He Restores My Soul

 The Lord is my Shepherd,

    I shall not want.

He makes me lie down in green pastures,

    He leads me beside still waters.

He restores my soul.

    He leads me in paths of righteousness

    for his name's sake.

Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death,

    I will fear no evil, for you are with me,

    Your rod and your staff, they comfort me.

You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies,

    You anoint my head with oil; my cup overflows.

Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life,

    and I shall dwell in the house of the Lord Forever.

                        Psalm 23

    

    Verses 1-3 of the famous psalm of David, Psalm 23, paints for us a beautiful picture of how God chooses to restore and guide us as sheep are lead by a Good Shepherd. In the day to day journey of life, there are times when we just follow the Shepherd through well-worn, familiar paths to guide us to places of still waters and green pastures. Unfortunately, we still have free-will, which means when the fancies of life catch our eye, it is easy for us to get distracted and not stay on the right path. The "Fun things" of the world steal us away from the protected hand of the Father, and sometimes it leads us to unsafe places where we end up stuck in a crag or hole, stuck by our own sin. Then the father in all of his love and goodness, chooses to willingly leave the rest of the flock in the safety of the shepherds' crew and then he goes off in search of the sheep that is lost. 

    "He restores my soul. He leads me in the path of righteousness for His name's sake"

       After he searches far and wide listening for the bellow of help from his child, upon finding us, he risks his life to come down to where we are stuck and frees us from the vines or the thistles or the pits we have found ourselves in. He inspects us for any bruises or blemishes and watches over us as he takes care of our hurts and needs, staying by our side until we are restored to full health. Sometimes, He simply wraps our wounds and lets the healing be done naturally. Most of the time, the healing takes a little longer, but that is ok. God will never look down on us when our healing doesn't happen immediately. He won't be disappointed if the path to full restoration takes a more time then for other sheep in the herd. As a good shepherd, he is prepared to stay with every single one of his sheep until all have a chance to be the best that they have been designed to be. 

    Don't fret when it looks like the sheep who share a pasture with you are receiving their miracle before you do. God is in full control of the time-table, and he knows the path that every person needs to walk down. Just stay the course and trust that God, the good shepherd knows what you need and when you need to reach the fullness he desires for you to have. 

He makes me lie down

  The Lord is my Shepherd, I shall not want. 

He makes me lie down in green pastures, 

He leads me beside still waters, 

He restores my soul, 

He leads me in the paths of righteousness for his name's sake. 

Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death,

I will fear no evil, for you are with me, 

Your rod and your staff, they comfort me. 

You prepare a table for me in the presence of my enemies, 

you anoint my head with oil, my cup overflows.

Surely goodness and mercy will follow me all the days of my life. 

And I will dwell in the house of the Lord forever.

                                        Psalm 23

        In verse one of this Psalm, King David tells us that the Lord is not only our shepherd, but a Good Shepherd. A Protector who cares for his sheep. Verse 2 demonstrates to us that not only are we protected by God, but we have a soft, safe place to rest as the world around us seems to get crazier and rougher. "He makes me lie down in green pastures, he leads me beside still waters." What would it feel like to rest by still waters, despite our lives not always allowing us to do so? Think back to a story of Jesus and his disciples. Jesus had finished preaching, and after sending the crowd home, he got into a boat with his 12 disciples. By the time the boat was far from land, Jesus had settled in the bottom of the boat and was getting some holy zzz's. After a little while, the wind began to pick up, and a nasty storm began to rock to the boat. The disciples, many of who were former fisherman, began panicking and fearing they would be tossed overboard. They go into the bottom of the boat, and decide to wake up Jesus from his nap and beg him to save them. Jesus gets up, goes up to the front of the boat, and simply tells the storm to take a chill pill. The waters immediately become calm, and the crew arrives safely at their destination. Jesus was able to sleep, even among the storm, because his father, The Good Shepherd, is bigger than the storm and protects those he loves just as he does still today. 

