When I'm Restless and Stressed

Well, good morning everybody. How are you doing? I'm René, one of the pastors here at Twin Lakes. I am so glad that you guys are here with us today, whether you're joining us live or on Facebook live or on our website sometime in the future. It's just great to have you part of this.

My name is René, one of the pastors here, and I want to just jump right into the topic today. It is that important because there is a condition that is devastating Americans right now. Doctors are very concerned about this. It's causing all kinds of medical trouble, and I'm not joking. I want to put some characteristics of this on screen and see if you can guess what it is. And if it's affecting you, no joke here. This condition afflicts 70 million Americans. It is faulted for 38,000 deaths per year. And now to put that into perspective, that is far higher than the average number of flu deaths that we have every year. So this is a very serious thing.

It costs the US economy 70 billion dollars a year in lost productivity, in health expenses, and so on every single year. 64% of high schoolers struggle with this, and that is believed to be the highest number ever of teenagers who struggle with this affliction. The most severe cases, though, are in people between the ages of 30 and 40 years old, and an estimated 50% of senior citizens have this. And the condition I'm talking about is sleeplessness.

Max Lucado quotes these stats in his book on Psalm 23. He says in America, we are a sleep-deprived nation. Check out this stat. In 1910, Americans slept nine hours a night on average. And today we sleep seven hours, two full hours less a night. And somehow we're almost proud of it, right? Because it shows that while we're working hard and we're busy, and we almost brag about it to our friends. But it's no fun, is it? I struggle with sleeplessness. Show of hands, how many of you at times struggle with sleeplessness in your life? Look around. It's amazing. This is a modern affliction.

Now I don't know about you, but I used to completely not relate to people when they told me, you know, I have insomnia sometimes because there was a day when I could sleep wherever I was, whenever, whatever time of day it was. One time, true story, my parents lost me at a campground near Disneyland. It was like I vanished from the face of the earth. They looked all over the place, couldn't find me because I had fallen asleep in one of the toilet stalls. Now I can't fall asleep in my bed, you know. I just went to, I didn't tell them I needed to go, and I just sat down on the toilet middle of the day and just kind of went, for two hours. It's like I vanished off the face of the earth.

Two nights this past week, I woke up at about 3:30 in the morning and I could not get back to sleep. That was Wednesday and Thursday. How many of you were awake then and I could have just called you? We could have had a good conversation, right? Did you know this? Only one other creature on earth has as much trouble sleeping as human beings do. Now what other creature do you suppose is? It's not dogs, right? That's the thing. I suppose it's not dogs, right? That's for sure. It's not cats. They invented the catnap. It's not bears. They hibernate all winter long. It's not sloths. They sleep about 24 hours a day.

In fact, if you go to a zoo, the first thing you notice is how much all the animals sleep, like all the time, right? There's one exception. Sheep. Only sheep have as much trouble getting a good night's sleep as people do. And this is why the shepherds have to make them lie down. And that's what we're going to talk about this morning in the series we call "Living in the Goodness of God." We're in it for the whole month of April. It's based in Psalm 23. This is known as the Shepherd's Psalm. And we're going to talk about one big theme today that really could change your life. One big idea that you crave. Rest. That's the key word this morning.

The good news is rest is a major theme of Psalm 23. In our kickoff last weekend, we said Psalm 23 is the antidote to bad ideas about God, right? And one of the biggest bad ideas about God that people have is this. God is a slave driver. And basically, in one way or another, what God's trying to communicate to me is work harder. Pray harder. Go to church more. Just work harder at being a good person and a good father and a good wife and a good dad and a good employee. Work harder.

So I want to show you what another pastor showed me one time years ago. I've never forgotten this, and this is kind of the theme for this morning's message. God is not pro-exhaustion. Can you say that out loud with me? God is not pro-exhaustion. Do you believe that? You know, for years, I really lived as if God was pro-exhaustion. I really lived like I believed, and in the core of my being, I really did believe this, that God wanted me to burn out for him in a blaze of self-sacrificial, hardworking glory. In fact, honestly, that's still kind of my default mode.

