The Goodness of God Follows You

Excerpt from article written for Machias Valley Baptist Church:

Earlier this year, Pastor Zach preached a sermon series on joy with the key verse “Oh, taste and see that the LORD is good!” Psalm 34:8. The praise team introduced a new song to our congregation to emphasize this series called “The Goodness of God.” The bridge lyrics of this song go like this:

“Your goodness is running after, it’s running after me.”

When I first heard these words, I thought that was a strange way of putting it. Your goodness is running after me? Then I recalled that Psalm 23:6 says, “Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life…”

The Hebrew word for “follow” in that verse means “to be behind, follow after, pursue, persecute, or to run after.” This explains why the writers of the song “The Goodness of God” worded the bridge as they did.

Why would God, through the writer David, say that goodness and mercy would follow? As we remember the context of Psalm 23, we know that this is about the shepherd, the sheep, and their journey. David is drawing from his experience as a shepherd himself. Sometimes the shepherd leads the sheep from behind. I asked my shepherdess friend, Laci, about how they lead sheep. She said, “Depending on the situation you either need to drive them somewhere from behind (usually somewhere they don’t want to go) or head them from the front (usually when it’s somewhere they really want to go but need to slow down and wait for you).”

You can read the entire article here.