Restoration Quarterly 43.4 (2001) 280-292.
Copyright © 2001 by
Restoration Quarterly, cited with permission.
I WILL SHOW HIM MY SALVATION:
THE EXPERIENCE OF ANXIETY
IN THE MEANING OF PSALM 91
LEONARD
C. KNIGHT
I was sitting in chapel at
College)
one day about ten years ago when Steve Eckstein was the scheduled
speaker. On this day, Steve reminisced about
some of the formative experiences
in his life. Among them, he talked about what it
meant to be an infantry soldier
during the Second World War as the allied armies
ground their way through
his lesson was his reference to Psalm 91. He said
he had an aunt who wrote to
him regularly while he was in
thousand may fall at your side, ten thousand at
your right hand, but it will not
come near you."1 Steve seemed to
marvel at her faith, and, clearly, he had been
deeply comforted by her application of this passage to
his battlefield experience.
My reading of Psalm 91 reflects the
struggles that I, as a counselor, and my
clients encounter in an attempt to claim the
promises of these verses. My goal
is to help those with whom I am working find the
confidence to trust God in the
midst of their suffering. Weiser
points out that Psalm 91 "is the wholly personal
and intimate relationship of trust in God portrayed
within the narrow scope of the
personal circumstances of an individual."2
One of the metaphors suggested in the
language of verses 11 and 12 is that of a journey
(Gen 24:7, 40; Exod 23:20; cf.
Prov 3:23, where the parallel is "you will go
on your way in safety"). Cohen
notes that the Talmud interprets these verses as
teaching that "two ministering
angels accompany a man through life to testify about
his conduct before the
heavenly tribunal after death."3
The Christian counselor often has the sense of
accompanying another on a long
journey toward spiritual and emotional healing.
This
image influences how I understand Psalm 91 in the midst of human
1 References to the
Scriptures are taken from the New International Version.
2 A. Weiser. The
Psalms (trans. Herbert Hartwell;
605.
3 A.
Cohen. The
Psalms (New York: Soncino
Press, 1977). 303.
KNIGHT/I WILL SHOW HIM
MY SALVATION 281
difficulty. To begin, I will provide the reader
with a brief overview of the
meaning of the text, and then I will attempt to
place these verses in the context
of real life experience.
The psalmist's theme is the intimate
enjoyment of the presence of God. The
psalm begins: "He who dwells in the shelter of
the Most High will rest in the
shadow of the Almighty. I will say of the Lord, ‘He is
my refuge and my
fortress, my God, in whom I trust’" (Ps
91:1-2). The comfortable use of the
divine names emphasizes the protection and intimacy
the supplicant feels in the
presence of God. God is "the Most
High," the God who is above every other
deity (Gen 14:17-24). He is El Shaddai, the almighty God who is
totally self-
sufficient. He needs no other assistance in
rescuing, sustaining, and establishing
his people (Exod 6:1-8).
He is also Yahweh, the Lord of the
covenant (Gen 12).
The
giving of the covenant is couched in the rich interpersonal experience of
wedding language (Exod
19:1-17). In Hosea, the covenant relationship is gov-
erned by hesed, or covenant love. The
essence of covenant love is loyalty and
mutual service. The psalmist (91:4) echoes this idea:
"his faithfulness will be
your shield and rampart." Finally, he is Elohim, God. But
he is "my God." Under
the "shadow of the Almighty" and in the
"refuge and fortress of my God," the
speaker discovers security and significance that
he cannot know away from the
presence of God.4
One of the linguistic problems in
Psalm 91 is the unusual use of the
pronouns. Translators and commentators have been
tempted to understand the
second person singular, "you," as what they
term "an ideal second person." Thus
it becomes not "you" but
"one," or an impersonal, literary description of
"someone." But the power of this psalm is in the
intimacy of the relationship that
allows the traveler to seek "rest in the shadow
of the Almighty" and to consider
the Lord his personal "refuge" and
"fortress." As with the permission to address
God
by his personal names, so the dialogue is carried along by the use of the
intimate interpersonal pronouns "you"
and "your," which strengthen the sense
of belonging.5
This psalm promises that the one who
trusts in the Lord shall be protected
from four threats and will triumph over four
dangerous beasts. The threats
4 Weiser. The Psalms. 607.612; Anthony Ash and
Living Word Commentary (ed. John T. Willis;
Austin,
318:
Franz Delitzsch. The
Psalms (trans. Francis Bolton;
63; Eric F. Evenhuis. "Marital
Reconciliation under the Analogy of Christ and His
Church" (D.Min.
thesis, Fuller Theological Seminary, 1974). 18; Walther Eichrodt,
Theology of the Old
Testament (Philadelphia:
Westminster. 1960). 232-33; and N.
