Psalms No.2 Security in the Valley

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 name's sake.

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. Amen.

I would be grateful and I think you may find it helpful if you'll have your Bibles open at the 23rd Psalm, and we shall be looking shortly into the fourth verse. For some weeks now we have been considering life in terms of a journey through a valley, and I think the symbolism is helpful. A valley has a beginning and an end, and so does life.

A valley changes in its scenery, in its topography. There are places where the valley seems to be a slit between a mountain, a gorge that has divided the mountain into two. It's narrow and the river rushes crazily down the steep slope.

There is only a fleeting glimpse of the sun as it passes over the top of the gorge once in every 24 hours. The way is hard for the traveler, and then later on down the valley perhaps it broadens out into a plain, and the luscious green grasses contrast with the blueness of the river as it now lazily meanders across attractive land, gurgling quite merrily. And again I suggest to you that life is sometimes like that.

There are the gorges, when one feels hemmed in with the side so very, very close, when the going is rough, when our ability to see into the distance is considerably limited, when the contrast is not so much between night and day, but rather between twilight and absolute darkness. And then, thank God, there are the moments when we go into a plain, when we enjoy the scenery. The mountains are there but they've been pushed back and we can see more clearly.

The air is invigorating and we enjoy life. It's good to be alive and there aren't the problems and there aren't the depressions that we experienced a little way back in our journey. I put it to you that life is very much like the passing through a valley and it has been extraordinary to me, never intending to preach a series of sermons on the God of the valleys, to realize just how much scripture has to say about valleys and how often this symbolism is employed to illustrate life.

And most surely David the psalmist views life in terms of a sojourn of a journey through a valley. This, I think, comes out most clearly in the fourth verse of the 23rd psalm. Possibly David was an older man when he wrote this psalm, maybe he was by that time a king, and he's reflecting upon the days that he spent as a boy looking after his father's sheep in proximity of Bethlehem, his native town.

And there are many hills around Bethlehem. Maybe David is envisaging a scene late in the afternoon when the sun has dropped from its supremacy in the Middle Eastern sky. And now it's behind the hills and it's projecting the silhouette across the valley and there is David with his flock and the sheep, timid fearful creatures that they are, are afraid to move.

The patches of light, that's all right, they hold no fear for them, but in the valley now there are shadows, there are deep shadows, that is really the literal translation of the Hebrew here, the shadow of death, the shadow of absolute darkness. And these dumb creatures are afraid, afraid that is until David moves. David their guide, David their friend, David whose one concern is the welfare of the sheep, and as he moves down the valley, as he goes into the shadows, the sheep will follow because they recognize that David is their guide.

David can indeed be trusted. You know my meditations upon this theme, and my conclusions as they have developed in studying the Word of God, leads me to make this suggestion, indeed to make this pronouncement as I understand the teaching of the Word of God, that Christian people invariably are to see their lives in terms of passing through a valley, and not rather see their lives in terms of going from one mountaintop to another mountaintop. For it appears to me from my consideration of the Word of God, that mountaintop experiences are noted for their infrequence.

They are a rare thing. It is highly significant, is it not, that Moses did not get a panorama of the promised land until he was a very, very old man, and then he stood at the summit of the mountain. Oh yes, I know Peter, James, and John had a summit experience on the Mount of Transfiguration as they witnessed that remarkable event.

But I put it to you that Peter was speaking more from the confusion of his mind than the clarity of his mind when he said, Lord it is good for us to be here. Let us build three booths, one for thee, one for Moses, and one for the other Old Testament person. Let us build these booths, and let us stay there.

But the scripture tells us that Peter wist not what he was saying, for Peter was not to stay on the mountaintop, and neither was the Lord Jesus and these Old Testament men. Peter, it's down in the valley where you're needed, down in the valley where the gospel message is to be transmitted and communicated, for it's in the valley that there's an epileptic boy who needs healing. There's a father that's demented who needs soothing.

It's in the valley, I put it to you my friends this morning, that you and I are to spend our journey, are to spend our lives, are to engage upon our spiritual pilgrimage. It's there where the Christian life is to be lived out in the valley with its bleakness, its hostility, its pain, its incredible circumstances. And if that seems to you to be a depressing and a despondent thought for me to bring to your attention, then let me suggest something else that will show to you that the valley is not to be feared, that it's not just a bleak and a depressing place.

With what insight and spiritual genius did Solomon speak about the beauty of our Lord Jesus Christ? With what accuracy was he unable to pinpoint the sphere of his spiritual ministry? For referring to the Savior, Solomon said that he is the rose of Sharon, but listen, and the lily of the valley. It's in the valley where you find the lilies. It's just at the beginning of the mountain slopes that sometimes in Switzerland you see those delightful wild flowers.

