The end of the Psalm is a beginning. Everything we have considered so far in this Psalm prefigures what these final few words reveal.

From the start of the Psalm, the Lord is presented to us as a shepherd who leads us. Throughout our lives, the shepherd leads us to places of rest and restoration, and through the valleys of deep darkness; on paths of righteousness, and through trials and tribulations. Throughout, he is leading us deeper into shalom where everything is in the right place and nothing is in the wrong place.

But as we considered in the previous reflection, these are necessary for this age because we still live with the presence of evil and death, and our mortal bodies are subject to decay along with the whole of creation. Shalom does exist in this age and is accessible to us in this life, but one day shalom will be our ‘natural’ state.

Throughout this age; throughout our short mortal lives; the Lord leads us to and through all these places and situations to create for us an awareness of what it is to live in shalom. It’s as if he is giving us a taste of what is to come; a limited experience of a future full reality; a partial glance of what we will one day fully see. As Paul puts it,

“For now we see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face.
Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I have been fully known.”
(1 Corinthians 13:12)

In all the ways the Lord leads us, he is pointing us to a future that will be forever.

All roads lead to home

As we have journeyed through this Psalm, we have applied it to the journey of our lives. The culmination of this Psalm finally presents us with a destination. The Lord who is my shepherd is leading me home.

Since the beginning, when the Lord created all things, his dwelling place was with man. He spoke with his children and walked in the garden he created to share with them. When Adam and Eve chose to be like God, their idolatry was an act of adultery in the Lord’s own house; they had to leave. Since then, the Lord has been working his plans and purposes to find a human capable of covenant faithfulness to once again unite him with his people. Many showed faith, but none were faithful — except one.

The father’s own son left his heavenly home to take on flesh and blood and become a man — Jesus. He was the faithful human; he is the faithful human. Through him all mankind finds its redemption, and its right to return home.
We cannot live the life of faithfulness in our own strength, but if we follow Jesus, all roads lead to home.

Heaven on earth

“Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and the sea was no more. And I saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband. And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, “Behold, the dwelling place of God is with man. He will dwell with them, and they will be his people, and God himself will be with them as their God. He will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain anymore, for the former things have passed away.” And he who was seated on the throne said,
“Behold, I am making all things new.”
(Revelation 21:1–5)

When the Psalm says that, “I shall dwell in the house of the Lord forever,” for David, the house of the Lord referred to his heavenly dwelling here on earth. In the beginning it was the Garden of Eden; following the Exodus it was the Tabernacle in the wilderness; then it was the temple in Jerusalem which David wanted to build, but was built by his son Solomon; finally it was Jesus himself — Immanuel, God with us.

In John’s revelation, we see that at the end of this age, heaven and earth will once again be joined, this time forever. The dwelling place of the Lord will be with man, forever. Previously, the dwelling place of God on earth was the temple, but not so in the new Jerusalem —

“For its temple is the Lord God the Almighty and the Lamb.”
(Revelation 21:22)

The ‘house’ of the Lord is revealed to be the Lord himself; the God who is spirit, and the God who is man. The destination the shepherd leads us to, is not a place, but a presence. We are being led not to a residence but a relationship. Our minds struggle to make sense of what this might look like, or how it might be, but when we finally reach the ‘house of the Lord’ we will know we are home and it will all make perfect sense.

When we look ahead to this new reality, we discover here in the present that shalom is living in the presence of God all of the time, in our true image, with our true identity, always life in its fullness. As we become increasingly aware of this, our hearts long with a sort of ‘homesickness’ to be at home with the Lord.

Every wrong righted

As we draw these reflections to a close, we end where we began, with an understanding that shalom means everything is in the right place and nothing is in the wrong place. We have considered all the ways in which this applies to the multifaceted mystery that is our life in this age. We have recognised that in all these dimensions of our soul, the Lord who is my shepherd is putting right all that is wrong so that we can live in shalom.