Glueck. Hesed in the Bible
(Cincinnati: Hebrew Union College Press. 1967), 57.
5 Ronald W. Goetsch, "The Lord Is My Refuge," Concordia Journal (July.1983):
140:
Ash and Miller, "Psalm 91," 319; H. L. Leupold.
The Exposition of the Psalms
(Grand
Rapids: Baker, 1977).. 654; Franz Delitzsch,
The Psalms, 62.
282 RESTORATION
QUARTERLY
suggested by "snares of the fowler" and
the "deadly pestilence" (Ps 91:3) are
further developed in verses 5 and 6. These
images suggest attacks on the very
existence of the one who is entrapped by the
"fowler." The "deadly pestilence"
is literally translated "from death of
destructions" and carries the idea of a
violent death (see also Ps 78:50 for the use of deber).6
The focus is not so much
on the weakness of the wayfarer as it is on those
who are hostile to his success.
Chief
among the fowlers is Satan, whose goal is to destroy not only the wicked
but also the righteous (Job 1 and 2).7 Safety and protection from these dangers are
found within the cover of the Lord's wings (Ps 91:4).8
This is the image of the
eagle, who provides protection for her young and
supports them as they develop
their own abilities to scale heaven's heights (Deut
32:11).
God's faithful promise provides a
bulwark against "the terror of the night"
as well as the "arrow that flies by
day"(Ps 91:4-6). The terms for "shield" and
rampart" refer to armor that would cover
the entire body. The images of battle
suggest all assaults by the enemy, both
unprovoked attacks and direct confron-
tations. "You will not
fear" (Ps 91:5) expresses the confidence of those who face
life's natural dangers as well as threats that arise
from conflict with others. The
trust in the Lord overcomes fear even in relationship
to all kinds of epidemics.
The
psalmist addresses the common beliefs that certain dangers were more
prevalent in the daytime and others were to be
feared at night. The presence of
the Lord makes possible peace and rest for those
who fear both the dangers of
the day and the terrors of the night.9
Dangers of the journey are both hidden
and obvious (Ps 91:13). The Hebrew
for lion (shachal, 13) can be figurative for enemies of all kinds.
Thus all violent
and abusive threats may be included. Some are
hidden, and others are openly
threatening to the traveler. Both the cobra and the
serpent represent the ven-
omous dangers on which one
may accidentally tread. As vipers, these creatures
do not shrink from the one passing by but
aggressively attack.10
In the midst of the dangers that the
psalmist has enumerated, the believer is
assured of protection. Though thousands and even
ten thousands are falling to
the right and to the left, the judgement
of the Lord will become apparent to the
one whose eyes are fixed on him (Ps 91:7-8).
Commentators suggest that the
6
Cohen. The
Psalms, 301.
7 Goetsch. "The Lord Is My Refuge." 142: Ash
and Miller. "Psalm 91," 318:
Delitzsch. The Psalms, 63: Joseph Exell, "The
Psalms," in The Biblical Illustrator (Grand
Rapids:
Baker. 1956). 84-85: H. L. Leupold. The Exposition of the Psalms.
652: L. H.
Spurgeon. The
Treasury of David (
8 Ash
and Miller. "Psalm 91." 318.
9 Cohen.
The Psalms.
302. 12: Weiser. The Psalms. 608-9: A. F.
Kirkpatrick. Psalms
(Cambridge: University Press. 1906). 556.
10 Goetsch. "The Lord Is My Refuge." 144:
Eugene H. Peterson, Psalms (
Springs.
