I’m learning to appreciate the Psalms in a whole new way. You might be surprised at the reason — or you might be experiencing the same thing.

I’ve always loved the Psalms. I think of Psalm 42, which begins,

As a hart longs for flowing streams,
so longs my soul for thee, O God.
My soul thirsts for God, for the living God.”

Sometimes I’ve read that and agreed, Yes, God, I seek you with all my heart. Sometimes instead it’s been, Oh, God, I have known that desire, but I don’t feel it now. Revive my soul! Either way it was a prayer I could claim as my own. That’s Psalm 42. But then there’s Psalm 43, which opens,

Vindicate me, O God,
And plead my cause against an ungodly nation.

What was I supposed to do with a prayer like that? Sure, I knew it was a good prayer to pray, but it was always someone else’s prayer.

There are lots of Psalms paired up that way: a familiar-feeling sort of prayer, then a foreign one. Take Psalms 63 and 64, for another example. Psalm 63:3-4 sounds like any Sunday morning worship service:

Because thy steadfast love is better than life,
my lips will praise thee.
So I will bless thee as long as I live;
I will lift up my hands and call on thy name.

How often have we sung Psalm 64, though?

Hear my voice, O God, in my complaint;
preserve my life from dread of the enemy,
hide me from the secret plots of the wicked,
from the scheming of evildoers …

Maybe your experience has been different, but that’s always been a hard prayer for me to nod in agreement with. I haven’t been there. It’s like I’m reading someone else’s Bible: Sure, it’s in there, but not for me. It’s been a good prayer, but it hasn’t been my prayer.

But I’m starting to see the Psalms in a new way.

George Yancey has been telling us about Christianophobia here at The Stream. This isn’t just academic information: His studies confirm feelings I’ve felt. For a long time here in America we were used Christianity being treated with some respect. Now we have Samantha Bee on TBS (for one example among many) stereotyping Christians as “terrible at science,” racist, and on and on … and Psalm 64 begins to feel more like a prayer I could lift up to God as my own.

It’s not that Americans have never battled evil. Racist oppression has been with us since the beginning. It’s not that I’ve never seen violence face-to-face myself: Two of my first cousins were murdered (in completely unrelated incidents). I could go on.

But Christianophobia — this kind of direct oppression against the people of God as the people of God — is new here. Is it persecution? Not on the scale suffered by many of our brothers and sisters around the world. We’re just beginners here, entering on a path they’ve walked for generations. Will it turn into that kind of persecution? I don’t know. I do know that I can remember when it was impossible to imagine that happening in America. It isn’t impossible any more.

Up until now it’s also been impossible for me to relate to the beginning of Psalm 43 (above). Maybe that’s also kept me from knowing the kind of joy the Psalmist expressed in verses 3 and 4:

Oh send out thy light and thy truth;
let them lead me,
let them bring me to thy holy hill
and to thy dwelling!
Then I will go to the altar of God,
to God my exceeding joy;
and I will praise thee with the lyre,
O God, my God.

It might surprise you to know there’s a greatly encouraging Christian book titled The Insanity of God. I’m not sure I understand the title, even after asking the author, Nik Ripken (a pseudonym) about it. I do know that it’s one of the best books out there telling the story of the truly persecuted church around the world. Ripken writes of one group he spent time with:

These Chinese believers still lived under the very real threat of arrest and imprisonment for the practice of their faith. That threat required constant vigilance and painstaking attention to security precautions. Every time the believers gathered for worship or met with a foreign fellow-believer like me, they were in a situation of great danger. [That’s why he used a pseudonym.] Even so, the believers in China exhibited a constant joyfulness in the midst of harsh circumstances. I never heard them deny or down-play the danger. They never made light of it. They were painfully aware of the reality of their lives. Still, they exhibited an undeniable, irrepressible joy …

This sound a lot like the Psalmist to me: honestly facing the pain, loss and stress of being opposed by those who oppose God himself, but trusting God through it all. It’s a joy we in America have had little opportunity to experience.

Maybe our turn is coming. We’re not there yet. I’m not saying I want to go there. But if we do, maybe we can begin to read the Psalms with more familiarity, more direct experience. Maybe those passages Bible won’t just feel like someone else’s Bible. Maybe we’ll even learn to know God in ways we’ve never known Him before.