Psalm 23 John 10 - Memorial for Margaret Faye Hatton

READ Psalm 23

This is the word of the LORD given by his Holy Spirit through his servant David for his people for all eternity. May we have ears to hear and receive it such as it is.

PRAY

There is a reason that this psalm has proven to be one of the most known and most loved in the Bible. Now all the Psalms, and all of God’s word this “Scripture is breathed out by God and is profitable for teaching, reproof, correction, and for training in righteousness,” The use of this Scripture is most often to give comfort to those who are grieving, so that means that even as we grieve, we still need to be taught, reproved, corrected, and trained in righteousness so that the people of God may be complete and equipped for every good work.

This Psalm was according to her sister, Faye’s favorite passage of Scripture. It was written about a thousand years before the birth of our Lord Jesus, yet even early in the writings of the church, teachers began to recognize that this Psalm was teaching us about Jesus. That is not to say that when David wrote this Psalm, he really understood that it was about the man we call Jesus, but the Holy Spirit who inspired David to write certainly knew it was about Jesus. Jesus, after his resurrection met two of disciples on the road between Jerusalem and a neighboring town, and though they could not recognize him immediately, he taught them about how all the Scriptures, the Law, the Prophets, and the Writings, were leading people to expect and now understand who Jesus is and what he came to do for his people.

So if it is Scripture, Jesus says it is somehow given to teach us about him. That means that even as we grieve the loss of a friend, a sister, and and aunt, we can read or hear this Psalm and the Holy Spirit if he is working in us will teach us about Jesus. My task here today, is not to tell you about Faye. I remember her well, but not as well as you all do. I knew Faye before her health began to fail. You were all much closer and with her as she suffered and declined. Many of you were with her and sat beside her over the course of her last months, weeks, days, and even moments. That time you shared with her is not wasted. Suffering is a part of this life that cannot be avoided entirely, even as we should seek to escape it or alleviate it as much as we can. Still, as Christians, we are called to enter into and walk alongside the suffering of others, even as Jesus entered into suffering for his people, to save his people from our sins.

In his own teaching, our Lord, in John Chapter 10 says,

Truly, truly, I say to you, I am the door of the sheep.  All who came before me are thieves and robbers, but the sheep did not listen to them.  I am the door. If anyone enters by me, he will be saved and will go in and out and find pasture.  The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy. I came that they may have life and have it abundantly.  I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep.  He who is a hired hand and not a shepherd, who does not own the sheep, sees the wolf coming and leaves the sheep and flees, and the wolf snatches them and scatters them.  He flees because he is a hired hand and cares nothing for the sheep.  I am the good shepherd. I know my own and my own know me,  just as the Father knows me and I know the Father; and I lay down my life for the sheep.  And I have other sheep that are not of this fold. I must bring them also, and they will listen to my voice. So there will be one flock, one shepherd. For this reason the Father loves me, because I lay down my life that I may take it up again. No one takes it from me, but I lay it down of my own accord. I have authority to lay it down, and I have authority to take it up again. This charge I have received from my Father

When you and I hear the twenty-third Psalm read or even sang, it might not cause us to immediately recognize it is about Jesus. But even early in the church, one of their most common illustrations to understand Jesus, was to speak of and portray him as the Good Shepherd. Jesus, in John 10 is applying the Old Testament image of God’s being a shepherd to himself. Even as others who were supposed to work as shepherds under God as the great shepherd had largely failed in their task, Jesus would not fail. From all eternity, Jesus is the Good Shepherd. Even before men and women fell into sin, even before we created, God the Father loved God the Son. Jesus said the reason the Father loved him is because he lays down his life so that he may take it up again. The death, burial, and resurrection of the Lord Jesus was not an accident. It was not some injustice that God couldn’t stop. It was how God planned from all eternity to reveal his mercy, his steadfast love, for his people, so save his people from their sins.