KNIGHT/I WILL SHOW HIM
MY SALVATION 283
poet has in mind the devastating retribution that
was poured out upon the first-
born of
the Red Sea closed upon them in their pursuit of
the children of
Israelites
were just beginning the great exodus, and though they would often
falter during their journey, God ultimately redeems
them.11
Two metaphors of hope are suggested
in the imagery of Psalm 91. The first
is the impregnable fortress of the great army's
commander situated high above
the enemy and surrounded by rank upon rank of
encamped legions of angels.
The
security of the fortress is offered to the weak and fearful as a city of refuge
(Ps
91:1, 9-10). Angels are commanded to "guard you in all your ways, [and]
they will lift you up in their hands, so that you
will not strike your foot against
a stone" (Ps 91:11-12; cf. Exod 19:4). In the midst of this great army committed
to the believers' security, they may at last rest
and recover from the wounds of
hand-to-hand combat.12
The comradeship shared with the
commander ensures the safety of those
who are too vulnerable to guarantee their own
protection. This picture is
reminiscent of Mephibosheth,
the disabled son of Jonathon and grandson of Saul.
Though
he had no right to expect the generosity of the new king, he found safety
in the house of David because of the integrity of
his father. He ate at the table of
David
in
father was guaranteed to him (2 Sam 9:1-13). Even in
the midst of rebellion
when another made accusations against him, David
upheld his honor (2 Sam
16:1-4;
19:24-29).13
The second metaphor is the implied
table fellowship of him who dwells in
the "shelter of the Most High" (Ps 91:1).
The guest is honored with protection
and care. Every need is supplied as suggested in
Psalm 23. The covenant benefits
of goodness and love (Ps 23:6) are evident in the
experience of dwelling in the
house of the Lord. It is the attention of God to all
of the needs of His guest that
brings a sense of refreshment and fulfillment. The
Hebrew verb in Ps 23:1 is
haser, meaning "to lack,
to need."14 Thus the effect of being the protege of the
Lord
is that he will always provide for every need, leading to contentment of
both body and mind. Indeed, the symbolism of leading
"beside waters of
restfulness," walking in the valley of the
shadow of death, being honored at a
11
Cohen. The
Psalms, 302; Kirkpatrick, Psalms,
553.
12 Goetsch,
The Lord Is My Refuge," 141; J.
Richard Chase, "Don't Just Visit the
The Psalms, 303.
13 Goetsch. The
Lord Is My Refuge." 141; J. Richard Chase, "Don't Just Visit, 14.
14
Dennis Sylva. Psalms and the
Transformation of Stress: Poetic-Communal
Interpretation and the
Family
(
1993). 78.
284 RESTORATION
QUARTERLY
table set among one's enemies, and the anointing with
oil emphasize the
significance of trusting in the
Lord.15
Psalm 91 identifies two qualities of
those who are the Lord's guests. First,
they have learned to trust the Lord (vs 2), and second, the gracious kindness of
God
has taught them to love their Lord (vs 14). The
language of verse 14 means
to cling to the Lord with love. It is used with
reference to God's love for
(Deut
7:7–8; 10:15). The identity of the Lord reflected in the acknowledgment
of his name involves an understanding of his
identity as the faithful protector of
those who belong to him. In response to this love,
they have the Lord's assurance
of safety and security. Even the significance of
the Lord (lit., his glory) is
imputed to those who trust him (Ps 91:15). The
fullest realization of the protec-
tion of God is experienced
in the phrase "my salvation" (Ps 91:16). This phrase
refers to the experience of God's providence in every
aspect of the lives of the
individuals, including that which is material as
well as that which is spiritual.16
The parallels to the experience of
anxiety, depression, and stress disorders
implied by the images in Psalm 91 have often
occupied my thoughts during the
last ten years. Like many in our society, my clients
have experienced the
frightening struggles that anxiety imposes on the
spirit. During the
War,
Psalm 91 was known as the "Trench Psalm."17
This psalm described the
trauma that the soldiers of all wars have had to
endure. Long before the Diag-
nostic and Statistical Manual
of Mental Disorders (DSM-IV) and its predecessors
identified the experience of anxiety, soldiers,
citizens, and, today, children in our
schools have encountered the pounding heart,
trembling, shortness of breath,
choking, chest pain, sweating, dizziness, and
fear of dying that is the essence of
stress, fear, and panic.18 Anxiety and
depressive disorders are the most signifi-
cant mental health problem affecting people in our
society. Physiological and
psychological conditions, family
problems, career difficulties, grief, domestic
abuse, school violence, and media representations of
these phenomena in our
living rooms can bring on all of the symptoms of
anxiety and depression. In
addition, the choice of how we will live in a
sinful world can corrupt our life
experience, leading to crises in relationships, in
personality structure, and in our
relationship to God.
