Psalms 23:5 – “Your rod and Your staff, they comfort me.”
In verse 4 David writes, “I will fear no evil.” Verse 5 reveals why we do not have to fear. I John 4:18 says, “Fear has torment.” As believers we have power over the spirit of fear. We have the promise of 2 Timothy 1:7, “For God has not given us a spirit of fear, but of power and of love and of a sound mind.”
In the Middle East the shepherd carries only a rod and staff. Phillip Keller writes, “Each shepherd boy, from the time he first starts to tend his father’s flock, takes special pride in the selection of a rod and staff exactly suited to his own size and strength. He goes into the bush and selects a young sapling that is dug from the ground. This is carved and whittled down with great care and patience. The enlarged base of the sapling where its trunk joins the roots is shaped into a smooth, rounded head of hard wood. The sapling itself is shaped to exactly fit the owner’s hand. After he completes it, the shepherd boy spends hours practicing with this club, learning how to throw it with amazing speed and accuracy. It becomes his main weapon of defense for both him and his sheep. The rod was, in fact, an extension of the owner’s right arm. It stood as a symbol of his strength, his power, his authority in any serious situation. The rod was what he relied on to safeguard both himself and his flock in danger. And it was, furthermore, the instrument he used to discipline and correct any wayward sheep that insisted on wandering away.”[1]
The rod represents God’s power. The right hand is the place of privilege and authority. The Lord spoke to Moses in Exodus 4:2, “So the Lord said to him, ‘What is that in your hand?’ He said, ‘A rod.’” Verses 3-4 continue, “And He said, “Cast it on the ground.” So he cast it on the ground, and it became a serpent; and Moses fled from it. Then the Lord said to Moses, “Reach out your hand and take it by the tail” (and he reached out his hand and caught it, and it became a rod in his hand).”
In Exodus 7:19, “Then the Lord spoke to Moses, “Say to Aaron, ‘Take your rod and stretch out your hand over the waters of Egypt, over their streams, over their rivers, over their ponds, and over all their pools of water, that they may become blood. And there shall be blood throughout all the land of Egypt, both in buckets of wood and pitchers of stone.’”
The rod was a weapon in the hand of the shepherd to deal with predators who would harm his sheep. John 10:12-13 says, “But a hireling, he who is not the shepherd, one who does not own the sheep, sees the wolf coming and leaves the sheep and flees; and the wolf catches the sheep and scatters them. The hireling flees because he is a hireling and does not care about the sheep.”
David spoke these words to King Saul in I Samuel 17:34-36, “But David said to Saul, ‘Your servant used to keep his father’s sheep, and when a lion or a bear came and took a lamb out of the flock, I went out after it and struck it, and delivered the lamb from its mouth; and when it arose against me, I caught it by its beard, and struck and killed it. Your servant has killed both lion and bear; and this uncircumcised Philistine will be like one of them, seeing he has defied the armies of the living God.’” The New Living Translation says, “I went after it with a club.”
We take comfort that the Lord brings His power to bare on our behalf. When we are attacked by the enemy the Great Shepherd will come to our defense.
[1] Keller, Phillip, A Shepherd Looks at Psalms 23, page 80.
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