Psalm 23 And The Courage To Sit With Pain

God doesn’t wait for your life to calm down before He meets you. He sets a table while the chaos is still loud, while the grief is still fresh, while anxiety is still sitting in the corner of the room. That’s the heartbeat of this talk, built around Psalm 23 and one of its most challenging lines: you prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies. 

We share a story of being pulled into faith the way it often happens in real life, through friends who keep inviting and keep showing up. That invitation lands in the middle of family fracture, the aftershocks of divorce, and then the kind of loss that makes you wonder if any spiritual practice can possibly matter. From there, everything turns on a moment at summer camp, deep in a dark cave, where an honest prayer cuts through the noise: “Show me that you’re real.” 

From that place, we slow down and unpack Psalm 23 as more than a comfort quote. The Shepherd doesn’t promise to erase the enemies on command. Instead, God offers presence, perspective, and peace that can overflow even when fear and sorrow remain. We talk about why spiritual growth so often happens in the valley, why “have a seat” can be a radical act of trust, and how letting go starts with naming what is surrounding you and placing it on the table. 

If you’re wrestling with grief, stress, doubt, or spiritual burnout, this is a grounded reminder that you’re not abandoned in the fight. Subscribe for more, share this with someone who needs steadiness today, and leave a review with the “enemy” you’re learning to trust God with.

Transcript

Setting The Retreat Table

SPEAKER_00 1:03

No anymore. You go ahead and take a seat. Have a seat, have a seat. Uh don't don't draw or write yet on those index cards. There is going to be a purpose for the index cards. So we are we're halfway through as far as the sessions, the content, everything is thematically around this table that God has set, that He's invited us to. But likely, like Jason taught in the last session, the invitation that God has always comes through a person. I mean, in the parable that we talked about last night, the the great the great banquet, the host sends the servants out after the invited guests turn down the invitation to the table. The servants go out and they start inviting people off the streets, off the corners, things like that. And so I think it's really good for us to always acknowledge the Ryans that are in our life that have invited us in into faith. It might not might not just be one person. I came up and I wrote three names down, Danny and Corey and Sean, because they're three friends of mine in high school that when my um when when my par my parents split when I was like nine or ten years old, and

