible, instead of learning and apply truth, when worshiping in spirit and in truth, John 4:24, becomes just showing up for church, it could be that familiarity has lulled you to sleep spiritually speaking. It could be that your relationship with the Lord has fallen into the rut of familiarity. If we are not careful, we will continue to live dangerously close to being lulled to sleep spiritually in our relationship with the Lord, and that will lead to being lulled to sleep with relationships in general.
Familiarity in marriage can lead to dull routine, becoming mundane, and uninteresting, eventually leading to lifelessness. Marriages may sour because of our taking for granted the person we are married to and have become familiar. Someone who has been married for some time may have known each other all their lives. They may have gone to the same church, grew up with each other through school, courted and then finally married. Familiarity may be deteriorating their relationship, they are living together without refreshing their relationship with the Lord, and it is wearing on their married life. Unfortunately, this is the case for many marriages, couples end up living with each other with no real and meaningful growing relationship with the Lord first. Familiarity has replaced the freshness of relational growth, things have become stagnant because they have allowed dull routine, the mundane of everyday life, to eventually lead to lifelessness in their relationship. They have not grown in their marriage because they have not grown in the Lord in their relationship with each other. They live a separate life spiritually speaking.
Couples struggle with familiarity when they do not cherish the closeness and oneness of their one flesh relationship that is based and fortified in their relationship with the Lord. They live together alone spiritually and sometimes physically. Any relationship that is not growing because of familiarity will suffer, will die, because relationships are dynamic. When lovers feel as though the zenith of their relationship has somehow come and gone, that somehow when love was young it was more exciting, it was more appealing, it was worth working for, they have allowed familiarity to destroy their relationship.
This happens in our relationship far too often with the Lord as well. Our love affair with the Lord and His Word has dampened in the middle of familiarity. Believers struggle with familiarity when they do not cherish the closeness and oneness they once had with the Lord and His Word. Any relationship is harmed when the interest, significance, and relevance of a relationship becomes unattractive, monotonous, bland, or uninspiring because of familiarity. That is the danger of not looking up out of the routines of life, and not looking around at what is going on in life, not jolting yourself out of the familiar, not growing in a relationship. All relationships will go sour when we allow familiarity to replace the freshness of growth and change. Relationships must always be growing, must always be looking for deeper meaning, and that only comes from truth that we learn from God’s Word. God’s Word is the key to overcoming the unhelpful side of familiarity.
There may be some sense of security or ease with the familiar, but relationships need to be continuously refreshed, that will take us out of the comfort zone for a while, but eventually it will lead us back to the security and comfort of a deeper relationship. The Bible speaks to the daily need and supply for freshness. “The steadfast love of the LORD never ceases; his mercies never come to an end; they are new every morning; great is your faithfulness.” Lamentations 3:22–23. I fear that if we do not wake up out of the slumber of familiarity, we are in danger of losing the freshness and preciousness of a true relationship with the Lord, and that is what affects all of our relationships.
An uninspiring relationship is not fun to be around. What is so inspiring about the mundane? What is so inspiring about the bland, the boring, the unexciting? Scripture is like mining for gold, you find the big nuggets that are on the surface then you wash over it again and again screening out the finest gold dust. The difference in the earthly gold mine and the Bible’s gold mine is in its vast supply. One eventually runs out, but the other is never ending. The Great Shepherd is giving us a goldmine of truth, one that never runs out. He is telling us something about our relationship with Him, He is demonstrating for us what a relationship should look like, how a relationship with Him is continually nurturing us, never in want, never becoming stagnant, always comforting and caring for us as His goodness and mercy follows us all the days of our lives.
The reason that Psalm 23 is so powerful is because it addresses the fundamental need of everyone who is in the sheep fold. Believers who have placed their trust wholly in Christ and thrive in His growing presence and relationship with Him in their lives. The All-Sufficient Shepherd in the psalm is the green pasture, He is the still water, He restores my troubled soul, He is leading my heart, my inner man to paths of righteousness for His namesake, He is goodness and mercy that promises to follow me all the days of my life. Psalm 23 with its words of comfort, encouragement, protection and hopefulness speaks to me now, is fresh every morning. Psalm 23 is a psalm describing the All-Sufficient Shepherd in pursuit of His people, shepherding the sheep of His pasture. The All-Sufficient Shepherd does this at every moment and at every turn for a lifetime. “His favor is for a lifetime.” Psalm 30:5
Psalm 23 should be a familiar place of comfort, rest, and security. It is fitting that this psalm addresses familiarity; the All-Sufficient Shepherd is intimately acquainted with all our ways and His fresh pursuit of us is “new every morning”. This should be a familiar and comforting reality in our lives. Here is how to make application of Psalm 23 to your life. Take time to apply Psalm 23 literally to your life by making this psalm personal. In other words, personalize it by seeing yourself in the Psalm, the Lord as the Shepherd is personally addressing you. Read each verse and then pray through each verse as a personal promise to you, thanking the Lord and then believing each word written is for you from the Great Shepherd. Then apply every truth in this wonderful passage. For instance:
Psalm 23:1 The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want.
Lord, I acknowledge You as my Great Shepherd, but I am in need of recognizing You as such. You always are shepherding me and guarding me, I am weak and sometimes don’t acknowledge that I am in Your constant care. ………I shall not want……Oh Lord! I am too full of want instead of being satisfied with what I have in You, I am much too apt to allow want to overshadow Your provision as the Great Shepherd. By Your grace I am going to settle my heart by reminding myself that You are constantly shepherding me, and that you will supply my every need, thank You for helping me to do this by Your grace, Amen!
This Psalm is such a practical place to pray through and trust in. Make it practical and applicable in your life by starting to pray through it and then applying it. Now take each verse below and start praying and applying it to your life in meaningful, tangible ways.
2 He makes me lie down in green pastures. He leads me beside still waters.
3 He restores my soul. He leads me in paths of righteousness for his name’s sake.
4 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.
5 You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies; you anoint my head with oil; my cup overflows.
6 Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life, and I shall dwell in the house of the Lord forever.
Soon you will naturally address the problem we too often have with familiarity. The Good Shepherd will expose your heart to new ways of keeping your relationship with Him and His Word fresh and exciting, and that will lead to a fresh and exciting relationship with others. You will grow in partnership and with a lively understanding of “goodness and mercy” that is following you all the days of your life. Psalm 23:6 Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life, and I shall dwell in the house of the LORD forever. Start today and become familiar with the Lord being Your Great Shepherd.