Every Sunday, they showed up ready for church with stained shirts and torn pants, smelling a little like dirt and a lot like sweat. When they clambered into the back of my minivan, eager for the day to come, I had to bite my tongue. After all, I had only given them two simple rules: clean clothes, no holes. Week after week, my three young sons missed the mark. It was a regular annoyance, a pet peeve, and it well and truly irked me.

When the Small Stuff Really Gets to You

What minor losses, unmet expectations, or lingering disappointments do you experience? I mean, what really gets at you? Driving behind a slow school bus when you are late? Forgetting to thaw the chicken before soccer practice? The dog snagging your kid’s sandwich?

Scripture reminds us that in a fallen world, suffering touches every part of life. And most often, suffering settles into our ordinary days through a thousand tiny trials. Some seasons are heavier than others, but none of us are free from it.

We may be tempted to think that, in our humdrum life, God does not meet us in our ordinary, daily suffering. We know what an adverse diagnosis, a car accident, or a death in the family looks like. These can bring overwhelming, gut-punching suffering. But what about the less dramatic “trials of various kinds” that grieve us (James 1:2, ESV; see also 1 Peter 1:6)? Does God care about them?

God Doesn’t See You or Your Days as Ordinary

God does not think of His children as ordinary. David writes in the opening line of Psalm 23, “The LORD is my shepherd” (Psalm 23:1, ESV, emphasis added). Regarding this verse, preacher Charles Spurgeon comments, “The sweetest word of the whole is that monosyllable, ‘My.’ [David] does not say, ‘The Lord is the shepherd of the world at large, and leadeth forth the multitude as his flock,’ but ‘The Lord is my shepherd’; if he be a Shepherd to no one else, he is a Shepherd to me; he cares for me, watches over me, and preserves me.”¹ The Lord’s perfect, loving, and gracious care belongs in a special way to those who have received Him through faith. Jesus, the Good Shepherd, declares, “You do not believe because you are not among my sheep. My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me” (John 10:26–27, ESV). He tenderly gathers those who believe in Christ and sets them apart as His own.

Our days are not ordinary either. In Psalm 139:16, the psalmist declares that all our days are held by God and ordained by Him before we even came into being. David speaks again, confident in his Shepherd’s watchful eye in every moment: “He makes me lie down in green pastures. He leads me beside still waters. He restores my soul. He leads me in paths of righteousness . . .” (Psalm 23:2–3, ESV, emphasis added).

Simply put, the Shepherd does not drive His sheep to utter exhaustion or cast them out of His presence. The Lord knows the rocky road we travel, wherein

. . . the count of days only climbs

And nothing goes right;

When I meet the shadow falling

Between the way I wanted

And the way I went—²

While our suffering, circumstances, and daily intrusions of life may seem ordinary to us, they are not so to God. Scripture reminds us that God is not only present in the deepest valleys but also attentive to the everyday frustrations that disturb our peace.

How the Shepherd Soothes Our Everyday Irritations

As we meditate on Psalm 23, it helps to remember that much of the poem pictures a peaceful day in the life of the Shepherd’s dependent sheep, in which every need is met: water, food, safety, and good weather. Imagine waking on a summer morning and cozying up on your sunlit porch. Your Bible is open on your lap, a gentle breeze brushes your face, and the quiet promise of a beautiful day unfolds before you. Then suddenly, for no good reason, a fly lands in your freshly brewed cup of coffee.

W. Phillip Keller, in his book A Shepherd Looks at Psalm 23, explains that sheep are especially troubled by “fly time” in the summer months, particularly by the nasal fly. These tiny flies swarm the sheep’s head, depositing larvae in the moist lining of the nose. These larvae burrow into the nasal passages, causing severe irritation and inflammation. Their assault on sheep can quickly transform halcyon days into moments of sudden distress, driving the animals to utter distraction. “For relief from this agonizing annoyance, sheep will deliberately beat their heads against trees, rocks, posts, or woody brush.”³

This is a picture of the irritations, frustrations, and bothersome trials we regularly face. How easy it is for us to be annoyed, even in our most spiritual mountaintop experiences. It is the petty distractions, the ones that ruin our peace, that make us want to “hit our heads against a wall.” Often in this state, our behavior as children of God can unravel into an exasperated tirade. Quick-fire moments of sin follow: hurt feelings, darkened countenances, or snarky responses.

Psalm 23 reminds us that the Shepherd does not overlook even our common afflictions. He draws near, tending, guarding, restoring, and gently leading His sheep to places of relief where even minor pains are met with attentive care. After all, sheep cannot care for themselves. More than any other livestock, they rely on constant attention and diligent guidance from their shepherd. Only the shepherd’s strict attention to the sheep’s behavior can forestall the difficulties of “fly time.”