Here at the end of the Psalm, and the end of these reflections, we look ahead to that future age, beyond the horizon as we await the dawn of that new age. In the here and now, we can picture the gentleness of our king Jesus as he wipes away every tear from our eyes; his graciousness as he looks upon us as his beautiful bride and calls us his beloved; his compassion as he takes away all our sorrow and pain; his majesty as he declares,

“Behold, I am making all things new.”
(Revelation 21:5)

We can take heart now that all that is old and passing away will be replaced by that which is new and permanent. The Lord is a God of justice and he will ensure that every wrong is righted — his covenant faithfulness is our guarantee, as is his Holy Spirit who has been given to us.

In that day our heart’s greatest desire will be to live in the presence of the Lord who is my shepherd always.

Therefore, “I shall dwell in the House of the Lord forever”

May you live in Shalom, and know the Lord who is your shepherd is leading you home.
May you know his house is your house and he has gone to prepare a place for you.
May you know that every wrong will be righted and you shall dwell in shalom forever.

Those times in our lives when we look back, what do we see?

Do we look back with regret? Or do we look back with satisfaction?

Whenever we look back on our lives, we do so as a different person to the one we were and from a different place to where we were then. We can sometimes convince ourselves that ‘if only …,’ things might have turned out differently.

It’s undoubtedly true that all our decisions have consequences — for better or worse — but the truth about our past is that ‘if only …’ is an illusion, as we wouldn’t have made different decisions, because we were a different person in a different place back then.

The first part of this final verse of our Psalm invites us to see things in a different way altogether. In two places in this short Psalm, we read how the Lord who is my shepherd leads me. We have already expressed that being led by the shepherd and choosing to follow him are essential to a life lived in shalom.

But as we are being led by our shepherd, we discover that we are also being followed. Yet that which follows us is not what we might at first expect. In this verse we see that if the Lord is my shepherd, and I follow where he leads me, then it is goodness and mercy that follow me.

Redeeming, not regretting

As is often the case with many words from the scriptures, the translation from Hebrew into English can lose something of what is meant by a particular word. There is no better example of this than our word ‘shalom,’ but also here, our English word ’goodness’ can imply something different to each one of us, as it has a moral meaning as well as being a value statement. The Hebrew word used here is ‘towb’ and one of the ways in which this word is also used means ‘beautiful,’ as in something attractive. The Psalm is telling us that beautiful things follow us, when the Lord is my shepherd.

If we considered this word alone, we might not understand what is being expressed here about the nature of a life of shalom. If we couple it with mercy, as the Psalm does, then we can start to see something truly remarkable and incredibly beautiful.

So far in our reflections our focus has been on what our life of shalom looks like as we move forward in life. Our focus has been on the ways the Lord who is my shepherd leads us. But now we discover something amazing — a life lived in shalom not only affects our future, it also redeems our past.

When we choose to follow our shepherd and choose to live increasingly in shalom, everything begins to be put in its proper place. As should now be very familiar to us, shalom means everything in the right place and nothing in the wrong place. That means everything, including our past and our future. We cannot change the past, and we cannot re-live it however much we rehearse our ‘if onlys …’

But if we commit to a life lived in shalom, it frees us to see our past as the path to where we now find ourselves. Our past mistakes now become useful teachers; our wrong turns and dead ends now become the starting points on a new path of righteousness; our trials and troubles now become ways to access new kinds of joy and grace. Instead of regretting our past, shalom redeems it.

The God who wastes nothing

“And we know that for those who love God
all things work together for good,
for those who are called according to his purpose.”
(Romans 8:28)

The redemption of my past is only possible because the Lord is my shepherd. It is in his nature to redeem all things for those who love him. Whatever I’ve done to mess up my life, however many times I’ve strayed, his mercy follows me and transforms that which is ugly into something beautiful. The Psalm expresses this truth with the word ‘surely.’ Surely expresses a sense of certainty, but again, the word in Hebrew can mean ‘only’. Whichever word we choose, we can be certain that only beautiful things will lie in our wake if the Lord’s mercy is following up behind us. And we can be certain that the Lord’s mercy is the only thing he offers to deal with our past; not judgement, not condemnation; only mercy.

If all things work together for good, then nothing is wasted. The Lord who is my shepherd is the God who wastes nothing.

