Psalm 23 – Part 4
“..He leads me beside quiet waters, he refreshes my soul.”
The average human body is approximately 50% to 60% water, with some estimates as high as 65%. The average for sheep is around 60%. Therefore, sheep like us really need to drink water. I don’t know about you, but I’ve tried to drink, what some “experts” say, the 2 litres a day that is widely recommended, but that just leads to frequent and annoying trips to the rest room! If we, or sheep, are denied access to water for a long time, it can have disastrous consequences for health. Research has also shown that a good water intake will enhance good mental health and wellbeing.
For years I just used to drink just tap water, but fairly recently found myself regularly including good quality bottled water in my essential weekly shopping. I currently live in Scotland where I really noticed the difference in the quality of tap water compared to say Essex or London where I used to live, many years ago. I could also quite definitely taste a chlorine element to the tap water down south.
A good shepherd will have already gone out to find good water sources for his sheep and will then lead them there. He doesn’t want the sheep to drink from stagnant or dirty water where the sheep could open themselves up to get all sorts of problems through contaminated water.
In my youth, I took a break from ‘normal living’ and went and travelled around Africa for six months. I’d obviously done some research before and therefore, on good advice, took water purifying tablets with me. My trip was in a very old converted Bedford truck and we stopped at rivers & streams to collect water, wash ourselves and our clothes. The water that I filled my water bottle with, would often be cloudy looking and so far removed from the tap water I had been accustomed to. The water purifying tablets left a pretty foul taste to the water but were very much essential. Also, we had to be very careful with water in streams and rivers. I had read some terrible reports of how parasites lived in the water; little flukes that could get not your blood, live there and breed! Bilharzia is to be greatly feared; it’s a parasitic disease caused by little worms transmitted by contaminated freshwater containing infected snails. It’s very nasty indeed!
The diligent and skilled shepherd, as I say, will lead his sheep to good water. However, along the journey, some of the sheep may become inpatient and stop to drink from what looks like a nice spot but the water is muddy and certainly not fresh or safe. The sheep is totally unaware that it is causing longer problems for itself and should have been patient and trusted the good shepherd.
We’ve already seen, right at the beginning of this journey in Psalm 23, that “we are all like sheep that have gone astray and we’ve all turned to our own ways.” (Isaiah 53:6). Another verse in the bible sates that: “My people have committed two sins: They have forsaken me, the spring of living water, and have dug their own cisterns, broken cisterns that cannot hold water.” (Jeremiah 2:13). You see not only have we rejected the Lord, who is our true source of living, life sustaining water, but we have looked for other sources, just like a wayward sheep. We look to so many other things to provide a spring of life for us. It might be a career, a partner, some hobby like football or golf, whatever. These things can never really truly satisfy our thirsty souls. Only a relationship with the Lord will truly satisfy the thirsty and hungry soul.
I love the promise found in the book of Isaiah 49:10 which states: “They will neither hunger nor thirst, nor will the desert heat or the sun beat down on them. He who has compassion on them will guide them and lead them beside springs of water.”
Another marvellous and wonderful promise is again revealed in Isaiah 58:11: “The LORD will guide you always; he will satisfy your needs in a sun-scorched land and will strengthen your frame. You will be like a well-watered garden, like a spring whose waters never fail.”
So, where in 2026, can we go and get springs of water that will satisfy our thirsty souls?
The answer can be found by looking at a conversation Jesus had with a Samaritan woman at a well in John chapter 4:
“Jesus answered her, “If you knew the gift of God and who it is that asks you for a drink, you would have asked him and he would have given you living water.”
“Sir,” the woman said, “you have nothing to draw with and the well is deep. Where can you get this living water? Are you greater than our father Jacob, who gave us the well and drank from it himself, as did also his sons and his livestock?”
Jesus answered, “Everyone who drinks this water will be thirsty again, but whoever drinks the water I give them will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give them will become in them a spring of water welling up to eternal life.”
Fast forward to John chapter 7 where Jesus is a little more transparent and forthcoming as to what he means about the “living water”:
“On the last and greatest day of the festival, Jesus stood and said in a loud voice, “Let anyone who is thirsty come to me and drink. Whoever believes in me, as Scripture has said, rivers of living water will flow from within them.” By this he meant the Spirit, whom those who believed in him were later to receive. Up to that time the Spirit had not been given, since Jesus had not yet been glorified.”
Let’s step back again and look at what Psalm 23 states: “..he leads me beside quiet (or still & peaceful) waters, he refreshes (restores & renews) my soul.” If we move away from the physical and look to the spiritual, we see, clearly, that this a beautiful picture of the Holy Spirit who revives us, refreshes us and isn’t one of the fruit of the Spirit peace! Also, just think of how the Holy Spirit is also likened to a dove; the very symbol of peace!
I think of that famous proverb: “you can lead a horse to water, but you can’t make it drink.” We are told that the good shepherd leads his sheep beside still waters, it’s then down to the sheep whether or not they will go and drink. Likewise, the Lord has already lead us to the Holy Spirit and it’s up to us to do something about it and actually “drink”.
Four ways we can respond come to mind:
- Acts 3:19: Repent, then, and turn to God, so that your sins may be wiped out, that times of refreshing may come from the Lord.
- Luke 11:9-13: So I say to you: Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives; the one who seeks finds; and to the one who knocks, the door will be opened. “Which of you fathers, if your son asks for a fish, will give him a snake instead? Or if he asks for an egg, will give him a scorpion? If you then, though you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him!”
- Ephesians 5:18 states that we are to be continually filled with the Holy Spirit.
- Romans 8:6: “The mind governed by the flesh is death, but the mind governed by the Spirit is life and peace.”
If we truly want “living water” and a life of peace and to be refreshed, then the Lord invites us to partake of His wonderful and precious Holy Spirit.
Next time, we will look at “He guides me along right paths, for his name’s sake.”
