I was speaking with a good friend yesterday about a place known to all who even casually read scripture, “The Valley of the Shadow of Death”, and he mentioned that as he toured Jerusalem that this was presented as a real place, The Kidron Valley. We quote this phrase when we are facing terrible situations in which we might truly die, and we have also affixed many figurative meanings to it as well, but when David was writing this psalm (23rd Psalm) he might, quite literally, have been writing about this very real valley; an evil place of deep darkness where children were sacrificed to Baal. Are we facing a place of evil in our lives today? Are we at the entrance to a very real valley of deep darkness in our lives, a place where death awaits, or are we walking through a more figurative place, such as a season of darkness and evil?