But that's not the picture you get in the Bible, and especially not here in Psalm 23, where you see God as a shepherd who really is concerned that his sheep get their proper rest. Psalm 23 says—and let's read this first line out loud together, because we talked about this last weekend, so let me hear you. It says, "The Lord is my shepherd. I shall not want." And last weekend, we talked about what this meant. It says, "L-O-R-D, all caps." That indicates in English that it's the Hebrew word "Yahweh," the non-contingent creator of the cosmos, right? And we talked about who could better be your shepherd than God. And when you realize that, then you shall not want. You feel like, "Oh, my needs are met in him." And the whole rest of Psalm 23 is really kind of an extrapolation of that idea.

Now, let's look at these next lines. This next verse and a half is just where I want us to settle down today. And let's put these on the screen. Let's read this next line out loud. Let me hear you. "He makes me lie down in green pastures." Stop there for just a second, because you know what? For much of my life, I lived like it read, "He makes me mow the lawn." You know? But he doesn't make me mow the lawn. He makes me lie down on the lawn. That's what it says. He makes me lie down in green pastures.

Let's keep reading. "He leads me to still waters. He restores my soul." I've got one goal today. That when you leave, you will feel more rested. And you know what that means? That means today is the one weekend where if you fall asleep during my sermon, my goal has been achieved. I hope you leave feeling rested, and I hope you leave motivated to keep resting at a soul deep level. I know there's a lot to do. You're probably thinking about all the stuff you've got to do today, but you can't do it well unless you find rest.

So on page one of your notes, let's talk about what shepherds do for tired sheep, and then on page two, what God does for tired you. Now, I mentioned last weekend to prepare for this series, I looked at books by shepherds and videos by shepherds, all to find out what this poem, which is all about sheep and shepherds, would mean to somebody who actually knew about sheep and shepherds. Because most of us in the modern era, we know nothing about this little culture of shepherding.

And so a lot of the truths in Psalm 23 can just fly right over our heads because we don't know the context culturally and professionally. In fact, in the lines you just read, there is one big idea being communicated, one theme that you probably didn't see yet, and that I would say goes over most people's heads, and they never see what David's trying to communicate here poetically. But if you knew something about sheep, you would totally get this theme.

So I want to go through this and explain it line by line within the cultural context of a shepherd and a sheep, and then see if you can figure out what the big message is, the big idea is behind these phrases. Second verse of Psalm 23 starts, "He makes me lie down in green pastures." Okay, what does that mean to a shepherd? He makes me lie down in green pastures. There's a lot behind this. Philip Keller is a shepherd who wrote a classic book, "A Shepherd Looks at Psalm 23" is its title. And he says, "Sheep are very, very jittery." He says, "Sheep can't rest unless they are completely free of four irritants." And I put these in your message notes that are in your bulletins.

He says, "First, they need to be free of all fear." He says, "Sheep are very easily spooked. They're frightened by every little thing. They can't sleep if they're afraid of anything." He said, "One day a friend of his visited from the city, and she had a tiny Pekingese dog puppy like this in her purse. And this micro dog that fit into a purse jumps out and does what dogs do, just kind of starts running around, and the sheep were all so freaked out that he said they wanted a full unexpected dog alert. Run for your lives!" And all 200 just stampeded away. Took them all day long to get them back. If sheep think there is the slightest danger, they will not lie down. The only thing that really calms them down is the presence of their shepherd. More on that in a minute.

But then second, he says, "To lie down, sheep need to be free from friction." Friction in the flock. What kind of friction could there be in a flock of sheep? Well, in chicken coops, it's called a pecking order. You've probably heard of that. But in sheep flocks, it's called a butting order. Sheep will headbutt and bully and mistreat each other, trying to establish dominance. Fascinating, isn't it? It's like, what do they have to argue about? They don't even know. But they will gang up on each other and do this. And you know there's nothing you can do to get them to stop unless you're the shepherd. When the shepherd shows up for some reason, the sheep stop headbutting. And they all go over to the shepherd, and they're happy. Because they're all distracted by the presence of my shepherd.

