We had the famous Psalm 23 preached in one of the Sunday services last December:
1 The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want.
2 He maketh me to lie down in green pastures: he leadeth me beside the still waters.
3 He restoreth my soul: he leadeth me in the paths of righteousness for his name’s sake.
4 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.
5 Thou preparest a table before me in the presence of mine enemies: thou anointest my head with oil; my cup runneth over.
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.
Of course the bottom line of the sermon is The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want. He provides our need (take note: our need, not our want). If we are still complaining that our need are still not satisfied, then probably The Lord is not our shepherd.
Actually, what is more interesting is Pink Floyd used this passage cleverly in their song, Sheep (Animals is a brilliant album, anyway). Roger Waters tounge-in-cheekily tooks this passage to describe how the sheeps (low class workers) are being controlled by the pigs blindfully (rich men). The pigs are leading the sheeps to slaughterland, not the promised land, unfortunately. They are following the false leaders. So what they do then? They beat the pigs (“judo kicks”). And once everything falls apart, they march into freedom. Hooray for the sheeps!!
Even though this songs seems religious, actually it’s not. It describes any kind of political or corporate culture very well, and somehow Psalm 23 fits this idea.
Nice analogy, isn’t it?