“The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want.
He makes me lie down in green pastures.
He leads me beside still waters.
He restores my soul.
He leads me in paths of righteousness for His Name’s sake.
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.
You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies;
You anoint my head with oil; my cup overflows.
Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life,
And I shall dwell in the house of the Lord forever.”
Psalm 23:1-6 ESV

Sheep are so opinionated, you know? They’re always trying to boss the shepherd around, lead the flock in different directions and plant whole new pastures completely on their own. They invent new ways to eat grass, they ignore obvious efforts to be made safe by him, and they generally are worse than cats.

Oh, wait no…that’s us sometimes, not real sheep.

Real sheep depend on their shepherd for their lives. They listen for his voice, know his face and would follow him anywhere without thinking twice. Real sheep do not question their shepherd because they trust him implicitly. Again, their lives depend on him more than anything else.

Where is the food? The shepherd knows.
Where is clean water? The shepherd will lead us there.
Where is it safe from lions and wolves and other predators? With the shepherd, who places himself between the sheep and danger.
So, who do sheep learn to trust, depend on and live because of it? The shepherd.

So, when David writes this psalm, he writes from this vantage point. He was a shepherd himself, remember? And he knew what it meant to have a flock of hundreds of sheep move and depend on him for anything and everything. He had their best interests at heart, and he was going to do anything and everything he could to ensure their well being. And as often as People bring up the point that sheep are stupid, and may drown themselves wading in too fat to drink, or walk off of a cliff because they see grass on an opposite hill without noticing the chasm directly in front of them, they do have something on us a lot of the time…

They listen to the shepherd.

So often, we find ourselves in places where we would be so much better off if we would just be more like sheep. If we would simply trust more fully, listen more intently and keep our eyes fixed on him, we would be so much better off. If we would quit trying to forge off on our own, blazing paths into brambles and floods and into the lion’s den, we might actually get through this life intact.

Pride tells us to keep pushing, our sinful desires tell us to ask forgiveness instead of permission and worries and fears sometimes cement us to the ground in a time when our Good Shepherd is trying to lead us to safety. We forget that He has already taken on death itself for us, and we cower in the face of much smaller enemies.

‘Trust in The Lord with all your heart, and do not lean on your own understanding. Acknowledge Him in all your ways, and He will direct your path.’ And that’s a promise.

He loves us more than we understand. He shepherds us out of this love, and so we in turn ought to trust Him, and share in His joy and peace and provision and protection rather than trying to strike off on our own so much. He is good all the time. Trust Him.

And because we have been loved so fully and so well, we should keep an eye out for other sheep that have wandered off or lost sight of Him and GoLove them back to Him in His Name and power.