The Lord of Psalm 23: A Seven Day DevotionalНамуна

Where He Invites

If it is true that “you are with me” (Ps. 23:4) is the heart of the whole Bible in a nutshell, then it is also true that in the closing words of Psalm 23, we have the climax of the Bible’s whole storyline expressed in a final, beautiful confession of faith: I shall dwell in the house of the Lord forever. (v. 6) This is the ultimate “being with.” This is the drama of the Scriptures, and it is the personal invitation of our shepherd-host: he comes to be with us (v. 4) so that we can go and be with him (v. 6). He invites us to dwell with him where he dwells and to be there with him forever. As Richard Briggs says so nicely, here now, at last, “the psalm arrives at an assurance that transcends the immediate imagery of the poem.”1

In Psalm 23:6, David takes us from all our days of pressing onward with the shepherd in front of us and from all our days of looking back over his goodness and mercy behind us. We have been hemmed in safely all along the paths and in the valleys, but now he asserts with bold confidence that we are going to make it all the way to the shepherd’s house. And as we enter, we will hear: “You’re with me now. You’re home. Welcome. This is it. Hang your hat. This is where you shall live forever.” There is some debate as to the meaning of the phrase “forever” in the verse. It literally means “for length of days,” and so some question the sense of endless duration, the idea of an afterlife. Maybe David is simply saying this is where he will be for as long as he lives. But I think it is best to read “length of days” not merely as synonymous with “all the days of my life” in the preceding line but as intensifying that duration.

When we live with the Lord, we will never have to move out. It will never end.

We were created for fellowship with God; the whole point of our existence is to dwell with him. This fellowship—as we know all too well—has been fractured by the fall and the waywardness of our rebellion and sin, but none of these calamities have succeeded in erasing the original design. Our GPS is now faulty; we do not know the way back to God by ourselves, and we do not always want to find him—in fact, often quite the opposite—yet none of it removes our deep innate need to relate to our Creator. As Augustine famously said, “You move us to delight in praising You; for You have made us for Yourself, and our hearts are restless until they rest in You.”2 This is a confession of faith about return. It is a recognition that human beings belong with the one who made them, wherever else we belong. I think it’s why every sense of belonging is an echo from the deep, heart-sonar signals for our true, eternal home. And Psalm 23 is a song of praise to the God who has come to get us and bring us home. The journey is long, so we need a shepherd; it is dangerous, so we need a companion; and it is wearisome, so we need a host. But the journey has always had an ultimate destination in mind: the restoration of return to the house of the Lord.

1) Richard S. Briggs, The Lord Is My Shepherd: Psalm 23 for the Life of the Church(Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic, 2021), 124.

2) Augustine,Confessions1.1.1, New Advent, https://www.newadvent.org/.

Enjoyed this reading plan? Check out David Gibson's book 'The Lord of Psalm 23: Jesus Our Shepherd, Companion, and Host.' crossway.org/thelordofpsalm23/