The Friends Who Kept Inviting

SPEAKER_00 2:33

I remember my mom asking her mom, hey, because my mom's from Kansas City, Missouri. So when we were, I mean, we're we're from like the Youngstown Boardman area. Um I remember I didn't know this at the time, but I I asked years later when I was eventually in college, like, hey, what did that season look like for you? So she said that she called her mom and was like, What what do I do? Because I don't I don't have any family here. I don't want to uproot all the kids and take them back to Kansas City. Um and her mom said, What you need to do is you need to literally kind of go back to your roots, like go find a church, not don't just attend, but like get involved. And so from like 10 years old until maybe like 15 years old, we were just kind of like the we were the creasters, we were the Christmas, Easter, occasionally like a handful of times in between those dates. Um, but for me, my experience with that was just sitting in like the church pew in the back of the room, and sometimes um but but uh my I'm I'm three out of four, um, but our the oldest and youngest brother both dealt with some disability that it's hard to sit through like a church service. So often we would be like sitting in church, and then all of a sudden we just have to leave because one of them was like upset. Um but that was kind of like my first experience in church, and I I wouldn't I wouldn't even consider that the real invite to the table. The real invite to the table was knowing what I was going through, I had I had three close friends that I um I knew through school, but I also knew a little bit through playing playing soccer, things like that. Um, and they kept inviting me not just to church, but to to youth group. Literally, the the Wednesday nights. Like you gotta come to Wednesday nights. At the time, like our Wednesday night, like our youth group program happened in the basement of one of our buildings at the Greenford campus. Now it's used for storage, but back in the day, there's still a painting up on the wall where it it lists the uh the youth group's uh it's like the uh the vision statement, which I don't remember like what it says, but if you went down there into the basement, it's like that is what my like that was my like first experience of like real church with with peers. But it was credit to Danny and Sean and Corey because at the beginning of my faith journey, they were the ones who invited, invited, and invited. And in the same thread, it was kind of like, hey, there's food, you can play pool and a whole bunch of games, and there's girls, and it's like, amen. Um never dated Jody, by the way. Oh, no, never dated Jody. Um, none of the girls that I liked in in youth group ended up being Diana, who's my wife. Um, I I I I I kind of knew her when I after I got involved in youth group and everything, when I was a senior, she was a freshman, but the freshman class and the senior class were like the strongest involvement in the youth group at the time. Like the sophomores and juniors, when I was in youth group, they we didn't really have many of them, so it was like freshmen and seniors, and she was a she was a freshman. Um, and then we ended up a handful of years later dating, so we didn't start dating in high school or anything. But I bring up Sean and Danny and Corey because to kind of tail off of what um what Jason was teaching about, these are people who invited me to a table that I it's not that I wasn't sure that I deserved the table or not. It's I wasn't sure sitting at the table if it was gonna do anything about what I was going through. I didn't know that the invitation to the table, if I came and I sat, if I came and I sat in a seat, is this gonna do anything about how I feel about my parents' divorce? Is it gonna, is it gonna change how I feel about like seeing my dad twice a month, you know, having to having like two birthday parties, two Christmas parties every year, which I mean that ends up turning out pretty great. You know, there's a little bit of silver lining sometimes in those things. I mean, as a kid, that's what you look forward to. But then when it comes to like the relational tension and all that kind of stuff, it's it's not just gray area, it's there's there's areas of darkness and hurt and ruin, but you can see God, you know, re-restoring some of those things. Um, but I Danny and Sean and Corey inviting me to the table was in really the perfect season, the perfect timing, because between the time that I was maybe 11 years old until I was about 16, um I didn't really make a lot of bad choices. I've always been a short-tempered and hot-tempered person. Um, but the way that I felt on the inside, there was just a lot of a lot of things that were becoming destroyed on the inside that I I didn't think coming to the table was gonna solve was gonna solve any of that. Um it kind of got worse. Um I I had tested God a lot. Like if you do this, like then I'll do this, or if I do this, would you do this? And there was a lot of that for for years. Um and it increased dramatically. Um in two that in 2002, so I was a I was a freshman in high school, it was a week before my 16th birthday. Um, unex unexpectedly, in the middle of one night, um, my brother Randy passed away. And so you have this table that I've been invited to, and it's like, this is not gonna do anything for that. And for for over a year, I had been coming to the table going, it's it's great, like the table, the table is great, but I still feel this. Um, and the thing that changed was not asking God for something necessarily in him giving that to me, but what changed was there was a moment where I felt like I was testing him and he was answering me, but I really think that what he was doing was giving me perspective of hindsight, but also insight and foresight into what he's gonna continue to do in my life. And it was a moment, um, it was a moment during a summer camp, my my sophomore year of high school. So

Divorce Grief And Sudden Loss

SPEAKER_00 8:53

this is about a year and a half after Randy had passed away. Um, we went during the week, there was always one day, one afternoon at at KCU, that's where we had the camp at Kentucky Christian University. And there was always this one moment where for part of the afternoon we would go out to um, oh shoot, I forget if I forget if it's Carter Caves National Park or or what the the actual park is called, but we would go caving. And there was always a couple caves that our youth minister, because he went to school there, um, that they would take us into. And I just remember this one cave, you anticipated it. I was anticipating it because I'd heard about it that before I took the trip the first time. I knew about it because the first time that I took the trip that that was like a couple months after Randy had passed. But now, another year of being at the table and asking God why, why, why, and not feeling like I saw anything, we we

