Walking in a Circle: A Deep Dive into Psalm 23:3

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Have you ever felt like you're walking in circles, stuck in the desert of life, yearning for a path out? It's times like these when we need to trust in the shepherd, our God, to guide us to green pastures. Join me, Vic, as we peel back the layers of Psalm 23:3 and delve into this rich biblical metaphor. 

We unpack the symbolic journey of the Israelites and the shepherd's act of circling their flock, revealing the abundance of God's mercy and grace. We'll travel through time, exploring the cultural, historical, and geographical contexts that shaped this verse, and gain insights into how it resonates with our personal life journeys. This is more than just a podcast episode; it's a spiritual journey that pulls at the threads of our faith, weaving together ancient wisdom and modern perspectives. Come, let's embark on this journey together, as we unearth the deep spiritual connections between these sacred words and our own lives.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:08):
Welcome to our ancient future story, navigating
Scripture through the Eyes ofFamily, where I share with you
biblical stories like a familymember would share a story
around a dinner table.
As children of God, we are apart of God's family and His
family story has a lot ofhistory.
Each week we will take onestory and talk about it the
cultural, historical,geographical and sociological

(00:31):
impacts.
We will be looking at thesestories through the perspective
of our ancestors, through thelens of ancient times, in hopes
of learning more about ourfamily.
This is our ancient futurestory.
Welcome back to our ancientfuture story.

(01:00):
I'm Vic and I am so excited tocontinue our series as we dive
into the most recited chapter ofScripture, psalms 23.
Just like last time, we willdive into the amazing history
behind this Psalm, psalms 23.3.
He restores my soul, he leadsme in the paths of righteousness
for His namesake.

(01:22):
So if you're ready, grab a cupof coffee or something to drink
and let's get ready to dive intoPsalms 23.3.
If you grew up in church, youprobably have heard this Psalm

(01:42):
many, many times.
You probably memorized it.
Or even if you didn't grow upin church, you have probably
heard it a few times.
But there are a few things thatI think are interesting and
will help shape the context ofthis story for us.
So first location We've beentalking about it the last few
weeks.
Our story takes place in theShepherds fields, but this time

(02:04):
on a mountainside, moving fromone location to the next.
We will talk about thismovement and how the structure
of the flock is important injust a minute.
So let's break down this verse.
The first part says he restoresmy soul.
In Hebrew the word for restoreis shub, which means to put back
or return.

(02:24):
So it would read he puts backmy soul, which I was a little
confused by.
Put me back from what?
Well, just like sheep who arelost in the shepherd who goes to
find them, when the shepherddoes find the sheep, he returns
to the flock.
He puts the lost sheep backinto the fold.
David is saying that.

(02:44):
Likewise, when I stray from myshepherd Yahweh, he finds me and
puts me back into the family.
He returns me to the flock.
So he restores my soul.
The next part is he leads me onthe paths of righteousness.
Now, the word for path is what'sunusual here.

(03:06):
In this psalm, david didn't usethe Hebrew word for road or
street to describe the righteousway he used path, and this is
interesting because thestructure in which a shepherd
would guide their sheep across amountain was more or less a
straight line that sheep wouldwalk about two steps apart from
the sheep next to them.

(03:26):
These paths have long sincebeen established as, year after
year, shepherds would lead theirflocks across these mountains.
The purpose of this is to guidethe sheep along paths so that
each sheep can get a chance toeat, so that other sheep cannot
cross the line and eat greenpastures for themselves.
It's a way of providing for theentire flock.

(03:47):
These lines are also importantfor sheep not to forge their own
path, for if they continue tofollow the shepherd, they will
have food and water and all oftheir needs met, but if they go
off course, they can get lost,face wild beasts and be in need
of rescue.
However, these paths are notjust in one direction, straight
across the mountain.

(04:08):
Instead, these paths actuallymake a circular spiral.
We're standing at the base ofthe mountain and moving up the
mountain.
The word path here is Magal,which means circle, so we get
this idea of sheep followingtheir shepherd literally in
circles.
Okay, pause, anyone else need aminute to process.