At the very first sign of flies among the flock, the shepherd will apply an antidote of linseed oil, sulfur, and tar to the sheep’s nose and head, reapplying it many times throughout the season as protection against these pesky critters. What a remarkable change comes over the sheep! As soon as the oil is applied, the agitation, frenzy, irritability, and restlessness fade, and before long, the sheep grow quiet and settle down, resting in peaceful contentment.⁴

Just as a literal shepherd covers a sheep’s head with oil to create a protective barrier against biting insects and parasites, God shields our minds and hearts from the things that torment and stress us. Keller hears this practice in Psalm 23:5, “you anoint my head with oil” (ESV), and through this lens, we need the Shepherd again and again to “anoint” our heads with oil to protect us from the “flies” in our lives. His continual anointing gently soothes and overcomes the daily irritations, frustrations, and trials we face. But how do we get there? Are we allowed to lament ordinary suffering?

Is It Okay to Cry Out to God About Small Things?

Lament is crying out to God, laying bare our emotions before Him, and affirming our trust in His promises. Most of us readily recognize it as something we long for in seasons of deep loss or tremendous crisis. Yet how often do we, whose lives are hidden with Christ (Colossians 3:3), live, reason, feel, and behave as if we are left to struggle on our own, wandering helplessly in the valley (not even the valley of death!)? Do we assume God thinks less of us when we cannot manage our reactions to everyday frustrations, like a clogged drain, a child cutting their own hair, or a friend’s careless comment that touches a tender insecurity?

In Psalm 22:24, David gives us our Shepherd’s perspective, saying that our Lord “has not despised or abhorred the affliction of the afflicted, and he has not hidden his face from him, but has heard, when he cried to him” (ESV). Our Shepherd does not find even our simplest cry of “affliction” abhorrent. No. In fact, our Lord leans in and hears us when we cry because He loves us (Psalm 56:8).

The frustrations of daily dilemmas remind us how deeply we need Jesus, our Good Shepherd, to counterattack tormentors who trouble our minds. In Luke 11:13, Christ Himself urges us to ask the Father for the Holy Spirit, through whom we receive God’s daily anointing and gentle work. Jesus spoke tenderly about the Holy Spirit as a source of comfort for His followers, especially in times of uncertainty, grief, or fear (John 14:16–17). He alone makes it possible for us to react to aggravations and annoyances with quietness and calm, remembering all that the Shepherd has taught us (John 14:26).

Often, however, our eyes are so fixed upon our disease,that we cannot see the remedy, though it be near.⁵ It is there, in the very moment our proverbial fly lands on our nose, that we must lift our eyes to the green pastures where our Shepherd so faithfully stands (Psalm 121:1). Practically speaking, we cry out, “O tender and caring Shepherd, I am at my wits’ end. Everything is bugging me. Please apply the oil of Your Spirit to my mind, both at the conscious and subconscious levels of my thought life, reveal my sin, and enable me to act and respond just as You would.” Our ordinary sufferings may seem insignificant to some. Still, God does not think them so. To be tended by the Shepherd means He cares for every concern we carry. Even those that merely “niggle” our minds are taken seriously. Nothing that troubles us is outside His purview.

Our Shepherd stands ready to comfort, provide, protect, restore, and strengthen us. The author of Hebrews gently exhorts us with these words: “For we do not have a high priest who cannot sympathize with our weaknesses, but One who has been tempted in all things as we are, yet without sin. Therefore let’s approach the throne of grace with confidence, so that we may receive mercy and find grace for help at the time of our need (Hebrews 4:15–16, NASB). May we not hesitate to draw near to our Good Shepherd, who abundantly offers extraordinary grace in our ordinary suffering.

If you liked this article, check out the related resources linked below!

Notes:

1. Charles Haddon Spurgeon, The Treasury of David: Commentary on Psalm 23, accessed June 19, 2026, www.romans45.org/spurgeon/treasury/ps023.htm.

2. Andy Patton, “Psalm 23: When I Meet the Shadow Falling,” Darkling Psalter (Substack), accessed June 19, 2026, https://darklingpsalter.substack.com/p/psalm-23when-i-meet-the-shadow-falling.

3. W. Phillip Keller, A Shepherd Looks at Psalm 23.

4. W. Phillip Keller, A Shepherd Looks at Psalm 23.

5. Thomas Brooks, Precious Remedies against Satan’s Devices (London, 1652), PDF, 151.

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Author Bio

Tricia Lewis, PhD, lives in the Nashville area with her husband and their labradoodle and enjoys helping homeschool her grandchildren. She is co-founder of the Reproductive Loss Network, equipping helpers to compassionately support those navigating pregnancy and infant loss.

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