Alright, brethren, let's go to
Psalm 23. Greg read this Thursday night and it stayed with me a
little bit. I want to begin here. Let's read
the Psalm. Psalm 23.1, The Lord is my shepherd. I shall not want. He maketh me
to lie down in green pastures. He leadeth me beside the still
waters. He restoreth my soul. He leadeth
me in the paths of righteousness for his namesake. Yea, though
I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear
no evil, for thou art with me. Thy rod and thy staff, they comfort
me. Thou preparest a table before
me in the presence of mine enemies. Thou anointest my head with oil,
my cup runneth over. Surely, goodness and mercy shall
follow me all the days of my life, and I will dwell in the
house of the Lord forever." You know, David was a shepherd of
sheep. And that was a job nobody wanted. David was pretty much the runt
of the litter. He was the youngest, smallest
boy. And they put him out there to
be the shepherd. A lot of times when there wasn't
a son, when they had grown up and could do other things, they
would put one of the daughters out to be a shepherd. It wasn't
a job anybody wanted. It was lowly and it was lonely
because you were by yourself just tending the sheep out in
the pasture in the wilderness. It didn't pay anything. It was
dangerous. David on one occasion wrestled
a bear and a lion to save one sheep. And I picture David out there
on a hill with all those sheep, and he's looking at, you know,
him there as the shepherd, and there's these sheep, the flock
of sheep. And the Spirit moved on his heart to where when he
saw that setting, rather than putting himself in the position
of being a shepherd, he said, those sheep, that more resembles
what I am. I'm a sheep. I'm a sheep." He
saw himself like a dumb sheep. They can't find their way. They
wander off and they can't find their way back. He saw himself
surrounded by bears and lions and every danger, just like those
sheep. And just like those sheep, he
didn't have any defenses. He saw he needed a shepherd.
And the Spirit moved David in his heart to write this psalm.
And he wrote, The Lord is my shepherd. The Lord is my shepherd. Is the Lord your shepherd? Is
He your shepherd? Before we look at this, I want
to tell you some things about this shepherd. The Lord Jesus
is the shepherd that God provided for His sheep. God chose His
Son to be the shepherd. and he chose a people by free
grace. He chose them simply because
he would, by grace. And he gave them to his son,
and his son entered the covenant to be the shepherd, to save them,
keep them, and bring them to the Father. He used David as
a type of the shepherd, and he said in Ezekiel 34.22, God said,
I will save my flock, and they shall no more be a prey,
and I will judge between cattle and cattle, and I will set up
one shepherd over them." One shepherd. God the Father made
the Son the one shepherd over His sheep, over His elect. He's
the great shepherd of the sheep through the blood of the everlasting
covenant. And God said, I'll set up one
shepherd over them and He shall feed them, Even my servant David,
now David was a picture of Christ there. Christ came through David. He is the son of David. So you
look past David and our Lord is talking about Christ. He shall
feed them and he shall be their shepherd. And Christ my servant
shall be king over them. And they all shall have one shepherd.
All God's people throughout this world just have one shepherd.
They shall also walk in my judgments and observe my statutes and do
them. You know what God's judgments
and His statutes tell the sheep to do? Look to the shepherd. Trust the shepherd. Follow the
shepherd. And if you ever see a shepherd
with sheep, you'll learn real quick that the only way the sheep
do that is by the shepherd. By the shepherd. Christ the shepherd
laid down His life for the sheep. Zechariah 13.7 said, Awake, O
sword against my shepherd, against the man that is my fellow, saith
the Lord of hosts, smite the shepherd, and the sheep shall
be scattered, and I will turn my hand upon the little ones.
There was only one way God could save these sheep, His elect people. The only one way He could since
we fell in at them, He sent His Son to be the shepherd, to represent
us, to be the substitute, to lay down His life in place of
His people to bear God's wrath and justice and satisfy that
justice so God could be merciful to us. God couldn't be merciful
to us without being just at the same time. In other words, He
could be both just and merciful. It was for somebody to take our
place. And Christ came and took the
place of His people. And God said, Awake, O sword,
against My shepherd. And He took the sword of justice
and plunged it into the shepherd, into Christ on the cross. That's
what we deserve. That's what we should have borne
were it not for God's grace. But He sent His Son and He bore
it in our place. And so now the shepherd is risen. He didn't stay in the grave.
