"The Lord is my shepherd..." Probably as well-known and well-loved as any phrase of scripture: the twenty-third psalm. Generations have memorized it, in Sunday School or at the knee of parents or grandparents. It is one of the first Bible passages we learn, and, as often as we hear it funerals, it is among the last words said over us when we die. A wonderful affirmation of our faith in God's ability to protect. "The Lord is my shepherd..."

There is an old story out there of the man who, in the midst of a disastrous flood, took refuge on the roof of his water-filled home. With the unconquerable faith of the 23rd Psalm, he prayed that God might rescue him; and he heard God speaking to him, saying he would be saved. Soon after, a sheriff's deputy came by in a small motor boat offering to get …