The Cave Prayer That Changed Things

SPEAKER_00 9:49

enter the cave. And you can't simulate it in here because the windows and like light peeks through the curtains. But if you've ever been in a really dark cave and turned out the flashlight and you can't even see your hand in front of your face, we were in a moment like that, but it was it was deep in this one cave where the ceiling of the cave is a little bit low, and the cave floor slopes from one side to the other. There's a little creek that runs through the one side, and it's kind of like a gravel sand dirt shore. And literally we get in there and it's chilly because inside a cave it's like 60 degrees, but we sit down, and our youth minister had said a couple words about darkness and the presence of God in solitude, and without prompting, I don't even remember who it was. It was a girl, but I I don't I don't remember who it was off the top of my head. But somebody started singing songs, and so we started singing like, I love you, Lord, and I lift my voice to worship you. Oh, my soul rejoice. Um, we sang a handful of songs, and literally something overcame me, and it wasn't like chills from like a cave that's 60 degrees. Um, Dawson, this is the moment that I was telling you about. Like I've only had the I've only had the moment once. Like, I I could, it's it's not chills, you're not cold, but I I feel this presence that overcomes on me. But what I felt was not just physical, what I felt was spiritual. And what I had been asking God literally that week, God, I have so much grief and I have so much pain and I have so much uncertainty and lack of clarity. Show me that you're real this week. And if you want to give, if you if you want to give all the grief and pain back after this week when we leave, like give this to me for just a day, and then I'll I'll take it for the rest of my life. Just show me that you're real. And that was a prayer that I had before even entering the cave, and entering the cave, I was just like, oh, this will be nice and relaxing. And what I didn't, what I didn't know was that in the cave, God would basically show me the reason for the table being set. The table is not set so that you can take your grief and put it on the plate and God takes it away. Um to Psalm chapter 23. Um, a lot of this lesson is learned in hindsight, which David himself himself likely wrote Psalm 23 toward the end of his life. Um his life started out really good. A man after God's own heart run ins with a whole bunch of huge mistakes. I mean, namely like setting up a guy's murder, committing adultery, getting her pregnant, you know, all this kind of stuff. And then kids later in his life, his own offspring trying to usurp his his throne as the king of Israel. I mean, a lot of psalms talk about he's being chased by his enemies, and his enemies are pursuing him. He feels like that he's like the the muck and the mire are coming up to my neck. Like I just feel like my enemies are surrounding me and there's nothing that I can do. And half the time he's talking about his own kids. He's

