You could turn to the twenty third Psalm, Psalm 23, and I want to share just kind of a testimony of what God's taught us about himself over the last couple of years as we've sought to follow his leading. And in this psalm, I think the heart of what David is testifying to, very familiar psalm, but the heart of what he's testifying to is found in the first line in the little word my. That he's my shepherd. That word captures a personal relationship with with his shepherd. He's not just a shepherd.

He's not even just our shepherd. He's my shepherd. I have a relationship with him. And then so when I quote that line of the psalm, I like to put that word first for emphasis. I'll say, my shepherd is the Lord.

And when you put it that way, you can kind of hear an implied question. Like, you know, one of the kids comes up to another kid, he says, my daddy is a soldier. What's the implied question? What's your daddy doing? Is it as cool as being a soldier?

And so when David says, my shepherd is the Lord, the implied question is, who is your shepherd? Because everyone looks to someone or something to be their shepherd. We look to money or friends or the government or family or jobs, careers. We look to these things to meet our needs, to be our shepherd. But David is testifying here that the Lord is our shepherd.

And so the message of this psalm for God's people is not just you have a shepherd. Everyone has a shepherd. Even unsaved people have a shepherd. They look to something. The message of this psalm for God's people is your shepherd is the Lord.

We look to the Lord to be our shepherd and to meet our needs. And so David goes on and he says, because the Lord is my shepherd, then the second line of the psalm, I shall not want. And I don't know about you, but I when I read that, I think about all the things that I want. Right? Like, child's Christmas list.

I want the latest iPhone, bigger house, new car unit, all the things that I want. Is that what David's saying? The Lord is my shepherd and he always gives me everything I want. No, I don't think so. Listen to how that word is used in Deuteronomy two seven.

Moses is talking to Israel about how God led them as their shepherd. And he says, the Lord your God knoweth thy walking through this great wilderness. These forty years the Lord thy God hath been with thee. Thou hast lacked, same word, thou hast lacked nothing. Now did Israel always have everything that they wanted?

Think about those forty years in the wilderness. No. But they did always have everything that they genuinely needed, and that is what David's testifying to here. The Lord is my shepherd. He'll always provide all of my genuine needs.

Not necessarily what I want, but he'll provide what I need. A few chapters later, Moses talking to Israel again in Deuteronomy eight about God leading them as their shepherd. He says that God suffered them to hunger. Sometimes God didn't feed them. Why?

Well, he goes on and explains that God knew that they needed to learn to live by every word that proceeds out of the mouth of the Lord. So they thought they needed food. God knew they needed to learn to live by His words. And you see, this gets confusing when what we think we need is different from what God knows that we need. And so it's like I worked a marketing job one time and they taught us that to be a good salesman, you have to figure out what the other person wants in life, and then you just show them how your product will meet their need.

And they'll probably buy it because they already thought they needed it. They had this need that they had in life, and your product can meet that need for them. That's not how it works with our shepherd. He doesn't come to us and say, What do you think you need? Okay, that's what I'll give you.

No. He comes to us with infinite wisdom knowing what we need, far better than we do. And that's the shepherd that we have the privilege to follow. And so what are our needs? Well, that's the rest of the psalm.

It's like he gave us the thesis, the Lord is my shepherd. I'll never lack anything that I genuinely need. And then the rest of the psalm catalogs those needs. And you're supposed to read through the psalm and say, yes, those are my genuine needs, not what I thought I needed. Look at the wisdom of my shepherd, that he knows what I need.

And so the first need that the shepherd meets, it says that he makes us to lie down in green pastures. I don't know about you, but I always thought about food when I read that. And then still waters, there's our drinks. So food and drink, our physical needs. Thought about it that way.

And then one day it hit me, David doesn't just say he leads me to green pastures. What does David actually say? He makes me lie down in green pastures. And I got thinking about that, and we have this saying in English. We'll say, The grass is always greener on the other side of the fence.

