Psalm 23 Day Four: The Next Right Step
He guides me in paths of righteousness for His name’s sake. Psalm 23:3
Day 4: The Next Right Step
As we have been walking through this day by day, we have discovered that no matter what life has thrown at us, we are not walking this path alone. God, our Good Shepherd is guiding us, providing what we need for healing, and inviting us to rest so our souls are restored.
Without abandoning the importance of rest, today we look at taking the next right step.
”He guides me in paths of righteousness for his name’s sake”
Our brain is an amazing and efficient organ. In its efficiency though it can create its own problems that are difficult to solve and can, in its own well-meaning way, keep us stuck. Let me explain.
When you learn something or have an experience, a neural pathway is developed. These develop quickly at lightning speed in children. The first time that path is carved out, it is small and tentative. Like paths in nature, a trail travelled over and over becomes a path. The path with continued use becomes a road. The road, inviting and easy for more travellers, becomes a highway. And that highway, in turn, can become a superhighway quickly funnelling all kinds of mental activity down its wide-laned wonder.
The repercussions of that is, if the first tentative neural pathway contained information that wasn’t completely true, reinforced over and over, your brain will strengthen that path again and again until our responses can begin to feel automatic.
For example, if as a child I experience a caregiver who responds quickly to my cries, offers soothing and tries to supply whatever need I have at the moment, I learn trust in other humans. If on the other hand, I learn that my cries bring an angry caregiver who makes my distress worse, I learn to either stifle those cries or intensify them in a desperate attempt to be heard. If the caregiver fluctuates between attending to my needs and ignoring my needs, I learn to read the room so I know what to expect.
We are not walking this path alone. God, our Good Shepherd, is guiding us, providing what we need for healing, and inviting us to rest so our souls are restored.
We know this practically if we have learned to drive a vehicle. As a new driver there are so many things to keep in mind – mirrors, signals, windshield wipers, lights, lanes, other cars, signs and traffic lights. But over time our brain automates so many of those functions. We can often drive for miles and realize we aren’t quite sure where we are. The system has taken over.
This is fantastic in most areas of life but when there has been negative pathways or trauma-disrupted pathways, we have a problem that leaves us feeling stuck.
“The walls we build to protect ourselves in childhood often become the prison walls of adulthood.” – Alex Howard.
If as a child you perceived tension in the house, and discovered it is best to disappear to your room, or on your bike or anywhere to escape the conflict, when that child grows up and their beloved spouse is upset about something, the well-worn pathways of your brain convince you, you are better off leaving the room or escaping into your head instead of figuring out some way to negotiate the conflict. You now have a bigger problem on your hands.
This tendency of the brain takes time and repetition to rewire. But rewiring is crucial if we want to change, heal and grow.
Our verse today reminds us that again, we are not alone, going before us is the Shepherd that wants us to be whole even more than we do. So much in fact, he was willing to lay down his life so that you might have life “to the full” John 10:10-11.
We are not alone – going before us is the Shepherd that wants us to be whole even more than we do.
Trish Wilbee
“He guides me in paths of righteousness” The word righteousness isn’t one used much in our world and when it does it has the connotation of moral decisions. This isn’t wrong as the path God leads you on will be one based on healthy morality. But it’s more than that. Tim Mackie helps us understand in the Bible Project’s Righteousness and Justice that righteousness is a relational word. It’s about right relationships between people and includes treating others in ways that are right and just.
So “paths of righteousness” is not only about your moral choices. It also describes living rightly – with God, and with other people in the world He created. The pathways we learned to survive as a child have to be revamped or they cause issues in our adult relationships.
Trauma adds another layer of struggle by putting us into a survival mode that repeats itself over and over.
It can be hard to escape these loops. It takes intentionality and effort. Today, your focus can simply be on taking your next right step forward.
We don’t like small steps. We want this to be over and done and in the past so we can be back to our normal self. But yearning for the past doesn’t create a new you. And if your tendency is to beat yourself up for not being able to move on – remember, you will never beat yourself up to a better place.
You will never beat yourself up to a better place.
Trish Wilbee
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So where do we start?
One small step. In the realm of healing it might be an act of self-care. It might be taking one step to look at a situation that hurt you.
Healing is cyclical and as you take new steps and forge new pathways in your brain, it is at first, painfully hard, then it becomes minutely easier. The more you repeat it the easier it becomes until eventually your brain will automate that response.
But you can’t short circuit the process.
When the Israelites left Egypt the Ark of the Covenant, a symbol of the presence of God went before them. When it moved, they packed up camp and moved. When it stopped, they rested. (See Numbers 10:33-35) That same presence of God is ahead of you today, showing you the next step on the path to healing you are to take.
That same presence of God is ahead of you today, showing you the next step on the path to healing you are to take.
Trish Wilbee
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Our verse today doesn’t end with the path. It ends with the phrase “for his name’s sake” which can be difficult to understand. On the surface it sounds a bit like – He wants me to follow the right path so He looks good. The meaning behind it is “for his names sake” is that He doesn’t lead you in the right paths because you deserve it. He leads us because His faithful guidance is consistent with who He is. He doesn’t lead you because you have performed well enough to earn his attention. If you can’t do anything to deserve that guidance, the good news is, you therefore can’t to anything to ‘un-deserve’ it. He leads you because that is who He is. Your brain re-wiring guide is a shepherd who cares.
Negative life circumstances often carve painful pathways in our brains that have us believing “I have to earn love.” “I’m too much” “I’m abandoned.” “I’m only loved when I’m useful.” Those pathways need re-wiring with the message that there is nothing you can do to be more loved by God.
Loved as you are.
Loved exactly the way you are.
Loved in health or in sickness.
Loved in struggle or in victory.
Loved on dark days and bright ones.
He leads because He’s a good shepherd.
Trust it.
Journal Prompts or Ponderings
1. Find a literal path in nature and go for a walk. Reflect on the pathways that have developed in your brain.
2. What well-worn response once helped you feel safe but may now be keeping you stuck?
3. What activates the old pathway?
4. When that old pathway is activated, what do you usually believe about yourself, other people or God? Choose something that feels manageable today. You do not need to revisit overwhelming experiences alone or before you are ready.
5. Ask your shepherd, “What is one small step I can take today toward my own healing?”
Prayer:
Lord, sometimes our vision is so clouded we cannot see where you are leading.
Open our eyes and clear the path so we can see the very next step.
Help us not to despise small steps, gentle beginnings and quiet starts.
Lead us today toward health.
Toward hope. Toward you.
Amen
Trish White
Counsellor/Pastor
Fellow traveler in this messy world aiming to inspire, encourage, and nuture.