This age, and the age to come

We have already acknowledged in previous reflections that in this age a life lived at 100% — life in all its fullness — might not be possible, but in the age to come, shalom will be our ‘natural’ state. The end of this first part of the final verse of the Psalm says that goodness and mercy will follow me all the days of my life. The Hebrew word translated ‘life’ here is ‘chay’ (khah’-ee) and typically means ‘age.’ It is a recognition that in this age I need the Lord’s mercy to redeem my past so I can be freed to live in shalom, and that I need this all the days of this age — every day. In the age to come, things will be different and we will consider this in the next reflection.

It matters to the Lord as our shepherd that we are not hamstrung by our past, preventing us from leaping forward into a life of shalom. His mercy provides a way to not only free us from our past, but also to redeem it and ensure that ALL the days of our lives — past, present and future — are put into a right place so we can know shalom.

Do you have things in your past you regret? Today they can be redeemed. All that you need is to receive the Lord’s mercy. If you receive his mercy — truly receive — your past will be transformed and open up as a way of life leading up to this present moment, and releasing you to seize the glorious future your shepherd has prepared for you; to know shalom and live your life in all its fullness.

May you live in Shalom, and know your past cannot be changed, but will be redeemed.
May you know his mercy always follows you, to free you to follow wherever he leads you.
May you know the Lord who is your shepherd is the God who wastes nothing.

This line of the Psalm is possibly its most beautiful part. So far, we have considered all the ways in which a life lived in shalom requires a right understanding of who our shepherd is, a right balance of being, a right identity, right relationships, and a right attitude towards death and suffering.

But as we arrive at this line of the Psalm, our whole understanding of shalom ascends suddenly to a much higher level as we see just how much the shepherd values and honours each one of us.

What we are about to uncover is that the Lord who is my shepherd pours his gifts, love and grace on us with an extravagance that is truly breathtaking.

Glory hidden in plain sight

“What is man that you are mindful of him,
and the son of man that you care for him?
Yet you have made him a little lower than God
and crowned him with glory and honour.”
(Psalm 8:4-5)

“For those whom he foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image
of his Son, in order that he might be the firstborn among many brothers.
And those whom he predestined he also called, and those whom he called
he also justified, and those whom he justified he also glorified.”
(Romans 8:29–30)

When we consider the day-to-day ordinariness of our lives it is easy to forget our true nature. In these two scriptures we are reminded that we have been made for glory. We bear the image of the living God. We are being transformed into the likeness of his son. We are a royal priesthood, a holy nation. This is a big deal. You are a big deal.

One of the most effective strategies our enemy has against us is to convince us we are nobodies. Sure, we’re special to somebody — everyone is, but that doesn’t make me ‘special’ special. But the scriptures tell a different story of our lives. Key to living in shalom is that we have a proper view of ourselves as we are seen by the Lord who is my shepherd. As we have stated repeatedly, shalom requires that everything is in the right place, and nothing is in the wrong place. That must include our own image.

If we tell ourselves what our true image is, it is unlikely we would speak truthfully. This is not because we would be untruthful if we were to point out our shortcomings, our weaknesses and our waywardness — we all know these things are true of us; the way we would not be speaking truthfully is that we would almost certainly fall short of describing the glory that the Lord sees in us, and often others can see in us.

Why do we struggle to see the glory within each one of us, when others can so easily? It’s as if our glory is hidden in plain sight.

Anointed ones

The Psalm tells us that the Lord anoints my head with oil. In our culture we don’t tend to see many people anointed with oil. But David, who wrote our Psalm, was anointed with oil by the prophet Samuel. Anointing with oil was a big deal in David’s day. In his mind, it meant you were to become a priest, a prophet or a king. David had been anointed to become king. The other contexts where someone might be anointed would be if they were an esteemed guest in someone’s home. To be anointed was a sign of conferring great honour on the person being anointed. For the people of God, their ultimate king was referred to as Messiah, or Christ in Greek: both mean ‘anointed one’.