And we mean by that that we're discontent people. We always want what we don't have. And I think what David is testifying here is that the Lord's sheep don't think that way. They don't go over to the fence and look out at other pastures that the shepherd has not led them to and wish they were over there. No, they're content where the shepherd has led them.

And they're so content that they lie down. They're at rest and at peace. Like, was talking with a lady once, and she homesteads. Her husband died. She homesteads.

And she said, I used to keep goats, but I got rid of the goats because they always ran away, I had to go chase them down. Too much work. So I got rid of the goats. Then she said this. She said, now I keep sheep because as soon as the sheep know who their shepherd is and who's gonna feed them, they don't run away.

They stay right there with the shepherd. And I thought, I think that's what David's talking about, that contentment that the sheep have. David goes on. He says, he leads me to quiet waters. And again, he's not just saying he gives me water.

The emphasis is on the kind of water that the shepherd gives. It's quiet. It's still waters. And you know that sheep won't drink fast flowing water because they don't swim. If the current catches the wool, sink to the bottom.

They drown, so they're spooked. But the quiet water stills their fears and takes away those fears and calms them, and they will drink there. It's that effect for everybody. I remember we lived house at the end of the street. There was a little stream, and if I was really agitated in my spirit, I'd go sit by the stream and just listen to the water flow past.

It would calm my spirit. Just that sound of it. That's why you go to the doctor's office. There's the little fountain in the corner with the water tinkling over the rocks. Right?

They're trying to calm your spirit. You're nervous about your appointment. You know, it's strategic. And David's out there in the wilderness, and Saul's trying to kill him. Can you imagine someone's out there in the darkness trying to find you and kill you?

You know, the terror of that. And David, he's sitting there at a little stream, little place called Engedi in the wilderness, and the water is flowing past and it calms his spirit. And he says, that's how my shepherd leads me. He takes away my fear. And so David, just to kind of review, David is is telling us the Lord is our shepherd.

And because of that, he meets all of our genuine needs. And the first needs that David talks about here are contentment and peace in our hearts. You know, we get into a hard time in life, and we have all these things we think we need. We lose our job. We think we need money.

We get sick. We think we need healing. You know, all of these external physical needs. We get all worked up. How am I gonna have this external physical need met?

And and our shepherd comes to us and he says, I can meet your genuine needs, your deepest needs. I know what they are far better than you do, and they're not actually external and physical. Your greatest needs are actually spiritual. They're in your heart, needs for contentment and peace in this trial. And I think that's what David's really getting at because the next thing out of his mouth is he restores my soul.

David's talking about the needs of our soul, that our shepherd meets those. And no other shepherd can do that. And throughout the psalm, it's the presence of the shepherd that brings that contentment and peace. If you look at verse four, sometimes the shepherd doesn't lead to green pastures, sometimes he leads to the valley of the shadow of death. But even there, the sheep say, I'm not afraid because you are with me.

It's the presence of the shepherd that is what brings the contentment and the peace. And so it's not just that my shepherd leads me to good places. It's that every place is good if I get to be with him there. It's actually being with the shepherd that brings the contentment and the peace. Not necessarily sometimes he leads to very difficult places.

Sometimes he actually leads to places like the valley of the shadow of death. But it's the presence of the shepherd in those places that is where the contentment and the peace and the restored soul is found. It's in the shepherd himself. And the sheep find in their relationship with their shepherd a joy that's more than enough in any circumstance. Suddenly, those circumstances don't matter as much anymore.

It's like I heard of a pastor, and he he asked the little children in the church if any of them could quote the twenty third psalm. He had a little prize if they could. And so a little girl came up the front and she said, The Lord is my shepherd and that's all I want. And she sat down. And the pastor said, I think that's the best exposition of the twenty third psalm I've ever heard.