The psalmist encourages the believer
to trust in God in the face of such
dramatic, unexpected, traumatic, and even
seductive life challenges. However,
15
Dennis Sylva. Psalms
and the Transformation of Stress. 79, 84-91: Eugene H.
Peterson.
Psalms. 33–34.
16 Goetsch. "The Lord Is My Refuge." 144:
Cohen. The Psalms.
303: Kirkpatrick.
Psalms. 557–58: Weiser. The Psalms. 612-13.
17 Goetsch. "The Lord Is My Refuge.'" 143.
18
American Psychiatric Association. "Anxiety Disorders." in Diagnostic and
Statistical.Maural of Mental Disorders (4th ed.: DSM-IV:
Psychiatric Association. 1994). 393-444.
KNIGHT/I WILL SHOW HIM
MY SALVATION 285
the impact of life's changes and struggles,
especially those that are experienced
as trauma, is to leave one feeling alone and
isolated even in the midst of the most
intimate, interpersonal relationships. Job and
his wife could not communicate
about their losses, and he could only sit in silence
and grieve with the three
friends who had come to comfort him. For seven
days, Job had no voice even to
express the depth of his loss (Job 2:9-13). When
he could finally speak, his
words expressed how loathsome life had become for him
(Job 3). Everything in
this life that gave richness to his experience had
suddenly, unexpectedly been
ripped away. The only meaning he could derive, that
which caused him the
greatest grief of all, is that he had somehow
lost his relationship with God.19 How
could that be, though, since he had done nothing so
egregious as to warrant such
unimaginable suffering (Job 13:18;
14:13--17; 16:19; 19:25-27)?
C. S. Lewis, whose wife of just four
short years, Joy Davidman, had died of
cancer, expresses the essence of the loss that the
sufferer endures in A Grief
Observed:
No one ever told me that grief felt
so like fear. I am not afraid, but the sensation is
like being
afraid. The same fluttering in the stomach, the same restlessness, the
yawning. I
keep swallowing.
At other times it feels like being
mildly drunk, or concussed. There is a sort of
invisible
blanket between the world and me. I find it hard to take in what anyone
says. Or perhaps, hard to, want to take it in. It is so uninteresting.
Yet I want the
others to
be about me. I dread the moments when the house is empty. If only they
would talk
to one another and not to me.20
Where
is God in the midst of such agony? Has he hidden himself from his
servant? God, the Almighty, has become for
Lewis, and every sufferer like him,
the great enigma. Lewis says of God that he is like
the death of his wife,
"incomprehensible."21
What consumes the sufferer is fear
and confusion. The threats enumerated
in Psalm 91:3-7 have become real. Since the
current pain had always seemed far
away and impossible, these other threats identified
in Psalm 91 were likewise
beyond imagining. Elton Trueblood
notes that the experiences of life surprise us
for they reveal unexpected and unacknowledged
aspects of our inner selves.22
The
heartache that must be suffered by others now has a personal reality. With
the new consciousness of what suffering can feel
like, the individual retreats,
defeated, disappointed, and afraid.
19 H.
H. Rowley. "The Book of Job,” in The New Century Bible Commentary (ecl.
Ronald
E. Clements;
20 C. S. Lewis, A Grief Observed (New York: Bantam
Books, 1976), 1-2.
21 Ibid..
26—27.
22
Elton Trueblood. The Common Ventures of Life (
1949). 104.