Anointing required oils which were very expensive and therefore highly valued. To anoint someone with oil was to transfer this great value to that person — a gift which out-valued the monetary worth. When Jesus was anointed at Bethany by Mary, the gospel tells us that she anointed Jesus’ feet with a perfumed nard that was worth an entire year’s wages. Judas Iscariot immediately tried to put it in monetary terms by saying the nard could have been sold and the proceeds given to the poor. But Jesus describes its true value and says, “She has done a beautiful thing for me” before adding,

“And truly, I say to you, wherever the gospel is proclaimed in the whole world,
what she has done will be told in memory of her.”
(Mark 14:9 & parallels)

Anointing with oil is a big deal and the one being anointed is also a big deal. The Psalm tells us, “You anoint my head with oil.” We are a big deal to the shepherd. We are his anointed ones. It is fitting that we are called Christians — little Christs; little anointed ones.

Sign and Sacrament

Anointing has a deeper purpose than just conveying honour and expressing value for the person being anointed. It also acts as an outward sign of an inner grace.
The word we use to describe this is ‘sacrament’. When we receive the gifts of bread and wine at Communion, these too are sacraments as they are also an outward sign of an inner grace. When we receive the bread and wine, we believe by faith that we receive Jesus.

When we are anointed with oil, it aroma, its flowing texture, its warmth and its effect on our skin all create a sensation that points to an inner grace and a deeper beauty. The grace we receive releases the true image of God within us, free from the distortion of deception, and healed of the marring caused by our sin.

The Lord who is my shepherd wants us to see who we really are, just as he made us to be, therefore, “He anoints my head with oil.”

Grace upon grace

“For from his fullness we have all received, grace upon grace.”
(John 1:16)

In John’s prologue to his gospel, he describes the word of God — the ‘logos’ — taking on human form and dwelling among us, full of grace and truth. From his fullness we receive grace upon grace. When the Psalm says that the Lord who is my shepherd anoints my head with oil, we can hear it as another way of saying that we receive grace upon grace.

There is no greater gift the Lord can give us than his grace. Without his grace, we cannot receive his love, which is his very nature. Without his grace, we cannot love him with all of our hearts, minds and strength. We need access to his love to know who we really are and whose we really are — to know and be known — and without grace we have no way to access his love.

When I receive his grace; when the Lord anoints my head with oil, then I receive his love, and then I receive grace upon grace. As his love fills my heart it overflows. As his grace fills my life, it overflows. As the Lord anoints my head with oil, my cup overflows. The extravagant, ceaseless flow of grace upon grace leads to the extravagant flow of love to overflowing, and it is all because I am ‘special’ special. In the light of this truth, I can look upon my true image and know:

I am dearly loved.
I am intimately known.
I am valued beyond price.
I am precious.


May you live in Shalom, and may you know your true image as the Lord’s anointed ones.
May you know that you have received grace upon grace till your cup overflows.

May you know you are loved, known and valued beyond price because you are precious.

Trials and tribulations are an unavoidable part of living in this age.
Jesus said they would be.

“In the world you will have tribulation.”
(John 16:33)

As we have considered previously, in the age to come, shalom will be our ‘natural’ state all of the time. In this age, how can we live in shalom when we know we will have trials and tribulations?

There are perhaps several ways to consider this question, but mostly we tend to respond in one particular way. In this way we see our lives as series of steps forward, punctuated by setbacks that mean we sometimes have to pause or even take steps backwards.

In this way of seeing our trials and tribulations, life is what happens only when we are stepping forward. The absence of troubles becomes our best indicator that we are living our life, and in this mode we can make plans, have hopes and even dare to dream. But when the inevitable setbacks come, we effectively put our lives on hold until we can move past the time of tribulation. In this way of being, we tend to reject any kind of suffering as an imposter and an enemy who has come to steal, kill or destroy us. Our life is supposed to be going a particular way but the enemy is preventing me from living it.

In the previous reflection we saw how a fear of making mistakes, often rooted in shame, can limit us and prevent us from taking risks in life — risks that often lead to significant growth and even great rewards. The same is true if we hold the view set our here, that trials and tribulations prevent us from living our lives. Why would we take a risk if we are comfortably living our lives in peace and without any major concerns? Wouldn’t we risk introducing trials and tribulations? If we did that, the life we were living would come to an end, at least until the trials and tribulations ended.