He accomplished what He came to do and God satisfied so He
arose. Hebrews 13.20 says, The God of
peace brought again from the dead our Lord Jesus, that great
shepherd of the sheep, through the blood of the everlasting
covenant. He fulfilled that everlasting covenant at all points for His
people, honored God in it so that God satisfied, He raised
Him. Now what does that mean? That
means that there is a man in glory, glorified,
just like His people, just like His sheep. And he was touched
in all points like we are. He knows everything that we ever
will go through. He knows it exactly. And there
he sits at God's right hand. And not only is he this glorified
man who knows us exactly, he is God so that he's able to comfort
his people and strengthen his people and lead his flock like
a shepherd. Really and truly, that's what
our Lord is doing. He assembled you here today as
you here that are His sheep. He brought you here. And what's
going on here today is He's ministering to His sheep. He's feeding His
sheep. He's instructing His sheep. He's
leading His sheep. This is what He's doing. This
is how He does it. It's Christ that does it. He's
the Great Shepherd with perfect knowledge of everything His sheep
need. And the One who has all power
to give His sheep everything we need. Therefore, the Lord
Jesus is the Good Shepherd. He's the Good Shepherd. Look
at John 10, verse 11. This is Christ speaking. The
whole book is Christ speaking, but this is Him speaking when
He was on this earth. John 10, 11. He said, I am the
good shepherd. The good shepherd giveth his
life for the sheep. He that's a hireling and not
the shepherd who's owned the sheep or not, see, the sheeper
he is. He owns the sheep. Bought them with his blood. But
he's the hireling that doesn't own the sheep. He sees the wolf
coming and he leaves the sheep and he flees. And the wolf catches
them and scattereth the sheep. The hireling fleeth because he
is a hireling, and he cares not for the sheep. I am the good
shepherd, and know my sheep, and am known of mine. How much
does he know his sheep? As the Father knows me, even
so I know the Father, and I lay down my life for the sheep. He
knows his sheep just like he knows the Father, and the Father
knows him. He said, and other sheep I have which are not of
this fold, not only of the elect among Israel, but also among
the Gentiles, and them also I must bring, and they shall hear my
voice. They shall. They shall hear my voice. He's
the successful shepherd. And there shall be one fold and
one shepherd. That's what God said would happen
back through Ezekiel. I'll set up one shepherd. One
shepherd, and He'll be one shepherd over them all. Look over here
in verse 27. My sheep hear My voice, and I
know them, and they follow Me, and I give unto them eternal
life, and they shall never perish, neither shall any man pluck them
out of My hand. That means He is the chief shepherd. He's the chief shepherd. Now,
He sends forth what Scripture calls His under-shepherds. But
he's the chief shepherd and he governs his under-shepherds. They're a sheep just like the
rest of the sheep. He's governing his under-shepherd
and he gives them the word to speak. And he makes that word
effectual when it goes forth. That word shepherd means pastor. It means bishop. It means elder. Christ is the bishop. He's the
chief shepherd. He's the shepherd who's God.
You were a sheep going astray, but now you're returned unto
the shepherd and bishop of your souls. You're turned to the shepherd
and pastor of your souls. That's who He is. Now do you
see what a great shepherd He is? This is what a great shepherd
we're talking about now. We're talking about a living
shepherd who just is really walking among His flock as He was when
He walked this earth in bodily form. Just that real. He's the
great shepherd, so David said, the Lord is my shepherd. Can you say that? Can you say
He's my shepherd? He's my shepherd. Well, if you
can say that, if you believe Him, trust Him only, let me show
you what He's doing now. Let's know what David said. Our
shepherd provides all for his sheep. He provides all for his
sheep. David said, the Lord is my shepherd,
I shall not want. His sheep have a lot of needs.
There's a lot we need. We need righteousness. We can't
produce it. We need holiness. We can't produce
it. We need redemption. We can't free ourselves. We need
spiritual life. We need spiritual food. We need
spiritual protection. We need spiritual guidance and comfort. We have
a lot of needs. They're all spiritual needs.
He'll provide the temporal things we need, but that's not our need.
Our need is spiritual. Christ provides every need his
sheep have. The Lord is my shepherd, I shall
not want. With Christ as our shepherd,
we won't want for anything. He said this, take no fault saying
what shall we eat or what shall we drink or wherewithal shall
we be clothed. Those are things that just take
your heart and mind off of Christ and the spiritual need. He said
the Gentiles live like that. He said, your heavenly Father
knoweth that you need all of these things, but seek you first
the kingdom of God. You seek Christ the Shepherd
and His righteousness. You need His righteousness and
all these other things He'll add to you. You will not want if you trust
the Shepherd. Secondly, our Shepherd gives
His sheep rest. He gives His sheep rest. Verse
2, He maketh me to lie down in green pastures. The green pastures
is the fullness of His grace. It's the fullness of His grace.