286 RESTORATION
QUARTERLY
It is when sufferers are in crisis
that they finally seek assistance. The
journey towards the hope alluded to in Psalm 91
begins with the realization that
sufferers will need the assistance of others to
reach the refuge of the Lord. Pas-
toral counselors often become
the ones who help clients in crisis discover the
meaning of the promises in Psalm 91. Counselors,
like the psalmist, must have
experienced the kindness and generosity of the
Almighty and learned from the
Lord
how to communicate what the experience of a "a compassionate, pene-
trating, rich involvement with
others" can mean. Out of the intimacy of their own
relationship with the Lord and sometimes
out of the experience of their own
suffering, counselors lead others into a
"deeper, worshipful, intimate enjoyment
of God."23
The first time I noticed Angie, she
was standing in the shadow of the
doorjamb to my office. She was herself a shadow,
a specter of a person. She had
come to see me against her will because her roommate
had threatened to move
out unless Angie sought help. I invited her in, and
we began a three-year journey
through the desert that was the grief and shame
associated with her experience
of one of the first school shootings to occur in
the
for me the events that had transformed her life
from a normal high school
teenager into a victim. Her life had changed one
day several years before when
her teacher asked her to go check out the noise
that had, come from a nearby
classroom. That classroom belonged to one of the
most popular teachers in the
school, a teacher that Angie liked and admired.
Entering the classroom, she was
confronted by a horrific scene in which her teacher
had been murdered by a
single shot to the head and the murderer was holding
the classroom full of
students hostage. Angie now became a hostage,
also. The young man with the
gun taunted the other students with the potential
of further violence. But as the
day went on, he released more and more of the
students until only Angie was
left. Angie still does not remember the complete
sequence of events, but she does
remember finding herself in the hallway, the
young man standing behind her
with the gun pointed to the side of her head. At
that moment, she believed that
she would be the next to die. Then the custodian, a
popular man among the
students, came up to the young man and asked him
what he was doing. The
young man took the pistol from Angie's head, pointed
it at the custodian, and
shot him dead. The rest of the day was a blur to
Angie. She remembers only
somehow finding herself later standing outside
the school with other students
and teachers. As is true in so many high profile
crimes, Angie would later
experience more trauma as she repeated her
understanding of the day's events
to police, to prosecutors, to defense attorneys,
and in court before a jury.
23
Larry Crabb. Understanding People: Deep Longings fir Relationship (
KNIGHT/I WILL SHOW HIM
MY SALVATION 287
To become Angie's guide in the
journey to a more intimate relationship with
the Lord, I had to develop a meaningful
relationship with her, for the rapport
developed with the sufferer is the basis for the
journey that they take together.24
The
teacher celebrates the power of the shared journey in Eccl 4:9-12:
Two are better than one,
because they have a good return for their work:
If one falls down,
his friend can help him up.
But pity the man who falls
and has no one to help him up!
Also, if two lie down together, they
will keep warm.
But how can one keep warm alone'?
Though one may be overpowered, two
can defend themselves.
A cord of three strands is not quickly broken.
The
rich, poetic language is a metaphor for a journey that two take together.
They
are supports for each other. The confidence that one expresses for the other
makes it possible for them to do difficult things
together. In the frigid cold of the
desert night, they keep each other warm, something
that is not possible for one
to do alone. As they face the threat of attack,
they defend each other. Though it
appears that they are only two, the bond of
their relationship is ensured by the
presence of the Lord.
The first thing that the counselor
and client must do is learn how to talk to
one another. Trust is built on understanding. The
journey with Angie began with
my listening to her. The focus of the listening
was to be able to understand what
the central events in Angie's experience had meant
to her. Counselors understand
that the same event can mean different things to
different individuals. Thus they
put aside their assumptions and focus all of their
attention on the meaning of the
sufferers' words for the sufferers, and them
alone. The growth of understanding
creates the bond of trust necessary to take the
risks to confront all the pain bound
up in the sufferers' grief. Eliphaz,
Bildad, Zophar, and Elihu fail Job because
they try to impose meaning on Job's suffering (Job,
4-5, 8, 11, 15, 18, 20, 22.
25, and 32). The Lord recognizes their failure to
serve Job, and tells them Job
will pray for them that God may "not deal with
[them] according to [their] folly"
(Job
42:7-8).
