“I will fear no evil, for you are with me; your rod and your staff comfort me.”
(Psalm 23:4)
There is a skill to herding sheep, and though I know nothing about it, I have learned some new facts from reading. Since the Psalms were written by David, who was a shepherd, I wanted to know how a shepherd’s rod or staff could ever bring “comfort” to the sheep. A crook is the name for a part of the shepherd’s staff. Growing up in the city, a crook, meant a dishonest person or a criminal. For those who grew up in the rural countryside, a crook is the hooked part of a shepherd’s staff. I learned that sheep have a sense of misguided independence when their heads are looking downward, and sometimes their downward gaze causes them to wander and stray into serious danger. To prevent them from going off a cliff, the crook, or hooked end, is gently placed around the wandering sheep’s neck and his head is pulled upward. His head has to be pulled upward, in order to be pulled back into the flock. David also wrote about God being the lifter of our heads in Psalm 3:3,
“Lord, thou art a shield about me, my glory, and the lifter of my head.” This act of lifting the wandering sheep’s head with the crook of the staff, gives a clearer understanding of those words used by David. There is an area around the sheep called the flight zone. If the shepherd applies the crook while standing inside that flight zone, the sheep will panic and impulsively run off. The shepherd extends the crook of his rod, from a certain distance and gently pulls the sheep’s head upward. He is standing outside the flight zone so that the sheep doesn’t panic, and His staff comforts them. We all have a flight zone around us too, and we each have something that causes us to panic from time to time. Fear and panic is a part of life, but our Good Shepherd knows how to bring our head back up, calmly, gently and safely drawing us back inside His flock. When we wander off, heading in a wrong direction, spiritually, He extends the crook of His staff, to lift our head upward, towards Him. The Lord knows how to do this without ever breaching our flight zone or triggering panic. That’s how His staff is comforting to us. Instead of scolding us, He calls to us saying, “Come on back, you belong to Me.” Jesus never triggers our flight zone. Fears are all around us in the world we live in, occasionally encroaching that flight zone and triggering us, but before we over react, the crook of His staff is lifting our head upward. I thought about this when someone is grieving, having suffered some kind of loss. When our head is downward in sorrow for too long, we tend to drift into depression. With a gentle but firm hold, the shepherd lifts our head up. The crook of His staff is lovingly placed, always drawing our gaze up toward Him. Walking with Jesus is a lifestyle of constantly returning to Him, having our head lifted up many times to restore us from sorrow, worry, sin or temptation. He never gets tired of being the lifter of our head, because that’s what a Good Shepherd does. His rod and His staff will comfort us time and again, until we breathe our last and He picks us up and carries us home.
Thank you Jesus, for the crook of your staff that gently lifts our head and calms our fears, always restoring our gaze up toward you, our source of everlasting comfort. Amen.