Every year, on the fourth Sunday in Easter, we celebrate Good Shepherd Sunday.  You may have noticed references to God as our shepherd in several of the lessons for today.  That is a beloved and familiar image for Christians.  At the National Cathedral in Washington, there is a tiny chapel on the outside wall of the Cathedral known as the Good Shepherd Chapel.  There is a stone statue of a shepherd cradling a lamb in his arms—parts of the statue are very smooth and shiny from people touching it as they pray.  And of course, the image of the Good Shepherd is deeply rooted in Judaism. We see it in Psalm 23, and there is also a long passage in Ezekiel about the bad shepherds who are the kings of Israel compared with God the good shepherd.  The sight of shepherds taking care of their sheep was commonplace in Israel, both in Jesus’ day and in the centuries preceding him, and so people readily grasped this metaphor for God. 

It is a little harder for us to grasp the relationship between the shepherd and the sheep nowadays—so many of us live in urban and suburban areas.  Even out here in the country, where there are some sheep (I saw some on Horsenden Road between here and New Paltz)—but the sheep are generally penned in—they seem to have enough pasture at least here in the East without roaming far and wide.  But in Israel, which is semi-arid, the shepherds would travel all over with the sheep to find the good pastures.  They spent 24/7 with the sheep, making sure they had food and water, protecting them from wild animals, thieves and storms, caring for them when they were sick or injured, preventing them from wandering off, and searching for them when they were lost.   A good shepherd knew all of his sheep as individuals and there was a custom of coming up with a pet name for each one.  And it is really true, as Jesus says in the Gospel reading, that sheep learn to distinguish the voice of their shepherd and will follow him or her, but will not follow a stranger. 

So this relationship between a good shepherd and her sheep is a good metaphor for the relationship between God and us.  I want to take a closer look at Psalm 23, and the way it paints the picture of God as our shepherd.  But first, let me say a few words about the psalms generally.  The book of Psalms, traditionally called the Psalter, is the prayer book of the Bible.  Like our own Book of Common Prayer, it has prayers for every occasion.  But the psalms are unusual because of their raw honesty.  There are psalms of complaint, psalms expressing rage, psalms filled with grief and despair.  There are psalms that accuse God of abandoning us.  And there are joyful psalms, psalms of praise and thanksgiving, psalms expressing wonder and awe, hope and trust.  The psalms are beautiful, poetic and amazingly up front about our human condition and the changing moods of our relationship with God. 

In my mind, psalm 23 is the jewel of the entire psalter--no wonder it is the most widely known and the most frequently prayed of all the psalms.  I have a funny history with it myself.  When I was a law student in my early 20’s, I took a break from memorizing contract law to memorize something more beautiful and poetic.  Even though I was not a believer at the time, I chose the 23rd psalm to memorize.  Years later, after I became a Christian, I returned to that psalm and prayed it frequently.  There was even a year that it was my daily prayer.  It is still very precious to me, and it is the first prayer on my lips whenever I’m in trouble.  I thought it was very clever of God to draw me in that way when I was still an atheist. 

 “The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want…” What an extraordinary statement of trust!  God cares for us the way a shepherd cares for his sheep and so we will lack nothing.  God protects us, and cares for us when we are sick or injured, and finds us when we are lost.  Imagine all the circumstances in which people have prayed that verse—situations in which they were in fact in dire need but were still able to express their trust in God. 

The next verse expands on this theme.  “He maketh me to lie down in green pastures, he leadeth me beside the still waters…” The heart of the shepherd’s job is to feed and water the sheep—green pastures and water mean sustenance and life.  But God doesn’t just bring us to green pastures---God makes us lie down in them. Just hearing these words is restful.  God leads us to the STILL water—what could be more peaceful and calming than still water, reflecting the sky? 

The next verse completes this thought:  “He restoreth my soul.”  God not only takes care of our physical needs, but also restores our souls when they are battered and bruised and weary. 

When we have been fed and sustained, refreshed and restored, God leads us in the paths of righteousness for his Name’s sake.  This is part of restoring our souls, because we are made in God’s image and we cannot be whole if we are not leading ethical lives—lives of loving our neighbor as ourselves.   So part of the way God cares for us is by leading and guiding us in the right ways so that we can honor God and honor God’s image in ourselves. 

Now the Psalm turns to some of the harsher realities of human life:  “Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for Thou art with me.”  Again, we see the brutal honesty of the psalms—we will walk through the darkest valleys—we will face suffering and evil and death.  But, “I will fear no evil, for Thou art with me.”  Another astonishing statement of trust.  Notice that the psalm shifts at this point from the 3rd person to the 2nd.  The psalmist is no longer making statements about God—instead she has begun a face to face dialogue with God.  The psalm has led us to a place of greater intimacy with God—what Martin Buber calls an I-Thou relationship.  This verse is the very heart of the psalm—You, God, are with me, your beloved, in all circumstances, and so I will not be afraid of anything. Isn’t this the heart of Jesus’ message to us as well?  He says it over and over in the gospels, “do not be afraid,” and he shows us what a life of trusting in God looks like.

“Thy rod and thy staff, they comfort me.”  The rod and the staff are shepherd’s tools—the rod was a club used to defend against wild animals, and the staff was used to guide wayward sheep back to the flock when they started wandering off.  God will defend us from our outer enemies and from our inner waywardness.

”Thou preparest a table before me in the presence of mine enemies.”  The psalmist acknowledges that we will have enemies, whether inner or outer ones, but God will sustain us as we face them.  This verse has echoes of God feeding the Israelites in the wilderness as they faced inner enemies of doubt, cynicism and despair, and outer enemies of heat, cold, thirst, wild animals and hostile peoples.  This verse also points ahead to this table that God prepares for us each week to sustain us as we face our own enemies. 

            “Thou anointest my head with oil…”  This reflects the ancient custom of pouring oil over the head of an honored guest.  We have moved into yet another level of intimacy with God.  We are no longer just God’s sheep, and let’s face it, sheep are not the brightest of animals.  We are God’s honored guests here on this earth.  God cares for us as tenderly as a shepherd cares for his sheep, but even more, God actively desires our company and celebrates our presence.   

No wonder the next verse is “my cup runneth over.”  God’s desire for us and love for us fills us to overflowing.  When we experience intimacy with God, and feel the depth and breadth of God’s love for us, we cannot help but overflow with love for others.  We see a  picture of that overflowing love in the reading from Acts this morning—where the believers are all together, sharing all their possessions, and taking care of anyone in need, while they praise God with glad and generous hearts.  When our hearts overflow with God’s love, we cannot help but love each other and be generous with each other.  Intimacy with God results in intimacy with our fellow human beings.