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As we continue looking at the final phrase of Psalm 23 –‘I will dwell in the house of the LORD forever’. David feels so safe and secure in the flock of God that he has no hesitation in affirming that this is the way it will be forever. Do you, I wonder, feel as safe and secure in your life as David did in the Shepherd’s fold? This is not the time or place to debate the issue of ‘eternal security’ –or, as it is sometimes described, ‘once saved, always saved’ –but it is right to focus here on that most wonderful of all earthly experiences –assurance. The question is often raised in Christian circles: can a person have, in this life, the assurance of personal salvation? One denomination gives this answer: ‘It is not possible to know in this life, with any degree of certainty, that one is a recipient of the grace of God.’ It is very important to reason this answer very well and properly in other to know! I strongly disagree! Listen again to those now famous words which John Wesley wrote in his Journal after going ‘very reluctantly’ to a room in Aldersgate Street, London, on 24 May 1738, where a reading was being given from Luther’s Preface to the Book of Romans: ‘I felt my heart strangely warmed. I felt I did trust in Christ, Christ alone, for salvation, and an assurance was given me that He had taken away my sins, even mine, and saved me from the law of sin and death.’ Assurance was given me! Wesley had the assurance of salvation. And so, I might humbly add, so do I. But what is more important, as far as you are concerned, is that if you surrender your life fully to Lord Jesus and trust Him alone for your soul’s salvation, then so can you.

We come now to the final phrase in David’s ‘hymn of praise to divine diligence’: ‘I will dwell in the house of the LORD forever.’ We said when we began our sermon on this Psalm –and the point has been reportedly emphasized –that David is not speaking here as a shepherd, though he was one, but as a sheep: one of God’s flocks; which each and every one of us is. David knew, better than anyone, that a sheep’s welfare depended to a great degree on the love and care of its shepherd. Having begun with the proud boast, ‘The LORD is my Shepherd’ –or, as someone translates it, ‘Look at who my Shepherd is –my owner, my manager –the Lord is!’ –he finishes on an equally positive note: ‘I shall dwell in the house of the LORD forever.’ The thought that comes through in this final phrase is clearly this –I am so completely contented with being under the care of my loving Shepherd that I have no wish to have my circumstances changed –I want things to stay this way forever! Some commentators have expressed disappointment at David’s use of the word ‘house’ in the closing phrase of his Psalm, believing it to detract somewhat from the imagery of a shepherd and his sheep. But the word ‘house’ has a much wider meaning than most seem to attach to it. It means, in fact, the ‘household’ of God, the ‘flock’ of God, or –as the Amplified Bible translates it –the ‘presence’ of God. Philip Keller’s rugged translation of this final phrase may offend the pursuits, but to me it states fairly accurately what was in the Psalmist’s mind. ‘Nothing will ever make me leave this outfit! It’s great!’ And to that I add a hearty Amen! You can only understand this when you know and realize that our God always mean well and good for us in everything He God allows to come our way in life!

The thought which has been quietly shaping itself in our minds over the past weeks is a powerful and transforming one –namely, that the goodness and mercy (love) of God follow hard on our heels to turn every tragedy and calamity into a triumph and every loss into a gain. This is the essence of having Christ in our life in both His Presence and His indwelling! It is easy to affirm this as we look back –the challenge is to affirm it with equal conviction as we look ahead too. If you can get hold of this divine truth in your heart/mind and absorb it into your life as a working truthful principle or call it law, then it will transform your attitude/character to everything in life. Never again will you be at the mercy of circumstances or vicissitudes of life. In Acts 5:40-41 we read an astonishing statement saying: “40So, convinced by him, they took his advice; and summoning the apostles, they flogged them and sternly forbade them to speak in or about, the name of Jesus, and allowed them to go. 41So they went out from the presence of the council (Sanhedrin), rejoicing that they were being counted worthy [dignified by the indignity] to suffer shame and be exposed to disgrace for [the sake of] His name.” Rejoicing? Over injustice? Someone may ask which is likened to being joyful in trials! How is it possible to rejoice over an injustice? Because they believed, with David, that the last word was not with men, but with God –goodness and mercy (love) would follow them and turn the situation to their advantage. When you can rejoice over injustice, you are indomitable. Indomitable is when something is impossible to subdue or defeat or depress you in all perspective of it. Another verse from Acts that always intrigues me reads: “And the patriarchs [Jacob’s sons], boiling with envy and hatred and anger, sold Joseph into slavery in Egypt; but God was with him,” as seen in Acts 7:9. The phrase, “but God…” is always at the end of every injustice –He (our God) has the last word in every situation. This is a divine principle or you call it law that man is yet to be thoroughly familiar with in life circumstances! And just as God used the injustice done to Joseph to feed the Egyptian people and his own family, so He transforms every injustice, every sorrow, every bereavement, every tragedy, every calamity for our good. Christianity may not explain everything, but it most certainly transforms everything.