(04:31):
This Shepherd guides theirsheep in circles.
What Following in circles has acompletely different dependency
than following in a straightline, because if you are
constantly moving in circles,you do not know the destination,
you may not even know where youare.
You must trust the shepherdcompletely, trust that they know

(04:51):
where they are going and thatthey will lead you to find food,
water and rest.
Now, the righteousness part ofthis verse is also interesting
because righteousness is theword Zedekah, which usually
means right or made right, butit can also mean generous or
generosity.
So in this phrase, when Davidis saying the Lord leads me or

(05:15):
guides me on the paths ofrighteousness, he is saying
Yahweh guides me in a generouscircle, which I don't know about
you, but immediately makes methink of two things.
One, the Israelites roaming inthe desert, making circles
around Mount Sinai, and God wasgenerously shepherding them
through the desert, making surethey had food, water and rest.

(05:38):
And two, it made me think ofall the times in my life I have
felt like I was just walking incircles, and following Jesus
sometimes feels like that, likewe are just walking in circles,
but we are actually movingupwards.
If Jesus is guiding our life,we must trust him, like the
sheep trust the shepherd.
We don't always know thedestination, but we trust that

(06:02):
he does.
So.
All of this begs the questionwhy?
Why does the shepherd lead usin circles?
Sometimes it just doesn't makesense for us, but David tells us
in the last part of this versefor his namesake.
To understand this, we have tofirst know what name means.
In the ancient Jewish culture,a person's name was not just

(06:25):
their identity, but it was theirhonor.
In Scripture, anytime someonerefers to God's name, it is
usually talking about his gloryor his character.
Throughout the pages ofScripture, god always does
things for our good and for hisglory.
So David is saying here Yahwehis guiding us like sheep in

(06:46):
generous circles.
Why?
For his glory and for our good.
Which brings us to the end ofthe first stanza of this Psalm,
which we can take to understandthat these three verses were
meant to be heard and understoodtogether.
Over the last few weeks,together, we have learned the
history of these three versesand I have written a Vicks

(07:10):
personal translation of whatthese verses are based on what
we have learned so far.
Yahweh is my shepherd.
He provides all I need.
He stands watch while I nap.
After eating, he creates stillwater for me to drink.
When I am lost, he finds me.
He puts me back into the fold.

(07:32):
He guides me in generouscircles for his glory and my
good.
The consensus of these versesis that Yahweh is a good
shepherd.
He leads, guides and protectshis flock at all times, ensuring
that all their needs are met.
And, as we will see in the nextepisode, the tone is about to

(07:54):
change in the next stanza fromtalking about Yahweh to talking
to Yahweh, and this is animportant shift in the Psalms,
but more on that in the nextepisode.
I want to take a minute and talkabout Jesus again.
Jesus is our shepherd.
He finds and returns us to theflock when we are lost.

(08:14):
He guides us in circles, notjust to make us confused or
disoriented, but to gently leadus to where he wants us to go.
If we trust him, he will leadus to everything we need.
So, as always, let's close ourtime together by reading the
scripture from Psalms 23.
I hope that, as you listen to itbeing read, that you embrace

(08:37):
all that we have learned andthat this passage will be
illuminated for you.
Let's read the Lord is myshepherd.
I shall not want.
He makes me lie down in greenpastures.
He leads me beside still waters.
He restores my soul.
He leads me in paths ofrighteousness for his namesake.
Thank you for listening totoday's episode of our ancient

(09:05):
future story.
I hope that you really enjoyedit.
This episode was written andproduced by me.
Vic Harmon Music is embarkingon an adventure by Evan
MacDonald.
Please support the show bysubscribing and rating us, and
if you want more info or want todive deeper, check out our
website at our ancient futurestory dot com.
See you next time.

(09:25):
Bye, you, you, you, you.