Psalm 23: He Leads Me Beside Still Waters

So as we enter the fall, we are working our way through Psalm 23, just phrase by phrase of Psalm 23.

David wrote Psalm 23 there in the Old Testament, pretty familiar Psalm to a lot of us.

David was a shepherd, oppressed on the run.

He later becomes king, which would have held some status and provision.

So he has something to say to us, not that we would have a pain-free life.

He's assuming we're going to have a difficult life.

But a life where God is for us and with us, right where you are, right where you are this morning.

So let's reread Psalm 23, 1 and 2.

We're going to focus on the last line of verse 2.

The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want.

Again, it's like how I felt last week.

I'm like, I mean, I need that.

I don't know if you're like that, like, yes.

Like, give me that.

That's what I want.

Like, I need that for my weary and overwhelmed heart.

And yet there can be some frustration of like, why am I not getting more of that?

Why am I not experiencing more of that?

So let's break this down.

We're going to break it into two parts.

We're going to start with the second half beside still waters and then jump back to the first half.

He leads me.

Point number one is this God leads us into lessening fear and calm replenishment.

That's the imagery David is giving us here.

David knows that the land is barren and dry.

He knows that because he lives there.

That's what the land of Israel was: barren and dry.

And only a thoughtful, really proactive shepherd would be able to guide his sheep to quiet waters of provision, replenishment that were safe.

Because often waters could be fast and frightening, or even dangerous if they came after a big rain and it flooded.

And David is just putting forth this idea that this shepherd is so good, so thoughtful, so proactive, and that this is what he wants for us.

I learned this week that one of the most dangerous rivers in the world is in England, and it's called the River Wharf.

Here's a picture of the river wharf.

Fast waters, undercut rocks.

If you fall in there, you get sucked down into tunnels and you drown.

Period.

It's dangerous.

I'm just going to make an assumption that if you changed your career from being an accountant to a shepherd and you moved to England, you're not going to take your sheep to the river wharf.

We can all kind of agree on that.

Yeah, I wouldn't do that as a shepherd.

Just wouldn't do it.

Now here's uh here I am on the Chacoa River, an hour north.

I was fishing.

My buddy Trent was behind me in the canoe.

He paddled the whole time.

I fished the whole time.

It was a great relationship.

I caught four rainbow trout that day.

Pretty sure it was four.

Could be six by the end of the sermon, but I'm pretty sure it was four.

Might have been two.

I'll never tell you if it was two, though.

We were in this little canoe for two to three hours.

Never once.

Never once was I afraid.

Quiet waters.

The heart of the shepherd is to guide his sheep to places of rest and replenishment.

This is God's heart for you.

You don't have to worry that his heart is something else for you.

Lessening fear and calm replenishment.

I received a text this week from my mentor, Scotty Smith, right when I was all kind of upset and angsty and questioning stuff this week.

We had a lot going on this week in our church and in ministry.

Just a lot going on inside.

And here's what the text said.

I will refresh the weary and satisfy the faint.

Jeremiah 31, 25.

Isn't that nice?

I will refresh the weary and satisfy the faint.

Hallelujah, we don't have to be enough.

Buck up, bail out, or blame others.

How does Jesus refresh and satisfy us?

So many ways, but they all involve slowing down, owning our need, and coming to him.

Two weeks ago, wonderful week.

School started back.

Some of you cried because your sweet little five-year-old, you know, went to kindergarten for the first time and you cried.

Others of you cried, you know, praise God, you were crying, you're so happy, you're elated.

It's a wonderful arrangement we have here where you drop your kids off and other people watch them and teach them, and you just go on with your day.

We have three schools and three routes in our family.

So that week in multiple practices started up, so a lot going on.

Christy and I finally started a Sunday night family calendar business meeting because she's very aware I'm gonna end up in the wrong place at the wrong time, or just not end up anywhere.

That can happen, it's very possible, and they'll just be like a crying kid walking home or something.

So we need that meeting at this point.

It can all be really overwhelming, can't it?

Just life.

Life can be overwhelming.

And of course you're not always doing okay.

Even to pretend that you are is exhausting.

That's overwhelming to pretend that you're always okay.

Because you maybe you just can't shake that one issue, you can't shake that one memory, that one thing that happened.

You didn't plan on getting sick, but you did.

I mean, you thought your brother at age 40 would stop being passive aggressive and controlling your family, and somehow he's still doing it.

And you don't want to kill him, but you would help him move to Mongolia.

Right?

You know what I'm talking about.

Or maybe you're like me and you just thought you'd be a better Christian.

Like you just really thought, like at this point, like you would be more giving, or more thoughtful, or more loving, or more resistant to drink the third drink, or maybe the second drink, or maybe the fourth drink.

You just thought you'd be better.

Less self-obsessed.

I mean, we really need when we talk about being a church that rests and grows in the grace of God, I mean, we really need that.

The question is, will I allow my heart to be shepherded to the very thing my heart needs the most?

