Psalms 23:6 Meaning and Explanation

After the valley and the enemies, David looks down the whole length of his life and sees two things on his trail. "Goodness and mercy shall follow me," he says, and the word for follow means to chase, to pursue. What hunts him now is the steady goodness of God and His covenant love, no longer the wolf or the foe, running after him every single day. The sheep that began the psalm has become a guest, and the guest now sees himself headed somewhere: the house of the LORD, and there to stay "for ever."

This is where the Shepherd has been leading all along. Jesus made the promise explicit: "In my Father's house are many mansions... I go to prepare a place for you" (John 14:2). The same mercy that pursues us through every day is bringing us home to dwell with God without end. The psalm that opened with "I shall not want" closes with the deepest want of all answered: to live, finally and forever, in the house of the One who kept us the whole way.

Consider how the whole psalm has moved: from green pastures to the dark valley, from lying down to walking through, and now to a house with a threshold that will never be crossed again in the other direction. The two companions David names, goodness and mercy, read almost like servants sent ahead by a gracious host to escort the guest all the way home. Hosea would later plead, "let us follow on to know the LORD" (Hosea 6:3), but here the pursuit runs the other way: it is the LORD's own kindness that follows on to find us. Every day, even the ones we would rather forget, is quietly patrolled by this pair, until the following ends in a dwelling that has no end.