It's there in the valley of life where the fragrance of the Lord Jesus Christ is experienced, where his perfume is realized. And when one appreciates this, when one realizes that the Lord Jesus Christ is in the valley of shadows, then the valley becomes not only passable, but the sojourn through it can indeed be precious. Why do we fear the valley? Perhaps there's a suggestion of it in my verse.

The psalmist says, I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil. Notice the double, the repetition of the personal pronoun I there. And this of course is one of the problems of life.

We tend to walk alone. Here is David emphasizing the fact of himself, the ego. I walk through the valley of the shadow of death.

And you know, there is perhaps here in this scripture and in related scriptures, an evidence of the loneliness that sometimes we feel in life. Do you ever feel lonely? Perhaps a better word, a more skillful word, would be solitariness. There is a solitariness in life, is there not, that each one of us at some time or another experiences.

Oh, the two on the Emmaus road, they had the company of one another. And yet you know, that Emmaus road was probably crowded with people, yet there's no evidence of that in scripture. It was the festive season, and no doubt there were a number of folks who were walking from Jerusalem to Emmaus.

But what stands out when you read that passage of scripture, is the solitariness of the two who are involved. And life can be a solitary thing. Oh, your marriage may be a tremendous success, and thank God for it.

You may know unity along every level, but there are moments if you confess it when you feel solitary. You see, we all come into the world on our own. We have no companion.

We enter into the valley ourselves, and the ego is very much in predominance in as much as we come, as I say, alone. And similarly, when we leave the valley, we leave it alone. This is an unpleasant thought.

How often one wishes that we could go together, that man and wife could leave together, that man, that woman, and woman could leave together. But no, we leave the valley alone, and it is this thought of solitariness that sometimes causes us to be afraid of life. Professor Whitehead went on record as defining religion in terms of what a man does with his solitariness.

I reject the definition as being adequate, but one thing I would concede, and it is that when one is in a solitary condition, then the value of one's religion is proved. You realize whether it's counterfeit or whether it's valid or not. When I am alone, when I am going through the valley alone, when I feel solitary and that no one understands, it is then, I suggest to you, that I can judge whether my religious experience is a valid one.

David says, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil. Is not another characteristic of going through life, the sensation of fear? And yet, David doesn't seem to regret this sensation. And you know, fear is not a condition that we should really regret.

Fear can be very helpful. Fear is akin to pain. Oh, pain, if it's uncontrolled, is certainly a horrific thing, but pain is inbuilt into the human frame as a friend of man and not as a foe.

Without pain, I would not know that there was something wrong with my body that required attention. Without pain, the doctor would be hard-pressed in certain circumstances to prescribe a remedy. And fear is like this.

Fear can be man's friend. So, it's not fear itself that seems to me to be suggesting anxiety, to be causing anxiety as we pass through the valley of the shadows. Then what is it that causes worry? Well, again, I deduce it from my text.

It is evil. I will fear no evil. Alas, there's lots of evil in the valley of the shadow of this world.

And it's not something that you have to sink a mineshaft to discover. There are outcrops of it all over the valley. Lots and lots of evil.

You may not like the idea man recalls from the teaching of the word of God along this line. It is repugnant to him, but nonetheless it is true. I'm always amazed at the the ability of man to brainwash himself, to delude himself, to think of life in terms of a world with no difficulty, with no joy, with no pain at all.

I remember a very sincere woman coming along one day at one of the schools at which I taught in London. And she addressed the school body at prize giving. And I say I do not question her sincerity, though I do question her wisdom.

She said to the boys and girls who were gathered, and those particularly who were leaving school, the world is yours. Go and get it. As though it was a prize to be won, when it's not a prize to be won.

It's a battlefield to be feared. The world has many perils for the traveler who passes through it. It's a valley with pitfalls and also with shadows.

Dangers lurking valleys. The road that went from Jerusalem down to Jericho was a valley road. The parable of the Good Samaritan should illustrate most clearly the dangers that there were unseen, hidden, and yet they were real enough.

And one man virtually lost his life as a result. Walking through the valley of this world should, should prompt the fear of evil because there is evil there. There is something that causes us to be afraid if we have any spiritual sensitivity as we engage in our journey down the valley of the shadows of this life.

But why is evil feared? Well, again, my text suggests the answer. Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil. You must link death to the word evil, for evil is the harbinger of death.