It is true that we have enemies set on stealing, killing and destroying anything and everything good in our lives. If it were possible, they would even take that life itself.

Jesus said,

“The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy.”
(John 10:10a)

But here is the thing we need to notice and pay attention to: if we are living in this way, trying to maintain a life free from trials and tribulations, then our enemy has already succeeded without having to do anything. We have done all the hard work.

How so? As we stated earlier, Jesus said we would have trials and tribulations in this life. They are unavoidable. Avoiding trials and tribulations means avoiding life. The thief can’t steal something we don’t already have. But here is what Jesus also said immediately before and after his words about the inevitability of trials and tribulations:

“I have said these things to you, that in me you may have peace (that is, shalom).
In the world you will have tribulation. But take heart; I have overcome the world.”
(John 16:33)

Immediately after acknowledging that our enemies do indeed come to steal, kill and destroy, Jesus also says,

“The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy.
I came that you may have life in all its fullness.”
(John 10:10)

Both of these are Jesus’ ways of saying,

“You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies.”

Here’s how: Jesus’ view of life includes trials and tribulations and puts them in their proper place. As we considered when we looked at death in an earlier reflection, it too needed to be put in its proper place, because shalom requires that everything is in the right place, and nothing is in the wrong place.

There is something about embracing suffering in a proper way that is part of what it means to live in shalom in the present age. There isn’t sufficient time or space to explore this meaningfully here, but we can see from Jesus’ own example — and that of his apostles and many Christians throughout the centuries — that those who live for God somehow draw the suffering of the world onto themselves and are able to absorb some of its sting and turn a curse into a blessing. It is truly a great mystery, but nevertheless an observable truth, that the sufferings of the world are somehow carried and converted in the body of Christ.

Paul wrote,

“Indeed, I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For his sake I have suffered the loss of all things and count them as rubbish, in order that I may gain Christ and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which comes through faith in Christ, the righteousness from God that depends on faith—that I may know him and the power of his resurrection, and may share his sufferings, becoming like him in his death, that by any means possible I may attain the resurrection from the dead.”
(Philippians 3:8–11)

To live in shalom in this age requires that we accept trials and tribulations and, moreover, we recognise that, as children of God, we are somehow entrusted with these sufferings for the sake of the whole world. As has already been stated: this is indeed a great mystery, but Jesus uses a familiar picture to emphasise this point.

“When a woman is giving birth, she has sorrow because her hour has come,
but when she has delivered the baby, she no longer remembers the anguish,
for joy that a human being has been born into the world.”
(John 16:21)

If we have eyes to see, Jesus is teaching us that our sufferings are like birthing pangs that lead to new life — they are birthing moments. Paul says something similar in Romans 8, and includes the whole of creation as being caught up in this struggle. For Jesus, and in turn Paul, the focus is not the suffering; the focus is life and JOY!

Living in shalom frees us to claim every trial and tribulation as a means to a new level of joy. No one wants or enjoys suffering, and neither should we; a time is coming when there will be no more suffering. But in that day, those wounds we bore for love and for the sake of Christ will be glorified in our resurrection bodies, just as Jesus still bears his wounds.

Therefore we can despise the suffering, yet at the same time shake out the joy from any trial and tribulation. It’s always there for the taking, if we have eyes to see.
This is the abundant, extravagant and mysterious provision that only the Lord who is my shepherd can provide.

In the midst of our trials and tribulations, when our enemies are surrounding us and looking for ways to steal our joy, kill our hope and destroy our faith, the Lord sets a table before us and places some bread and wine on it, and offers them to us saying,

“Take, eat, for this is my body given for you;
Take, drink, for this is my blood, the blood of a new covenant
shed for you and for many for the forgiveness of sins.”

Whenever we gather at this table, in the knowledge and sight of our trials and tribulations, we can know this truth of the Lord who is my shepherd:

“You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies.”

May you live in Shalom, and may you know that there is joy even in trials and tribulations.
May you know the fellowship of Christ’s sufferings as you endure in your own struggles.
May you know the extravagant provision of the Lord in the midst of your enemies.