The Past, the Psalms and the Patriot

Today is July 4th, which as an American citizen naturally has me reflecting on the history of our United States. Like so many aspects of our national life, the interpretation of history in recent years has become a divided ground. Some emphasize only the glorious victories, the grand virtues, and the great ideals, while others focus solely on past failures, persistent vices, and present injustices. I'd like to suggest that the scriptures offer us another path to understanding the past—namely in the book of Psalms.

Two Ways of Telling History

While the Psalms are best known for their songs of praise and prayers for deliverance, a number of these ancient poems can be classified as "historical," retelling in verse the history of the nation of Israel, especially their "Independence Day" origin story—the Exodus from slavery in Egypt. Among these are Psalms 105 & 106.

Read Psalm 105 now.

Psalm 105 retells the Exodus story triumphantly—how God promised to make Abraham a nation, protected his fledgling family until they grew into a numerous people, and then fulfilled His promise by overthrowing Pharaoh's armies with demonstrations of His almighty power, caring for His people throughout their desert wanderings by providing food, water and guidance, and leading them into their Promised Land.

The Exodus, painting by Than Kyaw Htay

Read Psalm 106 now.

Fascinatingly, the very next Psalm retells the same story, only in Psalm 106 the focus shifts from the greatness of God in delivering His people, to the constant rebellion of the Israelites despite His goodness. They questioned Moses' leadership, they rebelled at the Red Sea, they made idols for themselves at Mt. Sinai, they grumbled against God in the desert, and when they finally did make it to the Promised Land, they were continuously unfaithful to their God until He allowed them to be scattered into exile.

I don't believe it is an accident that these two versions of the Exodus history are juxtaposed next to each other in successive Psalms. I believe the whole point is, we need both a Psalm 105 and a Psalm 106 interpretation of our history.

Practical Applications for True Patriotism

Let me pause here to state what should be obvious, but has sometimes been forgotten: America is not Israel. We are not God's chosen people. For the Christian, the salvation history of God that began in Israel is understood to be carried forward directly through Jesus Christ, and thus indirectly through all those who are marked in Christ by the Holy Spirit—namely the Church universal, which is specifically described as being "from every tribe and nation and people and tongue." The appropriate love any people has for their nation must always be subservient to our love for our brothers and sisters in Christ from all nations, and our allegiance to King Jesus must be above all other loyalties, or else our patriotism has become an idol.

Nevertheless, I think we can draw practical points of application from the Psalms to form a proper view of how to do history. We can break it down into three points:

1. When we recall the greatness of our past, our focus must be on God's grace and goodness. 

Psalm 105 is our example. It begins, "Give thanks to the Lord and proclaim his greatness. Let the whole world know what he has done. Remember the wonders he has performed, his miracles, and the rulings he has given." (Ps. 105:1, 5)

It is difficult to read the accounts of how the colonists gained independence from mighty Great Britain, perhaps the world's greatest superpower at the time, without seeing the providential hand of God at work. Likewise, when I see the role American forces had in liberating Europe from Hitler, and specifically bringing the Nazi death camps to an end, with all due respect to the American military, I believe the appropriate response is to praise God, and to recognize that He allowed America to rise to a position of power among the nations perhaps for just "such a time as this."

U.S. troops at the liberation of Dachau

To remember our victories as if they were our own is to court pride and hubris. As another Psalm puts it, "not to us, O Lord, not to us, but to your name be the glory." The lesson of Psalm 105 is that it is appropriate to remember the high points of our history, when we do so in order to give God proper credit.

2. When we recall the sins of our past, our focus must be on our own present need for God's mercy.

Psalm 106 shows that it is not "unpatriotic" to rehearse a nation's past failures, for doing so is an appropriate reminder of our propensity to rebel, leading us to humility and repentance. It does not self-righteously pretend that we, the current generation are immune from the ignorance and evil of our ancestors, nor does it separate the world into an "us vs. them" way of thinking that scapegoats one group as the source of all evil while elevating another group as pure and innocent. "Like our ancestors, we have sinned. We have done wrong! We have acted wickedly!" (Ps. 106:6)

As Americans I believe we must be willing to confront the truth of our past collective sins: the evils of slavery and racism; the acts of bad faith toward Native Americans; the times when we have used our military might (and put the blood of our brave young men and women at risk) for less than pure and unselfish causes; the innocent blood of unborn; the ongoing oppression of the poor through mass incarceration and other structural injustices.

These are hard conversations. Psalm 106 shows that we cannot distance ourselves from them; we cannot simply say, "I wasn't there, I didn't do those things." We must take collective responsibility for the past in order to take ownership of our collective future.

Slavery memorial at The National Memorial for Peace and Justice by Hank Willis Thomas

However, this Psalm also models a path beyond the partisan, ideological manipulation of history that we see today. It does not say, "look at history—it proves that I am right and you are wrong!" Rather, it says, "look at history—it's long track record shows that all of us together have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God, because all of us alike have a sin nature that bends towards rebellion." It is this inward rebellion against God that manifests itself in injustice towards our neighbor. Seen in this light, taking responsibility for history is not a means to produce "white guilt" or any sort of guilt. Rather, the acknowledgement of guilt is a necessary step, but the end goal is to recognize the redeeming grace of God that flows from His merciful nature.

Ultimately, this awareness of our individual and national need for God's mercy leads us back to seeking God's glory and praise: "Again and again he rescued them, but they chose to rebel against him, and they were finally destroyed by their sin. Even so, he pitied them in their distress and listened to their cries. He remembered his covenant with them and relented because of his unfailing love....Save us, O Lord our God! Gather us back from among the nations, so we can thank your holy name and rejoice and praise you." (Ps. 106:43-45, 47)

3. We can hold the positive and negative views of national history in an appropriate tension together when our ultimate goal is the Kingdom of God.

The reason the collectors of the Psalm could juxtapose the seeming opposites of Psalm 105 an Psalm 106 next to each other is that both point in their own way, not to the glory of the nation, nor to the reformation of the nation, but to the glory of God.

When our horizon is limited to this present age of the world, we tend to go to extremes: either we become drunk with nostalgia and propaganda about what a great nation we have, or else we become high on self-righteousness rhetoric about what an evil nation we have.

When we expand our horizon by faith to see the ultimate goal as the kingdom of God, which is beyond any merely human national endeavor, we position ourselves to more objectively evaluate both the good and the bad in any given worldly power structure. "But people who aren’t spiritual can’t receive these truths from God’s Spirit. It all sounds foolish to them and they can’t understand it, for only those who are spiritual can understand what the Spirit means. Those who are spiritual can evaluate all things, but they themselves cannot be evaluated by others." (1 Cor. 2:14-15)

That doesn't mean we don't celebrate our nation, or that we don't work vigorously for its reform. It only means that we do so with the appropriate sense of proportion and priority, which Jesus so succinctly summarized in Matthew 6:33: "Seek first the kingdom of God, and His justice, and all these other things will be added to you."

The Sower, Van Gogh