"Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil...."

At a wedding a week ago, the groom was nervous - a groom ought to be nervous. A bride too. The vows they are preparing to make are upping the stakes of their relationship to the Nth degree. This particular groom is an Air Traffic Controller - a vocation that calls for nerves of steel. When it came time for the vows, he repeated each brief phrase after me: "I Patrick, took you, Claire," "I Patrick, took you, Claire..." and so on. But he got all tongue-tied at one point and couldn't quite get the words out. I said to the congregation, "Kinda makes you afraid to fly." No one laughed harder than Patrick. All of us realized that it takes a certain calm to keep track of several planes landing and taking off at Houston Airport ... a different set of nerves than promising your life to another. But I was handed an opportunity to go for a cheap laugh ... and I pounced on it. "Kinda makes you afraid to fly."

We all have our fears. An Irish toast goes like this: "May you all live to be a hundred and ten, and may the last voice you hear be mine." That's all well and good - a toast to a long life. But there's a underside to the toast which is fairly obvious - no matter how long the life - that life eventually comes to a close. And when that time comes, if you could call the shots, whose would be the last voice you hear? What words would you want to be hearing?

It is unlikely the last voice you hear will be mine. Especially if I'm singing. Nevertheless. Nevertheless there's a hymn in our hymnal based on the 23rd Psalm; it's number 780 in our hymnal and I find it hauntingly beautiful, especially the refrain. You might not get that sense of beauty from my voice; nevertheless - I've got the mike. "Shepherd me, O God, beyond my wants, beyond my fears, from death into life."

".... beyond my wants, my fears, from death into life." The Young at Heart Chorus is made up of twenty-two singers with the average age of eighty. Some months ago, our Thursday Bible Study group watched a documentary of this group from Northampton, Massachusetts. The chorus was preparing for a concert, singing of all things, rock music from the '60s. A member of the choir, Jean, had had a heart attack some months earlier, and the documentary opens with Jean attending choir practice for the first time since her recovery. The choir director asked her, "Did you see the light?" She said with a smile, "I was too afraid to look." And everybody laughed. The laughter sounded a bit like nervous laughter, something akin to whistling though the graveyard.

"Did you see the light?" "I was too afraid to look." And we know what that means, don't we? It seems to be a common experience for those who have died and have lived to tell about it; those who have had a near death experience. The light. They talk about seeing a light. Almost to a person, according to what I've read, they have seen a light but, and this is key, once they have been resuscitated, another common experience is: they no longer fear death.

Tradition informs us that the shepherd boy, David, was the author of many of the psalms, and it's reasonable to think that the 23rd Psalm comes from the heart and the experience of one who spent countless days and seemingly endless nights tending sheep in the Judean countryside.. As David writes, "Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil...," surely David has seen the light. Once again, the refrain of hymn 780: "Shepherd me, O God, beyond my wants, beyond my fears, from death into life."

Some critics of Christianity claim that our reliance on faith is a crutch for weaklings. Real men don't need faith ... real women too. I've often shared from this pulpit how William Sloan Coffin addressed that issue when he was chaplain at Yale University. A student walking across the quadrangle at Yale yelled out, "Hey Chaplain, Christianity is for cripples." And without missing a step or skipping a beat the Chaplain yelled back, "You're right. But, aren't we all limping"?

I limp. When I was young, fear of dying almost crippled me. Paralyzed me. And maybe my call to the ministry was in part fueled by my fear of dying. Now I am convinced that the end of my earthly life is not the end of my story. Christ is Risen - and we shall also one day rise.

I've been to the Middle East more times than I deserve ... and I get to see sheep, as it were, up-close-and personal. I've observed the relationship between shepherds and their flock. I've been told that recognizing the voice of the shepherd in a source of security for the sheep. I doubt if the average lamb of the flock could put it in these terms, but it is comforting to know someone is looking out for you, has your best interest in mind. Sheep sleep a little easier at night, knowing the shepherd is minding the gate. Do sheep count shepherds as they try to doze off? For you and me, those times when sleep is hard to come by, rather than counting sheep, we might find comfort and rest as we consciously count on the Shepherd.

During the season of Lent, we often use this prayer during worship. "O Lord, support us all the day long, until the shadows lengthen and the evening comes, and the busy world lies hushed, and the fever of life is over, and our work is done. Then in your mercy grant us a safe lodging, and a holy rest, and peace at the last." And I might add, "may the last voice you hear be the gentle voice of the Shepherd, "Come to me you who are weary ... and I will give you rest."

Or to put melody to the words, "Shepherd me, O God, beyond my wants, beyond my fears, from death into life."