Sheep, The Shepherd, and Still Waters
God offers to save us from being overwhelmed if we will follow his lead.
Sheep are dumb, prone to bad decision making, and desperately need a shepherd to survive. These were the main lessons I took from A Shepherd Looks at Psalm 23 by Phillip Keller who had experience as a working shepherd living with a flock of sheep. Keller’s book goes line-by-line through Psalm 23 to explain how a shepherd would read and understand the imagery. We read the Psalm as a beautiful, comforting picture of God’s loving provision and protection of his people. Keller proves that this reading is correct but that there is a depth of meaning underneath it lost to a modern world that experiences sheep as animals in a petting zoo.
“He leads me beside still waters” is my favorite line in the psalm. The image it conjures engages all my senses: I hear a gentle brook, feel a gentle breeze, smell grass and trees, see God beckon me to drink, and taste cool water. The line represents the best picture of tranquility I can imagine. When someone mentions the idea of resting in the Lord, the still waters are the concrete picture of that rest.
Keller brings this idea of rest to life in his book. As he explains, sheep need still waters to drink because rushing waters will drown them due to their heavy wool coats. If you have ever used wool in art or crafting, you will know that it is light and fluffy when dry but becomes heavy and dense when submerged in water. If sheep have to drink from moving water to drink then they risk being weighted down and swept away to their death. A good shepherd will therefore provide his flock with still water to preserve the life of all his sheep.
Implicit in the image of a shepherd leading his sheep beside the still waters is the idea that there are other waters on offer. A bad or uncaring shepherd might seek to force the sheep to drink from a rushing river so that some are inevitably swept away. In his book, Keller also explains that sheep will drink from the fetid water in their own hoof prints, water contaminated by their own waste and potentially infested with parasites. A good shepherd therefore leads his flock to clean still waters so that they are not washed away by swift currents and not overcome by avoidable ailments.
The idea of being caught up in a flood has become so cliché that it is robbed of any meaningful impact today. We are overwhelmed by work, family, social media, over-scheduling, finances, stress, life, or any number of other influences or forces. The problem is that we interpret “overwhelmed” to mean that we are prevented from doing exactly what we want to do when we want to do it with the people we want to do it with. While this problem is frustrating, it is not what it means to be overwhelmed when we are truly on the verge of being swept away by currents beyond our control so that our existence and self-identity is threatened. Speaking from experience, there is no denying when you come to the point of being overwhelmed: you begin to be pulled under the water because the wool coat on your back becomes saturated and the weight becomes so great that you cannot pull back from the water. Just like a sheep whose weight has doubled and whose balance has been overtaken by rushing waters, without outside help you will drown when you are truly overwhelmed.
Sometimes we have to reach the point of submersion before we recognize that we have a shepherd that pulls us out of the rushing waters that we chose to drink from. While God leads us to still waters, we must choose to drink from them. If we choose to drink from some other water source, he does not abandon us consistent with the gospels telling us he celebrates when he finds the one missing sheep. Instead, he pulls us out of the waters that would drown us and places us beside still waters.
Setting aside how clichés rob the idea of being overwhelmed from its true meaning, we are hemmed in on all sides by forces that threaten to overwhelm us as individuals. What threatens to overwhelm me may not threaten you and vice versa. We must strive honestly to identify individually the people, things, and forces that might overwhelm us. Only after we identify those threats can we begin to see the still waters that God would lead us to if we will let him.
A great sales tactic is to convince someone that it is inevitable they will buy your product. Although ethically suspect, if you can slowly induce tunnel vision in someone so that they come to believe they have no choice but to buy your product then you can overcome the voice of reason in their minds that tells them not to buy what you are selling. Pressure and relentlessness is key because if that person breaks free from that tunnel vision for even a split second then the sale is lost.
Broken tunnel vision strongly is what is required to find the still waters God offers. There are rushing waters all around us that divert our attention and that other shepherds would lead us to drink from. Likewise, we encounter any number of polluted puddles that catch our eye and answer our immediate needs with negative long-term consequences. Amid these distractions, God offers us the pure still waters that will not overwhelm us.
Have you stopped to consider the waters you drink from in your life? Can you identify the forces that draw you in and convey a sense of inevitability that you feel helpless to escape? Once you have identified them, can you now look up and away from them to see the waters that God might offer you – waters that will nourish but not sweep you under? We are God’s sheep meaning he is our shepherd. Let us be humble enough to follow his leading to the still waters.