Assurance

Assurance

So much of life is unknown, even unknowable. The current day is not guaranteed, let alone the next day. We plan, set things in motion, and yet have no way of enforcing outcomes. There is a gap between the thing that we desire and it coming to pass. That gap gets filled with effort on our part. But effort alone does not guarantee outcomes. There are simply too many variables at play to be able to guarantee anything.

This is reality, and the reason why pursuits which ensure particular outcomes can devolve into authoritarian or oppressive experiences. Ensuring a particular outcome requires a limiting of possibilities. A limiting of possibilities requires a limiting of choice. A limiting of choice requires internal or external factors that limit those choices.

In this landscape it is a wonder that anyone can develop assurance. Yet, as we come to the close of Psalm 23 – we’re at the last line – we find the writer exuding confidence.

“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.”

We have journeyed with the writer of Pslam 23 for a number of weeks now. We have experienced a little of the world that he describes. He has described the context of his life – the relationship he has with his Lord, his quality of life, and how things play out in the harder times. This is where he lands.

The two halves of this profound final statement are of course related. Having lived through everything he has described earlier in the psalm, he states his vote of confidence. He is confident of two things specifically – what will be with him where ever he goes, and his position in the cosmic order.

Surely

Imagine for a moment being presented with a question. Something like, “What will happen if you travel toward the north?” Maybe traveling toward the north is known to be a harrowing journey. Your response? Surely, goodness and mercy shall follow me as I travel toward to the north.

“Surely” is on the opposite side of the spectrum from “I don’t know.” It is more complete than “I hope.” It is a position of confidence that comes from experience. It is not promissory as much as it is a description of reality.

The goodness and mercy that is being described here are not abstractions. They are gifts that come from a person. The same personal Lord – the good shepherd – that the writer has been journeying with throughout the psalm shows up here. It is the same good shepherd that lead the writer to rest and refreshment; walked with the writer through the valley of the shadow of death; that set the table for the writer and anointed their head with oil. They have history together. They know one another. It is precisely from this position that the writer can say, “Surely…”

The other thing to notice here is that the person of action shifts. Instead of being lead (as with the green pasture or still waters), or seemingly walking alone (as with the valley of the shadow of death), now the writer is being followed. They are living out their days while goodness and mercy are following them. Here is the completion of trust. Having experienced the assurance of relationship with the good shepherd, we can know that the goodness and mercy of the shepherd will follow us as we go.

For Ever

But surely there is a time limit to all of this. There must be an end. All good things come to an end, after all, right? Not for our writer. He says that goodness and mercy will follow him all the days of his life. How many days does that leave out? None. No days. There won’t be a day in which goodness and mercy are not following our writer. Goodness and mercy will never be found distracted in their following, unable to follow, or somehow impeded in their following of our writer.

If that weren’t enough, our writer is so sure of his relational position with his Lord that he closes his discourse with this: That he will dwell in the house of the Lord forever. There are at least two ways to think about this statement. One is material, while the other is relational.

Living in a house brings with it some very real material gains. There is shelter from the elements, protection from outside forces. While your door may be wide open, you can count on the roof and walls of your house to provide the necessary security for the family to thrive. You can always close the door when necessary.

There is a significant relational component to living in someone’s house. In the old sense of the word, you become part of their family. This is still evident in the Arabic language – which I grew up hearing, and have some functional experience with. In at least the Lebanese dialect of Arabic, if you are to ask someone for their last name, you could either ask, “Whose house are you from?” or “What is your family’s name?” The two are interchangeable.

So, to dwell in the house of the Lord is to live as a member of the family of the Lord. There are very real things that come with being a part of a particular family. Not only would you receive access to the material resources of the family – the house. But you would also receive access to the material resources of the family members of that house. Their personal protection, care, encouragement, and most importantly, love. You might find yourself taking on the personality and ways of the most prominent figures of that family. With the experience of intimacy and proximity as is found living in the same house with the same people this taking on is hard to avoid.

What about us?

It should be noted that our personal experience of being in certain houses might not lead us to an easy vision of what the house of the Lord would be like. The gap between our lived reality and the proposed reality of the writer of Psalm 23 is something we all must contend with. Yet, the proposition stands. Here is someone saying that this kind of life exists, that this is their lived experience, that they would want nothing more than to live in the house of the Lord forever.

The proposition is not in conflict with our realities, but rather stands as an invitation. Would we be willing to consider what it might be like to live in the world that the writer of Psalm 23 describes? Might we be willing to let go of our expectations, given our past experiences, for the sake of such a life? If we are, then the possibility of something new – something really new – is there for us.

This is what being engaged in our own spiritual formation looks like.

As we turn, and begin to work out what having a Lord as a shepherd might look like for us, or what being led to lie down in green pastures might be like, our lives will begin to reshape themselves. Our choices will change, our thinking will change, and in time what naturally comes out of us will change. Our words, actions, desires, hopes and dreams, will all transform as we transition from a life organized by the physical world around us to a life organized by the world of the shepherd as described by the writer in Psalm 23.