Listening is particularly important
because those traumatized by life find
that the anxiety they are experiencing seems to
steal their voice. The goal of
listening is to give sufferers back their voice
and help them feel heard again. It
24 Scott D. Miller, Barry
L. Duncan, and Mark A. Hubble, Escape
from
Toward a Unifying
Language for Psychotherapy Practice (New York: Norton, 1997),
26-27.
288 RESTORATION
QUARTERLY
begins with sufferers telling their story. But there
is the additional goal of
teaching the sufferers how to pray with power and
hope again. Trusting in the
Lord
means having the confidence to "acknowledge [his] name" and
"call upon
[him]" with the assurance that he will answer. This is
the promise God makes to
those who love Him (Ps 91:14-15).
The longing to pray is a powerful
drive for those who have known the
presence of the Lord. Several years ago, I
counseled a woman who had
experienced losses truly comparable to those of Job.
After many months, we
agreed that she had made sufficient progress that we
could terminate therapy. In
the closing session, she told me that she had come
to therapy all of those months
for one reason. She said that the one thing that
had been most important to her
in every therapy session was the time that we
would spend in prayer.
In Psalm 91, the believer who wants
to trust the Lord is aware of the
potential threats and dangers to be faced. Clients
in counseling who have
experienced an overwhelming trauma may find it
difficult to risk any new threats
in their emotional landscape that may arise during
therapy. The deadly pestilence
referred to in Psalm 91:3, 6, is frightening
because it catches people suddenly
and they have no way to protect themselves. The
plague suggests the deadliness
of a chasm into which the unwary may tumble, never
to be seen again.25 This
unexpectedness creates intense anxiety
for those who have already stumbled.
Afraid
of once again being injured, travelers may become frozen by fear,
unwilling to move to the right or to the left, tok go forward, or to return. The
journal of Ernest Shackleton
describes the horrors of the traveler who passes
over the unstable snow and ice of the Antarctic. His
team struggles against all
odds to reach the South Pole. On the great glacier,
he records the maze of
crevasses that constantly threatened their safety.
For December 7, 1908, he
writes:
Started at 8 a. m..
[the pony] behind. We traveled up and down slopes with very
deep snow, into which
Socks sank up to his belly, and we
plunged in and out continuously, making it very
trying work.
Passed several crevasses on our right hand and could see more to the
left. The light
became bad at l p.m., when we camped for lunch, and it was hard to
see the
crevasses as most were more or less snow covered. After lunch the light was
better, and as
we marched along we were congratulating ourselves upon it when
suddenly we
heard a shout to "help" from Wild. We stopped at once and rushed to
his assistance,
and saw the pony sledge with the forward end down a crevasse and
Wild reaching out from
the side of the gulf grasping the sledge. No sign of the pony.
We soon got up to Wild and he scrambled
out of the dangerous position but poor
Socks had gone. Wild had a miraculous
escape.26
25 Goetsch. The Lord Is My Refuge." 142.
26
Ernest Shackleton. The Heart of the Antarctic: The Farthest South Expedition,
1907-1919
(
KNIGHT/I WILL SHOW HIM
MY SALVATION 289
For travelers traumatized by the
anxieties of the journey, trust does not come
easily and the focus is not on loving but on
surviving. Although the travelers
long for relationship, they fear the risk. The
cumulative result of their losses is
that they feel unworthy of meaningful connections
with others and incapable of
establishing them. In addition, they
must often struggle against feelings of anger
and bitterness born of confusion and directed at
the Almighty, whom they feel
has deserted them. C. S. Lewis demonstrates this
pain in his own words as he
struggles with his confusion about his wife's
death and about whether this
anguish can even end with death:
"Because she is in
God's hands." But if so, she was in God's hands all the time, and
I have seen what they did to her. Do they
suddenly become gentler to us the moment
we are out of
the body? And if so, why? If God's goodness is
inconsistent with
hurting us then
either God is not good or there is no God: for in the only life we
know He hurts us
beyond our worst fears and beyond all we can imagine. If it is
inconsistent
with hurting us then He may hurt us after death as unendurably as
before it.
Sometimes it is hard not to say.
"God forgive God."
