The Lord Is My Shepherd — Trusting God Through the Valley

Psalm 23 and Psalm 46 teach covenant trust in every season. This seven‑minute devotional helps you recognize God’s presence in both still waters and deep valleys. 

What is Path and Promise?

Daily scripture. Seven minutes. Real peace. Path and Promise is a seven‑minute weekday devotional offering simple, sincere Bible reflections to help you feel closer to God.

 There are some scriptures we know so well that we almost stop hearing them. Psalm twenty-three may be one of them. The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want. We've heard those words at funerals. We've heard them in sermons. We may have memorized them in our youth. But for a few minutes, I want you to forget that you already know this psalm Welcome to today's seven-minute devotional.

Imagine that these are your words. The Lord is my shepherd, not simply God is a shepherd, not God takes care of his people. David makes it personal, my shepherd. The phrase, my shepherd has a relationship in those words. It conjures an image of dependence, trust, and perhaps vulnerability. Because if God is the shepherd, then I'm admitting something about myself.

I don't always know where I'm going. I can't see very far ahead. Sometimes I wander, and I need to be led. That may not be easy for us to admit. We like to think we're in control, but the psalmist seems comfortable saying, "I need a shepherd." And perhaps when David says, "The Lord is my shepherd," he's not sitting comfortably in the palace as a king.

But picture something different. David is in the wilderness. He has enemies. He doesn't know what tomorrow will bring, and yet he says, "I shall not want." Not because David possesses everything, but because he trusts the one who's leading him. Then the psalm begins to move. He maketh me to lie down in green pastures.

He leadeth me beside the still waters. He restoreth my soul. Can you feel what David is describing? Exhaustion and then rest. Thirst and then water. A soul that becomes depleted and then somehow begins to breathe again. We've all been there. Maybe not in David's wilderness. But we know what it's like to become tired inside.

There are moments when we're not asking God for some great miracle. We just need enough strength for today, enough peace to sleep tonight, enough light to take another step tomorrow. And the shepherd gives us exactly that. Then suddenly the psalm changes. Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death.

There it is, the valley. The Hebrew expression also carries the sense of deep darkness. The psalmist has moved from green pasture into a place where he can't see clearly, and that feels very much more like life. One day, there are still waters. Another day, there's a valley we never expected to enter. A diagnosis, the loss of someone we love, a marriage under strain, a prayer that seems to have gone unanswered, a future we can't see.

And notice what David doesn't say. He doesn't say, "Because the Lord is my shepherd, I'll never enter the valley." He says, "Though I walk through the valley. The shepherd hasn't failed because the valley exists." That may be one of the most important truths in this psalm. Sometimes we unconsciously measure God's love by our circumstances.

If life is peaceful, God must be blessing me. If life becomes painful, perhaps he has abandoned me. Psalm twenty-three gives us another way to understand the journey. The shepherd may lead us beside still water, and the shepherd may accompany us through deep darkness. Both are inevitably part of the same path home.

Then David tells us why he isn't overcome by fear. For thou art with me. That may be at the heart of the entire psalm. Not, I understand what's happening. Not, I know how this will end. Not even, the valley will be short. Just, thou art with me. And something interesting happens in the language of the psalm.

At the beginning, David speaks about God. He maketh me, he leadeth me, he restoreth my soul. But when David reaches the valley, he begins to speak to God. Thou art with me, thy rod, thy staff. It becomes more intimate. In the green pasture, David speaks about the shepherd. In the valley, David speaks directly to him.

Maybe some of us have discovered the same thing. There are things we learn about God in peaceful seasons, but there are things we learn with God only in the valley. Comfort doesn't always mean that God removes every hard thing. Often, our painful experiences become part of his tutoring, which leads us to him and his comfort.

Then another remarkable change takes place. David says, "Thou preparest a table before me in the presence of mine enemies." For years, that image confused me. Why would David need a table prepared in the presence of his enemies? Why would anyone want to sit down and eat with their enemies?

But I think I'm beginning to understand it differently. The imagery has shifted. God is no longer the shepherd. Now he's the host. And that table is more than food. Think about what it feels like to arrive somewhere and discover that someone has already prepared a place for you. The table has been set.

The chair is waiting. You are expected. You belong there. It's as if God is saying, "David, there's a place here for you." And notice where that place is prepared. In the presence of mine enemies. The enemies haven't disappeared. The danger is still real. But David is safe because of who he's with. That reminds me of my grandmother, June Moss.

. She was raised in central Utah in the early nineteen hundreds when life could still hold some very real dangers. The need for food and survival and living in a rugged territory with uncertain paths. I remember talking about her father. She said, "He was never afraid of anything, and I knew when I was with him, I'd be safe."

I've always remembered that. She wasn't saying there was nothing to fear. She was saying that when her father was beside her, she felt safe. And suddenly, Psalm twenty-three sounds different to me. Thou preparest a table before me in the presence of mine enemies. The enemies are still there, but so is the shepherd.

The host has prepared the table. David doesn't have to stand guard. He can trust. He is safe. He can rest. Not because there are no enemies, but because thou art with me. That may be one of the great covenant truths of this song. Covenant safety doesn't necessarily mean there's nothing around us to fear. It means we know whom we're with.

Then David continues, " Thou anointest my head with oil; my cup runneth over. These are images of hospitality, welcome, generosity. David isn't merely surviving the valley anymore. He belongs at the table. He's being received. There may be moments when everything else in our lives feel uncertain, but our place with God doesn't have to be.

The shepherd doesn't simply get us through the valley. He's leading us somewhere. And now the whole psalm begins to come together: pasture, water, path, valley, table, anointing cup, and finally, surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life, and I will dwell in the house of the Lord forever.

The shepherd has been leading him home all along. For Latter-day Saints, I think there's something deeply covenantal in that image. The Savior isn't trying to make our mortal journal comfortable. He's leading us back into the presence of God. The temple teaches that same great story. We leave God's presence.

We enter a fallen world. We learn to walk by covenant. We receive light, instruction, and power. And ultimately, the invitation is to return home. Psalm twenty-three is, in, in its own beautiful way, a journey home. Psalm forty-six gives us the same assurance in different language. God is our refuge and our strength, an ever-present help in trouble.

And then comes that famous phrase: Be still and know that I am God. But the Hebrew is stronger than simply relax. The word is harpu. It means let go, cease, stop striving. So perhaps God isn't saying, "Be quiet for a moment." Perhaps he's saying, "You don't have to control everything. Release your grip. Stop fighting every battle as though everything depends entirely upon you.

Remember who I am." That may be exactly what a sheep eventually has to learn with a shepherd. Trust the shepherd. Follow his voice. And when you can't see beyond the next bend in the valley, stay close. Maybe that's also what David learns at the table. He can sit down even while enemies remained nearby because his safety isn't ultimately determined by what surrounds him.

It's determined by who is with him. So consider two questions. What valley are you walking through right now? And would anything change if your first prayer became not, "Why am I here?" but, "Lord, help me recognize thy presence with me here". And what fear might be eased if you truly believed that whatever surrounds you, you're safe in the care of the shepherd?

The Lord is my shepherd. Those words aren't meant just to comfort us at the end of life. They're words for every morning, every uncertainty, every valley, every table he prepares for us, and every step home. Please join me in the next podcast as we bring our study of the Psalms together and consider the question of Psalm twenty-four, who shall ascend into the hill of the Lord?

And what the Psalms teach us about the kind of people the shepherd is helping us become.