“He Leads Me Beside Still Waters.” Psalm 23:2

“The Lord is my Shepherd, I shall not want. He makes me lie down in green pastures. He leads me beside still waters.” Psalm 23:1-2

Just as there is no substitute for the Shepherd’s pasture, there is also no substitute for the waters where He leads us. Water is essential for our lives.

In A Shepherd Looks at Psalm 23, I learned that “water determines the vitality, strength, and vigor of the sheep and is essential to its health and general well being.” Let’s first consider your well-being. 

What sources are you drinking from spiritually? 

How have you noticed those water springs affecting your overall health? 

What difference in your heart can you tell when you choose God’s water sources over the options of this world?

I personally see a stark difference in my perseverance for the race marked out for us when I’m seeking God’s fuel and fresh water.

SEEK THE STILL WATER

I’m so relaxed by the vision of a sheep and shepherd beside still water and the beauty Psalm 23:2 paints. Yet my next thought leads to asking, “What does it look like to trust God in the middle of waters that aren’t still?”

Have you walked through deep, chaotic, unfamiliar, stormy waters – ones that are the complete opposite of still? 

As Believers, we aren’t promised easy lives filled with only stunning, still water. So what is true in the midst of both life storms and sunsets? We can seek the Shepherd who leads us both beside and to the still waters along the way.

To me, the beauty in Psalm 23:2 points to the truth that no matter your current circumstance, He is the peaceful, still water extended to us.

How do we receive this?

By lifting your hands and trusting His promises of who He is in the midst of His will.

By seeking the still water.

It’s His presence that provides the peace and stillness our heart desires. 

Isaiah 43:1-2a promises us, “Fear not, for I have redeemed you; I have called you by name, you are mine. When you pass through the waters, I will be with you, and through the rivers they shall not overwhelm you;” He promises to always be a presence of calm in the midst of anything. He promises to provide all that we need. “He is before all things, and in him all things hold together” (Colossians 1:17).

Scripture is full of examples where the Lord went before His people and held the details in His Hands, leading them to still water.

I think of the Israelites walking through the Red Sea. Hebrews 11:1 says, “Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen.” The Israelites had faith that they would cross on dry land despite the reality of the Red Sea in front of them. Like them, we don’t have all the answers and cannot see the still water; often, we wonder if we will get to where God is leading us.

Yet by faith, we seek Him & trust as He splits the sea and opens a walkway only He can pave.

I think of when Jesus was in the boat with his disciples during a storm. The disciples frantically asked Jesus, “Teacher, don’t you care if we drown?” He got up, rebuked the wind and said to the waves, “Quiet! Be still!” Then the wind died down, and it was completely calm. He said to his disciples, “Why are you so afraid? Do you still have no faith?” They were terrified and asked each other, “Who is this? Even the wind and the waves obey him!” (Mark 4:38-41) 

By faith, we seek Him for still waters in the midst of a storm.

When was the last time you called out to God asking if He cared about a circumstance in your life? What answer did you hear from the Lord?

In each moment, we point to Christ as His presence, through the Holy Spirit, is our constant calm.

The Waters Do Not Overstep His Command

This week, I’m telling you with confidence that you will trust that God will meet all of your needs to the degree that you know His character. Do you know the Prince of Peace? Do you trust in His Sovereignty even when you do not know the “why”? Do you know the One who created the earth and “...marked out the horizon on the face of the deep, when he established the clouds above and fixed securely the fountains of the deep, when he gave the sea its boundary so the waters would not overstep his command…” (Proverbs 8:27)?

I read that verse in Proverbs and am struck by the beautiful image that the waters do not overstep His command. Our all powerful, almighty God is the commander over every sovereign detail on this earth. It gives me peace to lift my hands and put all circumstances on His throne – knowing that nothing happens outside of His story for our lives. No matter how [our] waters look, they do not overstep His command, and He leads us to still water along the way.

In full transparency, I have a lot of tough questions I wrestle with when I think about why earth-shattering, horrible, heart-wrenching things happen. Situations filled with loss and grief that I would not wish upon anyone. I ask God, “Why?” Was this part of your command?