The green pasture really is him. He's the shepherd and he's the
pasture. He's our rest. Because he's our
shepherd, we lie down in him and have rest. He said in John
10 there, he said, I'm the door. By me, if any man enter in, he
shall be saved and shall go in and out and find pasture. He's
the door. He's the shepherd. He's the pasture.
He's all. And so He's our rest, He's the
one in whom we lie down, whom we cease from our works of trying
to earn God's favor and earn a salvation that we just can't
earn. He's provided it, and so we rest
in Him. And believers now, we're not
oppressed anymore by men oppressing us into attempting to keep the
law of God. He's taken that oppression off
of you because he's given you faith to believe and know that
by Christ establishing the law for us, we have kept the whole
law of God. As God commands and as God demands,
we've kept the whole law of God. That's what it means to be made
the righteousness of God, to be justified from all our sin.
So we're no more tormented by the law for our sin. We have
rest. We have rest. Sin shall not have
dominion over you. You're not under the law but
under grace. You're not going to be condemned and sin's not
going to going to make you fall away. The shepherd is going to
keep you. That's rest. His church is green
pasture. He said this in Ezekiel 34.14,
I will feed them in a good pasture and upon the high mountains of
Israel shall their fold be. That's where their flock will
be. This is a high mountain of Israel right here. Wherever He's
assembled His people is a high mountain of Israel. It's His
church. There shall they lie in a good
fold, and in fat pasture shall they feed upon the mountains
of Israel. That's all the work of our Lord.
Notice it's the shepherd who does all this for the sheep.
He makes His sheep to lie down in His pasture. Ezekiel 34.11,
He says, Thus saith the Lord God, Behold, I, even I, will
both search my sheep, and seek them out. As a shepherd seeks
out his flock in the day that he's among his sheep that are
scattered, so will I seek out my sheep and will deliver them
out of all places where they've been scattered in the cloudy
and dark day. He'll bring them all into a fold,
into one of His green pastures on the high mountain of Israel.
And together, while we're sitting here today, hearing the gospel
preached, and somewhere over here there's a church where they're
hearing the gospel preached, and two or three states over,
they're hearing the gospel preached, and around the world, they're
hearing the gospel preached. Truly, it's just one fold. It's
just one flock. The Great Shepherd is seated
in glory and we're all looking to Him. We're all looking to
Him and we're all right there with Him in that high mountain
of Israel. This is so of our Shepherd. So
He makes His flock to lie down because He declares to you in
your heart, it is finished. I've accomplished the work. He
accomplished our salvation. He makes his flock lie down together
in the mountain, knit together in love by one spirit and one
common faith, trusting one shepherd. That's what he said he would
do. There'd be one shepherd and one foal. He makes us rest in
peace from wolves and bears and lions, just like David wrestled
that lion and that bear and slew them to snatch that one sheep
from them. Christ said, My sheep hear My
voice, and they follow Me, and I give them eternal life, and
they'll never perish, neither shall any man pluck them out
of My hand. Nobody will pluck them out of
My hand. That's His promise. That's rest, brethren. That's
rest. And then thirdly, look here,
this great Shepherd leads His sheep. He leads His sheep. Verse 2 says, He leadeth Me beside
the still waters. Verse 3, the second part says,
He leadeth me in the paths of righteousness for His name's
sake. That's what we're saying. He leadeth me. He leadeth me. Sheep are very fearful. Sheep
are fearful creatures. We are. We are. They don't like loud running
rapids. Neither do His people. He leads
me beside still waters, David said. He leads us beside the
still waters. He leads us in the right path,
the right way, and He does it for His namesake. The waters
of this world, whatever the world offers you, and all the false
Gospels, the so-called Gospels around this world, they're loud,
they're oppressive, they're noisy, because they're shallow. Just
like, that's why a creek is noisy, it's shallow, and there's a lot
of rocks and a lot of shoals, and that's just all this world
is, is a bunch of noise because it's shallow. There's no substance
to it. But the Lord calls his gospel
the waters of Shiloah that go softly. Still waters run deep. And we have a gospel, we have
the Word of our Lord, and there's no end to this water. You can't
plumb the depths of this. It's always full. Full of His
grace, full of His love. The height, the breadth, the
length, the depth. Deep water. Deep water. At best, while we're
in this earth and the little bit we know, we just dip in our
tiptoe in it. That's all. We can't wait too
far out in it. Every word declares the Lord's
the way. He's the right path. He's the
way. He's the righteousness of His
people, and He's leading us for His namesake. His name's attached
to this. He promised the Father He'd bring
His people to Him, so His name's attached. And every word of this
deep river, every word of it, that he's making us drink from
is leading us in the path straight to Christ. Think about it. When
we study the doctrine of election, we're not just trying to make
people mad. We study the doctrine of election because God said
his son is the elect. I chose my son. This is my elect. He's preeminent in everything.