It probably goes without saying that this phrase of David’s which we are considering –‘Surely goodness and mercy (love) will follow me all the days of my life’ –is an utterance of faith. It can be said only by someone who looks beyond the events and circumstances of life and has implicit confidence in the One (Lord God Almighty) who is ultimately in control of everything in the universe. David believed that nothing could happen to him, no difficulty or dilemma could come into his life, without eventual good emerging from the chaos because he knows that as long as he remain loyal to his God, He will overrule everything in his life and bring good out of every evil or bad that come his way. Most of us, when we look back on our lives, can see the truth of this, but the challenge is to believe it when we are going through the circumstance. Ah –then it is not so easy! The only people who can practice this life principle are those who believe and trust in our Lord God Almighty. Let us all try and be practicing this divine principle. Have you heard of Philip Brooks? He was one of the great preachers of a previous generation. He began his career as a schoolteacher and both he and his advisors had every reason to believe that he would do well. But he was a failure. He went home to his parents mortified beyond words. In the midst of his depression, there came to him a clear call to the Christian ministry. At first he pushed it aside, but the call grew louder and louder. He was led on step by step to become a preacher of amazing influence, gaining a position of high esteem on both sides of the Atlantic. Whenever our God wants you in a particular area of life, He has a way of bringing you into it through circumstances and vissicititude of life. He says in a sermon on the 23rd Psalm: ‘In the hours of my humiliation, if anyone had said to me that “God’s goodness and mercy and His Gracious interventions” were following hard on my heels, I would have considered them an imbecile. But actually God’s goodness, His mercy and His grace did! How differently I might have quickly responded if I had believed then, as I believe now, that His goodness and mercy and grace are constant companions.’ How different indeed! And so it is with many people today, and this is why it is vital that we take advantage of our hearing the Gospel so that we will always be on God’s side!

This is the marvelous promise of our Lord God to us; a promise of an all round protection! We said last week that God does not engineer evil, and that the tragedies and disasters of life that we often encounters are more often the consequence of sin, ignorance and carelessness due us as knowledge limited beings who ought to be dependent on our all knowing heavenly Father and our God but unfortunately we rarely depend on Him. Many people saw the loss of the most beautiful and attractive and gigantic cruise ship ever built by man called the Titanic in 1912 as many saw it as an act of God’s judgment because of the proud boast of its owners that it was ‘unsinkable’. But is this assertion true? Although I do not see it in that light at all, because it’s sinking was partly due to prideful reckless racing through an ice-field because its already seen as unsinkable, and the death toll was greater than it needed to be because she only carried lifeboat accommodation for only 1,200 people, though the passengers and crew on board totaled 2,293 which could be seen as an overload! The great ship went down due to a compound of pride and criminal folly in man. ‘Many a life’, says one writer, ‘has been saved by the Titanic experience because after the accident/incident; the track-route of westbound ships traveling across the Atlantic was shifted further south, away from the dangerous ice-fields irrespective of whether the ship is unsinkable or not. The obsolete Board of Trade requirements with regard to emergency boat accommodation were stringently revised to contain modern safety lifeboats close to the number of people in the ship as a matter of compulsion.’ This is where our God is more than us humans because before a thing happens, God knows of it ahead of time and makes provisions, and when God pronounces a thing, so it is unlike man who have pronounced the Titanic to be unsinkable but that pronouncement failed! Man makes provisions from past experience after it had happened. This is often the way it is in life –disappointment, tragedy, disasters and grief teach people a great deal because of no divine foresight and lack of total true and sincere dependence on God. In the Christian life, however, this is not often the way it is/should be –but always the way it is because man is not a truthful and sincere being hence God said the heart of man is cunning. God follows hard on the heels of every event and circumstance in our lives, not only teaching us a great deal, but working to turn every loss into a gain for His true sons and daughters who don’t follow Him with cunning mind and foolish smartness. Look back over your life for a moment and see if you are real and sincere with our God in all your dealings. Try asking yourself have there not been times when you questioned God’s wisdom and management of your affairs: moments when you thought you could survive better on your own if you have done it your way? But now how? Are you not now convinced that He God followed you in goodness, in love and mercy? Did not good come out of evil, light out of darkness, and faith out of despair? This is the principle that our God wants us to know and practice in life! This is why He wants our total dependence in Him to lead and guide us!