So he says, "To make sheep lie down, they need to have the shepherd there to free them from friction, free them from fear, and then to free them from pests." Pests, he said, especially the summer sheep can just be driven to distraction by, listen to this, even just this list is going to make you feel all, "Ugh." Itch mites. There's something about saying the word "itch mites" that just makes me feel all itchy, right? Itch mites. Itch mites. And blow flies, and ticks, and lice, and nasal flies. And it becomes impossible for them to rest because they're so literally bugged. And so good shepherds clean the sheep of bugs. This is a huge hassle like they run them through a trough with what's called "sheep dip." This is medicine that goes into their wool, and it repels the bugs. And they have to examine each sheep carefully to look for flies, and ticks, and mites. Keller says it takes a lot of time, a lot of trouble, but there's no choice. Because it is impossible for the sheep to rid themselves of pests. Only the shepherd can do this.

Now, we even use the phrase, "Something's really bugging me, don't we?" That's bugging me, especially in the middle of the night. Thoughts can buzz around in your brain like mosquitoes in the room. Some tiny little concern, but in the middle of the night it's magnified. What do you do when something is bugging you? The only thing you can do is go to the shepherd. Try it tonight when you can't sleep. Say, "Good shepherd, I am giving you this thought, this thing that is bugging me. And I just want to focus on you and not this. I know from personal experience this is the only way to overcome it when you're bugged." And then finally Keller says, "Sheep can't lie down and sleep unless they're free of hunger." They can't be hungry and sleep. Now, this can pose a problem because this means the shepherd has to lead them to green pastures.

Now, here's again where culture and understanding geography makes a difference. When you think, "He leads me to green pastures," you're probably thinking of like, England and the Cotswolds and fields that are green all year round. But remember, David did not write this, you know, in the pastures of England. David wrote this in what country? In Israel, especially the south in Judea, which is down near the desert. Now, when we were there a few weeks, have I mentioned we were in Israel? We were in Israel lately. And when we were there just a few weeks ago last month, he was lush. Took this little video with my phone, green grass, wildflowers, because it was spring. And just like here in California, in the spring, all the hills green up, right? But most of the year, these hills, especially in the south where David was a shepherd, are brown.

And you see sheep grazing on these dry hills in the summertime. You wonder, where in the world are they getting something to eat? Well, the shepherds know where to find green. Even in the dry season, there are certain slopes that get coastal fog. We relate to that. And the condensation of the fog is enough on one side of the rocks for greenery to sprout. And so as Ray VanderLan, a Bible teacher who took this video points out, it's not like one time they lead their sheep to one green field of barley where the sheep luxuriate for the rest of their lives. The shepherd must lead them to the greenery day by day. And the sheep just have to trust that the shepherd's going to do that.

And isn't this just like your spiritual life? It's not come to Jesus and instantly all green pastures. No more dry times, no more trouble. Sometimes we're in a lush season, but most of the time it's like you got to just trust that the shepherd is going to lead you to just what you need for each new day, one day at a time. And then David, all this is behind, he makes me lie down and grieve pastures, right? There's a lot behind that. Do you see the theme yet? All right, you might see it when we continue. Then he says he leads me to still waters.

Now it has to be still waters because sheep actually fear moving water and deep water. They get freaked out by it for good reason, actually, because, you know, they're like half wool. And if they fall into moving water, then, you know, the wool is going to soak up and they will drown. They drown so easily. So they prefer still shallow water. However, their preference for still water gets sheep into big trouble. It leads them to drink from shallow but muddy polluted puddles on the side of roads. And they get all kinds of intestinal parasites from this. Philip Keller says sheep will drink from small dirty muddy pools, quite sure it is the best drink obtainable. So this is a problem, right? Because they don't like moving water from a creek or something that is going to be clean. And shallow puddles, which they prefer are dangerous and make them ill.