Sometimes it is hard to say so much. But
if our faith is true, He didn't. He crucified
Him.27
In their anger and bitterness, the
weary travelers struggle to believe the bold
assertion that "you will not fear"(Ps
91:5). For the psalmist, "the terror of the
night" and "the arrow that flies by
day" may be metaphors for the sudden attack
of the enemy, but for those governed by fear, the
night has its own smothering
impact. Sudden awakenings from frightening dreams in
which the horror of their
trauma is replayed bring a heightened sense of
anxiety, disorientation and diffi-
culty going back to sleep.
Their fear of the night adds to their struggle and makes
it difficult to find the peace and rest that seems
to be promised in Psalm 91.28
Finding
meaning in suffering is a significant part of the journey to healing.
This
involves helping clients to resolve issues of guilt and shame. Lewis Smedes
points out that "shame is a very heavy feeling.
It is a feeling that we do not
measure up and maybe never will measure up to
the sorts of persons we are
meant to be." He adds: “The feeling of shame is
about our very selves--not
about some bad thing we did or said but about what we
are.”29 Almost all who
have suffered as victims must deal with the guilt
and shame they feel about being
27 C.
S. Lewis. A Grief Observed, 29.
28 Ash
and Miller. "Psalm 91." 318: American
Psychiatric Association, "Nightmare
Disorder"
and "Sleep Terror Disorder" in Diagnostic
and Statistical Manual of Mental
Disorders (4th ed.), 580-87.
29
Lewis B. Smedes. Shame and Grace (
also Julie J. Exline and
Roy F. Baumeister. "Expressing Forgiveness and
Repentance" in
Forgiveness: Theory
Research, and Practice (ed. Michael E. McCullough, Kenneth I.
Pargament, and Carl E. Thoresem
290 RESTORATION
QUARTERLY
victims. Sexual abuse, rape, assault, robbery—
violence of every kind leaves a
stain of self-loathing on the victims as though the
victims, themselves, were
somehow responsible for what had taken place in
their lives.30 This is the
"fowler's snare," "the pestilence," and
"the plague" by which Satan often sepa-
rates the weak and helpless from the Lord. The goal
in counseling is to convince
sufferers of the truth of the Paul's statement in
Rom 8:1–2: "Therefore, there is
now no condemnation for those who are in Christ
Jesus, because through Christ
Jesus
the law of the Spirit of life set me free from the law of sin and death."
Central to Angie's healing process
was the sense of guilt and shame that she
carried with her. This shame got mixed up with
other events in her childhood and
her adolescence about which she also felt guilt. It
was often difficult to separate
the meaning of these events in Angie's
understanding of herself. The healing
began with the experience of having someone who
listened to her accounts of all
of these events and who accepted her
unconditionally. We were able, again and
again, to confront the pain and the accompanying
guilt she carried with her, and
session by session she was able to leave small
parts of it with me.
To help Angie process her shame and
guilt interpretation, we had to investi-
gate the meaning of these events in her
life-setting. Family and community
systems as well as cultural and ethnic issues
often play important roles in the
guilt that people struggle with as victims. Very
often societal expectations about
what individuals should have done and about how long
the healing process
should take add to the suffering.31 The
community, the church, and the family
also have difficulty realizing that victims may feel
a need for forgiveness. The
task of counselors is to help clients separate true
guilt for things they have
actually done from false guilt for things that
have been done to them.32
For sin that is real, repentance,
confession, and prayer are necessary to
healing. In Psalm 91, the faith of the psalmist
encourages the readers to risk
trusting in the Lord. In the pastoral setting,
clients lean on the faith of counselors
and hope their confession of sin may lead to relief
from guilt and shame. This
part of the journey offen
moves slowly as the sufferers' trust and confidence in
the Lord are restored. Counselors must be faithful
and patient guides over the
difficult terrain at this point in the journey,
kindly lifting up and supporting their
30 John P. Splinter, The Healing
Path: A Guide for Women Rebuilding Their Lives
after Sexual Abuse (Nashville: Nelson, 1993), 146-47.
31 Smedes,
Shame and Grace, 69-82:, Splinter, The
Healing Path, 155-56; Exline
and Baumeister,
"Expressing Forgiveness and Repentance," 143.
