He makes me to lie down in green pastures; He leads me beside the still waters. 

Psalm 23:2 

Christ gives us rest. As a shepherd, David understood the basic needs of sheep. These are food, water, and rest. As he describes his relationship with Christ, his Shepherd, he says, ‘He makes me to lie down in green pastures.’ Christ provides rest as one of the basic necessities. This rest, along with the food and water is a combination which will enable the sheep to thrive. David is quite clear that this is what Christ does for him. When Christ is our Shepherd we also can say, ‘He makes me to lie down in green pastures.’ Christ has promised rest to those who come to Him, ‘Come to Me, all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.’ He gives us rest now, even in the midst of a weary world and promises us eternal rest. ‘Then I heard a voice from heaven saying to me, Write: Blessed are the dead who die in the Lord from now on. Yes, says the Spirit, that they may rest from their labors, and their works follow them.’ We find ourselves laboring at the moment, often in spiritual ways. We seek to imitate Christ in doing good to those whom we encounter. We find ourselves growing weary at times. We know the work we are doing is worthwhile, but we wear down and out over time. Christ leads us to rest in the midst of those labors and leads us onward to the eternal rest He has prepared for us. He is in every way the Good Shepherd. As we follow Him day by day to all the places He will lead us, we can be sure He will give us all we need, not the least of which is rest.  

Our Gracious Savior and our God, 
we rejoice that You know all our needs. 
We praise You that You give us rest now,  
and promise us rest for the future. 

Tomm Tice
Where the Bush is Burning

He makes me to lie down in green pastures; He leads me beside the still waters 

Psalm 23:2

Christ meets our physical needs. The most fundamental need a sheep has is food and water. These are critical to life. It is important for us to realize David was writing this in the climatic context of the Middle East. Good pasture and good water are not always plentiful. There are years of little or no rain. Pastures brown and waters dry up. The shepherd who knows his job and his territory knows his responsibility is to place his sheep in good pasture where there is drinkable water. This is the only way they will thrive and not merely survive, or worse, weaken and die. The shepherd undertakes to guarantee the welfare of his flock by meeting these most basic needs. Christ undertakes to do this for His people. David said, ‘He makes me to lie down in green pastures; He leads me beside the still waters.’ Christ tells us He will care for us. He preached, ‘Therefore do not worry, saying, What shall we eat? Or What shall we drink? Or What shall we wear? For after all these things the Gentiles seek. For your heavenly Father knows that you need all these things. But seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things shall be added to you.’ He wants us to trust Him for these basic necessities. He taught His disciples to pray, ‘Give us this day our daily bread.’ Thus Christ, being well aware of what He has promised, is as good as His word. What He did for David, and for all His people of faith before us, He will do for us. David’s experience of Christ’s faithfulness will be ours. 

O, Great Shepherd of the sheep, 
we rejoice that You know what we need the most. 
We praise You that You move to meet those needs. 

Tomm Tice
Where the Bush is Burning

The LORD is my shepherd; I shall not want. 

Psalm 23:1

Christ shepherds His people in every way. David, having been a shepherd himself was keenly aware of the details of that occupation. He knew the difference between a good shepherd and a bad one. He knew how dependent and needy sheep are. He began by claiming Christ as His own. He started with the Person of Christ and proceeded to His work. He declares, ‘I shall not want.’ The implication of this statement is that David understood that because Christ was his Shepherd, he would lack for nothing. He knew that Christ was not just the Good Shepherd but the Great Shepherd. As the Great Shepherd and his own personal Shepherd, Christ would guarantee his complete welfare. This is the historic testimony of the redeemed. God having not spared His Own Son but having freely delivered Him up for us all, will also, with Him, freely give us all things. This is what we have because Christ is our Shepherd. What Christ gives to us and does for us guarantees our total welfare. ‘And we know that all things work together for good to those who love God, to those who are the called according to His purpose.’ This means David’s testimony is our testimony. What Christ did for him, He will do for us. We are as secure as David was. What he had, we have. When we say, ‘The LORD is my shepherd; I shall not want,’ we mean all that David meant.  

Our Gracious Savior and our God, 
we rejoice that You care for us in every way. 
We praise You that because You are our shepherd, 
we shall not want. 

Tomm Tice
Where the Bush is Burning

The LORD is my shepherd; I shall not want. 

Psalm 23:1 

Christ is the Shepherd of His people. The new Testament presents Him as the Good, Great and Chief Shepherd. He makes quite a point of His position in John 10, where He describes Himself as the Good Shepherd, and articulates in great detail how He executes that role. David had extensive evangelical knowledge as the Holy Spirit revealed eternal truth to him. He well understood Christ and the role He occupies as the Shepherd of His people. David wrote this psalm as a highly personal statement of his relationship with Christ. He begins the psalm with the categorical statement, ‘The LORD is my shepherd.’ David was abundantly clear that his Shepherd is Jehovah. He was equally clear that Christ was His Shepherd. The logical conclusion is that Christ, the Shepherd, is Jehovah. What makes the psalm so personal is the pronouns. David does not say, The LORD is a shepherd; the shepherd, or even our shepherd; but ‘The Lord is my shepherd.’ Christ has personally entered into a relationship with him that means his custodian is no one less than the eternal God. Sheep do not choose their shepherd. Shepherds choose their sheep. Christ was David’s Shepherd, and is ours’s because He has chosen us as His own sheep. This is a most blessed relationship. ‘The LORD is my shepherd.’ 

Our Gracious God and our Savior, 
we rejoice that You have made us Your own. 
We praise You that have undertaken to care for us, 
in such an intimate way.

Tomm Tice
Where the Bush is Burning

A posterity shall serve Him. It will be recounted of the Lord to the next generation, they will come and declare His righteousness to a people who will be born, that He has done this.  

Psalm 22:30-31 

‘Salvation is of the LORD.’ Jonah said it. The rest of the Scripture demonstrates it. We are not our own saviors. Another human cannot save us. No one else but God can save us. He does save us according to His Own explanation. Paul explains it concisely when he says, ‘For whom He foreknew, He also predestined to be conformed to the image of His Son, that He might be the firstborn among many brethren. Moreover whom He predestined, these He also called; whom He called, these He also justified; and whom He justified, these He also glorified.’ Thus we see that salvation is, from start to finish, the work of God. As our text puts it, ‘He has done this.’ The whole of the psalm has described the intense sufferings of Christ. We have beheld Him hanging on the cross and heard the agonized cries from His lips. We have seen His humiliation and heard from Him how He felt as He suffered. He has related to us in graphic terms what excruciating pain He has endured to purchase our redemption. We read this psalm with the increasing knowledge that God has done the most extensive, intensive, superlative work to redeem us from sin, death, and hell. Therefore we say, ‘To God be the glory, great things He has done.’ We want no credit for any part of salvation. He has done all the work and deserves all the glory. From now through eternity our song shall be, ‘Amazing grace how sweet the sound, that saved a wretch like me. I once was lost, but now am found; was blind, but now I see.’ 

Our Glorious Saving God, 
we rejoice in Your grand redemption. 
We praise You that You deserve the glory for it, 
from beginning to end. 

Tomm Tice
Where the Bush is Burning