So where in the world are sheep going to find good water, especially in the summer in the Judean desert in Israel? There's really only one option. In this completely barren dry land, there's actually plenty of water for the sheep. Way down in the ancient wells. And so the shepherds, they know where the wells are and they draw up buckets of clean, cool water from these deep wells for the sheep to drink. And again, there's nothing the sheep can... The sheep don't have the skills to find the well. They don't have the power to draw up the well water. Nothing they can do about this. They just need to trust the shepherd completely and follow the shepherd to the water to drink.

You know, we're like that too, aren't we? We prefer shallow. We prefer shallow, but often shallow just means polluted and impure. We need to rely on our good shepherd to draw up deep water from the well of his word for us to drink. And then finally, it says he restores my soul. Now the word soul in Hebrew can also be translated life. He saves my life. What could that be referring to? Well, it might very well be referring to the plight of sheep that get cast. Cast is a word that you give to a sheep that looks like this. Their legs just stick straight up in the air and they can't turn back over no matter what they do.

Now, how does a sheep get cast? Well, here's how it happens. All sheep have their favorite little munchies. Some little flower or something that they love to munch on. And they don't stop. They just keep eating and eating and eating and eating and eating until the food builds up and the gas builds up in its room and it rolls over and it just lays there. And it can't get up. They're immobilized. And it looks kind of funny to us, but Keller says a cast sheep is a pathetic sight. Lying on its back, feet in the air, struggling to stand up. If the shepherd does not help, the sheep will die. Nothing that the sheep can do. And yet it is such an easy thing for the shepherd. You just walk up to cast sheep. Can't do anything about it itself, but you just plop it back on its feet and they're safe. But again, this is something no sheep has ever had the power to do, to save itself when it's cast. Only the shepherd can do the saving.

Are you starting to pick up on this theme? That can stay hidden if you don't understand sheep and shepherding. Do you see the big idea in this poetry yet? Look back at all these phrases. Notice the pronouns here. He makes me lie down. He leads to still waters. He restores my soul. Who's the active one here? Who's in charge here? The shepherd. The shepherd calms the sheep. The shepherd finds the green grass. The shepherd locates the still water. The shepherd saves the sheep's life. The only thing the sheep can do, only thing they can do, is keep their eyes on the shepherd and trust the shepherd 100%. Watch this. The answer is not the sheep tri-harder. The answer is the shepherd is good.

Now, write that down and then before you turn the page, just look up here for just a second. Because this right here, this is the key to the Christian life. This is the key to your spiritual health, your physical health, your mental health, your emotional health. But somehow this right there is the single most elusive truth about Christianity for most Christians and people who aren't into the Christian thing. Most of us, whether we're Christians or not, think that the Christian life is about moralism. It's about self-help. It's about trying harder to be good. It's about the sheep trying better, as hard as they can. But that's not what it's about.

It's about realizing when I'm hungry, when I'm thirsty, when I'm cast, when I have pests, when there's friction, when there's tension. There is nothing that I as a sheep can actually do about that. I need to realize I am powerless over those situations and instead look to the good shepherd and just... Paul talks a lot about this, doesn't it? Fix your thoughts on Jesus. Eyes on Jesus. Thou will keep in perfect peace the one whose mind is stayed on thee. It's pretty simple, but it's elusive. Because we tend to make our faith all about technique. How do I pray better? How do I rest better? How can I be a better husband and father? And there are some techniques, but they're always under the big umbrella of just keep your eyes on Jesus. Just stay focused on your good shepherd. Don't get distracted.

