the Lord as our Shepherd makes us lie down in green pastures and leads us beside waters of rest

Hallelujah, the Lord Jesus is our Shepherd and under His loving tender care we lack nothing! This morning I was encouraged when I read Psalms 23:1-2 (Jehovah is my Shepherd; I will lack nothing. He makes me lie down in green pastures; He leads me beside waters of rest) together with John 10:11 (I am the good Shepherd; the good Shepherd lays down His life for the sheep) – from these two portions, we clearly see that Christ is our Good Shepherd!

In Psalms 23 we see five stages of Christ’s shepherding in His ascension, and they are progressive – from the “elementary school” care of feeding and lying down on the grass to eat and drink, to the “graduate school” of the lifelong enjoyment of the divine goodness and lovingkindness in the house of Jehovah (Psa. 23:6).

Jehovah is my Shepherd; I will lack nothing

Just like the sheep need to worry about nothing because their shepherd takes care of everything they need, so we as the sheep in God’s flock need to worry about nothing since Christ as our shepherd will take care of everything we need!

This is what the Apostle Paul also experienced and he then said, For I know that for me this will turn out to salvation through your petition and the bountiful caring supply of the Shepherd Jesus Christ (adaptation of Phil. 1:19).

The Lord Jesus takes all-inclusive tender care of our soul and He also wants us to cooperate with Him in His present heavenly ministry to shepherd others.

He makes me lie down in green pastures

The fact that “He makes me lie down…” – shows that it is an initial stage of enjoyment, where “you don’t care about table manners” when you eat: you simply lie down on the grass and eat it freely! This is what babies and the little lambs do – so the Lord as the Shepherd makes us lie down in the green rich pastures – which is Christ as our food supply – and we eat of Him to be nourished!

We enjoy Christ as the pastures (John 10:9) – we enjoy the unsearchable riches of Christ, and we become rich, even very rich! I enjoyed a particular utterance about the word, PASTURES,

The base of the Greek word for economy in 1 Timothy 1:4 is of the same origin as that for pasture in John 10:9, implying a distribution of pasture to the flock; this reveals that Psalm 23 is a psalm on God’s economy, His household administration, to dispense Himself as the green pastures into His people and build them up to be the house of Jehovah, the divine-human incorporation of the processed and consummated Triune God with His redeemed, regenerated, transformed, and glorified tripartite people(Witness Lee).

He leads me beside the waters of rest

Every time we eat Him, we get rich; every time we drink Him, we get rest! The Good Shepherd leads us beside the waters of rest – we drink the Spirit as the living water (John 7:39). By our calling on the name of the Lord, we drink of Him as the living water…

NEVER graduate from calling on the Lord’s name! The more we drink Him, the more our whole being is at rest! As we see in 1 Cor. 12:13, the way to drink the Spirit is to speak His name and call on His precious name!

We want to continually drink Christ as the life-giving Spirit so that we may be filled with waters of rest(and not with anxiety!). [sharing inspired from the life-study of the Psalms and the message given in the training, as quoted in the Morning Revival on the Crystallization-Study of Psalms(1).]

Lord Jesus, You are our Good Shepherd! In You we lack nothing. You take care of all our needs. Such a tender all-inclusive care. Lord, You make us lie down in green pastures. You are the rich pastures for our enjoyment. You lead us beside the waters of rest. Thank You we can eat of You to be rich towards God. Thank You we can drink of You to be in rest. We love Your tender all-inclusive care.