He leads me beside still waters.

Point number two.

We are ready for water when we realize we are thirsty.

We don't have to make things complicated.

It's pretty simple.

We're ready for water when we realize we're thirsty.

Owning our need is the beginning of receiving the grace of God.

This week I kept thinking about that thirsty woman in John chapter 4, the Samaritan woman.

John 4 · chapter mention

You might remember the story.

Jesus was headed to Galilee.

He went through a town, an area called Samaria.

Now, a little bit of history here.

When the Jews were exiled and moved out, some Jews remained.

Those Jews intermarried with the Canaanites.

They formed a new race called the Samaritans.

So these Samaritans were a mix, a racial mix, but also a religious mix.

And the Jews considered these people, these Samaritans, to be racial inferior heretics.

They thanked God they weren't like the Samaritans.

Thank you, God, I'm not born a Samaritan.

They asked God not to save them.

They despised them.

They avoided them.

Very kind, godly behavior here going on.

But then there's Jesus.

Always against what religiosity tends to do.

And Jesus comes into that area, doesn't avoid it, and he comes to a well in the middle of the day, and he's sitting down and he starts a conversation with a lady who's a Samaritan.

That's the context going into it.

John 4, verse 7, a woman from Samaria came to draw water.

John 4:7

Jesus said to her, even her, even him speaking this, it would have been shocking, a Jew speaking to a Samaritan.

Give me a drink.

For his disciples had gone away into the city to buy food.

The Samaritan woman said to him, How is it that you, a Jew, asked for a drink from me, a woman of Samaria?

For Jews had no dealings with Samaritans.

So it's the middle of the day.

Things are kind of odd here.

This odd setup.

Really, it would be brutal hot out.

And she's getting water in the middle of the day.

That wasn't normal.

So she's probably avoiding something.

She's some sort of outcast.

Point number three is this Jesus pursues us in our need and even in our resistance to him.

That's good news.

Because we are needy and at times we are even resistant.

And Jesus loves us enough to pursue us in all of that.

Jesus is pursuing this woman, verse 10, Jesus answered her, If you knew the gift of God and who it is that is saying to you, give me a drink, you would have asked him, and he would have given you living water.

The woman said to him, Sir, you have nothing to draw water with.

She's not picking up on it right away.

He just said living water, but she's not quite picking up on the metaphor here.

The woman said to him, Sir, you have nothing to draw water with.

The well is deep.

Where do you get that living water?

Are you greater than our father Jacob?

He gave us the well and drank from it himself, as did his sons in his livestock.

And Jesus said to her, Everyone who drinks of this water will be thirsty again.

But whoever drinks of the water that I will give him will never be thirsty again.

The water that I will give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life.

So Jesus is speaking about primary needs of the heart.

Even more profound than a physical need.

Love, acceptance, validation, righteousness, forgiveness, justification.

Verse 15, the woman said to him, Sir, give me this water.

Give it to me.

Yeah, I want that, right?

I want that magical special water you got.

So that I will not be thirsty or have to come here to draw water.

And Jesus said to her, odd response, go call your husband and come here.

What a strange interaction here.

The woman says, She's in, and Jesus says, Go call your husband.

She says she doesn't have one.

He says, You're right.

Remember the story?

And she says, don't have one.

And he says, Yeah, yeah, yeah.

You've had five.

Living with another guy.

It'd be easy to think Jesus is shaming her.

Try to get her act together.

He's not.

He's disrupting her life with grace.

We need a disruption so often.

We need to be disrupted into the belovedness that Jesus is trying to woo us into, that our heart might finally be at rest.

Remember the great quote, the great line by St.

Augustine, the fourth century.

That's our story.

Now let's jump to the first part of the phrase.

He leads me beside still waters.

He leads me.

Point number four is this.

We are ready to be led when we realize we are not as put together as we originally thought.

We're just not ready to be led until then.

We're just going to be independent, autonomous, we're going to attend church and kind of go home.

But I'm talking about being shepherded, waking up to new mercies and crying out to God, lead me today.

I want to hear your voice.

I'm going to be led.

Last year, Christian and I went on a day date up to LAJ.

And so we headed up to Ellay.

We had no real lunch plans.

And so once we got up there, we saw the Arby's and the curly cue fries are good, but we're looking for something else.

And so we need to be led.

We need something else.

And so she pulls up Yelp and she puts$1.

I'm like, hey, hit the$1.

That's what we're after, is the$1.

And sure enough, what pops up is Tony's Country Corner Kitchen.

Now that sounds like our kind of spot.

Fantastic.

Country corner.

Well, we still need more help.

We don't know where it's at.

So then she's got to take that address.

She's going to open up Waze and put it over there.

We still need to be led, right?

We get there, turn by turn, we're led, right?

We do this every day.

We get there, it's a shack of a restaurant.

Here it is, country corner.

Shack of a kind of log cabin restaurant, up against a gas station.

You don't see that.

The gas station's to the left.

