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Psalm 23

The original title for today's sermon was "Previously Unnoticed Images of Shepherds." The main point of the sermon was to be that while the 23rd psalm is a psalm of comfort, other images of shepherds in the Bible can exp and our horizons and lead us to see that this psalm is about more than comfort.

But then, about forty-six hours ago, I received word that friend and member Bill Behrens had been killed in a car accident in Wisconsin, returning to his hotel for a well-deserved night of sleep, after spending the day looking at Lawrence University and Conservatory with his oldest son Christian and leaving Christian behind to spend the night in the dorm.

• Bill Behrens was 49 years old.
• He was a husband and father
• Confirmation leader and Scoutmaster
• Music instructor and symphony trombonist.
• He was the guiding force behind our Maundy Thursday Service of Tenebrae
• A player of brass every Easter morning.

There is no family whose knowledge and love of the worship hour of this congregation exceeds that of the Behrens. One or more of them are here nearly every Sunday. Bill stood before us last Sunday as our confirmands were received because he had spent most Sundays this school year helping Lori lead them. As you all proudly beamed at our confirmands, I kidded Bill about this being the first time I had ever seen him in a suit and asked him when we was going to trim his pony tail.

Upon learning of Bill's death, I knew we would need to hear today not a new a different interpretation of the 23rd psalm, but the tried and true interpretation. I knew we would need to hear the psalm as a psalm of comfort. So last night I returned to its familiar lines and cadence to seek comfort for myself and to try to write a sermon that would express God's comfort for us all.

Let us pray. Lord, in this moment of worshipful grief, may the words of my mouth and the meditations of our hearts taste, touch, know the divine comfort you provide us as shepherd. In the name of Christ. Amen.

Several scholars assert that the 23rd psalm is the most familiar passage in scripture.

• It is read at nearly every funeral and every memorial service held in America.
• It is associated with comfort for those who are dying and for those who face the death of someone we love.

  "Yea,
  Though I walk
  Through the valley of the shadow of death
  [the psalmist says],
  I will fear no evil;
  For thou art with me;
  Thy rod and thy staff,
  They comfort me." [1]

Whether we walk through the valley ourselves, or walk with someone else, we fear no evil, because God is with us. Therefore, we are comforted.

I.

When we hear this psalm at funerals, we hear it almost exclusively as a psalm of individual and personal trust.

The Lord is my shepherd
I shall not want
He maketh me to lie down in green pastures
He leadeth me beside the still waters
He restoreth my soul.[2]

Of the 108 words to this psalm, sixteen are "I," "my," or "me." Scholars correctly describe this psalm as one of individual trust, individual assurance, individual comfort.

"The Lord is my shepherd,
I shall not want."

Yet buried in the final phrase of this psalm, almost unnoticed, is a reference to something larger than the individual. "I will dwell in the house of the Lord forever," says the psalmist.[3]

According to one scholar:

• "The house of the Lord" may be a reference to the Temple. It may indicate that the psalm was originally used at a meal in the Temple in which the worshiper presented his or her thanksgiving offering to God.
  
  
• Another possibility is that the psalmist is literally living in the Temple in a time of crisis — eating, sleeping — drawing emotional and spiritual support from the Temple community, awaiting a reassuring vision from God. 4

Whatever the case, most scholars agree that the mention of "the house of the Lord" in this highly individualized psalm is significant. To be in "the house of the Lord" provides a communal dimension to this psalm. The mention of "the house of the Lord" reminds us that the most complete way to experience personal assurance from God is in the community of God's people. "I will dwell in the house of the Lord forever."

II.

Many years ago, when I was an associate minister in west Texas, a woman called me over to her house one morning and told me that her brother's college age son, who lived in another state, was dying of cancer. She told me that her brother and his son had no church background, no church community, no congregation to which to turn.

"I do not see how somebody gets through something like this without their faith," she said, "without their church."

This particular woman was known to the church not to be a stable person. But on this day she was focused and clear. The link she made between personal faith and the faith of the church was consistent with the 23rd psalm. You see even though the bulk of this psalm is about individual trust, the ending of the psalm is about the faith of the church. "I will dwell in the house of the Lord — I will dwell in the faith of the church — forever."

• My friends, after calling her mother in Waterloo, the first phone call Laura Behrens made Thursday afternoon was 364-6148.
  
  
• The first human face she saw after receiving this devastating news was a face from this congregation.
  
  
• Besides she and her mother, the first tears shed over the death of her husband were tears shed by people from First Presbyterian Church.

Members of the Behrens family have tremendous faith. They have tremendous individual assurance of the presence of God as they walk through the valley of the shadow of death. The have tremendous ability to fear no evil, even as evil — in the form of death — turns their lives upside down, takes their father and husband from them.

But the source of their faith, the font of their fearlessness, is the communal life of First Presbyterian Church, which they experience each Sunday in worship and church school, each Wednesday in choirs and youth fellowship. A major reason the Behrens have such faith is that — literally —"They dwell in the house of the Lord forever."

III.

Those of you who are longtime members know that we had a minister in the 1970s named John Shew. You may not know that one of John's sons, David, was a student at Union Theological Seminary in New York a few years behind me, just as, ironically, the daughter of John's successor, Cal De Vries, whose name was Jan, was a student a Union a few years ahead of me. I knew them both distantly, not knowing that I would someday serve the church their fathers served.

I was once told by someone who knew him that during seminary, David Shew was a terrific leader of a youth group in the New York area. I was told that a young person in the group became ill, and David took the youth group to visit their fallen friend in the hospital.

One of the young people David took to the hospital was quiet and shy. Yet, when along with several of his peers, this youth visited his friend in the hospital, the shy visitor came to life.

• He held his friend's hand.
• He stroked his brow.
• He whispered words of encouragement to him.

"We are holding you up," the shy youth said to his friend. "We're holding you up." The best way I know to reach the depth of faith, assurance, and comfort expressed in this great psalm, the best way I know to fear no evil, is to be part of a community which whispers in our ear: "We're holding you up, we're holding you up."

Amen.

First Presbyterian Church of Cedar Rapids
310 Fifth Street SE Cedar Rapids, IA 52401
Phone: 319-364-6148
E-mail: church@fpccr.org

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