        All throughout life, we will experience storms that shake our faith. In some cases, when we call out to the Father, he comes in a speaks to the storm and it disappears in an instant. I have found in my own life that in most cases, however, God still comes in during my time of need, but instead of calming the storm around me, he calms me. As the sheep of God's pasture, we can trust our shepherd to guide us and lead us away from the tumult areas of life, and let us rest beside the still waters. 

"for I will refresh the weary soul and replenish all who are weak"- Jeremiah 31:25

"and the peace of God which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus"- Philippians 4:7

Trust the guiding of the father, and he will give you rest in a safe place that is full of life and peace.

Adam Semple- A Young Man on a Journey through the Psalms. 

The Lord is my Shepherd

 The Lord is my Shepherd, I shall not want. 

He makes me lie down in green pastures, 

He leads me beside still waters, 

He restores my soul, 

He leads me in the paths of righteousness for his name's sake. 

Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death,

I will fear no evil, for you are with me, 

Your rod and your staff, they comfort me. 

You prepare a table for me in the presence of my enemies, 

you anoint my head with oil, my cup overflows.

Surely goodness and mercy will follow me all the days of my life. 

And I will dwell in the house of the Lord forever.

                                        Psalm 23

        All throughout the book of psalms, we are given praise and promises we can use to help combat the attacks of the enemy. Some focus on the physical aspects, others on the mental attacks. Psalm 23 focuses on the physical. Long before David was a great king, he was the youngest son of a Bethehemite named Jesse, and a shepherd boy. While his older brothers went off to fight battles, little David had to stay back and protect his father's sheep. Overtime, he learned how to defend himself and keep the sheep safe by learning how to use a slingshot and warding off the predators that tried to attack. As a shepherd, he learned what the sheep need. What they eat, and drink, how to grow big and healthy. King David wanted us to know that the Lord watches over his children in the same way. As a shepherd, the Lord knows every sheep by name and what they need as an individual, but also how to protect them as a herd. 

        As sheep, we don't always know what we are doing. There are moments when the only voice we hear is the voice of the Shepherd, leading us to drink or eat, or guiding us down a safe path. We lack nothing as simple sheep, and that is all due to the Shepherd. What makes this psalm so powerful is not the different attributes of God, how we are safe in secure in all situations, although those are good. This psalm, especially right from the beginning is the 4th word in first verse: MY. "The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want." This word changes God from a being out there who only watches out for the church as a whole body, and it paints him as a personal, loving God. One who knows us by name, and what we need to grow and to be covered by his watchful eye. 

        Today, we still serve this same God, who protects us and watches over us. We just have to be willing to surrender ourselves and trust that the place he is leading us is good and right, and that he knows what we need. 

Adam Semple- A Young Man on a Journey through the Psalms

את

    The bible we have today is very different from the one back when the characters and the stories were written. Inspired by God and written by 40 different authors over the span of about 1500, the Bible we know has been translated into a language we speak and know. The original, however, was written in 3 main languages Hebrew, Greek and Aramaic. As the scribes and the prophets sat down to transcribe the texts, there were some words that were lost in translation. One example of this is the letter את, which translates to TavAleph. In the Hebrew alphabet, these letters, read from right to left rather than left to right as we read it in English, are the first and the last letters, essentially AZ to us. This word, found over 7000 times in the Old testament alone, was hard to translate, because at the time, it made no sense. This word is found all throughout the Torah, the major and minor prophets, and the psalms, but it wasn't until the Book of Revelation that this word began to take on meaning. We see in the book, right near the last chapter of the bible, that Jesus, in a vision tells the apostle John,

            "I am the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end, the first and the last."-Revelation 22:13

    Jesus, the Son of God, the 2nd person of the Holy Trinity, has been around since before the beginning, even before the world was a thought. Even back in the first book of the Bible, the book of Genesis, in the Hebrew, we can see this see right next to the first name of God, this word את appears. 

    After Jesus came to the earth, lived a perfect life, and died on a Roman cross, he revealed that he is, has been and always will be the beginning and the end. The Alpha and the Omega. The First and the Last.

