I Stand Amazed...

I am amazed and humbled by the things I discover daily it seems.  I don't know how many times I have read, recited, looked at and studied Psalms 23.  It is a standand of life.  However, I have discovered that in spite of memorizing and reciting it, I have never truly seen what it is saying and how it is saying it.  I have to give Max Lucado in Traveling Light the credit for my latest discovery and as someone who has studied tone and audience, you would have thought I would have seen it on my own.  Such is life...  In Psalms 23: 1-3, David talks to us when he says, The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want.  HE makes me to lie down in green pastures, HE leads me beside the still waters, HE restores my souls.  David is talking to us about the Lord and what He does for us.  But in verse 4, a real change takes place.  David says, 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.  David is no longer talking to us.  He is now directly talking to God and we are allowed to listen in. It's as though David is looking at God and claiming the promise that is ours when God says, "I will never leave you or forsake you."  It's an amazing thing.  Often we hear that death, while a reality of life, is the one thing we must face alone.  God waits for us on the other side, yes, we must make the journey alone.  But that is simply not true.  God our Father, our Savior, our Friend, our Comfort...He is with us as we go through that last earthly event.  He is by our side as we are absent from the body and present with the Lord.  We are instantaneously present with the Lord because He is right there by our side as we move from earth to heaven.   What a blessed thought! Thank you, Lord.