he leads me beside quiet waters" (Ps. 23.2)
"Green pastures", "quiet waters" - these speak of needed nourishment, refreshment and rest. The Divine Shepherd doesn't meet the sheep's merest whim, but cares for their deepest needs. We may well compare how Jesus taught us to pray for "our daily bread."
Of course, life isn't green pastures and quiet waters all the time - though many folk in our time seem to think it should be!
Nor was life that way for David. In fact, it was a far more stormy experience for him than it is for any of us! And yet, as he looked back, he knew that the Lord had given him green pastures and quiet waters along the way.
Did he, perhaps, recall his friendship with Jonathan, Saul's son?
As David's popularity grew with his success, Saul became embittered against him. But not so Jonathan.
Jonathan had earlier expressed the same sort of confidence in the Lord with which David had gone out against Goliath. Jonathan and his armour-bearer had tackled a Philistine garrison in the conviction that "nothing can hinder the Lord from saving, whether by many or by few" (1 Sam. 14.6).
A very close bond developed between David and Jonathan and they made a covenant with one another.
But Jonathan's father became increasingly jealous of David. He tried to kill him when he was playing the lyre for him (18.10-11; 19.1-10).
David became a fugitive, and Jonathan tried on the one hand to intercede with his father (19.4-5), and on the other to warn David of danger.
In moving words, Jonathan reaffirmed his pledge to his friend - "Go in peace, for we have sworn friendship with each other in the name of the Lord, saying, 'The Lord is witness between you and me, and between your descendants and my descendants forever'." (20.42)
Green pastures and quiet waters - did David mean that life was always pleasant and easy? It wasn't!
It was in the midst of difficulty, trial, pressure that it happened - something that David recognised as refreshment from heaven.
It has been suggested that, if we want to think life is meant to be a bed of roses, we had better remember that roses have thorns!
We are all familiar with the mirages that appear on the bitumen on a hot day. For the thirsty traveller in the desert the effect is more dramatic and inviting. He hopefully sees palm trees, water - an oasis - beckoning him on. Tragically, the illusion disappears as he gets closer to it - having travelled many precious kilometres in the wrong direction.
It was Karl Marx who contended that "religion is the opiate of the people," as if the help it offers is illusory, mirage-like - leading people on to nowhere.
"He makes me lie down in green pastures; he leads me beside quiet waters."
This is no mirage - it is reality. How often, in the midst of worry, anxiety, doubt, despair, there has come to us the experience of green pastures and quiet waters. Through some person or circumstance we have received fresh strength and fresh hope, fresh courage and renewed spirit.
Our Divine Shepherd hasn't promised us a life of ease, but he has promised sustenance and refreshment for the way. And isn't that just what we need?
| PRAYER: Sometimes, O Lord my Shepherd, I let life get me down. Things just don’t always go the way I would have chosen or planned. But then you send some person or circumstance to remind me that you are still there, that your love surrounds me and your help sustains me. Thank you, Lord! For Jesus’ sake, Amen. |
Amid the storms of life,
Its pressures and its strife,
God gives a place of calm,
Of peace and strength.
No, not amid life’s ease
When all its happenings please,
But when the going’s hard,
God gives that place of calm.
When anxious cares frustrate
Or bitterness and hate
Would do their worst,
God gives that place of calm.
Before earth’s struggles cease
God heals us with his peace
And strength to live again –
God gives a place of calm.