What the Old Testament Means to Us. . No. 12

GOD KEEPS US ON THE RIGHT TRACK

This installment on what the OT means to us, along with the previous one, is assuming that we have in the 23rd Psalm, which we are treating as a canon of Scripture within itself, the essence of religion. It is not only the OT at its best but it makes the basic truths of religion practical. The 23rd Psalm not only tells us what we should believe but how we should live.

The first installment took us to the line that reads, “He leads me in paths of righteousness for His name’s sake,” which we may translate more practically as, “God keeps me on the right track.” In a world where it is so easy to get derailed it is a reassuring promise. In the NT God is described as “able to keep you from falling” (Jude 24), which is to say he will keep us from falling if we truly want to be faithful. We are sustained not by our strength but by God’s.

The eastern shepherd sometimes walked ahead of his sheep, sometimes behind, depending on where the protection and guidance was most needed. There were well-trained dogs to help in any case. The crucial fact was that it was the shepherd who knew the direction that was best for the sheep to go, not the sheep. It is usually the case that when we get off track in our dangerous world it is because we assume to direct our own course, as if we, rather than God, know the way we should go. The prophet Jeremiah (10:23) said it well, “O Lord, I know the way of man is not in himself; it is not in man who walks to direct his own steps.”

The sheep are safe from peril only if they know the voice of the shepherd. Aware of this truth, our Lord, likening himself to a shepherd, said, “My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow Me” (Jn. 10:27). Following the Lord depends upon knowing and trusting him, as sheep do the shepherd. When this is the case the sheep are secure, as Jesus indicated, “They shall never perish; neither shall anyone snatch them out of my hand” (v. 28).

We live in a world of phenomenal advancement. Science has made possible things that would have been thought miracles a few generations back. Modem modes of transportation and communication has made the world a global village and all peoples neighbors. Every generation appears to produce greater intellects than the previous one, so that we refer to things to come in terms of “future shock.”

In spite of all this most people in the world seem to be “lost”—not hell-fire lost in this context, but lost in the sense that they are derailed, not knowing where to go or how to get there. The 23rd Psalm points to away, “the paths of righteousness” that has the God of heaven as its shepherd. Even when life seems muddled there is hope.

The Shadow of Death

In that memorable line, “Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for You are with me” the word “death” does not appear in the original but has been added by the translators. And it may have no reference to death per se, but to any and all of life’s troubles. It could be rendered, “Though I pass through a gloomy valley, I fear no harm,” as the Jerusalem Bible has it. It. could be applied to a financial crisis, a siege of illness, a bout with depression, or a loss of self-esteem as well as to death, but since death is to many the darkest of all valleys it is appropriate to think of death when we read this line.

The shepherds of ancient Palestine had their dark and dangerous valleys to contend with. Their sheep were prey to robbers and wild beasts alike, and the weather was often beastly in ravines 500 feet below sea level. In creating this psalm David remembered those gloomy passes and compared the experiences to life’s difficulties. And sometimes, of course, David’s own life was at stake, especially when he was being stalked by King Saul in those same hills. Even when death threatened David was unafraid. He knew that God, who was his shepherd, was with him and would see him through. It is religion at its best, a tremendous affirmation of faith.

This does not mean that religion is insurance against calamity. We know that bad things happen to good people. Not only sorrow but tragedy (there is an important difference) befall most of us. This psalm recognizes that we may be led through gloomy ravines oflife, even calamities, but it is telling us that it is OK, that God is with us.

People have a misconception of prayer and religion when they suppose that because God is their “Shield” and “Fortress” and that they take refuge “under the shadow of his wings,” all apt metaphors of God’s care, they will be spared the tragedies that befall others. The man who prayed for his son away at war, “Keep my son safe, a Lord. Hide him under your wings. No bullet can pierce thy wings,” runs the risk of being disappointed with God, for the soldiers who are prayed for often also die. God does not promise to keep us from tragedies, only to be with us amidst them. In the light of eternity that is enough.

And yet we know that God does sometimes deliver us from the shadows. It is sometimes through surgery, medicine, counseling, or common sense. The promise of Rom. 8:28 is not that God works all things for good, but that in all things (including bad things) God is working with us (cooperating) for good, which means he helps us to make bad experiences lead to some good, even if years down the road. The key to it all is that God is with us. That’s the good news and that is the message of the 23rd Psalm.

A war story captures this great truth. A soldier asked his captain if he could go out into “no man’s land” between the trenches and rescue his friend. The captain told him he could go but that it would do no good, for his friend was probably already dead and he would endanger his own life. The soldier went out amidst the fire and managed to hoist his friend on his shoulder and bring him back. When the two of them tumbled to the bottom of the trench, the captain said tenderly to the would-be rescuer, “I told you it wouldn’t be worth it. Your friend is dead and you are mortally wounded.” The soldier told the captain that it was worth it, for before his friend died he said, “I knew you’d come.”

