1. Hymn to God through pains

Today¡Çs lecturing portion is Psalm 23, which is very popular as the lyric of the hymn ¡ÈThe Lord’s My Shepherd¡É (to listen the hymn*)

For thousands years the poem continues to encourage peoples who suffer from shortage of necessities, anxieties and other difficulties. Such power is generated by the faith that God saves us from hunger and thirsty.

Let us take a look at the contents. To begin with, the verse 1 ; - The LORD is my shepherd; I shall not want.

Palestine is a very dry country where sheep couldn¡Çt find enough water and herbage without shepherd. The land is also very rough with dangerously deep valleys. Besides, many animals prey on sheep there. The background of the poem is that harsh environment of life for sheep. But the poem sings ; - He(The Lord) makes me to lie down in green pastures; He leads me beside the still waters. He restores my soul; He leads me in the paths of righteousness For His name¡Çs sake. (Psalm 23:2-3)

Very often a lost sheep ends its life in ¡Èthe valley of the shadow of death.¡É But the Lord will save it from danger as a pastor rescues his lost sheep. The poet confesses that he had the similar experience to the sheep. A pastor of the ancient time kept a rod and a staff which served to protect the flock against predatory animals. He used them to lead the flock too. And the following verses shows the feeling of those who were protected; - Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil; For You are with me; Your rod and Your staff, they comfort me. (Psalm 23:4)

Sheep is docile, fearful but sometimes stubborn. In general, animals have the homing instinct. For example birds can come back easily and accurately to their nests from very distant places. However the instinct of sheep isn¡Çt so strong. A stray sheep finds scarcely the right way back to the flock. Therefore, lost sheep fall prey to wild animals or die from hunger in many cases .

For that reason, sheep cannot live without pastor. And sheep is very often a metaphor of humans in the Bible. In short, the poet says that humans cannot live without the pastor, the Lord, because they are as weak as sheep. Indeed, we feel lost easily and cannot live alone. The life is like a desert, filled with dangers and sufferings. We are unceasingly facing illness and death, for instance. We meet God under that condition. The Lord is our pastor who gives us food and water of life. The poet recognized the fact and confessed, ¡ÈI will not be afraid, because you are with me. Your rod and your shepherd’s staff comfort me.¡É

Then the poem changes the tune from the verse 5 to commence praise and witness to God, the protector. ; - You prepare a meal for me in front of my enemies. You pour oil of blessing on my head;you fill my cup to overflowing. (Psalm 23:5)

The poet was in front of his enemies. Normally, we upset totally and feel lost by receiving attacks of enemies. Nonetheless the poet says that God prepared a meal for him regardless of severe situations. Traditionally, nomads in desserts help and take care of those who seek rescue in their tents. The poet should have experienced a similar kindness. So he expressed the joy of being in the house of Lord: ¡ÈYou pour oil of blessing on my head; you fill my cup to overflowing.¡É

For several previous years, our congregation sang hymns with CD players because we didn¡Çt have accompanist. Now, 5 pianists play for the Sunday Service in turn. God responded to our prayer for accompanists. Furthermore, we had missed voices of little children and payed for them. In these days, many boys and girls attend the worship. God listened to our prayers again. And experiences lead us to the faith. Even if we lack for something we hope to have it in future because the same cases happened before. Psalm 23 sings that happy remembrances must encourage us.

And it finishes with this glorious praising words ; Surely your goodness and love will be with me all my life, and I will live in the house of the Lord forever. - (Psalm 23:6)

¡ÈThe house of the Lord¡É might be ¡Èthe Temple¡É or ¡Èthe Holy of Holies.¡É And ¡ÈI will live in the house of the Lord¡É should be interpreted as ¡ÈI will live by joining the church,¡É or ¡ÈI will respect a faithful life,¡É in today¡Çs christian terms.

* to listen Psalm 23
http://www.weddingguideuk.com/articles/wordsmusic/hymns/Hymn-TheLordsMyShepherd.asp

2. Hell becomes the kingdom of God

I present now a work of which title was taken from Psalm 23. The author is Scottish Presbyterian dean, Ernest Gordon. He named it ¡ÈThrough the valley of the Kwai*¡É by alluding to the verse 4. The contents concern a historical event, the construction of the Burma Railway in 1942–43. The Burma-Siam railway was a Japanese project driven by the need for improved communications to support the large Japanese army in Burma. The construction work was realized with labor of war prisoners and forced civilians. The hard work in a hurry resulted in death of more than 700,000 inmates. The railway was called afterwards ¡ÈDeath Railway¡É for that reason.

E. Gordon was one of those prisoners. He was an English officer in 20s at that time. He saw other inmates becoming totally heartless toward others due to physical and mental sufferings, hunger, exhaustion and sickness. Under extremely harsh conditions, he also felt abandoned and forgotten by the nation, friends and even his family. In short, he found himself thrown out by God. He lived literally days of ‘ The Valley of the death.’