            "I am the Alpha and the Omega', says the Lord, ' who is, who was and who is to come, the Almighty."- Revelation 1:8

    What these 2 letters represent throughout all of scripture is that Jesus has been in and through all of the history of the Bible people: through the prophecies and exile, throughout all of Israel's history of creation, slavery, wilderness period and the promised land; through the gospels and epistles and visions from the Garden to the Island of Patmos and beyond. Jesus is weaved throughout all the whole timeline of God's creation. 

    So what does this mean for us today? How do 2 little letters that make up the whole of the alphabet bring us closer to the Father? If God is in the beginning and the end, how do we fit in the middle of it all?

    God is omniscient and omnipotent, meaning he is everywhere and all powerful. He is before us at the beginning, and he is waiting for us at the end of all things, but because he is everywhere all at once, it means that while we seem stuck in the middle, God is there with us too. He was there to set the plan in motion, Jesus is at the end to bring it all to conclusion and the holy spirit resides with us, to get us to the goal set before us. These 2 letters are essentially Jesus' signature on the earth that what is done is done. What will come has already been set in motion. Our job is let the holy spirit work through us trust that from the beginning to the end, God plans to bring everything to completion, and Jesus' seal is the proof we need to keep pressing toward the goal.     

    God is the TavAleph, the Alpha and the Omega. The one who is, who was and who is to come.

Adam Semple- A Young Man on a Mission From God.

Psalm 119 TAV

 "May my cry come before you, Lord;

    give me understanding according to your word.

May my supplication come before you;

    deliver me according to your promise.

May my lips overflow with praise,

    for you teach me your decrees.

May my tongue sing of your word,

    for all your commands are righteous.

May your hand be ready to help me,

    for I have chosen your precepts.

I long for your salvation, Lord,

    and your law gives me delight.

Let me live that I may praise you,

    and may your laws sustain me. 

I have strayed like a lost sheep.

    Seek your servant

    for I have not forgotten your commands."

Psalm 119:169-176 

    The more I have dived in and studied this chapter in Psalms, the longest chapter in all of the Bible,  comprising of 176 verses spilt into 22 stanzas, all 8 verses in length, I am amazed and in awe of the significance and the wisdom that is given to us by its Writer, David, King of Israel. We we read the bible in present day, we have the whole book in its entirety. All 66 books, split into Old and New Testament, 39 in the Old, 27 in the New, and we can see the way God has been weaving his way throughout the whole of creation and His divine word. It may be easy to forget that the people who lived through the stories and timeline of the Bible did not have such a luxury. In fact, during multiple seasons of the Israelite history, God was silent, and when he did speak, it was only to a small handful at a time, on behalf of the king and or the nation. When know that David was a man after God's own heart, even from the time of his youth up until the moment he took his last breath, and even he had to talk to God through a prophet, with the Holy Spirit coming upon him at various times in his life, but it didn't stay like he does in the lives of believers today. With all that being said, Psalm 119 continues yet again to guide us to the Father and the ultimate sacrifice Jesus would one day make on the cross for all of our lives. When we look at the pictures above, we can see 4 depictions of this last letter of the psalm, TAV. In its original design, it translated as "a mark or a seal. The period at the end of a statement. " In the Greek, the lines that ones were straight, like a t or a cross, shifted into the 2nd picture of more of an X shape, "X marks the spot, you did it, here is your treasure." One picture I saw in my research for this blog showed the letter as more of a sword, as if when it is used, you are fighting for and defending with truth the words you are saying. David understood this principle both as a warrior and king and as a man of God. The enemy will do all he can to make us question what God "actually said" and has been using this tactic since Adam and Eve in the Garden. What David is doing with TAV is demonstrating the fact that the things that have come before are setting things in motion for when Jesus would come the first time, and then when he returns at the end of the age. 

    There are 2 words from the Hebrew language I want to highlight that begin with this statement of fact- Truth and Torah. 

  Truth( Hebrew-emet) spelled

                            Aleph(The Creator)

                            Mem(gives his life)

                            Tav(on the cross)

Torah-spelled in Hebrew

                            Tav(the cross)

                            Vav(the nail)

                            Resh(the Captain, or Leader)

                            Hey(Behold!)