Now, God knows that is very hard to do in a distracted world. And so that's why he gives us a very important principle for making it easy for us to refocus on the shepherd. And that's on page two, what God does for tired me. We had a... Practically everybody raised their hands. I struggled with sleeplessness at times. We're a nation of tired people. And believe it or not, the Bible actually speaks into this very contemporary feeling of just being exhausted. God does two things for you. First, God provides physical rest because he is a good, loving shepherd.

How does he do this? The first time this principle appears in the Bible is about 3,400 years ago in the second book of the Bible. God was rescuing a people who became the Jews from slavery in Egypt. And these people had no rules for a civil society. They'd been slaves for centuries. And so God is creating an insta nation. And so he has to give them some basic rules for how to function as a people. And the top 10 rules he gives them, we call them the 10 commandments. But what's fascinating about this, and if you are Jewish here today, you gotta be loud and proud about this, because this is an amazing thing. Of all the top 10 things that he could have made rules about, commanded them to do, one of the top 10. 10 is about rest.

Look at this in Exodus 20:10, the seventh day is a Sabbath day of rest, dedicated to the Lord your God. You could call this the principle of Sabbath on the seventh day, you rest, don't work, rest one day out of seven. That is awesome. But we humans almost instantly messed up this command. Because immediately we created controversy. We'd rather, we would much rather argue about things than obey God's command. And so we're like, well, what actually counts as work on the Sabbath? And what precisely is the right day to take off for the Sabbath? Missing the simple point, which is one day out of seven, rest. There's seven days in a week, take one of those days off. Why?

Let me put it this way. I was listening to a podcast this week. And the host mentioned that military historians talk about a mystery. And here's the mystery. The veterans who fought in World War I and World War II came back from the war, and more often than not, reintegrated into society with very low levels of PTSD, low levels of stress, low levels of abuse, alcohol, drug abuse, and reintegrated and had good careers, marriage, family, raised kids. Of course there were some problems, but nothing like in subsequent wars. Many, many more vets have had problems with abuse and PTSD and so on. And one theory is that when soldiers returned from Europe in World War I and World War II, they usually came back on a transport ship like this one. Troops crammed together.

And it took about 30 days for these slow boats filled with troops to get back to the States, while soldiers in all the subsequent wars were flown back and often just plopped right back into civilian life. And the theory that some military historians and psychologists have is that those who came back from World War II were on that boat. And what do you do on a boat for 30 days? Well, you talk about your shared experience. You grieve. You process. You tell stories. But for 30 days, everything stops for you. There's nothing else to do but to process. While in those subsequent wars, they didn't have the opportunity to do that. They didn't have space to process.

And there's a doctor, Dr. A.J. Swoboda, who calls that a metaphor for modern life. Because he says, "We have no downtime to process." Excuse me. "No space. We live a nonstop existence. We never breathe. We never ponder. We never pray. We don't have time to lament or rejoice. We just rush from one exhausting event or traumatic event to the next. And so we all have this low level trauma that is never dealt with because we don't process anything. What Sabbath does is give you time on the boat to process both your triumphs and your tragedies. Time to just think. And this is why God said, "Realize that the Sabbath is the Lord's gift to you." It's not meant to be some onerous burden like we make it into. Don't make it into some legalistic thing. It's a gift.

Now, very, very honest here. True confession. There is not one person in this room or watching on Facebook Live right now that needs to hear this message more than I do. I am no different than you because I have a hard time finding breathing room on my schedule. The only thing, the only difference between me and you is I get to stand up here for 35 minutes a week and talk. We can talk about it, right? This week especially, my week has been absolutely crazily crammed full of activity. I've been sleepless a couple of nights. I usually am very rigorous about making Friday my day off, but there were funerals and other things that came up this week that I didn't see how that was possible.

But I really think that God wanted me to go through that a week like that, as I often do other times, but He wanted to make sure that I spoke to you about this from a place of empathy, right? So that there was no way I could stand in front of you all self-righteous. You people, you bad sheep, you non-restors. What is wrong with you? Just take a day off. Go feeling guilty. Thanks for coming. In fact, I listened to tons of messages about rest and Sabbath and read books. I got a little stack of books in my office about this. And here's the problem with most messages, 99% of them are about rest or about taking a Sabbath. They're not very restful sermons.

