“A rod and a staff—they feel like a strange comfort. Consider sheep in a dark valley surrounded by predators, and their only encouragement being the push of a rod or the wrench of a staff. It’s a comfort ultimately, but at the time it may not feel like it.” As a friend and I discussed Psalm 23, we addressed an often overlooked part of it. How, I wondered, can we find comfort in these images of correction?
King David, having grown up a shepherd boy, knew the tools of the trade. In the ancient near East, shepherds would carry a rod to keep the sheep safe from predators and to discipline them when they went astray. The staff is a gentler tool with its distinctive hook. It can be used to place a newborn into its mother’s lap or it can guide a sheep in a new direction.
How might God use these instruments with us? When we feel anxious, we may experience a sort of rescue, like the Shepherd’s crook that pulls the sheep up to high ground. If we act out of irritation or selfishness, we might sense the loving discipline of the Shepherd. We will not find ourselves ostracised, but nestled among His flock.
We can trust our Good Shepherd, who lays down His life for His sheep and who knows them by name.
By Amy Boucher Pye
REFLECT & PRAY
When have you sensed God using His rod and staff in your life? How do you react to loving correction?
Saving Jesus, keep me from going astray, and help me to share the message of Your saving grace with others.
SCRIPTURE INSIGHT
David isn’t the first to use the shepherd-sheep metaphor. Hundreds of years before, Jacob referred to God as his shepherd (Genesis 48:15). Later, the prophets too used this metaphor (Isaiah 40:11; Ezekiel 34:12, 31).
Psalm 23 is undeniably the best-known psalm. We traditionally view it with the assuring and comforting picture of the Lord as the Shepherd-Pastor. But in the ancient Near East, the shepherd metaphor is also used to denote the Shepherd–King who provides for (vv. 1–3) and protects His people (vv. 4–6). Other psalms also speak of God as a shepherd leading His people (28:9; 78:52–53; 79:13; 80:1; 95:7; 100:3 ).
In the New Testament, Jesus is called our Good Shepherd (John 10:11), the Great Shepherd (Hebrews 13:20), and the Chief Shepherd (1 Peter 5:4).
K. T. Sim
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