Knowing God Is With You
Psalm 23
NKJV
The Lord the Shepherd of His People
A Psalm of David.
23 The Lord is my shepherd;
I shall not want.
2 He makes me to lie down in green pastures;
He leads me beside the still waters.
He leads me beside the still waters.
3 He restores my soul;
He leads 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 You are with me;
Your rod and Your staff, they comfort me.
5 You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies;
You anoint my head with oil; My cup runs 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
Forever.
1) Do you know who God is?
God is a Healer. The Creator of heaven and earth. All powerful
and amazing. He does bigger and greater than we could ever imagine.
God's presence speaks. It means that when He is there you have the solution to everything. At times it can hurt knowing He is there and everything seems like it's going wrong but rather it should be your strength. For God to be with you it means that you're under His guiding eye.
2) Do you know your relationship with God
When David wrote that even in the shadow of death he will fear no evil it says something.
The presence of God is what is our assurance to know everything will be okay. Why? Because if you read the first verse of Psalm 23, David first communicates his relationship with God.
David says that God is His shepherd. His guidance. His leader. Just like we accept Jesus as our Lord and Saviour and call Him our King
You must understand first what it means to be a child of God. To be God's child means a lot. It means that God as your Father has the responsibility to take care of you, to guide you, to protect you, to help you, to teach you, etc.
To be a child of God shows that you're dependent on your father. That you can't take care of yourself but that you're submitted and surrendered to Him. What does this mean? it means that if any harm comes to you, it can't be without His watch. He watches your every step carefully making sure you're under the boundaries of His will.
It means that nothing can pass unless he examines that it will not utterly destroy you but instead, it will build you up. God being your father means that he isn't just your guidance and true strength but your peace and redeemer even now. It means that God is your guidance and hope.
For David to boldly say that even if he walks through the valley of the shadow of death he won't fear means that he has an assurance that he has a Shepherd who watches his every step and even if harm comes that his Shepherd will get him out. He had an assurance of his relationship with God.
Do you have an assurance of your relationship with God? Do you know what it means to be a child of God? Do you understand what it means not to fear any evil? Do you realize how precious God's presence is?
3) Assurance of victory
One of the first things a kid does when they are taken to a strange place is that they look for the parent's hand. A kid no matter how scary a situation looks for someone, something or somewhere familiar. They'll first yell for their parent, and once they just see their parent they are at peace because they trust their parent will protect them. Similar to God, what can anyone do to you if God is with you?
For God to be with you guarantees victory. There is nothing above God and nothing that can defeat God so for God to be with you means that nothing can overcome you.
Job was allowed to go through something painful yet God was with Him. Joseph went to prison yet the bible says God was with him (Genesis 39:21-23).
4) Walking In Peace
Because you have the assurance of who your God is and who you are you can walk in peace, boldness, and confidence. David spoke from a place of hope. He believed God was preparing a table before Him in the presence of His enemies. He understood what it means to have faith in God. You can know who God is but not have hope and faith in Him. What David demonstrated was hope and faith in the presence of God. He believed in who God is, His word, and what He had to say.
When you're aware of the presence of God you must be bold enough to declare what you see in faith. Knowing God is with you makes you bold enough to say
I'll see victory
I'll grow out of this
This is temporary
I'll receive restoration
Why because God's presence brings hope, faith, boldness, confidence, and reassurance.
The 3 Hebrew boys could boldly say that God is with them and that even if they end up in the fire God can take them out (Daniel 3:16-28). Knowing God is with you makes you do foolish things but with joy. It makes you sing in the prison-like Paul and Silas did (Acts 16:25). Why? Because you know that in Gods presence there is victory and every pain we go through has an eternal glory (2 Corinthians 4:17) and even an earthly reward that what we sow we will reap (Galatians 6:7-8) as we persevere, try and be bold that we will receive the fruits of our labor and boldly declare the works of the Lord.
Romans 8:31
NKJV
God’s Everlasting Love
31 What then shall we say to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us?
-etty