What I do read in Scripture is that as Believers, we will have suffering in this world. And that suffering produces character, and that character produces hope. And hoping in our Savior gives us an eternal lens for what’s to come – beyond the brokenness of this world.

I think about the disciples who questioned Jesus when they saw a blind man.“...his disciples asked him, ‘Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?’ Jesus answered, ‘It was not that this man sinned, or his parents, but that the works of God might be displayed in him.’”

As we walk through our life circumstances, in any questions we may not have fully answered this side of Heaven, may we point to the works of God on display. Even if it looks different than we ever would have imagined.

God’s works were on display when He calmed the storm. God’s works were on display when He split the sea.

So for you, how are the works of God on display in your life? How does it reassure you that the waters do not overstep His command?

For me, trusting that the waters do not overstep His command shifts my lens and focus for each day. Trusting that God is sovereign over the details and will lead me to still, refreshing water each day.

Over the last several weeks we’ve discussed the truth that through Christ, we have everything we need. Remember Isaiah 58:11, “...the Lord will guide you continually and satisfy your desire in scorched places and make your bones strong; and you shall be like a watered garden, like a spring of water, whose waters do not fail.” That verse shows the image of a Believer led by the Lord, whose waters did not fail, because of the Lord’s strength.

My prayer is that in the midst of seeking Jesus in a sunset or a storm, we can hear the gentle assurance that through faith in Christ, we can trust He is there holding the details all along. He split the sea. He was in the boat. The waters do not overstep His command. 

He is the Living Water

Keller explains “to drink,” in spiritual terminology, simply means “to take in”-- or “to accept” – or “to believe.” That is to say, it implies that a person accepts and assimilates the very life of God in Christ to the point where it becomes a part of him.”

I think of the lyrics from the song, “O Come to the Altar” by Elevation Worship:

Have you come to the end of yourself?

Do you thirst for a drink from the well?

Jesus is calling.

Do you live a life where others look at you and know you are an image bearer of Christ?

Jesus promised to provide the living water, the Holy Spirit, in John 7:37-38: “If anyone thirsts, let him come to me and drink. Whoever believes in me, as the Scripture has said, ‘Out of his heart will flow rivers of living water.’” 

As we drink from the Living Water, the salt in our speech is evidence of our walk with Him. as Luke 6:45 references, “...for out of the abundance of the heart his mouth speaks.”

Keller outlines in his Psalm 23:2 chapter that, “Thirst indicates the need of the body to have its water supply replenished from a source outside itself.”

A source outside itself.

We know that the greatest, most refreshing source is, of course, God.

Yet how often do we seek a drink from other wells this world offers?

Keller describes people of this world “drinking deeply from the wells of the world only to turn away unsatisfied–unquenched in their soul’s thirst.”

When we personally seek the Living Water through reading His Word, that’s where our souls receive what they need. Keller says that, “One comes away from [time with God] refreshed in mind and spirit. The thirst is slaked and the heart is quietly satisfied.”

Keller also points out, “Just as the physical body has a capacity and need for water, so Scripture points out to us clearly that the human personality, the human soul, has a capacity and need for the water of the Spirit of the eternal God.”

Do we see our need for God?

What truth do you know lies in His wells for you today?

Out of the overflow of seeking God’s springs, we will embody the verses in Psalm 1:1-3 that say, “Blessed is the man who walks not in the counsel of the wicked, nor stands in the way of sinners, nor sits in the seat of scoffers; but his delight is in the law of the Lord, and on his law he meditates day and night. He is like a tree planted by streams of water that yields its fruit in its season, and its leaf does not wither.”

As we seek our Shepherd, may our prayers look like David’s when he prayed, “You, God, are my God, earnestly I seek you; I thirst for you, my whole being longs for you, in a dry and parched land where there is no water.” (Psalm 63:1)

It is through His gentle leading to drink His living water that we find peace and health in this life journey; that still water through our Shepherd nourishes and restores our soul.

Join us next week as we study Psalm 23:3, “He restores my soul.”