And death is one of the greatest foes of mankind. It is his adversary. Death is the ultimate obscenity.

It is death from which we recoil. And that's strange, is it not? Strange that man should be so afraid of death if secular philosophies are right. And death is mere oblivion.

Death is mere annihilation. But you see, there is a sense in which when we have concluded our logical analysis of death, when we have applied our, our secular reason to it, we're still afraid. Why? Because there is a thought within our breasts that tells us that death is not just an act, it is a state.

That when a man is taken out of the valley, he does, he is not removed from his sins, but rather he goes to face their consequences. And this irrational fear that man has of death, I say, can only be explained in theological terms. And this is why on occasion I have made criticism of so much of modern psychology, which tries to reduce man to a mere machine and explain him in terms of a here and now, that man is not a machine.

Man has a soul. Man has a spirit. Man has an awareness, even if he will not confess it, even if he is not honest enough to admit to it, that he is responsible to his Creator.

And he has the dread possibility that having gone down the valley, and having eventually been removed from it, he will stand before his God to give an account for the way that he has lived his life. But listen, for this is precious. The man who writes this psalm is not afraid of the valley of the shadows of death.

He's no obscurantist. He appreciates the difficulties. He realizes that most of his life he's spending it in a twilight world, where, as I say, the difference is not between sunshine and darkness, but rather half-light and night.

And yet this man, although he's a courageous thinker, he does not shrink from passing through the valley of the shadow of death. Why is that? Well, look at the first couple of words in the statement. Yea, though.

Those are tremendous words. Says David, I know where I'm going. I'm aware of the pitfalls.

I see the shadows. I appreciate the dangers. Sometimes I'm hemmed in on either side.

Sometimes I find myself in inexplicable circumstances. But yea, though I pass through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil. Why not? For thou art with me.

David is, you see, introducing something else into the argument. Something that's vital, and yet is so often missed today in our modern view of life. We've talked about the ego.

We've talked in, if you like, about egocentricity. Now he is talking about God. He is talking about theocentricity.

He is referring to God being with him. I will fear no evil, for thou art with me. The white lily is in the valley.

The rose of Sharon is there. This is where God offers you and me aid, in the rough and tumble of life, in those extraordinary circumstances when we don't understand him, and we cannot grasp the significance of our experience, and why it has dawned in our lives. It is at that moment, in particular, when the Scriptures tell us we are to appreciate that thou art with me.

God is there. There's a Jewish theologian, I believe, Martin Buber, who referred to God in terms as, in terms of the eternal thou. And I think that the comment is significant.

You see, God is personal, not impersonal. God is related, not unrelated. God is not divorced from this world.

He is involved in this world. God is not just the God of the summit. He is the God of the, of the valley.

And this is what David appreciates. The Lord is with me. The Lord is my shepherd.

That was his opening statement. When Christians are aware of the shepherd-like nature of God, remember the occasion in the epistle to the Hebrews, when you read that glorious benediction, Jesus Christ, that great shepherd of the sheep. He knows the human flock.

He knows all about you and me. This is the teaching, surely, of the 10th chapter of the Gospel of John. The Lord Jesus is aware of our failings, aware of our successes.

He knows our blemishes and our imperfections. He knows our pain. He remembers that we are dust.

And in the valley, He communicates to us. And this is why, really, He came into this world. Again, the writer to the Hebrew says, we have not an high priest.

And there, I think I'm permitted also to put in parentheses, in brackets, we have not a shepherd who cannot be touched with the feelings of our infirmities. Why? Because He was tempted as we are tempted. It behold Him to be made like us, to come into the valley of this world, so that He could understand our problems, so that He could understand our difficulties, so that He could enter into our infirmities and minister to us what we need.

Jesus Christ passed through the valley. He experienced the assaults of hell itself. He fought the powers of evil.

On the cross, we remember He overcame them. And there, He secured a right of way, so that all of us could pass through the valley, not immune from the conflict, not immune from the difficulty, but assured of final deliverance. In the valley, Jesus tells us, we shall have tribulation.

In the world, ye shall know tribulation. But even when walking through the valley, even when it's a gorge, when you're hemmed in on either side, the Savior says, don't be afraid. Why? Because I've overcome the world.

Because I have secured a passage through that valley, and will lead you as you follow Me. And again, the teaching of David, here in the Psalms, plainly endorses that of the Savior, that, yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for thou art with Me. And that is the assurance that I offer you this morning.

I do not know what all your circumstances are. Some I do know, and some have gone through difficult times. Then in the name of God, yes my friend, I put it as strongly as that, in the name of God, I bring you a message from Him.

