Psalm 23, pt.3
A Different Look

3b …he leadeth me in the paths of righteousness for his name’s sake.

He leads us, by His word and by His Spirit. We would not know how or where to go in this world but for His direction. Some of the leadership is conscious to us in that He shows to our minds the right way and enables us to go in it. Some of it is invisible to us in that He goes before us and prepares the way. But His hand guides every turn of our lives. He leaves nothing to chance nor does He leave us to our own devices.

He leads us in a certain direction, toward perfect righteousness in which we have forsaken all of our sins and taken up the obedience of every command of His word. His direction is constant and predictable. We can always know that any impulse we have toward what is wrong is not from Him, for He does not tempt His people with evil.

And He does this for His own reasons, that He might get honor and glory from our lives, that men and angels might praise Him for His goodness and His grace in and through us.

4 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.

This is the verse which causes this psalm to be identified with death and, indeed, these words have been great comfort to the saints of God who have walked the path of death. However, given the setting of it, I wonder if the first idea in the mind of David was the thought of his physical death.

I do not believe that this verse can be separated from the one which goes before. It seems to me that when David contemplated walking in righteousness, there were other thoughts concerning death which came
before his mind.

The apostle Paul, for example, made much of the comparison between walking in righteousness and dying. After building the case that we died and rose again with Christ he says further:
Rom 6:11
11 Likewise reckon ye also yourselves to be dead indeed unto sin, but alive unto God through Jesus Christ our Lord. (KJV)

It was his own testimony that walking in righteousness was a matter of personal death.
Gal 2:20 20 I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me: and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave himself for me.

Perhaps David is reflecting on the valley of the shadow of death that he who walks in righteousness must go through. He must deny himself, consider his old man dead, draw upon the life of God that has been given to his restored soul.

It is the valley of death to self, to sin, and to the world. It is that awful struggle of ongoing repentance as God leads in righteousness. It is the valley of self-denial and great personal struggle. In all of that God is present both as a protection against the attacks of the wicked one (rod) and as a recovery for those times when our foot slips and we find ourselves overwhelmed by temptation (staff). The Christian can be comforted to forge ahead toward righteousness knowing that God ‘has his back,’ and knowing that failure
is not fatal but that he can be recovered from any fall.

Not only that but David also realized that walking in righteousness placed in life in danger. The valley of the shadow of death is also that valley of danger which the saint must walk if he would walk in righteousness. But there is another danger and that is the enmity of carnal men whose hatred knows no bounds when confronted with the righteous. They, too, set upon the saint to cast him down and destroy his life as he labors to walk with God.

It was Stephen who asked this question.

Acts 7:52
52 Which of the prophets have not your fathers persecuted? and they have slain them which shewed before of the coming of the Just One; of whom ye have been now the betrayers and murderers:

There is an abiding animosity in the human race toward those who are serious about righteousness. It was not, I believe, so much the claims of Jesus to be Messiah that angered the ruling class of the Jews as it was
His condemnation of their wickedness. It was His insistence upon repentance and His affirmation that they must walk in the righteousness of the heart that caused the religious among them to hate him so. And it has
been the same throughout human history.

David had experienced even the disgust of his own first wife at his devotion to the Lord. It was his forgiving and righteous treatment of Absalom that had given him the opportunity to supplant David as king.

Living for God, seeking to be godly, is a Valley of the Shadow of Death in many ways.

— May 5, 2020