I read this the other day on a blog that I enjoy reading (Hope Road), and it struck a chord of realization in me. It was titled the "antipsalm". It is the reversal of a psalm---basically what a psalm would sound like if it were written from the completely opposite perspective. What would David have sounded like without the Lord in his life? How different his songs would have sounded!! I have always found tremendous comfort in the Psalms, and after reading this, it was even more clear to me why that is. My cry as a child of God, saved by His loving grace, is far different from that of so many hopeless, hurting people in our world...because I have a hope that is real.
Psalm 23 "AntiPsalm":
I’m on my own.
No one looks out for me or protects me.
I experience a continual sense of need. Nothing’s quite right.
I’m always restless. I’m easily frustrated and often disappointed.
It’s a jungle — I feel overwhelmed. It’s a desert — I’m thirsty.
My soul feels broken, twisted, and stuck. I can’t fix myself.
I stumble down some dark paths.
Still, I insist: I want to do what I want, when I want, how I want.
But life’s confusing. Why don’t things ever really work out?
I’m haunted by emptiness and futility — shadows of death.
I fear the big hurt and final loss.
Death is waiting for me at the end of every road,
but I’d rather not think about that.
I spend my life protecting myself. Bad things can happen.
I find no lasting comfort.
I’m alone … facing everything that could hurt me.
Are my friends really friends?
Other people use me for their own ends.
I can’t really trust anyone. No one has my back.
No one is really for me — except me.
And I’m so much all about ME, sometimes it’s sickening.
I belong to no one except myself.
My cup is never quite full enough. I’m left empty.
Disappointment follows me all the days of my life.
Will I just be obliterated into nothingness?
Will I be alone forever, homeless, free-falling into void?
Sartre said, “Hell is other people.”
I have to add, “Hell is also myself.”
It’s a living death,
and then I die.
What a difference from the Holy-Spirit-inspired Psalm 23:
The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not be in want.
He makes me lie down in green pastures.
He leads me beside quiet waters.
He restores my soul.
He leads me in paths of righteousness for his name’s sake.
Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death,
I will fear no evil, for you are with me.
Your rod and your staff, they comfort me.
You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies.
You anoint my head with oil.
My cup overflows.
Surely goodness and mercy will follow me all the days of my life,
and I will dwell in the house of the Lord forever.
Reclaiming Psalm 23 (and not the antipsalm) whenever I need to gives me a profound strength--an inward strength that is ONLY from God! Reading these words of the hopeless, empty "antipsalmist" gave me a renewed zeal to reach out to the depressed, the bitter, the hurting, the spiritually disheveled souls all around me.