Because number one, all they do is make you feel guilty. And you know what? Guilt motivation is effective, but it only lasts as long as the guilt. And so they got to keep prodding you, feel more guilty, feel more guilty, feel more guilty all the time. That's one thing that these books tend to do. But the biggest error of these books is that, now watch this, they're all about technique. Here's how to rest. Here's how to find margin. Here's how to do a time audit so that you can find more time. It's funny because we love to plunge into that. Yeah, give me a list of things to do. Give me technique for finding Sabbath. My guess is most of us know what it means to take a day off and rest. Oh, you take a day off and rest, you know. You don't need all these techniques.

And the problem with techniques is it takes attention away from the whole point of a Sabbath. Do whatever techniques work for you. But the Christian life is not about technique, and that is not the emphasis of Psalm 23. What does David do in Psalm 23? David is painting such a beautiful picture of our shepherd. And the green fields and the fresh water that we read that and we go, "I want to go to there." That's what the Bible does. That's the point. You fall in love with your good shepherd. Your heart's so enthralled. Your imagination is so captured by the goodness of God that you want to live in it.

And when you do, there's something you learn, and that's this. God offers not just physical rest, but also soul rest. Soul rest. This is what Jesus is talking about in Matthew 11:28. He says, "Come to me, all of you who are weary and burdened." "Weary and carry heavy burdens, and I will give you," what? "Rest." He's talking about the deepest rest possible, soul rest. See, here's what he's talking about. This is backpack, my backpack. And this morning when I left my house, I loaded up this backpack with super big, super heavy rocks from our garden. This whole thing is just full of rock. So this is pretty heavy.

Now, when I put this on my shoulder, it's very uncomfortable. And a lot of us go through lives carrying these backpacks full of regret, full of guilt, or full of all kinds of motivations. Like, "I've got to work harder. I've got to keep going because if I don't work hard, I'm not living a significant life. And if I don't achieve more, then I'm not validating my existence. And if I don't prove to people how good I am, they're not going to love me." And we carry all these burdens around us all the time. And then, even when we do take a rest, even when we do sit down somewhere from our labors, it's still not very restful because we're still carrying that backpack full of all these regrets and weird mixed motivations.

This is why Jesus says, "Come to me, all of you, who are heavy burdened, and I will give you rest." He wants you to give him that backpack loaded full of all those regrets and all those feelings like, "I've got to prove my worth," and just drop it and give it to him. Only then, when you physically rest, is it truly restful. So you could go to Hawaii for three weeks and you could get a massage every day and eat out every night. But if you don't have sole rest, you won't feel rested for very long. You've got to have that sole... When you have sole rest, you realize that my existence is validated and I am unconditionally beloved and my life has meaning because Jesus believes that to be true of me.

And he demonstrated it by sacrificing his life for me on the cross. And when I believe that, then not only are all those burdens gone, but you know what? My own work doesn't have to bear the weight of all that, right? My work doesn't have to be the way I validate my existence. It's just something good I found to do. That's paying the bills. And it's not burdened with all these existential things because Jesus has already accomplished that for me. I love the way that Tim Keller puts this. He says, "Soul rest means that the real work, capital W, that I think I need to do, has all already been done for me by Christ." By his grace alone. And that is a powerful, powerful truth.

I got to tell you, this week for me, this is very practical. When I woke up those nights in the middle of the night, I tried to figure out the answers to my problems I was worried about and tried to distract myself by reading. And that didn't last because I'd read a page and realized I didn't really read the words. I just was thinking about my problem, right? What really helped me was just thinking about Jesus. Not even thinking about how Jesus is going to solve this problem for me. Just thinking about Jesus and his goodness and his power and his mercy. And before I knew it, it was 7 a.m. and my alarm was going off. That's the key, is to refocus on your good shepherd. That's what drives the fears away.

