10232021 Goodness and Mercy

Dear Missionary Lady,

Does it sometimes seem like life is just falling apart? That everywhere around things are disintegrating? Like the world in general no longer has any idea how to handle life?

If we allow our minds to follow those tracks, there is plenty of fuel to carry them. The challenge then is to deliberately put our minds on different tracks, and I find myself having to do that frequently. This world is filled with sorrow, despair, and all that is negative and disheartening, but God … but God!

God, on the other hand, is hope and life. He is light and peace, grace and mercy. He is not overwhelmed, nor is He stymied or restricted by the world’s chaos. God has all the answers.

One night this week I directed my thoughts specifically to Psalm 23:6. “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.”

“What does that mean?” I asked myself, that “surely goodness and mercy shall follow me.” It’s such a familiar phrase that it’s easy to read (or quote) over it without assigning meaning. The psalm is full of concrete pictures about sheep and their care, about walking on paths, about tables of provision. I’ve heard people try to put this verse 6a into the imagery by calling “goodness” and “mercy” two of the other sheep in the flock.

But I want this to mean something to me. What does it mean? My meditation took me to the idea of the guiding and the paths that are so dominant throughout the psalm. The psalm is about walking where the Shepherd guides. It is about the Shepherd’s provision when we walk at His direction.

So I think this verse is about what I will find on that path – the Shepherd’s path – and in the Shepherd’s presence. God cannot be separated from His goodness and mercy, so if I am walking with Him, these characteristics/blessings will also be trailing along on that same path. There is nowhere that I can walk with my Shepherd, even in the valley of the shadow of death, even in a world that is falling apart, that I will not be accompanied by His goodness and mercy. If I am at His side, if He is there, then these are also there.

All the days of my life. Every day. I just need to keep walking with Him and depending on Him and looking to Him for guidance, and I will have His goodness and mercy for as long as this life lasts. Now, I’m looking forward to 6b, dwelling in His house forever! That day will come, praise God! But until then, He is carefully and lovingly caring for me for however many days remain.

I pray that God will encourage you daily as you seek to focus on His truth. It is His truth that will uphold our spirits, protect our minds, give us guidance, and carry us through. Thank God for His truth!

Love in Christ,

Peggy Holt

member at Open Door Baptist Church in Lebanon, PA