"Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil: for thou art with me; thy rod and thy staff they comfort me."
Psalms 23:4
Usually reading this verse I focus on the comforting part where God is with us and helping us by giving us things to guide us... symbolically both the rod and the staff of the shepherd and the word of God. There are a lot of good lessons there.
This time, though, I was drawn to the idea of fearing no evil. That seems amazing. There are so many things that I am afraid of, and evil is probably at the top of the list, above even failure and cockroaches. :) The idea of not being afraid of evil is an amazing idea all by itself, and it requires some faith to trust God that he will help us and guide us so that we really don't need to be afraid.
In addition to faith, I think it requires some preparation on our part as well. The mention of God's rod and staff mean that we need to be keeping God's word in our hearts, which of necessity means that we are reading and learning from the scriptures, listening to the prophet, and continuing in sincere prayer each day. I know that scripture study and prayer kind of sound like typical Sunday School answers that always get mentioned, but those are the simple things that we can do to keep God with us, and thus also help insulate ourselves from fear with his comfort.
Today, let's trust God, but also put in the time and the effort in our lives to seek God's word and keep his spirit with us so that he can comfort and help us in times of trouble and calm our fears by calling to our minds his words that we know, because we have been opening our ears to hear him.
Psalms 23:4
Usually reading this verse I focus on the comforting part where God is with us and helping us by giving us things to guide us... symbolically both the rod and the staff of the shepherd and the word of God. There are a lot of good lessons there.
This time, though, I was drawn to the idea of fearing no evil. That seems amazing. There are so many things that I am afraid of, and evil is probably at the top of the list, above even failure and cockroaches. :) The idea of not being afraid of evil is an amazing idea all by itself, and it requires some faith to trust God that he will help us and guide us so that we really don't need to be afraid.
In addition to faith, I think it requires some preparation on our part as well. The mention of God's rod and staff mean that we need to be keeping God's word in our hearts, which of necessity means that we are reading and learning from the scriptures, listening to the prophet, and continuing in sincere prayer each day. I know that scripture study and prayer kind of sound like typical Sunday School answers that always get mentioned, but those are the simple things that we can do to keep God with us, and thus also help insulate ourselves from fear with his comfort.
Today, let's trust God, but also put in the time and the effort in our lives to seek God's word and keep his spirit with us so that he can comfort and help us in times of trouble and calm our fears by calling to our minds his words that we know, because we have been opening our ears to hear him.
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