    Truth- The Creator gives his life on the cross. That right there is the gospel! Jesus Christ, the Son of God, the 2nd person of the Holy Trinity, came to earth as a man, born of a virgin and lived a holy, sinless, perfect life. He died for our sins on a Roman cross, was buried in a borrowed tomb for 3 days and rose from the grave, taking back the keys to Hell and the Grave. By his blood shed for us on the cross, the price of our sin has been paid, no longer allowing it to have any control or hold on our life. Now when the Father looks on His children, He doesn't see the sin that once separated us. Instead he sees the blood of the perfect sacrifice, the Lamb of God, His Son, covering our debt that we could never pay on our own. 

    Torah- Behold! The Leader, the nail, the cross. The very law that David was able to have read to him by the priests states that the Son of God would come, would die for the people and rise to free them from the oppression of Sin. 

    David was a man after God's own heart, because when the priests read these words of the Mosaic Law, it was just a bunch of rules and rituals, and they could not always see the promises within, but David heard them through the lens of the Holy Spirit, and I would like to believe that as a promise was spoken, the Spirit was nudging the heart of David, whispering to him, " Guess what, that is me. That is what I want to do for all people, and I will come down and do it just like it is written. Hold tight, press through. Not a single word of this law will be in vain or void. I'm coming to do a new thing in the hearts of the people who believe in and belong to me. Just Wait, Watch and Pray. You won't believe what I want to do in your life, as long as your believe."

    The first and last letter of the Alphabet ALEPH and TAV on their own paint a beautiful picture of who God is, but hold tight, because there are moments in scripture when these letters come together and the masterpiece they paint are absolutely incredible, but until then...

Adam Semple- A Young Man on a journey through the Psalms. 

(Hebrew breakdown taken from A Small Drop of Ink

Psalm 119 SIN and SHIN

"Rulers persecute me without cause,

    but my heart trembles at your word.

I rejoice in your promise

    like one who finds great spoil.

I hate and detest falsehood

    but I love your law.

Seven times a day I praise you

    for your righteous laws.

Great Peace have those who love your law,  

   and nothing can make them stumble.

I wait for your salvation, Lord,                                       

    and I follow your commands.

I obey your statutes,

    for I love them greatly.

I obey your precepts and your statutes,

    for all my ways are known to you."

                Psalm 119:161-168

    As we begin to land the plane on the longest chapter in the Bible, we come to a section that has a very cool and distinct balance. The Hebrew word SHIN is translated as Peace and Perfection (Shalom). It was the word proclaimed on the 7th day of creation when God declared the whole world good, and set in place a time of rest. It is the first letter of a familiar name of God, El SHADDAI, which we know to mean God Almighty. But here,  we see how as Christians, we need to have a balance in our lives of both fear and trembling, and peace and perfection. If we look back at this set of verses, we can see it is split into 2 sections. Verses 161 - 164 describes David's fear of the Lord, while also displaying his genuine love towards God. As Christ-followers, there are times when we need to walk in fear of the Lord. Not a fear that is afraid or scared to get to close, but a fear in terms of awe and reverence towards the almighty power of the God that we serve. When David walks with a reverent fear of the Lord, the enemies seem to surround him all on sides, but that doesn't stop him from praising God seven times a day,(vs. 164). The second half of the stanza reflects the truthful declaration that shows when we approach the Father with obedience and love for the things He has spoken and declared, his ways become known to us, and the enemy becomes nothing next to the Awesome El Shaddai. 

    It can be easy, even as Christians to stay in either the camp of Fear of the camp of Faith, but I want to be like David who operated out of a balance between the 2. God desires to have us close enough to hear Him whisper to our hearts the things He wants to reveal to us, but if the troubles of this life get in the way, his voice can become lost or silent to us. When we set our eyes on God and the truth he has spoken instead of the lies of the Enemy, we can see the path God has created to guide us out of the mess and into the Messiah. 

