¹¹ “I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep.^(A)

¹⁴ I am the good shepherd. I know my own, and my own know me, ¹⁵ just as the Father knows me, and I know the Father. And I lay down my life for the sheep.

Psalm 23

The Divine Shepherd

A Psalm of David.

¹³ No one has greater love than this, to lay down one’s life for one’s friends.^(A)

¹⁶ We know love by this, that he laid down his life for us—and we ought to lay down our lives for the brothers and sisters.^(A)

²⁴ He himself bore our sins in his body on the cross,^[a] so that, having died to sins, we might live for righteousness; by his wounds^[b] you have been healed.^{(A) 25} For you were going astray like sheep, but now you have returned to the shepherd and guardian of your souls.^[c](B)

¹⁷ When David saw the angel who was destroying the people, he said to the Lord, “I alone have sinned, and I, the shepherd, have done evil,^[a] but these sheep, what have they done? Let your hand, I pray, be against me and against my father’s house.”^(A)

Benediction

²⁰ Now may the God of peace, who brought back from the dead our Lord Jesus, the great shepherd of the sheep, by the blood of the eternal covenant,^(A)