Pickup trucks are everywhere, which is a sign.

You know it.

Breakfast or lunch, pickup trucks are a good sign because they know where the good food is.

The$1 bill good food.

That's where you go.

And we see this place, we're like, this is it.

This is our kind of place.

We settle into a booth, order a patty melt, tater tots, ice cold Coca-Cola, not Pepsi.

Right?

This week, by the way, this week, as a some fancy schmancy restaurant down in Atlanta for lunch.

I ordered a Coke.

They brought me an R.C.

cola.

I know it's from Columbus, but I'm still recovering from that RC Cola.

I'm talking about ice cold Coke.

We're from Georgia, folks.

You know what I'm saying?

And that country corner had Coca-Cola, patty melt, tater tots, the booth.

I mean, this.

You can take us out of the country, but the country's still in us, right?

Amen.

If you're from the country, you know what I'm talking about.

This is how we grew up.

We are settled in.

This is our place.

What an amazing place.

And we would have never found it if we were not led.

We had to be led there.

Sometimes we just have to be led.

You just don't have the knowledge.

You don't have the experience.

You don't have the wisdom.

You don't have the capability.

Here's my point.

Maybe you noticed it in Psalm 23.

Psalm 23 places God as the actor.

We are the recipient of how He is acting upon us.

God makes me lie down in green pastures.

He leads me beside still waters.

It's about our posture of receiving His leadership, His shepherding, His one-way love to us.

The implication is our relationship with God is not pulling up our bootstraps and tying them tight and climbing up the mountain to God.

The implication is that we own our need even more.

And a posture of receiving that God comes down the mountain to us in the cross.

That's the gospel.

Our sin put upon Him on the cross, His forgiveness put upon us, His righteousness put upon us, that we're forever His beloved.

This is what changes our heart.

Eternal life welling up within us.

For me, for application this week, as I was thinking about it, I think the application comes into my spiritual practices, things like prayer or coming to church or a devotional life.

These ideas of being shepherded into quiet waters by practices are not duty anymore.

They're delight.

For so long it was guilt motivated and then beat myself up if I'm not doing them.

But now because I'm secure in Christ, they're grace motivated as a wooing to be reminded who I already am.

How he actually feels about me.

And I get to, by the still waters, I get to the privilege to listen to the word and the spirit of how he's calling me to live.

That's growth in the gospel, we would call it.

Growing in grace.

It's godliness.

I think for my schedule, it means to slow down more, to be shepherded by the love that actually can quiet my heart.

For my relationships, it means to show, to just shower grace on people.

Empathy.

Compassion.

Not perfectly, by the way, but that's the movement.

That's the movement we're looking for by a heart that's been quieted by his love.

To show compassion and empathy rather than judgment and resentment.

And the question is always, will I allow him to shepherd me?

Finally, into that conversation, Jesus with the thirsty woman, the woman said to him, verse 25, the woman said to him, I know that the Messiah is coming.

He who is called Christ, when he comes, he will tell us all things.

And Jesus said to her, I who speak to you am He.

So he's leading her to quiet waters, and then he's saying, Hey, by the way, it's me.

It's ultimately me.

So what might happen to a person like this woman or like me or like you, who beautifully surrenders to their need, owning it more and more, surrendering to his provision, his goodness, his shepherding?

What might happen to us?

Well, a few chapters later in John chapter 7, verses 37 and 38, Jesus says this on the last day of the feast, the great day, Jesus stood up and cried out, If anyone thirsts, let him come to me and drink.

John 7:37

Whoever believes in me, as the scripture has said, out of his heart will flow rivers of living water.

Out of his heart.

So we're not talking about behavioral change.

We're not talking about being moreless.

We're talking about a heart that is growing more and more and being quieted by your secure belovedness with God through Christ, so secure, you're becoming more and more healed, coping less, wanting to grow in godliness, out of the heart, rivers of living water.

It's a beautiful image.

I close with the same question from last week.

What if we, me and you, imperfect as we are, the mess that we can be even this morning, what ways might your heart be freed?

Healed?

What ways might your heart grow in godliness?

If by the power of the gospel, you could say, The Lord is my shepherd.

I shall not want.

He makes me lie down in green pastures, and he leads me beside still waters, quiet waters, rivers inside of your heart flowing up.

Living waters.

Let's pray together.

God, thank you for your grace and goodness to us, this image that you want to lead us, not to condemn us by dangerous waters or belittle us or limit us, but you want to lead us to quiet waters, lessening fear, calm replenishment.

Help us to cry out to you more, owning our need, to know the goodness that we have in you, our belovedness, and what you want to do in our lives.

Help us to be able, in the grace of God, repent more.

And to ask, what does living waters look like in me?

What are you calling me to?

What are you calling me out of?

I pray that you would speak to us this morning right where we're at.

For you love us right where we're at, and you are sufficient.

That you are the good shepherd of our souls and our hearts.

I pray this in Jesus' name.

Amen.