This is the fourth in our studies of using the Psalms to voice our prayers. This morning I am privileged to have been given what is probably the best known of all of the psalms, Psalm 23.
How do you picture God?
The psalm that we are looking at this morning pictures God in terms of a Shepherd looking after his sheep.
Psalm 23 was written 3,000 years ago by David, a Shepherd boy who became a King over God's people.
David would have been used to staying out in the hills with his father's sheep. In a dry and arid land he would have often to move them on to fresh pasture when grazing got scarce. We have been learning about how important it is to keep hydrated in hot weather. David would be always on the lookout for the streams and pools from which his flock could drink, avoiding the dangerous torrents that would rush down the mountainsides after rain. All the time he would be keeping watch for the wild animals that could prey on the sheep. David tells us that when a mountain lion or a bear came and threatened his flock he killed them. He was ready to risk his own life to keep the flock safe.
These experiences in caring for his sheep set him thinking – perhaps even composing this psalm while on the mountainside one night keeping watch over his flock. He had realised that just as he cared for his sheep and ensured their wellbeing, so also, but in a far more wonderful way, God cared for and looked after him. It is this that David celebrates in this psalm.
The Lord Jesus echoes the thoughts of this psalm when he describes himself as the Good Shepherd. John records in the tenth chapter of his Gospel that Jesus said that he knows his sheep and that they know him. He calls them by name and they follow him. He is the good shepherd who lays down his life for the sheep.
Jesus reveals to us what God is like, for he is God incarnate. He told his followers, “Anyone who has seen me has seen the Father.”
So, as we look at how Psalm 23 can help us give voice to our prayers, I want to focus on what it has to say about the one whom we address in prayer; what does it tell us about the character of our God?
This morning I want to use three ‘P’s to highlight what this psalm says about God.
God Provides for his people. David begins this wonderful psalm with the words “The Lord is my shepherd, I lack nothing.” He then goes on to reflect on his own care for his flock, ensuring that they lacked nothing.
God has been more than generous in his care for us. He has given us a wonderful world through which our daily needs are met. James reminds us that “Every good and perfect gift is from above”, while Paul reminds us that God, “richly provides us with everything for our enjoyment.”
God provides for all our daily needs. More than that, he has given us his own Son, the Lord Jesus, to be our Saviour. Jesus gave his life for us at the cross that we might be brought home into the embrace of God’s family – ‘ransomed, healed, restored, forgiven’. And, as the Apostle Paul reminds us, if God “did not spare his own Son, but gave him up for us all – how will he not also, along with him, graciously give us all things?”
See how God has loved us and provided for us: we shall lack nothing.
And then he has given us his Spirit. Jesus, risen from the dead, has poured out his Spirit upon us to be our counsellor, our encourager and our guide. He refreshes our soul. Don’t you love that phase in this psalm? He renews our life, our spiritual vitality.
Have you experienced such moments of spiritual revival? Perhaps when reading a particular passage of Scripture that speaks to your heart in a special way or when we have been singing a particular hymn or song together, you have felt the Spirit of God lifting your spirit, filling you afresh with a sense of wonder in your salvation. In such moments your soul is refreshed and enlivened, filled with joy and peace in believing. An old hymn by William Cowper expresses this thought when it says:
Sometimes a light surprises
A Christian while he sings;
It is the Lord who rises
With healing in his wings.
And then the Spirit guides us in the way that we should go – directing our life down the path that is pleasing to God.
God has richly provided for all our needs: he is a providing God.
The Lord is my shepherd, I lack nothing.
He makes me lie down in
green pastures,
he leads me beside quiet
waters,
he refreshes my soul.
He guides me along the right
paths
for his name’s sake.
God’s rich Provision for our every need should prompt our Praise.
Then secondly he is one who is with us in every circumstance we face. His Presence is with us.
We have spoken of God’s wonderful care for us, but that does not mean that we will never face any difficulties. There will be times when he will lead us through difficult paths where we will face great difficulties, disappointments or trials. But David says:
Even though I walk
through the darkest valley,
I will fear no evil,
for you are with me;
your rod and your staff,
they comfort me.
The phrase he uses which is translated in the NIV as “the darkest valley” we may be familiar with from older translations as ‘the valley of the shadow of death. In terms of David’s picture of a shepherd with his sheep, the idea is of a steep sided ravine where the path is entirely in shadow; a dark region into which no light can penetrate.
Have you faced dark days in your life where you cannot see the way ahead and do not know how you will through them? That is David’s picture here. David had known dark days before he was made king when King Saul, jealous of David had sought to kill him. David had fled into desert regions and lived out in caves always on the watch for Saul and his army. And after he had become king his own son, Absalom, rebelled against him and again, David had to flee for his life. David had known difficult and dark days.
But David has been aware that in each of these dark situations, the Lord his shepherd had been with him. He has never been abandoned to face them alone.
A frightened sheep might want to run away or turn back from the dark path but the shepherd would guide it back, or even hook it back with his staff or crook. In the same way, David knows the Lord has been with him in the dark days; he has never been abandoned; the Lord has been with him to lead him safely through.
