The Sheep and the Shepherd as taught by Ray Vander Laan

The Lord is my shepherd, I lack nothing.
² He makes me lie down in green pastures,
he leads me beside quiet waters,
³ he refreshes my soul.
He guides me along the right paths
for his name’s sake.
⁴ Even though I walk
through the darkest valley,^[a]
I will fear no evil,
for you are with me;
your rod and your staff,
they comfort me.

Yesterday, I was listening to one of his CD's in my car( yes I drive an older car and no it does not have a modern mp3 port) as this speaker gave the analogy of the sheep and shepherd.  In the CD I was listening he talked about the hillside, but much more detail was put into his message than on this short video clip.

Now I want to share a vision and a dream that our good friend had which he shared with our Home Builder's Sunday school class shortly after the tragic loss of our daughter Maria. Mark J. told me about this dream he had that God wanted him to share with our family.  In this dream it was night and storms were around my family.  I was in a crouched position walking forward while clutching to my young son. Behind me was my wife.  Behind my wife was our Lord Jesus standing erect and pointing forward.  When I heard this dream I thought it was odd that our Lord  wasn't in front of us until I heard Ray Vanderlaan explain the sheep and the shepherd analogy.

Ray pointed to the rocky hillside and to the shepherd girls leading their sheep.  In the day time the shepherd is in front of their sheep because the sheep will follow them, but at night the shepherds revert to being behind the sheep because sheep will do stupid stuff like run toward the shepherd.  When you are on a rocky hillside it can be a dangerous thing to have the sheep charge you. When I heard this explanation Mark's dream made more sense to me.

There may be moments in your life where you may feel abandoned and alone and you are wondering where is Jesus and why has he left you to go  through the darkest days of your life alone? What you realize later in your journey, like us, was  that Jesus had not deserted you, but in those darkest patches he had taken up the rear position pointing you in the right direction.