Sermon Summaries

Welcome to the New Year's Message Series. As you can see, I'm getting more caught up here, as I have been mostly by myself for the last 6 weeks or so. I had my granddaughter Sunday night to Monday afternoon, or I would have done this sooner. Meanwhile, the snow continues to fall every few days lately. I see it as a blessing of God making up for last year's drought. (and I don't have to shovel) 😉

In other news, I'm not sure if I already mentioned that my daughter Carissa has obtained the Storage keys from my father!! This is HUGE!! Now, as time allows, she and Greg, and possibly my father, and I, can FINALLY start sorting things out and getting rid of more unnecessary items. Especially since the Nursing Home won't release my mother anytime soon, if ever. Which, as you've seen recently, suits me just fine. First of all, it's the safest place for her considering the frequency of her falls during the past year or 2. Secondly, it means that, when I visit my father, I can relax, knowing she won't be there to hassle me/us about the topic of conversation. Dad and I both enjoy Bible Study, and often talk about various aspects I've been covering lately; either on here or on Quora. Although I've also recently been made aware of the work of Joe Felz. You may have seen his video shorts on Facebook in the past year or two. He finds old Bibles and other obscure history books in order to find the truth of them. His account is under his and his wife's name, so look for Joe Alx Felz. He's doing amazing things!!

Also, I got to see Andrea last week for a few hours!! It was just grocery shopping, but we got to catch up and have some laughs, so yay!!

Jeremy is trying really hard to be faithful to Sharon and happy in Omaha while desperately seeking other part-time employment to get him away from the intense temptations and aggravations of his current environment.

Prayers for all, as well as for me and Mike to find a ride soon. Video chats are nice, but really not enough for long periods apart.

While I'm using Pastor Matt's opening lines here, I also have my own experiences to relate in this space. In his introduction to this series, Matt spoke of how there are 2 kinds of people in this world. Obviously, there are any number of things that could be put after this phrase. But for the moment, he spoke of fast and slow walkers.

As a kid who spent a considerable amount of free time with my father, I naturally learned to walk fast in order to keep up. There are those who would say I never stopped.* (But, really, it depends on the temperature and my environment.) For example, in decent weather, on the streets of Concord, I tend to walk fast. Right now, the snow and ice are making me more careful, thus slowing me down. During the Summer, when I'm at one of the nearby parks, I take my shoes off and slow down on purpose of my own accord.

Pastor Matt's reason for bringing this up was that, in this series, we are going to take a slow saunter through these 6 verses as we take each phrase to heart, letting it soak into our very being. Also, as he said, the familiarity of this passage in particular, can make it hard to slow down. (rather like me on pavement vs grass/dirt)

As we've gone through this series, we are reading the entire Psalm aloud each week. Turn in your Bibles to our text for the following weeks -- Let's read slowly together, shall we??

Psalm 23

A psalm of David.

¹ The Lord is my shepherd, I lack nothing.²     He makes me lie down in green pastures, he leads me beside quiet waters,³     he refreshes my soul. He guides me along the right paths    for his name’s sake.⁴ Even though I walk    through the darkest valley,^[a]I will fear no evil,    for you are with me; your rod and your staff,    they comfort me.

⁵ You prepare a table before me    in the presence of my enemies. You anoint my head with oil;    my cup overflows.⁶ Surely your goodness and love will follow me    all the days of my life, and I will dwell in the house of the Lord    forever.

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The first thing we are looking at here is the fact of Who we are claiming as our Shepherd. This is not just some "random farm aide". This is The LORD. In this opening phrase, we proclaim to all around that The LORD is the One we trust.

This now begs the question, Who IS He, exactly?? For our answer, we look to the Ancient Hebrew. The original word for Lord was "Yhwh", no written vowels, as those were assumed. Other languages have come to translate this as Yaweh, or Yehovah, or Jehovah. In Exodus 3, when God is speaking to Moses at the Burning Bush, we find the term "Ehyeh". This is what God was saying when He said, "I AM". This is a first person indicator that means, "I exist in and of Myself". While the letter "E" in "Ehyeh" simply means "I", the word "hayah" from which the rest is taken, means "to be/to exist". This is used in the 3rd person, typically.

