Psalm 139:1

Psalm 139:1

You know me, Lord

Psalm 139 is often quoted, and it is many people’s favourite, but it may not be as comforting as first appears. David, as ever, wrote these profound words, but in them he is asking the Lord to examine his heart and to determine if he is as devoted as he claims to be! This is a Psalm that, on the surface, appears to reassure us about the ever-present God who watches over our lives, but more intense study shows that it also an invitation for the same God to look even deeper within us, to search us and know us intimately. 

 

V1        As human beings we are prone to believe that we know ourselves as well as anyone knows us, that the one person who understands me – is me! David has pondered this idea and is mature enough to know that self-knowledge is not enough, in fact our views of ourselves are usually way off mark. There are many people who “think more highly of themselves than they ought to think” (Romans 12:3) and others who wallow in self-deprecation and defeatism all their lives. We even have a saying about being a glass half full or half empty kind of person. How many of us know or understand our true character, what we might be capable of if pushed? How many of us have fulfilled our full potential as human beings rather than the agenda forced on us by family, contemporaries or our culture? This Psalm invites you and me to look into God’s mirror and ask, “Who am I?” In fact, it goes further, David recognises that there is only one Being who truly knows him and who fully understands his heart, his soul, his character and attitudes, what motivates him and what makes him anxious. It is the Lord, the Creator who brought him into this world. Come with me as we seek this same Lord and invite Him to “know” us and to reveal the real “me”.

 

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