23 Pt. 12

     “Thou preparest a table…” Psalm 23:5

     I have always wondered a little bit about Psalm 23 and its shift in verse 5 from outdoors to indoors… from campsite to banqueting table… from the shepherd and his sheep to the king and his court. Then I consider who David was: the shepherd become king, the king become fugitive, the fugitive become king again and it all kind of makes sense. David’s life was an ebb and flow of battles and banquets, poverty and principality. He like me was in constant need of a Savior. God constantly met that need.

     I don’t know if David wrote this Psalm early on in his life or looking back over the years of advance and retreat. If he wrote this while he was a shepherd then these words are heavy with prophetic power. If he wrote looking back over his long and checkered history then they are words pregnant with godly wisdom. Either way they are powerful.

    David writes “Thou preparest a table” . The verb is in the imperfect tense indicating incompletion of the action or an action that is continuous. It’s not “Once God prepared a table for me.”  Nor is it “Someday God will prepare a table for me.” It’s “God is continually preparing or setting a table for me”.

     David understood that while God had blessed and while He was going to bless in the future that was only because He was constantly about the business of blessing in the here and now.

    So it is today that God is in the midst of blessing you right now. I know it may not look like it, but where you stand will turn out for your blessing if you trust Him as your shepherd. For right now God is preparing a table for you. By the way it’s not a card table, or a coffee table. It’s not an end table or even a formica dining table. It is a shulchan, a king’s banquet table. Your situation right now is God setting you a shulchan. Can you see it? Maybe not but just wait the dining room doors haven’t opened yet. Trust Him! Hang on! You will see!