Yes, though I walk through the deep, sunless valley of the shadow of death, I will fear or dread no evil. For You are with me: Your Rod to protect & Your Staff to guide, they comfort me.
Psalm 23:4
Some of the hardest times in my life really can be described as deep, sunless valleys of the shadow of death. I don’t necessarily mean death as in the end of life but more death as in that finality, that complete end, that nothingness, that empty space. Depression is one of the hardest Daunters to deal with. Depression is often described as a shadow over your life. But a shadow is all depression is. It isn’t who we are and it isn’t who God is.
In this Psalm the author is ‘walking through’ not getting stuck in it, not setting up camp in the valley, not laying down in defeat, no they are walking through. We know that there is no guarantee of the perfect life and that we will find ourselves in these sunless valleys.
There’s an interesting war the Israelites had with the Syrians in 1 Kings 20. The Syrian King Ben-hadad had suffered a massive defeat after trying to attack the Israelites, it was true Daunters style attack and true Undaunted Victory. The Daunter King’s advisors decided that the victory only happened because it was a hilltop battle and then their theory about God. Their arrogant theory! Remember God is very serious about His glory and letting Daunters know Who is in control. So a man of God went to the Israel King and gave him this word from God.
Thus says the Lord: Because the Syrians have said, The Lord is God of the hills but He is not God of the valleys, therefore I will deliver all this great multitude into your hands, & you shall know & recognize by experience that I am the Lord.
1 Kings 20:28
You see the Syrians made a fatal flaw in their thinking that the lying deceivers Daunters have convinced so many women of God. That God isn’t the God of the valleys. They try to lie that God isn’t in the deep sunless valley. We place our ‘experience’ that God loves us on the hilltop and mountains but we don’t see that it is in the deep, sunless valley that we will know and recognize BY EXPERIENCE that Jesus is Lord and that He had deprived our Daunters of the power to harm us.
By all measure of military strategy, the Israelites should have been defeated. In verse 27 it says “The Israelites encamped before the enemy like two little flocks of lost kids, absolutely everything against them but Almighty God, but the Syrians filled the country.” Do you ever feel like that? A lost child with absolutely everything against you but God and the Daunters are filling every part of your life?
Listen to me, and I am saying this to myself today too, yes you may be a lost child with absolutely everything against you but He is with you! HIS ROD to protect you and HIS STAFF to guide you! We need to let that comfort us. This is only a valley and you are walking through it. Take hold of His hand and let Him guide you.
We have the most beautiful promise about the New Earth that is coming and what will happen to deep, sunless valleys.
And there shall be no more night; they have no need for lamplight or sunlight, for the Lord God will illuminate them & be their light, & they shall reign as kings forever & ever through the eternities of the eternities.
Revelation 22:5
Let that promise warm your heart today as you walk through this valley, that one day there will be no shadow of death to fear.
Lord God, I pray you fill our hearts with so much hope and promise in You that will help us walk through the valley of the shadow of death. Comfort us in these deep, sunless valleys with Your Rod and Your Staff. May we know and recognize through our experience in the valley that You are the Lord our God. In Jesus’ name! Amen!