For many of us, of many differing backgrounds, traditions, faiths, Psalm 23 from the Jewish Torah and included in the Christian Bible brings a resonance with life. Even many who don’t express a spiritual faith find the words and poetry of Psalm 23 extraordinarily meaningful, intriguing, telling. For three thousand years, Psalm 23 has been spoken, sung, valued, prayed. The ancient Jewish poets put songs and words to parchment, keeping for us a way of knowing our humanness, and a way to speak reality.
Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death…
After all, we all will walk through the valley of death. After all, before our last breath, each of us will have lived through the shadow of a death in the midst of life. Loss of one loved beyond measure, loss of expected future, loss that comes from deep family rifts may come our way. We humans have in common knowing how deep life’s valleys can be. We also know the shadow of death: a friend faces life’s end, serious illnesses threaten, the season of fall follows summer, each day’s sunlight fades to dark.
But the 3,000 year ago Psalm writer also found this: in the darkness of valley and shadow, there is not emptiness nor aloneness. For the poet turns from speaking of self, saying
I will fear no evil, for You are with me
“You are with me.” Words that tell one reading, praying, reciting, pondering, that they are not alone, nor are they “at the center.” When in seminary to become a pastor, I marveled when learning that in Hebrew, the original language of the Psalms, the words spoken not to self but to Creator “You are with me” are at the very center of the Psalm, preceded and followed by exactly the same number of words. Intentional, this placement, to help us grasp, the Lord is at the center, of life, valley, existence. In the middle of this most beloved of Psalms is the message we desperately need in the midst of life’s valleys and shadows: at the center of life’s most dense times, we are not alone.
In a recent visit to a medical clinic, I met a man I think of as a friend, despite the fact that we never got to exchanging one another’s names. It was clear that he faces many over-lapping serious illnesses, and as I was silently wondering “what keeps him going with all of that?” he looked up and said “It’s tough being here, isn’t it, in this waiting room?” And as he continued, he included something like this: “Do you know Psalm 23? Lots of people do…Yea though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I shall fear no evil, for Thou art with me.’ I keep sayin’ that over and over, for it reminds me, I am not alone, here, in the center of this room or here, in the center of my soul.”
His words helped me remember the “central position” given by the placement of the Words, Thou art with me. His words also remind me that he, myself, and all of us are not the center of life, yet all are held dearly by the One who is. My friend without name helped me see that all of us, at the Center, are Shepherded, Comforted, Led to a place of quiet, Given goodness and mercy, not by our own strength, but by the Lord.
Thanks be to God, for the original poet-recorder, and for Psalm 23!
Each month a member of the Cook County Ministerium will offer Spiritual Reflections. This month our contributor is Pastor Kris Garey, Trinity Lutheran Church, Hovland.
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