I have Christ, and so I'm okay. Suddenly, other things don't matter. The things I thought I needed, they don't really matter anymore. Because there's a joy in my relationship with this shepherd that is bigger than those circumstances and is more than them. And that is how our shepherd restores our soul.

Not by leading us to good circumstances, but by giving us Himself in any circumstance. And so this is the wonderful blessing of following the Lord as our shepherd. And you know, I I don't know, maybe maybe there's someone here in the Lord's really led you to a very difficult place. You're really struggling with that leading. Well, in the Lord there is found rest.

It's like Jesus said in Matthew 11, he said, Come unto me, all you that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, learn of me, for I'm meek and lowly in heart, and you will find rest unto your souls. We have a shepherd who restores our souls, and he's the only shepherd who can do that. He's the only one who can do something about that state of our heart and of our soul. And I don't know, maybe someone here, you've never actually come to Christ.

You're not one of his sheep. You couldn't say the things that David is saying in the Psalm. Well, you could you could find him as your shepherd tonight. You could walk out those doors able to say, my shepherd's the Lord. And he gives contentment and peace.

It's found in him. I found it tonight. You could say that. I don't know. Maybe you're thinking, Andrew, you should be preaching a mission's message.

That's what missionaries are supposed to do. Didn't they teach you that? Well, this is a mission's message. If you turn with me over to Matthew chapter nine, we'll just look at a couple things there and then we'll be done. Matthew chapter nine.

And, you know, when you look at scripture, you realize that this this idea of the Lord as a shepherd is not just found in Psalm 23. It's actually a theme that runs all through the Old Testament where all through the Psalms and the prophets, God is called the shepherd of Israel. And what you see in Psalm 23 is just a little sampling, a little microcosm of that. And if you keep tracing that theme of God as Israel's shepherd, if you keep tracing it into the New Testament, you end up in Matthew chapter nine where we've turned. And in verse 35, Matthew nine thirty five, it says that Jesus went about all the cities and villages, teaching in their synagogues and preaching the gospel of the kingdom and healing every sickness and every disease among the people.

But when he saw the multitudes, he was moved with compassion on them because they fainted and were scattered abroad as sheep having no what? No shepherd. These people were sheep without a shepherd. God was the shepherd of Israel. He said it all through the Old Testament.

And here these Israelite people are standing there and they don't know their shepherd. They're sheep without a shepherd. And it's against the backdrop of that whole expectation that Jesus stands one day and he says, I'm the good shepherd. I'm good because I give my life for the sheep. Jesus is God.

And he came to be Israel's shepherd, to be the shepherd of anyone who comes to him from any nation. You know, it's no different today. You look at the nations around the world, and they're they're sheep without a shepherd. They don't know the good shepherd. Even here, you know, just go out to Walmart.

Look into people's faces. You see sheep without a shepherd. They're looking to anything they can think of to find contentment and peace. Money, career and jobs, friends, family, intimate relationships, anything they can think of to try to find what is found only in Christ, and they come up empty again and again. They're sheep without a shepherd.

The twenty third Psalm is a Psalm for people in the valley of the shadow of death. David's looking forward to crossing the river and dwelling in the house of the Lord forever. You think of the terror that must grip lost people when they come to that moment, and they have no shepherd to lead them into eternity. Why don't they know the good shepherd? Well, Jesus goes on.

He doesn't just tell us that they're sheep without a shepherd. In verse 37, he's going to change the metaphor a little bit, but he's going to explain why that's the case. He says, The harvest truly is plenteous, but the laborers are few. No one was pointing people to their shepherd. No one was telling them and leading them to God as as their shepherd.

And it's no different today. You know, you throw a pin at a map of the world, you'll hit a place where there's probably no labor in the harvest. No one pointing people to the shepherd. In fact, you'll see there are false religions pointing people straight to hell. What's the solution?

Well, Jesus goes on in verse 39 or in verse 38. He says, the harvest truly is plenteous. The laborers are few. Therefore, do what? Pray.