    As we approach the end of this chapter, it is my prayer that God will reveal himself as he has done before and show us the truth that can only come from a deep love for his commands and desire to follow his statutes wherever they lead us. 

Adam Semple- A Young Man on a Journey through the Psalms

Psalm 119 Resh

 Look on my suffering and deliver me,

    for I have not forgotten your law.                                

Defend my cause and redeem me;

    preserve my life according to your promise.                                 

Salvation is far from the wicked,

    for they do not seek your decrees.

Your compassion, Lord, is great;

    preserve my life according to your laws.

Many are the foes who persecute me,

    but I have not turned from your statutes.

I look on the faithfulness with loathing,

    for they do not obey your word.

See how I love your precepts;

    preserve my life, Lord, in accordance with your love.

All your words are true;

    all your righteous laws are eternal. 

Psalm 119: 153-60

    A lot of words and phrases are repeated consistently through this psalm; Lord, see how I love your precepts; The wicked ae opposed to your commands; Lord, I love your decrees: But lord, I have not turned from your statutes. One phrase that is repeated 3 times in this stanza is this: "Preserve my life, Lord, in accordance with your - promise, laws, and love. Lets break down each one of these.

        Promises- David had lived through and fought a lot of battles, both personal and strategic throughout his 40 years as king. From the time he was a shepherd anointed King in his teen years to being on the run from Saul and his own children, he had received promises from God as well as saw God provide and protect him through all seasons. Even when he had the opportunity to end the battle in his way, there were times when he waited to ensure that this outcome was from God, and not himself. He knew the calling on his life was not a temporary thing, or a short-term promise, but till his last breath, he knew God would be faithful time and time again. Even as he writes the longest psalm in the bible, with enemies arising on all sides, he knew that if God still had something He wanted him to do, the current battle he was in would not end in death, because when God makes a promise, He will carry to completion, and David spent his whole life watching God do just that. "Preserve my life, Lord, according to your promises." David had a lifetime of stories about God fulfilling his end of the bargain.  

        Laws- "See, I love your precepts, See I have obeyed your laws." The people of Israel knew firsthand the Kingship and the heartache that came when the King of the day either followed God's law, or man's. It was the breaking of the law that kept them in the desert 40 years, even though the Promised Land was practically within sight. It was after they stopped following God's law that nation after nation would come in and carry them off to exile. David wanted his kingdom to remain in God's good graces, so to speak. Despite the enemy following their own ambition and morals, David trusted in everything that God had declared. Because of this, the wicked nations were destroyed, but David and his men came out with the victory. Even if we think we know God's plan for the current battle we are in, we can't assume God will work a miracle in the same way. Knowing God and understanding his decrees and statutes helps us prepare for every trial we face. 

        Love- King Saul was a great king, for about 3 days. As soon as pride and triumph entered into his heart, God lost his place as number one in his life. Now instead of being the man chosen by God, he became the man who spent every waking moment hunting down his son-in-law trying to kill the man God had selected to replace him. David, however, always kept God on his proper place in his life. In the position of a Father pouring out his love for his children. When David asked God to preserve his life, in accordance to His love, he was coming from a place of a son asking his Father for good gifts. If God wanted David to have the victory in battle, God himself would provide the tools that were needed for the battle at hand. Because we walk in the love of the Father, when a trial or tribulation arises, God has already prepared the tools we need to come out on top. 

    David truly was a man after God's own heart. If we are to live our lives the same way, we need to pray the types of prayers that bring about real change, 

                        " Preserve my life, Lord, in accordance with your promises, laws and love. Guide me in             the path I need to take and supply me with the tools I need to do my part to bring about your                     victory. Though the enemy might be very well knocking on my door, you already have a plan                that has been set in motion to carry out the victory in ways that only you can. "

    I have tried to win my battles on my own strength, with my own plan, but have fallen short every time. Instead, I chose to trust the plan that has already been tested tried and true, and I can only do that by trusting the Father to preserve my life according to the things he has spoken to me, the things His character requires, and the love that springs forth from a relationship that can only come from the Father.

Adam Semple- A Young Man on a Journey through the Psalms