“O Lord, you have searched me and known me!
You know when I sit down and when I rise up;
you discern my thoughts from afar.
You search out my path and my lying down
and are acquainted with all my ways.
Even before a word is on my tongue,
behold, O Lord, you know it altogether.
You hem me in, behind and before,
and lay your hand upon me.
Such knowledge is too wonderful for me;
it is high; I cannot attain it.
Where shall I go from your Spirit?
Or where shall I flee from your presence?
If I ascend to heaven, you are there!
If I make my bed in Sheol, you are there!
If I take the wings of the morning
and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea,
even there your hand shall lead me,
and your right hand shall hold me.
If I say, ‘Surely the darkness shall cover me,
and the light about me be night,’
even the darkness is not dark to you;
the night is bright as the day,
for darkness is as light with you.
For you formed my inward parts;
you knitted me together in my mother’s womb.
I praise you, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made.
Wonderful are your works;
my soul knows it very well.
My frame was not hidden from you,
when I was being made in secret,
intricately woven in the depths of the earth.
Your eyes saw my unformed substance;
in your book were written, every one of them,
the days that were formed for me,
when as yet there was none of them.
How precious to me are your thoughts, O God!
How vast is the sum of them!
If I would count them, they are more than the sand.
I awake, and I am still with you.” Psalm 139:1-18
The psalmist is nearly undone at the measureless mind of God for His own, and sings of it with respect, awe, and gratitude. His recounting of these many facets of God’s love strum repeated wonder for all who read his words. With every description of who God is and how He works the distance between their conception of one another seems to grow: the greater is his God, the smaller is he. The more intimately God knows him, the more he has to learn of God.
Our thoughts: pedestrian, human, worldly, limited, banal. God’s thoughts: magnificent, divine, otherworldly, infinite, perfect. Only the Holy Spirit can bridge the limits between us, and make intimate and palpable our love for the Lord who so deeply, personally loves us.
What keeps us from plumbing the depths of Christ who makes Himself known to the willing heart? Shame? His grace covers it all. Fear of being exposed and vulnerable? He already knows all, and loves us lavishly. Afraid He will demand too much in return? His gifts are free, His Spirit is ours, and we can never out-give our limitless Lord. How will we press on this year to get Him, and get more of Him? (2 Chronicles 9:5-9,12; Luke 6:38; Ephesians 3:20)
Lord, increase my knowledge of and awe for You, and so narrow the gap between us. Help me get You, to think, love, and act as You do, to Your praise.
As the rain and snow 