He's first, foremost in everything. And God chose the people in him.
That's why we preach it. He came to save a particular
people. Predestination. Where is that going to lead?
God predestinating you unto the adoption of children. Where does
that lead to? What does that path lead to?
It leads you right to Christ. Redemption. Redemption. You're in prison, you're in darkness,
you're in bondage, you're in sin. You can't free yourself
from the curse and condemnation of the law and from the chains
of your sin nature. Where does the redemption lead
you to? It leads you out of the prison, straight into His light,
straight to Christ. That's the path of righteousness.
Regeneration, when He comes in the Spirit of God, He said we
must be born again. You must be given life to hear
this. You must be given a new understanding. Where is it going
to lead you to? When He first called you, when
He first quickened you, when He first called you, where did
it lead you? Right to Christ. He leads me in paths of righteousness
for His namesake, and they all lead right to Him. That's this
deep river we're drinking of. What about sanctification? Where
is that going to lead you to? It's going to lead you to Christ
being your sanctifier. who keeps taking us, taking his
staff and turning us back to him to partake of his holiness
to know I'm the one keeping you separated. Preservation, perseverance of
the saints is because of the preservation of our great shepherd. Where does that lead you to?
It leads you to the one doing the preserving, leads you to
Christ, shows you the only reason I stand by faith is he keeps
me standing. The reason we press toward the
mark is because He's the mark and He keeps leading us. What about glorification? A to
Z, He's getting the glory for everything. Glorification will
be when He raises us anew in a new glorified body and we're
wholly sanctified in body, soul, and spirit. Where's that going
to lead to? Close your eyes in death and open them beholding
Him. Every path is leading to Him.
Every path is leading to Him. When we stray, we cry like David
did in Psalm 119, 176, I've gone astray like a lost sheep. Seek
thy servant and he finds us and he leads us back to Him. He leads
us to His Word. He leads us to His Gospel. And
He does it for His namesake. And He leads us, brethren. He
leads us. That's what a shepherd does.
Sheep. You lead sheep. You drive goats. He leads us. He leads us. He shall feed His flock like
a shepherd. He shall gather the lambs with
His arm. When we're too weak to walk,
He gathers you up in His arm and carries them in His bosom
and He shall gently lead those that are with young." Where does
He lead us? Revelation 7.17 says, He shall
lead them unto living fountains of waters. Living waters. This word. And God shall wipe away all tears
from their eyes. And keep noticing now, it's the
shepherd that does this. It's the shepherd doing it all.
We're the sheep. He's the shepherd. All right. Fourthly, our faithful
shepherd restores his sheep. He says there in verse 3, He
restoreth my soul. He restored that He took not
away. We did the sinning. We sinned in Adam. We came forth
sinning, corrupt. We ruined ourselves. But our
Lord Jesus restored everything for us and He didn't take it
away. He restores our souls when the Spirit of God comes and He
gives you spiritual life that you did not have. He restores
your soul. He restores us with faith and
love, and He restores us with a song. Just like this, we start
singing, The Lord is my shepherd, praising Him and glorifying Him.
He commanded that man with the withered hand to stretch forth
his hand, and by that command he stretched it forth. And scripture
says, and his hand was restored whole as the other. That's what
he's done for us. That's what holiness is. He's
made you whole. Made you whole. It's not finished
in this sense. One day we're going to be whole
in body, soul, and spirit. Right now it's just in spirit.
When we become sorrowful, He revives our soul, He restores
our soul. When we're weak, He strengthens
us. It's all our shepherd. It's all our shepherd. When you
love somebody, you won't talk about them. That's the only one
you won't talk about. That's why we're talking about
Him. Our separate conference is sheep. Look at verse 4. Yea,
though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will
fear no evil, for thou art with me. Thy rod and thy staff, they
comfort me. This world, from the beginning
to the end, is the valley of the shadow of death. This whole world is a valley
of shadow of death. We're surrounded by death on
all sides. And we're living in a body that's
dying. And we're all going to die physically. And through this
whole valley, it's a shadow of death. But for God's people,
it's just a shadow. A shadow can't hurt you. He made
you alive. A shadow can't do a thing to
you. You're just going to walk right through a shadow. That's
what death is for His people. You're just going to walk right
through it. just like walking through a door, leaving this
room and going into that room. But our Shepherd is with us all
the time. He said, although I walk through
the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil for thou
art with me. He's with His people all the
time. He promised to never leave us nor forsake us. He said, I'm
with you always. That's His promise. That's His
promise. And he said here, your rod and
your staff comfort me. You've seen a shepherd with a
shepherd's crook. That's the rod. His rod and his
staff is this gospel we preach, the word of God. And our Lord,
when a shepherd took his rod, that's how he separated out his
sheep. That's how he numbered his sheep.
