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I Am Because You Are September 30, 2025 Devotional

by David Joynt on September 30, 2025


PSALM 23:3b | 3b He restores my soul. He leads me in right paths for his name’s sake.

The second aspect of God’s good shepherding is direction. Judean shepherds used voice commands and physical tools to guide their sheep away from ravines and dangers and toward places of safety and provision.

 

The good shepherd “leads me in paths of righteousness for His name’s sake.” Life is a series of choices; moral, vocational, relational, and personal. We choose how to spend our time, energy, and resources. We choose which values to honor, whom to befriend, what goals we’ll pursue. Since God wants us to flourish and in so doing to bear His name, representing well His heart and His kingdom. To that end He guides us via His community, His word, through our own discernment, and via the circumstances of our lives.

 

Are you discerning God’s direction right now?

 

 

Gracious God,

Guide me O Thou great Jehovah—pilgrim through this promised land. May I bear Your name in ways that give You glory.

Amen.

 

About the Author
David Joynt

Dave Joynt began his service as a pastor at Valley Presbyterian Church in Paradise Valley, Arizona in September 2014. This meant a move away from the Northeast, where he has a long history, growing up in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania and then serving congregations in Delaware and New Jersey for a total of 23 years.

Dave was nurtured in a great church in Bethlehem where his parents, Anne and Carey, served as elders. He graduated in classics from Lehigh University where his Father taught, and then from Oxford, where he met his wife Julia. Ordained in 1988, he completed a Ph.D. from Princeton Theological Seminary in 1993.

He and Julia have a son, Tristan, and a daughter, Madeleine.

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