How do you respond to dark days or times of difficulty and trial? Are you tempted to say, ‘Where is God when I need him?’ We have been encouraged to be real with God in our prayers, even to cry out to him in anger and frustration. This also is endorsed by the psalms. But I want you to know that God does not abandon his children; the Good Shepherd never abandons his sheep. He is with us even in the darkest valley.
Remember when we looked at Psalm 22. That psalm expresses the deep pain of a believer who is facing threats against their life. It expresses the anger and despair of one who feels that God turned his back on him and who cries out in anguish, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?”
And this is the cry that our Lord Jesus utters as, rejected and mocked, he hangs in agony on the cross. In his cruel and unjust death upon the cross, Jesus takes upon himself our sin and suffering. He identifies with and voices our human plight and pain. He has felt human pain and anguish to the full.
And now he is risen from the dead as the Great Shepherd of the sheep. He feels our pain and fully understands our suffering for he has endured it with us and for us. And now he is with us even and especially in those dark experiences we are called to go through. He feels for us and with us.
We sometimes sing the song, “There is strength within the sorrow, There is beauty in our tears…” The chorus for this song says:
Your plans are still to prosper
You have not forgotten us
You're with us in the fire and the flood
You're faithful forever
Perfect in love
You are sovereign over us.
God is with us in every situation we face. Let me say this with the greatest sensitivity. He is with us when all our plans and hopes seem shattered. God is with us in days when we are given a verdict of terminal illness and told we have only months to live – when we enter the valley of the shadow of death. God is with us when we lose someone we love and with whom we have shared so much of our lives, when we feel bereft.
Jesus, the Good Shepherd will never abandon his sheep: he has promised to be with us always. As the Apostle Paul reminds us, nothing can separate us from God’s love in Christ Jesus our Lord, nothing in all creation, nothing in life, nothing in death. In dark days we may lose sight of God’s presence with us, but he is there just the same. He never lets go of us.
The knowledge of his Presence should still our fears and provide Peace.
So to the third of my ‘P’s:
He is a God who Provides;
He is a God who is Present and
he is a God who Protects.
David says:
You prepare a table before me
in the presence of my enemies.
You anoint my head with oil;
my cup overflows.
I love these concluding verses of Psalm 23. For a moment in verse 5 he abandons the picture of a shepherd with his sheep in favour of that of a powerful king who invites his subjects to banquet with him.
David is aware of the many threats on his life but, in the face of his enemies who are out to destroy him he delights in the fact that he is invited to feast with his Lord. The table is set and is covered with good things even in the very presence of his enemies. Imagine this! It’s as if the enemies are surrounding him but there is no way they can get at him. They simply have to watch on in fury as David feasts with his Lord. His head is anointed as a sign of his Lord’s favour and his cup filled to the brim to ensure he can rejoice in his Lord’s presence.
David’s enemies will not have the last word. They will be defeated as God welcomes his child to his banqueting table.
Then that last verse:
Surely your goodness and love will follow
me
all the days of my life,
and I will dwell in the house
of the Lord for ever.
What a lovely picture is drawn here: “Surely your goodness and love will follow me all the days of my life…” Perhaps you prefer the rendering “goodness and mercy”; that second word is difficult to translate with any one word in English. The Hebrew word ‘hesed’ means covenant love and faithfulness. It means heartfelt generosity, loyalty and unfailing concern – lovingkindness and sacrificial love. (See Psalm 136 for a celebration of such love.)
I love the picture painted in this verse which I like to think returns to the picture of a shepherd with his sheep. The Good Shepherd goes before the sheep leading them on by the call of his voice. But what of stragglers who might prove prey to wild beasts?
Allow me my fancy for a moment. The shepherd has his sheepdogs, goodness and love / mercy / lovingkindness which follow on at the back of the pack not to nip the heels of the sheep but to protect them from attack and encourage them on until they are brought at last to the fold; secure in the house of the Lord for ever.
The knowledge that the Good Shepherd has our backs and that he will not allow anyone or anything to snatch us from his hand gives us the strength to go on following him.
God’s Protection promotes our Perseverance.
This psalm reminds us of the wonderful character of our God and Saviour, character seen most clearly in the Lord Jesus Christ. He is the Good Shepherd who laid down his life for the sheep and who calls us to trust him and to follow him. This psalm teaches us to trust and gives us a voice in which to express our trust in God in prayer.
Can I encourage you each one to learn Psalm 23 off by heart. Learn it either in the NIV or if you were brought up with the Authorised / King James’ version and find Psalm 23 easier to remember then learn it off by heart in that version. Or perhaps learn it in the old metrical version that we used to sing to the tune Crimond – it’s sometimes easier to learn words when they are set to music in a song. Or learn it in Stuart Townend’s version with its lovely chorus:
And I will trust in you alone,
And I will trust in you alone,
For your endless mercy follows me,
Goodness will lead me home.
Learn it in whatever version you find easiest, but I urge you to learn it.
Then when you lie awake at night and your mind is filled with a jumble of thoughts and fears use this psalm. Speak it or sing it silently to yourself to remind yourself that you have one who watches over you and remember again that:
His Provision prompts Praise;
His Presence provides Peace, and;
His Protection promotes Perseverance.
And learn afresh to trust yourself to the Great Shepherd of the sheep.
Peter Misselbrook: Quakers Road & Christ Church Downend - 28/6/2026