With Him as your Shepherd, you have counsel in regular supply against temptation. With Him as your Shepherd, you daily have the power of love behind you and all of Heaven ahead of you. Having the Lord as your Shepherd enables you to have a God Who knows you a God Who loves and hears you and a God who cares for you. The height of all this is the joy and overriding benefits of having the Lord as your Shepherd. These could be a father, teacher, pastor or a leader. No wonder the Psalmist-David declared, вЂњThe Lord is my Shepherd, I shall not want.вЂќ Good enough, the Lord shepherds His flock through human shepherds. The shepherd loves, gives time and care to his flock. Between the shepherd and the sheep is the tie of love, care and time. His heart is always with them and he spends time with them. Is it any wonder then that He was particular about checking on Adam and Eve and ensuring He spend time with them? Every true shepherd is particular about his sheep.

He created man to tend and to care, to have dominion over (shepherd) all else and with Himself вЂGodвЂ™ as вЂњThe ShepherdвЂќ over all. Amen.Right from day one, God planned Creation in such a manner that there will be a shepherd and the sheep. Help me attend to the hearts of those I teach so that I may nurture and encourage them to grow into the likeness of Christ. God, you see deep into our hearts, and you love us completely. What might God see in each childвЂ™s heart that you also need to see and nurture? Take time to reflect on each of your children or youth and their potential part in GodвЂ™s plans for the world. Jesus clearly builds on this part of the tradition and makes it a priority in his understanding of what it means to follow after God.

Many of the Hebrew scriptures, including most of the prophets, Psalms, Chronicles, and Deuteronomy, celebrate the condition of the heart and the one who seeks God. This view, as with many of our ideas about differences between the Old and New Testaments, does not reflect what the texts actually say. We often have mistakenly thought that inner spirituality is a concern of only the New Testament and that the Old Testament emphasizes only physical manifestations of spirituality and devotion. The reasons for God choosing certain individuals are often not revealed in the Bible: see, for example, the calls to Abraham, Joseph, Moses, Jeremiah, and the apostle Paul. In this passage, David is selected by God we are not given any indication why. Why the two are treated so differently is never stated. Even though David, like Saul, will commit some grievous sins and make terrible mistakes, God does not abandon David. He will be the standard by which the book of Kings evaluates all subsequent kings of Israel and Judah. David becomes known as one after GodвЂ™s own heart (1 Samuel 13:14). The condition of the heart is a recurring theme in the book of Samuel, as in many other biblical texts. From this humble beginning will come one of the most influential figures in the entire Old Testament. What may be surprising is that a shepherd would actually become a king. So, it is not surprising that a king should be compared to a shepherd. The shepherd/king must lead the sheep/people, care for them-especially for the weak and powerless-and put himself in danger to protect them. Shepherding was commonly used as a metaphor for kingship throughout the ancient world.

David is the youngest and the one ignored in the original call to come before the prophet. God tells Samuel that вЂњthe Lord does not see as mortals see they look on the outward appearance, but the Lord looks on the heartвЂќ (16:7).ДЇinally, after Samuel has seen and rejected seven of JesseвЂ™s sons, David is brought before him. These are the attributes that made Saul seem like a good choice for king (1 Samuel 9:2 and 10:23). God, however, rebukes Samuel, warning him not to consider appearance or height. When Samuel sees JesseвЂ™s firstborn, he feels certain that Eliab is GodвЂ™s choice. God instructs Samuel to journey to the small village of Bethlehem, to the house of Jesse, so that God can reveal to Samuel which of the sons will become the new king. Samuel has been grieving over Saul, but God will not allow him to remain in this state. After GodвЂ™s rejection of Saul as king, God tells Samuel to anoint one of the sons of Jesse as SaulвЂ™s replacement.

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