Green Pastures
“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.” (Psalm 23:2-3)
When I was eligible to drive, an interesting inner hunger surfaced. Within twelve months I put sixty thousand miles on my first vehicle. Often the destination was a known remote forest trail to a stunning mountain overlook. Occasionally, it was an equally remote series of waterfalls cascading down a mountain side. Countless nights I would retreat to locations far from city lights where I would gaze out at our Milky Way galaxy and the random nightly falling stars. Many times I would set out on a road not knowing where it would lead me, as a great adventure. But always the underlying goal was the same – to arrive at some particularly peaceful place where I could blissfully ponder life and pray, as best I knew how, for direction and enlightenment. Back then I always felt closer to God when out in such remote locations or in some magnificent place of worship as if he was not already where I was.
My fascination with outer space finally led to a sobering realization: A gaze at the star-filled sky is simply an overwhelming view of ancient history. Stars, from our view, are just the light of unfathomably distant suns and entire galaxies – an image of what was countless light years ago. Outer space is a streaming testimony to God’s creation still expanding outward to become what He has spoken it be.
Physical reality constantly confirms that the only true present moment in our lives is the very moment we do or say something, which all instantly drifts off to become more past history. Notions of methods to journey into the future are pure fantasy. Based upon all we can observe, there really is no true future – only past. Life for us, whether believers or not, proves to be a one way journey to only a few surmised futures. In reality, our glimpses into the future are pretty limited and mysterious with one exception – the day we face death. We do know with certainty that in that moment our physical life here ends, and our body too begins to decay and erode away into the past.
Yet, we believers are being called to an indescribable God-created place within us framed by the verses above. As Jesus revealed, “If anyone loves me, he will keep my word, and my Father will love him, and we will come to him and make our home with him.” (John 14:23) God dwells in us! And, “the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for the Father is seeking such people to worship him. God is spirit, and those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth.” (John 4:21, 23, 24) We were designed to know and worship our God! And finally, “…whoever hears my word and believes him who sent me has eternal life, does not come into judgment, but has passed from death to life.” (John 5:24) We have a promised and very certain future beyond this world!
There is no greener pasture imaginable than the God-designed place within us where we can truly be still and know that God is God indeed. It is there that we were designed to truly commune with God, worship Him and feel the depth of His love for us. We find true rest there in the blessed assurance that our Lord, Savior, High Priest, King and Great Shepherd, Jesus, watches over us, and will, from that very place, one day lead us on to our promised future life in the very presence of our heavenly Father.
I still love to explore all the beauty and mystery of this temporal world, but I am learning that the peace that passes all understanding is not found somewhere out in the world, but within each of us thanks to our Good Shepherd who
“…makes me lie down in green pastures… leads me beside still waters… and …restores my soul.”