Psalm 23 And A Table Before Enemies

SPEAKER_00 13:01

not even talking about like opposing nations. And so David, toward the end of his life, he writes this psalm, and a lot of you know it. Like some of your grandmothers have a like a quilt or something that's like this tablecloth or like a something that's like embroidered, you know, in grandma's hallway or bathroom, and it's like a you know, one of those little threaded embroidery like canvases, and it's like a it's a sheep, and it's you know, Jesus like petting, you know, the soft little lamb, and it's like the Lord is my shepherd, you know. I just want to tear that off the wall, you know, just kind of throw that in the trash just for right now. But like this, he's writing this toward the tail end of his life, and he doesn't name the Lord as King, he doesn't name the Lord as Savior. But what what what he says in verse one is the Lord is my shepherd. But then what he says is I I shall not want. Like I have everything that I need. Um today we sang everything I need, like my father has it. Like this is this is that song, and this is what David writes. Um The next couple verses, he makes me lie down in green pastures, he leads me beside quiet waters, and he restores my soul. He guides me on paths of righteousness for his name's sake. And everybody's heard heard these verses, I'm sure, once or twice, or specifically verse 4 Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for you are with me, your rod and your staff, they comfort me. And then verse five, probably the most over skipped verse in one of the most famous Psalms ever, you prepare a what? A table. But where is the table prepared at? You prepare a table before me, and in the presence of who? My enemies. And you anoint my head with oil, my cup overflows, and surely goodness and love will follow me all the days of my life. I'll dwell in the house of the Lord forever. Guys, he says, You prepare a table. You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies. Now, you're not gonna, I don't want you to write anything on your index cards right now, but I want you to begin thinking about. It shouldn't take you long to think about this because this is probably something that is on your mind frequently. I don't know what enemies you have, or it might not even be an enemy, it could be something that is just weighing on your heart as you enter spaces like this, or you come to the retreat. I don't know if it's a fear or if it's an anxiety or if it's stress, if it is a person or persons. But David says, in the presence of my enemies, you have set a table for me. What he does not say is you've prepared a table before me, and you've cast my enemies to the side. Like, I want you to think about one or two words that describe what that what that enemy or opposition in your life is right now. That if you if if you could ask God right now to take this from me, that's what you'd want taken out of your like you you you don't want that in your presence. You don't want that in your life. And so often I've always wondered, God, why why did you let I mean why did you let my parents get divorced is one thing, but then a couple years later to lose Randy, it's like I maybe some of you have felt that that before, where it's like, why? Um and and so for me in that moment anxiety and and grief was kind of the enemy that I felt like I like I was surrounded with. Um I will tell you this, since then, that was that was 2003. Since then, I have not felt the same feeling physically or spiritually in my life. And if I'm being quite honest with you, 50% of the time I would tell you that I don't need that feeling again to commit to Jesus. But then there's a 50% of me that's like, could I could I just have that again sometimes? And I'm sure some of you guys come to an event like this, or maybe when you walk in the doors of your church on Sunday, or maybe it's in the floor of your bedroom when it's just been the roughest day, and your your sheets on your bed are kind of saturated with your tears. Like, God, just do something about this. And then you come to this psalm, and David tells us almost like if he's telling, if he's telling David that he prepares a table before him in the presence of his enemies, he's painting a battle picture. David for years is the commander of the army of Israel. If the army of Israel is surrounded by enemies, what is the last thing that David wants his men to do?

unknown 18:48

Retreat.

SPEAKER_00 18:49

Well not just retreat. If you're if you're standing, you can run. How easy how how is it easier to start running and retreating if you're standing up or if you're sitting down? Yeah. And and what and what does God do in the presence of the enemies? God says, David, hey, don't retreat. Actually, have a seat. Like isn't this kind of like borderline offensive? God, do you know what I'm going through right now? Like, could you take this away? And God's like, what are you doing? Have a seat in the midst of all this stuff that you're feeling. Just have have a seat. Um He prepares a table before us in the presence of our enemies.

The Battle Picture Of Sitting Down

SPEAKER_00 19:39

And so surrounded by grief, surrounded by um anxiety, surrounded by I mean, he's talking about fear or like enemies, that's that's fear, like fearful of his life. And instead of David, scoot your seat out, there's there's the open door, just run. No, he doesn't say he doesn't say run, he says have a seat. What would make somebody have a seat in the presence of their fears, in the presence of their grief, their sorrow? Amidst the circumstances? Is David more afraid? Hold on, is is he more afraid of his circumstances? Or is he more does he trust more in the shepherd? The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want. He prepares a table before me in the presence of my enemies. In the next verse, you anoint my head with oil, and my my cup overflows. He's not talking about a cup at the table. He's talking about his spirit. He's talking about the peace that he has. Somehow he has an overwhelming amount of peace because he's at the table and it's been prepared by God. Because the overwhelming fear and sorrow brought on by the enemies is completely overshadowed by the the trust in the shepherd. So for us today in this session, you have index cards to write down. I know we're not singing the song, but the song kind of comes to mind for me sometimes when I think about this table and this psalm. There's a song that goes, It may look like I'm surrounded, but I'm I'm surrounded by you. And God says, I've prepared a table before you in the presence of your enemies. Why would God prepare a table in the presence of the enemies? Because the goal is not to remove the enemies, the goal is not to remove the trial, the goal is not to remove the struggle. The goal is in the midst of everything that you're surrounded by to not miss the incredible opportunity of a God who is with you in the middle of it. Because though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil. Why? Because you're with me. You're

