Paths of righteousness. [Leviticus 20v 7 ]

He leads me in paths of righteousness for His name,s sake.[Ps 23v3]. Often the Lord will lead in difficult paths,He will challenge us in many areas of life, to do and go, but one thing He will not do, He will not lead us to sin. We all can rationalize what we do, even sinful behaviour,we can understand if a person is hungry, and they steal, but it is still wrong. There is always reasons why we do certain things, yes even wrong things, a marriage may be difficult,marriage can be great, but it also can be heartbreaking, so we may be tempted to justify unfaithfulness, we may even think God will approve, He wont. Our good Shepherd only leads us in paths of righteousness, sin is to be resisted, and of course He will help us[ 1 Corinthians 10v12-13] [ Dear Shepherd of our souls ,help us to follow You in paths of righteousness, Amen ]

He will lead.[ Psalm 25v9 ]

He leadeth me[Ps 23 v1], this is a wonderful promise, the Lord is leading His children, Barnes writes,/This God will always do if we follow the directions of His word, the teaching of His Spirit, and the guidance of His providence/. As we consider the life of David and others in the scripture, we see that God led them, so often I have cried unto God to lead me, because I am so conscious that I need His leading,so conscious that I can, if left to myself make the wrong choices. The scriptures tell us that we are to acknowledge God in all our ways and He will direct our paths [ Proverbs 3v5], so today, let us do ,what the scripture tells us, and let Him lead us in the right way, let us have confidence to believe that our good Shepherd will lead us.[ Dear Lord we thank You for Your promise that You will lead us,help us to follow in Your footsteps. Amen]

Weary with life.[ [Isaiah 40v29-31]

The other way we can look at the words, He restoreth my soulv3[Ps 23], is not so much the backslider, but as Barnes puts it,/To the spirit when exhausted ,weary, or sad/. For many life is full of pressure , I think of those in Christian minister,a friend of mine mentioned ,how he noticed the strain on a fellow ministers face. The Christian ministery brings with it particular pressures that can be overwhelming, pray for those in Christian ministery. The pressure of life can cause us all to be weary and exhausted, so consider the words of the Psalm, the good shepherd can restore us once again in our spirits.Let us all spend a little time in our Saviours presence,He will meet our need, and restore us once again. [ Dear Lord help us today as we face the pressures of life ,restore our strength, fill our hearts with Your joy and peace. Amen ]

He stills loves.[Jeremiah 31v3 ]

Verse 3 of Psalm 23, reads ,He restoreth my soul,there are two ways of looking at this, one the backslider, the person who has wandered away from their Lord.There are different reasons why people backslide, but whatever the reason, the important thing is to realize the fact that we are backsliden. We may have been hurt by a Christian ,or hurt by our involvment in a local church, or the worries of life,by difficulties in our marriage,or we may have yielded to some temptation,we may have turned our eyes from looking on Christ. Whatever the reason we are away from God, we need to be restored, for that to happen we need to bring everything to our Lord, be honest ,be willing, repent. William Cowper wrote,/What peaceful hours I once enjoyed. how sweet their memory still, But they have left an aching void the world can never fill/. Only the good shepherd can meet the deepest need of our hearts,He loves us even when we are away from Him, and longs to retore us.[ Dear Lord have mercy upon us when we stray from You, and in your great love restore us to Yourself Amen ]

Rest for saints [ Mark 6 v30-31]

Verse 2 of Psalm 23 .reminds us of how our good Shepherd knows that we need to rest,so many people are driven, busy, busy ,busy. Now of course it is good to be busy, but we do need to rest,both physically and spiritually,one great preacher said,that he did not tire of the work of God , but he did become tired in it.We read in Genesis 2 how God rested[not that He was tired] but it emphasizes the fact that we need to rest,God is not a hard taskmaster, He does not drive His sheep into the ground.In Mark 6v31, we have our Saviour speaking to His disciples, they are so busy and didnt have time to eat,[ I hear that often in my work],so Jesus says,/ Lets go off to a quite place and rest a while/. So today rest, dont feel guilty, relax, read a book, sit and listen to nice music, take a walk, and in it all, enjoy the the presence of your good Shepherd.[ Dear Lord we thank You that You are not a hard taskmaster,You do not drive us, but lead us gently beside the still waters. Amen ]

Rest for sinners[ Matthew 11v28]

We continue to look at Psalm 23, verse 2 reads,He maketh me to lie down in green pastures[av],the NLT version puts it ,He lets me rest in green pastures. We have in these words the idea of resting,very appropriate words for all of us, I am sure the universal cry of mankind is ,I am tired. There is a weariness in life, not just phyisical, but emotional, and spiritual, the unsaved are weary, with the burdens of life, and of sin, and it is the good shepherd , Jesus who says,/Come to Me , all of you who are weary and carry heavy burdens, and I will give you rest/[Matthew 11v28].William C Dix wrote,/ Come unto Me, ye weary, And I will give you rest. O blessed voice of Jesus . Which comes to hearts oppressed. It tells of benediction, Of pardon, grace and peace, Of joy that has no ending, Of love which cannot cease./[ Dear Lord Jesus we thank You that there is a place called Calvary were we can lay the burden of sin down. Amen]

I shall not want.[ Romans 8 v32 ]

I shall not want, so declares the Psalmist[23v1],the NLT , puts it/I have all I need/, whatever way it is put. it is a declaration that the Lord will , and has met all his needs.George Muller is one of my heroes of faith, a man who proved God continually, he lived in the 19th centuary, he was led to start an orphanage. The question is where would the money come from? the answer was, from the Lord, George never made the needs of the orphanage known, he prayed and he prayed, and he prayed, and God supplied. It had its times of testings, but the work continued to increase, until there were 5 homes. In 1859 he wrote in his diary,/I cannot tell you how happy this service makes me. Instead of being the anxious, careworn man many persons think me to be, I have no anxieties and no cares at all.Faith in God leads me to roll all my burdens upon Him....In every way I find God is my helper, even as I trust in Him, and pray to Him in childlike faith , about everything./ [Dear God and Father help us to see that You who spared not Your dear Son Jesus, delivering Him up for us all, how with Him you shall give us all things that we need. Amen ]