It is easy for us to see a person we love suffer so terribly and think that somehow God is unjust. But we need to be reminded of how our Good Shepherd, the Lord Jesus, came as man, born under the Law, and lived a perfect sinless life that we could not. He is the only Good Shepherd in that he alone is perfect in his righteousness. If we are in Christ, we want, as David wrote, to be led in the paths of righteousness for the sake of the great name of God our Savior to be glorified, but we inevitably falter. We are prone to leave the paths of righteousness. And so, David, who came from a family of shepherds, recognized that the rod and the staff of God were a comfort. God’s rod of discipline is often needed to correct us. His staff is often needed to defend us against attacks from the evil one. And this is a comfort to whomever belongs to him.

Even the humble, faithful and obedient servant of God, David, who wrote this Psalm was not perfect in his humility. He was a sinner and he needed a Savior. He needed a Shepherd who could walk with him through the valley of the shadow of death. He needed a Shepherd who could enter into suffering with him to free him from his fear of the evil one. He knew, even before he understood, that the LORD was able to be with him. How could the LORD of Glory, the creator and sustainer of the entire universe be with us in suffering? Friends that is the great mystery that is revealed in the person and work of our LORD Jesus Christ. Jesus, the eternal Son of God would become a person, conceived by the Holy Spirit, formed in the virgin womb of Mary, born in Bethlehem, raised to work as a builder but learning in his home and in synagogue the Scriptures, filled with and taught by the Holy Spirit, sinless and perfect. Yet even as they could find no sin in him, the men of his generation hated him. They coveted his righteousness and so they killed the Lord of Glory by beating him, cursing him, nailing him to a cross and there he died.

The author of life was buried in the ground of Palestine. The Good Shepherd laid down his life for his sheep. And still the Father loved him. Death could not keep him. Even as he was surrounded in death by his enemies, even as he bore the sins of his people, God the Son was loved by God the Father. Despite the wrath of God being fully poured out upon him, Jesus was still the Christ, the Messiah, the Anointed. And the only perfect Man who ever lived could not be kept by the grave. God did not let his Holy One see corruption.

The resurrection of Jesus is our great hope as his people. We don’t see death as an escape from corruption. We see it as an enemy that we are right to hate, but an enemy that we need not fear because Jesus has defeated it. One day he will put an end to death once and for all. Our Good Shepherd has more sheep still to gather. He will bring them also.

If you are here today and you are really having trouble believing that Jesus could do this or that he could do this for you, then you are not alone. The men of Jesus’s time asked him, “How long will you keep us in suspense? If you are the Christ, tell us plainly.” Jesus answered them, “I told you, and you do not believe. The works that I do in my Father’s name bear witness about me, but you do not believe because you are not among my sheep. My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me. I give them eternal life, and they will never perish, and no one will snatch them out of my hand. My Father, who has given them to me, is greater than all, and no one is able to snatch them out of the Father’s hand. I and the Father are one.”

This gospel, this good news, only works if Jesus is truly God and truly Man. His resurrection would prove that he is who he claimed to be. For those who believe in Jesus’s death, burial, and resurrection and who receive it as good news for them, then he gives them eternal life. The Good Shepherd knows his sheep, names his sheep, and keeps his sheep. We are on the receiving end. We hear and know his voice. We are kept safe in his hand for all eternity. His goodness, his righteousness, his mercy, his steadfast love will follow us, pursue us, for all our days, even unto the day when he raises his people from the grave and we live on glorifying him for eternity. We will dwell in the house of the Lord forever. Jesus can do this because he is one with God the Father in a way that is impossible for us to fully comprehend, but must surely be true for him to say and do the things he does.

As we end this time of service I want to pray that we who hear this Psalm of David will hear in it the voice of David’s greater Son, Jesus, the one who is the Christ, repent of sin, and believe in him.

PRAY

Lord Jesus, you are our Good Shepherd if we hear your voice. If we believe in you, you go in front of us, leading us as your sheep, bringing into your church, into your body. By your death, you took our sin upon yourself. By your resurrection, you defeated sin and death for us. By your Spirit, you cause us to be born again, to love you and follow you as the LORD. Give us faith in you, Good Shepherd. Pursue us by your goodness and your steadfast love for us. Cause us to live and to dwell in your house, your gathered people now and forever. AMEN.