Everyday Gospel: A Daily Devotional Connecting Scripture to All of LifeSample

If you are God’s child, nothing in your life is more constant and important than the shepherding care of your Savior.

I love how God, in his word, invites us to look into and eavesdrop on some of the most intimate, precious, and holy moments in people’s lives. God does this to remind us of our weaknesses, limits, and neediness and of the blessings of his presence, power, and love unleashed on our behalf. We find one of these incidents at the end of Jacob’s life. He is old, blind, and weak, literally at death’s door. But by God’s plan and grace, Jacob has not only been reunited with his long-lost son Joseph, the son he thought he would never see again, but he has met grandsons he didn’t know he had. I can’t imagine that there was a dry eye in the room. This was more than a family reunion; this was a moment of divine blessings (Gen. 48).

This poignant family moment quickly became a time of worship, prayer, and the passing down of blessing. For Jacob, there was only one summary of his amazing, blessed, and trouble-filled life, in which he had experienced the deepest of griefs and the highest of joys. Here is his final “says it all” statement: “God . . . has been my shepherd all my life long to this day” (Gen. 48:15).

It was not, “Look how wise and successful I have been. Look at the wealth I have acquired. Look at the great family I have raised.” No, in his final frail moments on earth, Jacob’s mind went to the things that had been his rock of surety and hope his entire life: the shepherding care of his Lord. In all of the times of fear and grief and in all of the lofty moments of hope and joy, this is the thing that had been the constant. The Lord was Jacob’s Shepherd, and in him, Jacob had found everything he would ever need.

In all of her weaknesses, neediness, pains, and joys, my mom found her hope in the Lord. So, as she was passing into eternity, in and out of a coma, she asked us to sing hymns to her. She loved the great hymns of the faith. We stood around her bed and sang hymn after hymn. Sometimes we didn’t know if she was cognizant enough to hear and be comforted, but then we would look more closely and notice she was mouthing the words with her lips. She faced her final days as Jacob did, reminding herself of the shepherding care of her Lord.

Our lives are mixed with sorrow and joy, courage and fear, but at the end of our journey we will look back at all the mountains and valleys and we will see one thing that was always there: the shepherding care of our Lord and Savior. And we will rest, knowing we didn’t have everything we wanted, but that our Shepherd had constantly supplied everything we needed.

For further study and encouragement: Psalm 23:1–6