Writing Your Fear And Trusting God

SPEAKER_00 22:35

with me. You don't get closer to God in the happiest moments of your life. You get closer to God in the valley. Because we're just human and we need the moments in life that are the most vulnerable to show the most dependence on Him. And He lets us go into the valley and He lets us be surrounded by. The enemies, so that we see the table. If I'm surrounded by all the good, what's the likelihood that I see the goodness of the table? No, I'm gonna be like I'm gonna be like last night. The the invite's great, but there's something more important. But surrounded by the enemies, the table is in the presence of my enemies, but who is at the table? Who's at the head of the table? The host. It's God. It may look like I'm surrounded, but I know that I'm surrounded by you. I know that you've prepared this table. I am with you. And all of a sudden, the enemies aren't gone. But now I I feel like I can trust the shepherd and I can withstand the time that I'm in the presence of what is going on in my life. And what it does is even though you walk through the valley of the shadow of death, you don't fear evil because you know God's with you and He sees you through it. Um God has seen me through a lot of dark valleys. And every dark valley that I approach, it's kind of like one, it's kind of like that moment, you know, um, in uh finding Nemo, where they tells, you know, they get the instruction when you get to this point, like, you know, go around and not through. And you know, Nemo, Dory's like, and they go, like, it is it is so true. I have so much hindsight, and I'm only 39 years old, but I I have enough hindsight of God seeing me through the darkest valleys to know that when a dark valley is approaching, I am not gonna skirt around it. But I will tell everybody how much it sucks and how much I don't want to skirt around it. But I know the best option for my life to be shaped in the image of the cre in of Christ, the best option for me is to go through. And that's why Paul even says in his letters, to live is Christ and to die is gain. I'm gonna do whatever I can to embrace the things that make me feel weak because I know in the midst of it, God is gonna transform me. Guys, this is the hardest thing about Christianity because so many people come to the table and we want the table to dismiss all of the enemies. And too often in different parts of the kingdom, there's prosperity gospel preached everywhere where when you start following Jesus, life just gets good. And I'm telling you, everybody who follows Jesus, your life is maybe the best it's ever gonna get when you first get baptized, and then from from then on out, it is it is going to be a trial, but it's one of those things where it's like it is worth it because the God of the universe is there. So I'm gonna read, I'm gonna read this one more time. I'm gonna pray over us, and then um we're gonna we're gonna listen to a song. The song is about this psalm. And while we're listening to the song, when you're ready, I invite you to bring whatever you wrote down to a plate and to set it on the plate and to acknowledge before God, God, you've presented this table before me in the presence of what's on this card. And I know that you can handle this even though I can't. And so I trust you. I trust you as I'm walking through this valley. So I'm gonna read this psalm in its entirety. I'm gonna pray, we're gonna listen to the song. The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not be in want. He makes me lie down in green pastures, he leads me beside quiet waters, he restores my soul, he guides me in paths of righteousness for his name's sake, even though I walk through the valley

Psalm 23 Read Aloud And Prayer

SPEAKER_00 27:04

of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for you are with me, your rod and your staff, they comfort me. You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies. You anoint my head with oil, my cup overflows. Surely goodness and love will follow me all the days of my life, and I will dwell in the house of the Lord forever. God, this table's before us. We know that this physical table doesn't mean anything, but God, we know that spiritually you have set a table to know you, a table to have your presence. And God, I don't know what's being written on these cards, but God, you do. You've you already see it. You're already orchestrating ways to bring us through what we're dealing with, what we're struggling with. God, I pray that in these moments, as we lay our cards down, as we acknowledge what we're being surrounded with, may this not be as much an acknowledgement of what is surrounding us as much as it is acknowledging the trust that we have in you that you're gonna see us through. God, thank you for being in the darkness of the valley. Thank you for guiding us, for comforting us, and God, most of all, thank you for this table. Bless you. Your son prepared a table in the presence of Judas right before going to the cross, God. And in the same way that you guided him from death to life, you guide us from death to life. God, we take a breath, we take these words that we've written down, and in these moments we release them to you, and we trust you. In Jesus' name. Amen.