{"id":518,"date":"2015-03-09T18:39:44","date_gmt":"2015-03-09T18:39:44","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/parkwood.dreamhosters.com\/blog\/?p=518"},"modified":"2015-03-11T21:23:43","modified_gmt":"2015-03-11T21:23:43","slug":"the-lord-is-my-shepherd-19","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/parkwood.dreamhosters.com\/blog\/the-lord-is-my-shepherd-19\/","title":{"rendered":"The Lord is my Shepherd (19)"},"content":{"rendered":"

“For you are with me.”<\/em><\/p>\n

The Cross makes fellowship possible. \u00a0Yesterday we learned that any barriers that stand between us and God have been removed. \u00a0 This is the act of a Good shepherd that loves His sheep. \u00a0 Luke 15 tells us that He will leave the 99 sheep to go find the lost one. \u00a0It also tells us that He will turn the house upside down to find the one lost coin! \u00a0God has spared nothing to make reconciliation possible. \u00a0It is the message of the cross! \u00a0It is the message of psalm 23…It is the message of the Bible as a whole!<\/p>\n

Yet, this is the very thing that the atheist sees as the weakness of our faith in Jesus. \u00a0Only fools believe in a God that would go to the cross on behalf of His creation. \u00a0But, this is the very thing that calms our fears in the dak times. \u00a0Not just the fact that He said He wold always be with us, but that He will do anything to make us into people of character…even if it means going through the valley of the shadow of death. \u00a0 In fact, the scripture never promises a free pass out of suffering and sorrow. \u00a0It only reminds us of the presence of our loving Shepherd who said He would never leave us or forsake us. \u00a0 This Good Shepherd does not run when the wolf comes. \u00a0He says and protects the sheep even if it requires sacrificing His own life…and it did.<\/p>\n

Maybe you are thinking…”Okay, we got it…God is with us.” \u00a0If you believe that then you will live each day with a refreshing sense of purpose that allows you to rise above your circustances and walk in His wonderous presence!<\/p>\n

So, let me remind you, as we continue to journey through this Psalm,<\/p>\n

“Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will not\u00a0be afraid, for you are with me.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

“For you are with me.” The Cross makes fellowship possible. \u00a0Yesterday we learned that any barriers that stand between us and God have been removed. \u00a0 This is the act of a Good shepherd that loves His sheep. \u00a0 Luke … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[5,9],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-518","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-lenten_blog_2015","category-all_posts"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/parkwood.dreamhosters.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/518","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/parkwood.dreamhosters.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/parkwood.dreamhosters.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/parkwood.dreamhosters.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/parkwood.dreamhosters.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=518"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"http:\/\/parkwood.dreamhosters.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/518\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":546,"href":"http:\/\/parkwood.dreamhosters.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/518\/revisions\/546"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/parkwood.dreamhosters.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=518"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/parkwood.dreamhosters.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=518"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/parkwood.dreamhosters.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=518"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}