Let me close with this illustration. I came across a video in my sheep research this week. A camera crew went out looking for a flock of sheep and they noticed that there were a couple of wolves on the perimeter that were stalking this flock of sheep. Now what's interesting is wolves are very attracted to sheep. They love sheep, but they won't approach if they think there are shepherds there. This wolf, his attention goes back and forth and back and forth, putting these delicious sheep and a sign that there might be shepherds and then finally decides I'm not going to risk it because there's a shepherd's hut. It looks like it's occupied, so I am going to walk away, even though I really, really crave those lamb chops on the hoof there.

And the other wolves see him walking away. They go, "Well, I better walk away too." They won't risk it if the shepherd is there. But one night, the same camera crew caught these sheep. The shepherds had left for the night and they had put the sheep in a wire mesh sheep pen. And the wolf again approached very cautiously, kind of looking for the sign of a shepherd. And when he did not see there was a shepherd around, he came a little bit closer to the sheep pen and he tries to work out how he can get one of those delicious mutton chops in his mouth.

And he notices that the shepherds had put these sticks to hold the fence together. And so he pulls out each stick one at a time to loosen up the seam where this fence is put together. But still, you know, they don't have thumbs so that he can't pull open the fencing. But he notices the shepherds have tied a rope to the fence. And so he figures, "If I pull on the rope, maybe something good will happen." And so he pulls on the rope and he ends up getting the very top part of this fence to bow outward. Now he still can't jump in without getting caught on the fence itself, but that's not his plan. But he has a plan. And that is to scare the sheep until one jumps out and he finds his dinner.

And we'll just stop it right there. This is the beautiful circle of life, people. But isn't that amazing? That his strategy is to scare the sheep so that one of them might leave a place where he's very, very safe. Did you know that's your enemy strategy too? This is why the good shepherds are always with their flocks. First of all, they put their sheep in these rock pens that you see everywhere all over Israel to spend the night. So it's very difficult for predators to peek in. This shepherd makes sure the whole flock is in. He's not missing one. He counts every single one. And then at night, the shepherd himself lies down in the entrance to the pen. You see this all over the place over there. He is the gate. Literally. The shepherd, if he's a good shepherd, knows that his presence alone will be enough to scare the wolves away.

The good shepherd is willing to literally lay down his life for his sheep. He's saying to the sheep, "You are secure. You do not have to fear because I am with you." And this is what Jesus is referring to when he says, "I tell you the truth. I'm the gate for the sheep. And my purpose is to give them a rich and satisfying life. I'm the good shepherd, and the good shepherd sacrifices his life for the sheep." When you feel those fears, when you're hearing the barking and snarling of the wolves outside, don't panic. Instead, remember your shepherd is here. Refocus on your shepherd. And this is really the key concept. It's so simple.

Later tonight, when fears are keeping you up late or tomorrow, when fears of failing are keeping you always working and never resting, don't jump out of the corral. Remember, your shepherd is here, and you can rest securely in his presence. Your job is just eyes on the shepherd. That's all. Just eyes on the shepherd. And to coin a phrase, you can rest only in the restless love of God for you. That's where you find rest. So let's pray to our good shepherd right now. Would you bow your heads with me?

I want to invite you to pray with me just silently in your heart. Can you pray to your good shepherd? Maybe in your heart, say, "Lord, you said come to me if you're weary and heavily burdened, and I am weary. So please give me rest, physical rest and soul rest." And I know that's found in giving myself fully to the care of the good shepherd. So that's what I want to do now. Maybe for the first time or maybe as a refocus, you want to pray to your good shepherd, Jesus, "I give every area of my life to you. I don't want to live in fear. I want to just keep my eyes on the shepherd. I'm going to turn my eyes upon Jesus. I want to fully trust you and live a life of rest in your goodness." It's in your name we pray. Amen.