32 Smedes. Shame and Grace, 31-44; Splinter. The Healing Path. 146-49:
Theology and Psychology (
and Thorana S. Nelson. Tales from Family Therapy: Life-Changing
Clinical Experiences
(New York: Haworth. 1998). 175-79.
KNIGHT/I WILL SHOW HIM
MY SALVATION 291
fellow travelers. As faith grows, sufferers begin to
release the guilt and claim the
promises of protection and deliverance (Ps
91:14-15).33
There is also the matter of the anger
that is felt towards the offenders. In
Psalm
91, the writer identifies the "fowler" as the one who has
intentionally set
"snares" to entrap others (Ps 91:3). Having suffered
painfully at the hands of
another, sufferers find themselves bound to those
people by their anger and sense
of injustice. It is a difficult struggle for them
to forgive and let go of the past.
The
metaphor in my work with Angie was a prison cell. Early in the process, I
discovered that she was emotionally locked in the same
cell with her tormentor.
Many
issues such as fear that transgressions will be repeated or the belief that
justice will not be done can be barriers to
forgiveness. But forgiveness is not
always about justice; very often it is about mercy,
and the journey to mercy and
grace can be very difficult.34
Research suggests five aspects of the
forgiveness process. They include first
the acknowledgment of strong emotions such as fear,
hurt, and rage. Second,
individuals must be willing to let go of previously
unmet needs such as failure
on the part of perpetrators to repent of and
apologize for their behavior. Third,
there must be a shift in the sufferers' attitude
toward the offender. Fourth,
empathy for the offenders and some understanding
of their motivations develops.
Finally,
sufferers must develop a new, healthier view of themselves and the other
persons.35
The journey from prison cell to
freedom progressed slowly for Angie. As
discussions of the perpetrator developed, Angie came
to accept him as a person
with great pain in his own life. Her empathy for him
grew; thus she vvas
eventually able to open the door to their prison
cell and step from it. As
forgiveness for him progressed and she acknowledged
that many of these
memories and feelings needed to remain. in the past, she was able to take other
steps on her journey to freedom. One day she
voluntarily returned to the school,
to visit, the first time she had returned, since
her graduation. Then one day she
took a letter she had written to her beloved teacher
and left it on the teacher's
grave. Later she brought me the packed file of
clippings from newspapers and
magazines that reported the events of the
shooting. That day, and for several
more, we sat in my office going through the file and
reading the articles. As we
finished each one, I would ask her what she
wanted to do with it. For most of
33 Splinter, The Healing Path, 158-64; Anderson, Zuehlke,
and Zuehlke, Christ
Centered Therapy, 271-74.
34 Exline and Baumeister.
"Expressing Forgiveness and Repentance," 147.
Wanda
W. Malcolm and Leslie S. Greenberg, "Forgiveness as a Process of Change
in Individual Psychotherapy." in Forgiveness: Theory Research, and Practice,
179-81.
See
also. Kristina C. Gordon, Donald H. Baucom, and
Douglas K. Snyder, "The Use of
Forgiveness
in Marital Therapy," in Forgiveness:
Theory Research, and Practice,
215-20.
292 RESTORATION
QUARTERLY
them, she chose the garbage can that I had set in
the middle of my office floor.
When
we had finished this task, she had discarded many of the evidences of her
suffering, and this physical act emphasized that
she had left the prison of her
past. Later, there were other days, usually on or
near the anniversary, when she
would return and we would spend some more time
talking and praying. But these
visits were brief, and she moved on with her life.
Occasionally now, I get a
phone call or a visit when she returns home, but
these are times in which we are
celebrating the joy that God is giving her.
The second half of Psalm 91 reflects the
victory that Angie has found of this
point in her journey. Echoing verses 1-2, the opening
couplet (9-10) states:
If you make the Most High your dwelling—
even the Lord, who is my refuge—
then no harm
will befall you,
no disaster will come near your tent.
The
psalmist now builds promise upon promise. Help and protection as well as
rescue and redemption are dedicated to those who love
the Lord and know His
name. Each promise sounds more glorious rising
toward the ultimate goal (16):36
With long life will I satisfy him
and
show him my salvation.
36 Delitzsch. The Psalms, 64.
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