Psalms 23:1

Psalms 23:1 opens the most-read psalm in the world with a line that already contains everything that follows: "Yahweh is my shepherd; I shall lack nothing." Psalms 23:1 is a song of David, who kept sheep before he was king and so reaches for the image he knew best: in Psalms 23:1 God takes the role of the one who cares rather than the one who demands, and the rest of the psalm simply unfolds that picture.

"I shall lack nothing" does not mean having everything you want. In a shepherd's world, it means the flock does not go without the essentials: pasture, water, direction, defense. The following verses unfold exactly that — green pastures, still waters, right paths, company in the valley, a prepared table.

Notice the pronoun: "my shepherd". The psalm is not about a general idea of providence; it is about a personal relationship that the speaker claims for himself.

It is one of the texts most read at hospital bedsides and funerals precisely because it does not promise the absence of the valley, but presence within it. Read the whole chapter aloud: it is six verses and takes less than a minute.