Pray the Lord of the harvest. So here's the challenge that I think God wants us to walk away with tonight. Will we pray? The world is full of sheep without shepherds. The harvest is plenteous.

The laborers are few. Will we pray that God will thrust out laborers into that harvest field? Will we do that? I don't know. Maybe we we don't pray because we don't think prayer works.

On paper we say it works, but then in failing to pray every day, we show we don't really believe in this as a solution to the needs of the world. Does prayer for laborers work? Well, about a year ago, a man came up to us in our church in Greenville, actually about a year and a half ago, our pastor had been challenging us that when we pray, we should not just forget our prayers, but pray in faith. Remember your prayer. Write it down.

Watch for an answer. Actually, expect God to answer. And so this man had made a prayer journal of all the things that he was asking God for. And number 11 on his list was that God would call the minics to BGMBC in The Philippines. And then he showed me the date.

It was like two years previous. The Philippines wasn't even on our radar. But during COVID, God had led these other faculty members there at the school to other ministries, and a real need was created there in Manila. And God burdened that man to pray very specifically for very specific people to go and meet that need. And did God answer the prayer?

Yes. God answers prayer for laborers. We can pray in faith. And so there's a challenge here. Will we pray for laborers?

Will we do this? But I think there's a second challenge. The first challenge, will we pray for laborers? I think there's a second challenge that's part of that. Can you imagine with me a first century farmer's field?

The laborers are working to bring in the harvest. The winter months are coming. They realize we don't have enough laborers. We're we're not gonna get this harvest in in time. And so they go to the man who owns the field, the Lord of the harvest.

And they say to him, would you please go down to the market and hire more laborers to come and help? We need more laborers. We can't get this harvest in in time. And the man who owns the field, the Lord of the harvest, he looks back at them and he says, Yeah, but you guys come to work at ten every morning, and you leave at three in the afternoon. And you take a two hour lunch, and the couple hours you are working, you're barely giving it half effort.

You can see that praying for laborers is, in some senses, valid only if we ourselves are already busy in the harvest. If we are already a laborer ourselves. And so there is a challenge here to pray for laborers, but I think there's a second challenge. Are we willing to pray this prayer first for ourselves? Not just God, laborers, but God, make me a laborer.

Are we willing to pray that wherever you sovereignly put me? Maybe it's not halfway around the world in Manila, but wherever you've sovereignly put me, that that neighbor across the fence, maybe that coworker, you've put me in contact with them because they're sheep without a shepherd. And my mission in life is to is to introduce them to the good shepherd. Or to come to them like David's doing in this psalm and just to say, my shepherd's the Lord. I don't know who your shepherd is, but my shepherd's the Lord.

And he gives me contentment. He gives me peace. He has restored my soul. Even when I go to the valley of the shadow of death, I'm not afraid. He's with me.

He's a wonderful shepherd. He should be your shepherd too. That's the mission, to introduce shepherdless people to the shepherd. And so there's a wonderful challenge here that we would pray for laborers. But I think inherent in that is a second challenge, that we we would pray this prayer first for ourselves, God, make me a laborer wherever you sovereignly put me.

Make me a laborer. Help me to be a laborer in the harvest and to be faithful in introducing people, to the good shepherd. Let's pray. Father, thank you for the wonderful blessing of being one of your sheep. Thank you, father, for the joy of being able to say, my shepherd is the Lord.

Thank you, Father, for restoring our souls, for giving us contentment, and giving us peace even to the valley of the shadow of death, that your leading is always righteous in good paths for your name's sake. And, Father, help us to remember that there is a whole world out there, and they knew nothing of these joys. And we pray that you would help us to be faithful in introducing people to our shepherd and coming to them and testifying of the things that David talks about in this psalm and inviting them to follow you as their shepherd as well. And Lord, we pray that you would bless those efforts, that you would bring people to yourself. And we ask for these things in Jesus' name.

Amen.