As Pastor Matt brought out here, God reveals Himself as fire that DIDN'T NEED FUEL!! Because He is self-sufficient, He showed up in a way that proved Who He was/is as He didn't consume the bush, He simply manifested Himself as fire. At the same time, Pastor Matt made the point that God didn't NEED to Create anything. He CHOSE to do it, in order to express His love to someone outside Himself.*

As we read through the Bible, we find that the first person to give God a different title than "Elohim" or "Yahweh", as used in Genesis 1, was Hagar, mother of Ishmael with Abraham. In Genesis 16:13, we read that, in her thankfulness for a son, she calls God, "El Roi", the God who sees. The next person who assigns a title to God is Abraham himself. When God provides the ram as a substitute for Isaac in Genesis 22:14, Abraham calls him "Jehovah Jireh", or the God Who provides. (I'll include the song below, along with another I was reminded of this afternoon in looking at the set list)

With these various titles, honoring various aspects of God's character, we discover that they have both cosmic and deeply personal relational connections.

As we look at the Earth, it is both beautiful and powerful, as is the rest of our Solar System, and indeed, even the universe. Pastor Matt had images here that I will post below, but just to give you a slight clue of how vast our Solar System is, do you know that it takes 25,000 light years from Earth, just to reach the NEAREST EDGE of the Milky Way!!?? 😯😯 Now think about that with the OTHER 10,000 galaxies the Hubble Telescope has currently discovered!!

Now, in getting back to our passage here, the fact that we HAVE the Lord as our Shepherd indicates that we NEED one, doesn't it?? Now, what Pastor Matt said next may come as a surprise to some of you. (Honestly, it did to me!) Did you know that sheep are NOT STUPID!!?? (That's right, you heard it here first!!) The truth is that they are vulnerable due to being 100% defenseless.

The statement that The LORD is MY Shepherd inherently indicates that we CHOOSE HIM among many other "shepherds".* Those others may include money, work, family, a "good school", the "right friends", etc... Literally anything we value above God becomes a "shepherd" to us during that time. Those things guide our decisions as we choose to follow them. But can any one of them make the claim, "I AM"?? Or are any of those named Yahweh?? No. And because this is true, none of those things can be trusted like He can. In saying, "The LORD is my Shepherd", we are saying that we trust Him and are able to rest in Him.

In closing, Pastor Matt directed our attention to John 10:1-18 -- This is where Jesus claims the title of Good Shepherd. It is among the primary reasons the Pharisees and Sadducees heard blasphemy in His words. If Yahweh was supposed to be their Shepherd, what did that say about Jesus??

Who or what do we trust?? Where do we grasp for control?? He invites us to trust in Him. Other "hired hands" will only run when the Wolf comes.

-- God Bless!!

Footnotes:

1. When I said that there are some who would say I haven't slowed down, I was referring to my ex-husband, Rich. Just a short time into our relationship, he started calling me "hummingbird" because I was "small, beautiful, fast, and smart". Thus, the prevalence of hummingbirds in my site themes.

2. As I'm sure I've mentioned before, "God" is really just like a name for the "team" known as the Trinity. Since before Creation, as Jesus brings out in John 17 with His Priestly Prayer, it has always been Him, the Father, and the Holy Spirit. The very nature of this multiple union is love because, as Pastor Matt has shared as well, love REQUIRES an object, and therefore, NEEDS to exist in community. When the decision was made to Create the universe, they chose to share their love beyond their small circle. (See my Trinity article for more on this)

3. The fact that we choose God as our Shepherd negates the concept of Predestination.

4. Although we are in a new series, the Podcast still continues. Find "Diving In with Matt and Joe" wherever you choose.

Music -- Never any rights!!

Now here's the first bonus song --

and the second...