He made them pass under the rod and counted them as they went
under the rod. You can see this at, if you ever go to a cell
barn, you can see this. They'll hold a rod out, not just
for sheep, but for other cattle. They'll hold it out and they'll
count them as they go under the rod. That's how they keep up
with how many they should separate out. Christ separates out his
sheep with this gospel. This is what does the separating.
This is the rod that does the separating. He said in Leviticus
27.32, concerning the tithe of the herd, or of the flock, that's
those that are his. He said, whatsoever passeth under
the rod, the tenth shall be holy unto the Lord. That's his elect
remnant, his portion. And by this word, He's going
to keep us and He's going to comfort His sheep with this rod
of this gospel, with the everlasting covenant of grace. He said in
Ezekiel 20.37, I will cause you to pass under the rod. That's
talking about a shepherd's staff. I'll cause you, my sheep, to
pass under the rod and I will bring you into the bond of the
covenant. That's His promise. That's what
He's doing through this gospel. calling out His sheep, gathering
them up, making them pass under the gospel, and that's where
He'll keep them. Separated out under Him. And
He's doing this for us continually. He's providing for us continually. Look at verse 5. Thou preparest
a table before me in the presence of mine enemies. Thou anointest
my head with oil, my cup runneth over. He's prepared this table today,
right here. in the midst of all the enemies
around, he's prepared it. And when it looks like there'll
be no provision and you just, you know, there's just no way
he can do it, he will prepare a table for you, a feast for
you. And it's not physical, it's spiritual. He said, you anoint my head with
oil. It's in the heart, it's in the
new mind. And my cup runs over when you do it. Those are terms
of banqueting. It makes your cup run over. They
spoke against God and they said, can God furnish the table in
the wilderness? Behold, he smoked the rock that the waters gushed
out and the streams overflowed. They said, can he give bread
also? Can he provide flesh for his people? And he rained down
manna upon them to eat and gave them of the corn of heaven, man
to eat angels' food. He sent meat to the full. Christ
said, I am the rock. He's the rock that was smitten
from whom the water of life flows. He said, I'm the bread that came
down from heaven. This table He's preparing us,
He's preparing it and the meat we're eating is Him. What He's
making our cup run over with is Him and all spiritual blessings
we have in Him. The oil and wine of the Gospel,
the sincere milk of the Word. He makes you feast on a feast
of fat things, wine on the leaves well refined. He says to His
people, come and dine. It's all ready. Come dine. Come
eat. Come feast. Why are you striving
and trying to pay for something, for a bread that can't satisfy?
He said, Here in your soul shall live. Let your soul delight itself
in fatness. This is a spiritual feast. He's
feeding his people right in the midst of our enemies. You know,
the shepherd not only accomplished reconciling his sheep to God,
What He's telling us here is He's able, He knows every need
we have, and He's able to provide that need, and He's able to comfort
you, and He's able to keep you, and He's able to provide for
you. Right as you walk through this wilderness, surrounded by
the world, He's able to do this for you. The only thing our Shepherd
tells us to do is cast all your care on Him. Just cast all your
care on Him. Trust Him that He careth for
you. That's what He's doing for His people. He makes us know,
I shall not want. If He's your shepherd, if you
know He's providing, if you know He's done all this and He's going
to do it to the end, just like He promised and you really believe
Him, you can say this right here, verse 6. Surely, goodness and
mercy. We're going to need His goodness
and we're going to need His mercy. We're going to need both. Surely
goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life, and
I will dwell in the house of the Lord forever." You see, the
house of the Lord is His people and Him, wherever He is and wherever
His people are. It's not this physical house.
And one day we're going to drop this physical house, but we're
going to be We are dwelling in His house now, and we're going
to dwell in His house forever. This is all by our Great Shepherd.
You see why David said, the Lord is my Shepherd. The Lord is my
Shepherd. Let's go to Him. Father, we thank
You for this Word. Thank You for providing this
Great Shepherd. Lord, we just cry to You. We won't ask you how to provide.
We won't ask you what to do. We'll just say, Lord, help us. Lord, save us. Thy will be done. Whatever you do, we'll be happy. We'll be content. Thank you,
Lord, for being such a faithful, merciful, good shepherd. In Christ's
name we pray. Amen.