Psalm 23:6
When reading a familiar passage of Scripture, such as Psalm 23, there is both delight and danger. To be sure, it is a joy to read a well-known chapter. There is comfort in familiarity. Many verses are well preached, well memorized, and well sung. Believers experience a heart-connecting unity and like-mindedness with others who know it just as well as they do.
There is a danger, though. Familiarity can often produce an unintended consequence. When a portion of Scripture becomes so casually familiar, its meaning may lose impact as we fail to dig deeper to mine fresh truths. Never think that the Word of God has limits to how it can bless!
This small statement boasts a magnificent promise! Herein lies the hope of every believer for today. The first word of this verse deserves a bit of emphasis: Surely. It lets us know that whatever follows is a guarantee. It is an absolute that the promise is true. Surely goodness and mercy will follow me.
If life has not turned out as planned, disappointment will devastate assurance when allowed to fester. We may even begin to wonder if God's promise is legitimate. Will it hold up amidst my personal struggles? The Bible says it is sure.
Goodness and mercy join together to guarantee hope for today.
Our Shepherd gives us goodness, and He gives us mercy. How? Most significantly, He forgives our sins when we confess them. This is no small thing. Yet, it can be taken for granted, even though the slightest affront to God merits judgment. We are allowed by the grace of God to live in His forgiveness. According to Lamentations, His mercy is new each morning, and we follow that daily example by continually offering our worship to Him. Every day is a chance to sing to the Lord a new song for His great faithfulness.
Not only are grace and mercy promised to us, but through the relentless will of our Shepherd, they follow us. To understand the language in Psalm 23:6, we must understand that the fullness of the word follow is to pursue. This energetic chase displays God's goodness because His mercy cannot be escaped, despite our failures. We cannot shake it, we cannot lose it, and we cannot disqualify ourselves from the mercy of our beloved Shepherd. This should give us fresh hope each day.
The Shepherd is before us, beside us, and behind us. The sheep are never alone. Do you feel neglected? Let the words of Psalm 23 assure you. He is always protecting, always defending, always nurturing, always guiding. As His constant companions, our influence should reflect the nature of our Shepherd and lead others to follow His leadership.
Consider this: as you go about your day, no matter the weather, the sun is shining. At night, as we slumber, we would say the sun is not shining, but, of course, it is. The sun never stops giving its light, though it is sometimes veiled from our view.
So it is with the goodness and the mercy of our Shepherd. His work never stops, even as you sleep and every morning when you rise. He is always active in your life, according to His will. There may be days, weeks, or even years when, like the sun at night, His work cannot be seen. At times, believers may struggle because there is no feeling of the goodness of God. Things seem bad! Sometimes, we don't feel that God is particularly merciful.
Remember that Scripture urges us to trust the Shepherd and live by our faith, not our feelings. We walk by faith and not by sight. Trust that even in the valley of the shadow of death, He is with you, interceding on your behalf. Even in the most challenging seasons of life, God is still merciful, and He is undoubtedly good. We know this because heaven awaits. Heaven makes up for any and every trial that threatens to rob us of our joy. Difficulties in life never negate the truth that God pursues those He loves. If you don't wake up tomorrow, you will be at home with the Lord, enjoying the fulfillment of something greater than you could ever imagine.
Hope…not hope in a mansion or streets of gold, but the hope of being with someone. The final comfort of Psalm 23 is the hope that the children of God possess. On earth, there is the reality of the shadow of death and the dangers it presents. Strife, opposition, and, at times, persecution abound. Jesus warned that the world hated Him and, therefore, hates us. This should not rob us of our joy because when a believer dies, the fulfillment of the hope that has been carried on this earth becomes a reality. So, according to verse five, we live with this hope every single day, with joy in our hearts, even in the presence of our enemies.
This hope should cause an inexplicable peace that drives others to desire to know, love, and trust the Shepherd.