The hero did not save his friend from death, but he was with him when he was needed and he tempered the pain with his love. In the shadows there was radiant joy. This is what the psalmist is saying. In life’s shadows God is with us and this turns fear into joy.

His Rod and Staff

“Your rod and your staff, they comfort me” refers to the discipline God imposes upon his people. The shepherd’s rod was really a club about two feet long with a knob at one end through which nails might be driven. A noose was threaded through a hole at the other end so that the shepherd could secure the club to his wrist when using it. It was a weapon of defense to ward off wild beasts or robbers.

The club became a metaphor of God’s demanding discipline, as in Rev. 2:27, “He shall rule them with a rod of iron.” Micah 7:14, “Shepherd Your people with your rod (club)” means that God does whatever is necessary to take care of his people. The club was also a symbol of authority, referring to God’s sovereignty. The mace, derived from the ancient club, is now used ceremonially as a sign of authority.

The staff was a pole about six feet long with a crook at one end, which is the back-drop for a bishop’s or pope’s pastoral staff today. It had many uses, such as using it as a pole vault to ford streams, beating down leaves from trees to feed the flock, and punish unruly sheep. If a sheep wandered into deep undergrowth where there were snakes or onto a precipice where it might fall, the shepherd would push the crooked end of his staff between the sheep’s hind legs, give it a twist and pull the animal to safety. The staff thus brought “comfort” to the sheep in a tough kind of way.

God deals with us with both club and staff, which means he disciplines in our sin and prods us in our lethargy. Sin is the enemy that will destroy us. It is easy for us to take sin lightly. But God deals with sin in our lives with the wrath of a big club. God is hostile to everything in the world that is evil,just as the shepherd is set against anything that would destroy the sheep. Sin has awesome consequences. By way of rod and staff God would spare us from sin’s destructiveness. So, he sometimes shows tough love towards us. But in the end it is comforting.

The rest of the psalm puts finishing touches to the theme thus far: that God is with us; he loves and cares for us; he is there when we need him; he disciplines us. The line that reads, “You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies,” seems to shift from a pastoral scene to a banquet hall, and refers to some fugitive rather than sheep. But if we allow “table” to simply mean meal, which it sometimes does in the Bible, then the sheep image remains and we do not have to think of a table in some building. The enemies referred to might be poisonous weeds and lurking snakes. So, the scene is of the shepherd finding safe, nutritious grass in a wide table-like field for the sheep, all the while guarding the sheep from all their enemies.

“You anoint my head with oil; my cup runs over” refers to the sheep being taken to the sheepfold when day is done and treated for the wounds inflicted by a hazardous environment. Feet were worn tender by the sharp rocks and the flesh torn by thorns. Fevers were common. The shepherd would stand at the door of the sheepfold and call the sheep to him. Examining each one, he would apply soothing oil where needed. A cup of water was there to assuage the thirst, a cup that ran over because of the continual flow of a trickling stream.

There is an enormous spiritual lesson in all this in that it shows what God will allow to happen to us and what he will not allow to happen. He allows us to get hungry, but there are the green pastures. He allows us to wander but not too far. We will walk through dark shadows but he is with us. We may get bruised and battered, buy he applies soothing oil. He allows us to be tested but not destroyed.

“Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life” probably refers to the dogs that assisted the shepherd, named Goodness and Mercy, not unlikely names for the beloved sheep dogs that were of such great help to the shepherd. David sees the Lord as his shepherd, leading the way to paths of righteousness, then there was God’s goodness and mercy, like faithful sheep dogs, bringing up the rear. Some poets have likened God to “the Hound of Heaven” who is continually in pursuit of his wayward sheep.

Finally, there is “I will dwell in the house of the Lord forever,” which almost certainly continues the pastoral imagery. David is not talking about going to heaven, but being with God the Great Shepherd in the sheepfold, safe and secure with him. Tomorrow he will go out again to green pastures, still waters, and, yes, dark valleys. But God is always with him, and that is God’s house, where God is. Tomorrow night he will again be in some sheepfold, going in and out, but always with God. So, “I will dwell in the house of the Lord forever” was to David the shepherd boy an affirmation of faith that wherever or whatever he will always be in the presence of God.

One wonders if our Lord was influenced by these thoughts when he said: “I am the door of the sheepfold. If anyone enters by Me, he will be saved, and will go in and out and find pasture” (Jn. 10:9).

Do not both David and Jesus see “at home with God” or being in the sheepfold not a state of inert repose but a continual going in and out in service to God and in the presence of God, forever and ever.—the Editor