Psalm 23: The LORD’s my shepherd (Melody One)

Psalm 23 Reflection

I remember walking into an unfamiliar pub, which I later learnt was a notorious place frequented by drug dealers and other criminals, and being immediately intimidated by those who faced me on every side. I felt a stab of unease but before my disquiet could turn to outright fear, the words from a Coolio rap record playing on the jukebox, rose over the noise. “Though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death” went the line of the rap. Immediately, my sense of peace was restored.

Psalm 23 has gone into something close to mass consciousness. Countless millions can recite at least a fragment, and I don’t think I’d be alone in calling it the greatest poem ever written. In Psalm 23 we have a profound depiction of the essence of the Christian life. Believers are indeed God’s ‘sheep’ and our very existence is the result of us willingly following our dependable guide along the right paths.

The fact that God is portrayed as a shepherd in Scripture has the same kind of humbling resonance as the New Testament account of Jesus washing the feet of his disciples. In ancient society a shepherd was of low status. The job was exhausting, back-breaking and dangerous. He had to locate pastures for the sheep to graze, find good water close by and lead them onto the next pasture, sometimes through valleys where a lion might be lurking. He carried a crook and a staff; a crook to lean on and a staff to ward off predators. Then, in the evening, the sheep are led back to the sheepfold, where with healing oil, their attentive master tends to those with small injuries.

The psalm’s final verse sums up the confidence the Christian has as we follow the good shepherd through this life and into the next.