Yea, though you walk through the valley of the shadow of death, there is no need to fear evil, for He is with thee. Take this word, apply it to yourself. Jesus said, I will never leave you nor forsake you.

Come injury, come disease, come financial ruin, come betrayal by your best friends, come all the tempestuous storms of life, come all the afflictions and assaults of the devil himself. Jesus Christ assures you that He will be with you, and though all the gates of hell were opened, and all the demonic forces were ranged round about you, Jesus Christ promised that they would not prevail. He will keep you.

David says, I have set the Lord before me at all times. What a marvelous statement, can you say that? I have set the Lord before me at all times, whether it's the gorge or the plain, whether I am having difficulty in making any progress, or whether I'm able to move with alacrity and with speed, I have set the Lord before me at all times. David appreciates the closeness of his God.

Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for thou art with me. What wonder there is in those words, thou art with me, the presence of God. And yet you know, the presence of the shepherd would not have been sufficient for the sheep.

They wanted a little more. They wanted the shepherd to act for their welfare. They wanted the shepherd for protection.

And this again is what the statement in the psalm teaches about the good shepherd, even Jehovah God. Thou art with me, thy presence is here, and also thou hast made provision for my protection, thy rod and thy staff, they comfort me. The staff was a form of cudgel, and the rod rather was a form of cudgel, and the staff was necessary to aid the sheep.

There were times you remember when David used his rod, when he used his cudgel to dispatch a lion and the bear, and no doubt there were times when he used his staff to rescue some timid sheep who had fallen on the rocks. And the same applies with that great shepherd of the sheep, even our Lord Jesus Christ. He has a rod and he has a staff, and he is applying them for our benefit, for our well-being.

He has set a hedge before us, and also at the back of us. He surrounds us with his presence. He does not make us immune from attack, but he promises that in the midst of conflict he will be there with us.

He does not always say that we'll know the sunshine, and sometimes the trips to the summit seem to be so terribly terribly rare, so so very infrequent, but he does guarantee us eternal security. We're as safe as lambs in the arms of Jesus, the one of whom it is written, having loved his own, he loved them to the end. And I believe that a full exposition of that scripture not only takes you to the thought of Jesus dying on the cross of Calvary, but Jesus preserving his church throughout the whole of time, until that moment when he shall present her falters before his Father.

Thy rod and thy staff, the provision that Jesus makes for you and for me, they comfort me. A final word then upon the thought of comfort. This is a blessed concept, is it not? It is an agreeable one.

Is not this the role of the Holy Spirit? Do we not read that he is the the divine paraclete, the one who comforts us? It is the ministry of the indwelling spirit within the breast of the believer that gives him hope, that gives him inspiration, that compels him to go on when reason would tell him to stop and to go back and to be in a state of despair. Comforts us when the journey is long and the situation is difficult. He comforts us when bizarre circumstances develop and we feel so solitary and so alone.

He comforts us in the shadows, even when the twilight seems to be remote. Comforts us when we are losing patience. Comforts us when we suffer the attacks of the evil one.

For then we realize that if God is for us, who can be against us? And then we realize that though everyone else has forgotten us, our names are indelibly engraved upon the palms of his hands. And he does not forget us, even though we are weak pilgrims making our way through the valley of the shadows of this life. Christian, let me say to you again from the word of God, I don't mind what part of the valley you're passing through at the moment the principle applies.

God is with you in it. Plod on faithfully and wherever the route might take you, remember that there is an end to your journey and there is a companion who is close by you all the way. And recall the grand statement of scripture which surely is parallel to that of the 23rd psalm and the fourth verse.

The path of the just is as a shining light which shineth more and more unto the perfect day. Life is a passing through a valley, but there's security there because it's in the valley that you find the lily, that you find the rose of Sharon. It's in the valley where Jesus and his presence is realized.

May the God of the valleys continue to bless you in your spiritual pilgrimage. Amen. Father, we believe that the steps of a good man are ordered by the Lord, so we would not dictate our route through life to thee.

We just take what thou wilt give and pray thee still through good or ill whoever lives. We ask that more and more our vision shall be fixed upon that point at the end of life's journey when we shall be taken to be with thee to experience the sunshine of thy presence. But until that moment, whatever the difficulty, whatever the joy, keep us close to thee, ever experiencing the fragrance of Jesus Christ ministering to our lives.

And now may the grace of the Lord Jesus and the love of God and the fellowship and communion of the Holy Spirit be our blessing now and until Jesus Christ returns again. Amen.