on the
fourth finger of your left, hold it over your heart and say with me,
'The +LORD+ is _my_ Shepherd.'"

The fourth finger of the left hand! Why that finger? Every woman knows.
It is the ring finger. Who placed that ring on your finger? My friend,
my lover, my husband; the man who is more to me and different to me
than any other and all other men in this world; the man without whom
life would not be worth living; _my_ friend, _my_ lover, _my_ husband.

The following Sunday the elder and the minister again crossed the moor
and came to the cottage on the hillside. As the mother opened the door
to admit them they saw by the expression on her face that a deeper
sorrow had fallen on her heart since they last saw her. She took them,
silently and solemnly, into a little room, and there, covered with a
snow-white sheet, lay the lifeless form of the shepherd laddie, her only
child. As the minister took the white sheet and passed it from forehead
to chin, from chin to breast, and from breast to waist, he saw, frozen
stiff in death, the second finger of the right hand on the fourth of the
left hand, which was fastened in death over his heart. The mother
exclaimed amid her tears, "He died saying, 'The +LORD+ is _my_
Shepherd.'"

What a world of difference that little word _my_ makes, does it not? As
a pastor I have often stood by the open grave that was to receive the
body of someone's beloved daughter, the light and joy of some heart. I
sought to be deeply sympathetic with those who were suffering
bereavement. I tried to mourn with those who mourned, and weep with
those who wept, and I think I did, so far as it is possible for a
friend to sympathize. But one day I stood by an open grave when _my_
daughter, _my_ child, _my own_ darling girl, _my_ Dorothy, was placed
beneath the sod. Ah! then I knew what grief was. Ah, what a world of
difference that little word _my_ makes!

It will not profit you much, my friend, to be able to say, "The +LORD+
is _a_ Shepherd"; you must be more personal; you must say, "The +LORD+
is _my_ Shepherd."

A Shepherd who giveth His life for the sheep,
A Shepherd both mighty to save and to keep--
Yes, this is the Shepherd, the Shepherd we need,
And He is a Shepherd indeed!

Is He yours? Is He yours?
Is this Shepherd, who loves you, _yours_?

--_Ada R. Habershon_

CHAPTER TWO

[Illustration]

="He maketh me to lie down in green