Holy Cross Monastery, West Park, NY
Br. Robert Leo Sevensky
The Fourth Sunday of Easter B, April 21, 2024
Click here for an audio of the sermon
There are four Scriptural readings or texts appointed to be read on this, as on every Sunday, in our eucharistic lectionary. But we have heard only three. The fourth is almost always a selection from the Book of Psalms and is traditionally said or sung between the first and second readings. I'm not sure why we no longer observe this practice. We did for some years, but that was decades ago. Perhaps we felt that our worship had become just a bit too wordy. And since as monastics we are committed to the recitation of the entire Book of Psalms, all 150 of them, over a two-week cycle, it may have been obvious that this is the place to cut back. And maybe we simply felt that we were overdosing on psalms. It's not hard to do. It strikes me as odd though that in my almost 40 years in the monastery I don't remember ever hearing a sermon on the psalms. Normally the focus has been the gospel passage or on occasion one of the other readings. But today I do want to speak about the appointed psalm. And that, of course, is Psalm 23: “The Lord is my shepherd.”
After the Lord's Prayer, Psalm 23 is arguably the most familiar text in the Christian tradition. Many people grew up memorizing it, as did I. It was read regularly in the public schools that I attended, and always in the translation given in the King James Version of the Bible.
If you know it by heart, please feel welcome to say it with me:
The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want.
He maketh me to lie down in green pastures: he leadeth me beside the still waters.
He restoreth my soul: he leadeth 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 thou art with me; thy rod and thy staff they comfort me.
Thou preparest a table before me in the presence of mine enemies: thou anointest my head with oil; my cup runneth over.
Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life: and I will dwell in the house of the Lord for ever.
This text is so familiar that it risks becoming a cliché…except of course when it isn't. Said in the middle of the night when sleep eludes us and we are gripped by anxiety or fear. Said at the bedside of a dying friend or parishioner. Or said at the grave side. It has the power to lift us beyond ourselves into a space that's wider than our fears and brighter than the darkness of our minds and hearts.
The psalms, as most of you know, are a mixed bag of ancient Hebrew poetry, often achingly tender and beautiful but also at times deeply troubling. Some are easy to pray or sing. I think of psalms that give praise to God, those that offer thanksgiving for creation and for God’s deliverance, those of offer consolation, and even those laments which give voice to our sorrows when we have no words to say, no other way to express them. These are all welcome parts of our psalm repertoire. Other psalms are a bit odd: royal enthronement or coronation anthems, wedding songs, psalms filled with obscure geographical or historical references. Still others are not so easy to engage. I think of those psalms that are violent and vengeful, those that are militaristic or chauvinistic, those that are celebrations of a complex and sometimes imagined history which are ripe for contemporary misuse. In fact, here at Holy Cross Monastery there are several psalms or verses of psalms—the so-called imprecatory or cursing passages—that we never use publicly.
The Christian tradition has from its inception developed creative ways of reading and praying the psalms, what I sometimes term “intellectual acrobatics,” to make them more in tune with our understanding of the Christian revelation and of our own developing ethical standards. For example, the bride in a wedding psalm becomes for me the Church or my own soul being united to the Holy One. And the king in an enthronement psalm may be understood to be a prophetic or symbolic reference to Jesus Christ. And the enemies, a term which appears repeatedly in the psalms, may be understood as the evil forces in our world or our own sins which need to be overcome by a power greater than ourselves. Whatever the literal or original meaning of the psalm—and we cannot ignore that—we all must do this kind of translation at some level if we're going to pray with them with any integrity, if they're going to give voice to our deepest aspirations even when the text appears strange and even repugnant.
But Psalm 23 doesn't require quite the acrobatic agility of so many of the psalms. For us, the 23rd Psalm is primarily about God’s power to console, to comfort and to provide for us, to guide and lead us in right ways and to our right end and to keep us safe along the way. And the psalm does this personally. It speaks to God directly in the first-person singular and offers us the image of a shepherd who is neither distant nor absent but lovingly present as a fellow traveler who both understands and protects. There is much to be said about this psalm. Let me simply draw our attention to two sections.
The first revolves around the phrase: “Though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death.” This is a phrase dear to us all because, as the old spiritual reminds us, “You’ve got to walk down that lonesome valley.” The critical word here is the word ‘walk’. Our temptation when faced with death, either literal or metaphorical, is to run…to run in the other direction or if we're brave or foolish, to run headlong into the death-dealing situation. The psalm, however, counsels us to walk, to take our time, to move step by step into and through the difficult places. Why? Perhaps because when we walk, we're less likely to stumble. And as we walk, our eyes have time to adjust to the dark; we begin to see more clearly where we really are. Perhaps we will see a pathway that we did not know was there. Perhaps we will catch a glimpse of a light ahead, faint but calling us onward. And as we give our eyes time to adjust, perhaps we'll see that there are other travelers on this road and that we are not in fact alone and that there is indeed one Traveler who has walked it before and will walk it with us and show us the way.
The second area I would draw our attention to is the conclusion of this psalm where it says that we sheep will dwell in the house of the Lord forever, or for length of days as some translations have it. That sounds fine and good until you realize that the ‘house of the Lord’ refers to the temple in Jerusalem. And if you know anything about the temple, you'll recognize that it was not exactly a safe place for sheep. The principal act of worship there was the sacrifice of sheep and other animals followed by a banquet to consume the sacrifice. The 23rd Psalm suddenly but strongly subverts that image. Instead of being on the menu, we sheep, the flock of this shepherd, will sit at table and feast in the house of the Lord: “Thou preparest a table before me in the presence of mine enemies.” That's consoling…especially for the sheep among us.
We may be tempted to read or pray this psalm with an attitude of naïve religious optimism. But we must rather hear this psalm within the framework of the history of God's people. We know that there is always trouble and tragedy, sadness as well as joy, defeat as well as victory. The psalmist knows this as well. I believe it is no accident that Psalm 23 immediately follows that psalm that begins with the words: “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” Perhaps these psalms ought never be recited or prayed apart from each other.
Psalm 23 does promise that there is One who journeys with us, a good shepherd. And in today's gospel passage Jesus identifies himself as this Good Shepherd, that is, the true shepherd whose power finds its strength in weakness and in emptying himself out for his sheep. Three times Jesus says that the Good Shepherd lays down his life for his sheep. This was not something expected of either shepherds or rulers in the ancient world. But this is what Jesus did. He laid down his life so that you and I may take up our lives again more freely in through him. In that sense, Psalm 23 is the perfect Easter psalm.
Have you ever picked up one of those Gideon bibles when you were staying in a hotel? They sit hidden in the nightstand next to your bed. And they almost always offer upfront some advice or guidance. Feeling weary? Read Matthew 11: 28-29. Feeling fearful? Read Hebrews 13: 5-6. Feeling lonely? Read Psalm 23. This is good advice, but my advice is, I think, better. Don't wait till you're lonely. Read it now. Read it tonight. Memorize it.
“The Lord is my shepherd I shall not want.” May those words be on our lips and in our hearts always.
Amen.
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