What is this hope? Our hope is in the promise that Christ will welcome His people home for eternity, just as He said He would. The assurance of Psalm 23 is not that our Shepherd will care for us in this life only. The end of our time on earth marks the beginning of our greatest joy. We will be home with Him forever. "One is inclined to say to David, 'But surely you have reached the end, you have spoken of all the days of your life.' Ah no! Not the end but the beginning! The great commencement! The great graduation!"21
Hope is something that is depended upon but not yet fully realized. God created the world for His people to enjoy. There is beauty and wonder in what He has made. Yet for believers, we know that this is not our final destination. In our hearts, there will always be the tug of home. Our real home, where our Father abides. We live today in His goodness and mercy as it pursues us. But we hope in what will be for all eternity.
Life does not end just because our time on earth does. This is where the promise of Psalm 23 is more significant than our minds can imagine. We will live in the house of the Lord when this life's journey is over. The words of John 14 confirm that heaven is our home, and we will unite with those who are in Christ to live in God's house. We will worship, we will rejoice, and we will abide in the house of the Lord, always under His shepherding care. This is what makes heaven, heaven. It is not what will be there but who that matters.
When we ponder heaven, we might think of streets of gold, family reunions, or meeting biblical heroes. But our first thought should be that our Shepherd is waiting to welcome us home, ready to guide us gently into eternity and be with us forever. "I will dwell in the house of the Lord," David said. It is the Lord's house. He is there. I will be with Him. His goodness and mercy have been in hot pursuit of me all the days of my life, and finally, when I take my last breath and am ushered into the fulfillment of every promise, it is then that I will realize just how great the Shepherd truly is.
Today, I am grateful for my salvation, but not nearly as much as I will be when I meet my Lord face to face. Beloved, we will love Him more than we imagined possible. We will be more grateful for the cross on the day of our death than on any day of our earthly life. Because on that day, the truth will be revealed in its fullness. Today, we look through a glass dimly, on that day, face to face. What makes heaven our home is who is there. This is the greatest part of heaven. Of all the people who have gone before us and will be waiting with open arms, only one laid down His life so that we, who were deserving of death, would be saved. Only one is worthy of eternal worship, and that one is our great Shepherd.
Speaking of eternal worship, though this may not be voiced out loud, it has probably been a thought for many: Will heaven get boring? The answer is, only if Christ ever diminishes His own glory…which is eternal, so in short, no. The reasons to give praise and glory to His name are inexhaustible. All the days of your life, His goodness and mercy pursued you. At the cross, it caught you. In heaven, it overwhelms you. You will never tire of thanking, praising, and simply being with the Lord forever.
But we are not there yet. It is so important that we do not let our hearts settle for the things of this world, "For here we have no lasting city, but we seek the city that is to come" (Hebrews 13:14). This journey is temporary. The destination is eternal. As Paul so confidently put it, "Our citizenship is in heaven" (Philippians 3:20). Like a soldier coming home from a long deployment, we will drop the baggage of this life and all the burdens it contains to run to our Lord.
We will not be concerned about our earthly status, financial standing, or any trinket this world ever offered. We will care only about being with our Creator. At that moment, we will finally be home. Until then, all the days of life are lived by believers with God's goodness and mercy in full pursuit. That is the hope for today. But the fulfillment for all eternity will be the presence of the Savior Himself. Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life…and as if that's not enough…I will dwell in the house of the Lord forever.
Friends, let us take comfort in this psalm of promise. We all know that this life can be a combination of joy and sorrow, peace and conflict, abundance and need. But each day, for the believer, the Shepherd is near. He has a staff to guide, a rod to correct, and a sure destination. He comforts us through the tough times, helping us grow our faith, and gives us times of peace and nourishment so that we might revel in His love. The sheep have but one job: to become wholly dependent upon the Shepherd.
And one sweet day, when all of the Lord's sheep are safely gathered in heaven, the questions will give way to understanding. Why were you created? Why so much suffering? Why did Jesus redeem you and save your soul? Why were you welcomed into heaven to dwell in His presence for all eternity? And with a resounding anthem of praise, God's people will declare that it was all for the sake of His name!