Many of inmates were affected by malaria, diphtheria, or jungle ulcers. And at the critical phase, they were brought to the Death House, a house built by the side of the morgue. Gordon was among them. He was lying to die on a miserable bed made of bamboo. He was putting curses on such a life. But, astonishingly, two christian inmates visited the Death House to bring him a part of their rations. Then they changed bandages of his diseased legs and cleaned his body. Those altruistic cares empowered Gordon to live. Thus he was led to the faith. He found acting God behind the christians. He wrote afterwards that they were motivated by the authentic love and God was with them. That way, he was touched by God who was performing a miracle in the Death House of the Kwai River.

Then Gordon began to follow in he footsteps of those christians. They took care of other ill persons, studied the Bible under bamboo trees and observed Sunday worship in fields. They prayed and read passages of the Holy Scripts aloud to encourage dying persons. Then, desperate prisoners commenced to smile again. Furthermore, they began to pray and sing hymns together every evening. Gordon felt the kingdom of God inside the camp at that moment. He understood and experienced vividly the contents of Psalm 23:4 ; - Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for you are with me.

He wrote as the conclusion of the work: ¡ÈThe Good News for humans is that God would bear our sufferings.¡É Indeed, God always does so through Jesus Christ. Under any circumstances, hard or clement, God is with us even during the most painful trials. If those suffering seem crushing us, God shares them with us, even the death itself. Therefore God came inside the Death House in order to rescue soul of prisoners.

However, God¡Çs acts through Jesus are carried out by other humans¡Ç hands. And the Gospels name those persons ¡Èpastors.¡É And we think generally that the word ¡Èpastor¡É points to a minister in charge of a church. But sometimes a pastor turns to a ruler who want to take profits from his position instead of taking care of the flock. Thus a shepherds become a king. Therefore it so happens that God himself takes the role of the shepherd. We find a case in Ezekiel ; - … says the Lord GOD ¡ÈMy flock became food for every beast of the field, because there was no shepherd, nor did My shepherds search for My flock, but the shepherds fed themselves and did not feed My flock¡É¡Ä ¡ÈIndeed I Myself will search for My sheep and seek them out. As a shepherd seeks out his flock on the day he is among his scattered sheep, so will I seek out My sheep and deliver them from all the places where they were scattered on a cloudy and dark day. (Ezekiel 34:8-12)

The shepherd must take responsibility of the entire flock. However if one of them strays he sets off to find it. Jesus compared himself to that shepherd ; - ¡ÈWhat do you think? If a man has a hundred sheep, and one of them goes astray, does he not leave the ninety-nine and go to the mountains to seek the one that is straying?¡É (Matthew 18:12) Jesus also said ; - ¡ÈI am the good shepherd. The good shepherd gives His life for the sheep.¡É(John 10:11)

3. The Lord is the best shepherd

Today¡Çs invocation verses are John 20:22-23 ; - And when He had said this, He breathed on them, and said to them, ¡ÈReceive the Holy Spirit. If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven them; if you retain the sins of any, they are retained.¡É

Those were Jesus¡Ç words given to the Apostles after the Resurrection. Even though they had run away from the scene of Jesu¡Çs arrest, he forgave them. Furthermore He trusted his flock to them. Thus they started to preach and founded the church by following in the footsteps of Jesus. Today the majority of christians think that pastors succeeded to the office of the Apostles to whom Jesus trusted the flock. Etymology of ¡È pastor¡É which came from ¡Èshepherd¡É in Latin seems to justify that.

However if we consider pastors to be responsible of all activities of the church it must be too much demanding. Indeed, church members very often blame their pastor for not serving them enough. Sometimes they claim that the pastor isn¡Çt adequate to the office. In that way, the church itself become a place of complains. But it is not at all the way that Jesus wished.

We must reflect again on Jesus¡Ç words. We must think about to whom exactly Jesus trusted believers.
The invocation verses implies that Jesus trusted them to the entire church, not only a leader. Each of church members should grasp the given role. Those who came to the church to find personal salvation should preach in their turn. Each of us should give intercessory prayers for others. Jesus said ; - And other sheep I have which are not of this fold; them also I must bring, and they will hear My voice; and there will be one flock and one shepherd. (John 10:16)

When we take the verse as a requirement of Jesus to us, we understand our personal tusk of spreading the Good News outside the church. We are all responsible of the future flock of Jesus. For that purpose, we should show and practice the lifestyle of serving, like a shepherd who lays down his life for sheep¡Çs sake. Once we arrive to choose to live that way we ourselves will establish spiritually the kingdom of God. E. Gordon did likewise in the Death House in Kwai. Please keep in your mind that we are gathered here to realize that miracle.