Psalm 139

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Intro:

When you read and study God’s Word there’s 2 particularly important questions that we should be asking.

#1 what does this text teach me about God?

First and foremost

And as we’ve seen through the Psalms and will continue to see through them is that, in order to live a life of praise to the Lord you have to know the Lord

And not just from an intellectual standpoint but also experiential

So, we want to love God and in order to do that we must know Him.

But what we’ve talked through the Psalms is that we also should enjoy Him and in order to do that our knowledge should drive us to experience Him on a personal level which will ultimately produce enjoyment of Him

So this is an important question “What does this text teach me about God?”

Secondary to that is then this question

#2 what does this text teach me about humanity.

Not necessarily what does it teach me about me but about humanity.

God is relational and so when we know and understand how God interacts with His creation and how humanity interacts with Him we may better know and understand how we can also.

The Psalm we are in today, if we ask those 2 questions....

What does this teach us about God

What does this teach us about humanity.

Simple answer: A lot!

Today we will be in Psalm 139.

Psalm 139 includes a complex and diverse set of genres.

Praise

thanksgiving

lament

confession

meditation

prayer

It’s a little longer than what we’ve seen so far

It’s divided into 4 stanzas of 6 verse each in our English translation

The idea of “knowledge” is the overriding theme throughout

Psalm 139 NIV

For the director of music. Of David. A psalm. 1 You have searched me, Lord, and you know me. 2 You know when I sit and when I rise; you perceive my thoughts from afar. 3 You discern my going out and my lying down; you are familiar with all my ways. 4 Before a word is on my tongue you, Lord, know it completely. 5 You hem me in behind and before, and you lay your hand upon me. 6 Such knowledge is too wonderful for me, too lofty for me to attain. 7 Where can I go from your Spirit? Where can I flee from your presence? 8 If I go up to the heavens, you are there; if I make my bed in the depths, you are there. 9 If I rise on the wings of the dawn, if I settle on the far side of the sea, 10 even there your hand will guide me, your right hand will hold me fast. 11 If I say, “Surely the darkness will hide me and the light become night around me,” 12 even the darkness will not be dark to you; the night will shine like the day, for darkness is as light to you. 13 For you created my inmost being; you knit me together in my mother’s womb. 14 I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; your works are wonderful, I know that full well. 15 My frame was not hidden from you when I was made in the secret place, when I was woven together in the depths of the earth. 16 Your eyes saw my unformed body; all the days ordained for me were written in your book before one of them came to be. 17 How precious to me are your thoughts, God! How vast is the sum of them! 18 Were I to count them, they would outnumber the grains of sand— when I awake, I am still with you. 19 If only you, God, would slay the wicked! Away from me, you who are bloodthirsty! 20 They speak of you with evil intent; your adversaries misuse your name. 21 Do I not hate those who hate you, Lord, and abhor those who are in rebellion against you? 22 I have nothing but hatred for them; I count them my enemies. 23 Search me, God, and know my heart; test me and know my anxious thoughts. 24 See if there is any offensive way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting.

pray

Since the Psalm is broken up into 4 stanzas we will break it up into 4 large sections as well.

Stanza 1 v. 1-6 teach us this

God knows everything

The Bible teaches us that the Lord is an “omni God.”

Omni is a Latin phrase that just means “all” or “of all things.”

And we will get to each one but here in the first section it is showing and teaching us that God is “omniscient.”

Meaning he is “all knowing.”

Psalm 139 teaches us here that God knows everything.

Firstly, He knows your heart

Psalm 139:1 NIV

1 You have searched me, Lord, and you know me.

The Lord’s knowledge of us is intimate and personal

It is penetrating and precise

Our hearts are laid before Him completely open and unhidden

There’s no where to hide, no where to run, nothing He doesn’t see.

He has searched you and He knows you.

He also knows your actions

Psalm 139:2–3 NIV

2 You know when I sit and when I rise; you perceive my thoughts from afar. 3 You discern my going out and my lying down; you are familiar with all my ways.

God knows your character

He knows your conduct and your actions

He knows when you sit down and when you stand up

He knows you inside and outside

Distance isn’t a problem

Day or night

As you come and go

He knows your actions

He knows your Words

Psalm 139:4 NIV

4 Before a word is on my tongue you, Lord, know it completely.

He knows all of your conversations

Even before you say a single word God knows its coming

I can say some pretty dumb stuff, God knows.

He knows my life

Psalm 139:5–6 NIV

5 You hem me in behind and before, and you lay your hand upon me. 6 Such knowledge is too wonderful for me, too lofty for me to attain.

A fitting conclusion to this section.

Lord you know the entire course of my life

You hem me in

You surround, encircle, without escape

The Lord has placed his sovereign, providential hand on each and every one of us

And you may be sitting here thinking, man that’s kind of a lot. It’s a little overwhelming

Well this omniscience of God is overwhelming for David as well.

It’s too lofty for him

it’s more than he can handle

It scares him, it amazes him, it causes wonder in him, it’s not human and therefore not attainable

God is omniscient and His knowledge is perfect and complete

God is everywhere

Section or stanza one focused on God’s omniscience, stanza 2 focuses on God’s omnipresence

If you’ve ever played hide and seek with little kids you know the simplicity of their thoughts and tactics.

The thought is: if I can’t see you then you must not be able to see me

And so they crouch in the corner with their hands over their face knowing for certain that there isn’t a better place to be

This is what it looks like when we try to hide from God

We look like infants sitting in the corner with our hands over our faces.

You can’t hide from God because He is everywhere, omnipresent

He is with you above or below

Psalm 139:7–8 NIV

7 Where can I go from your Spirit? Where can I flee from your presence? 8 If I go up to the heavens, you are there; if I make my bed in the depths, you are there.

This is called “hebrew parallelism.” because it’s two complimentary questions answered with two complementary answers.

Questions: Where can I escape your Spirit? Where can I flee from your presence?

answers: Nowhere!

If I go up to heaven you are there

If I die and get buried beneath the ground, you are there and you are everywhere in between.

He is with you in the east or the west

Psalm 139:9–10 NIV

9 If I rise on the wings of the dawn, if I settle on the far side of the sea, 10 even there your hand will guide me, your right hand will hold me fast.

Dawn implies east since the sun rises in the east

The mediterranean Sea formed the western border of Israel and so the word sea was used for west.

So the idea is, if we go east or west, “even there His hand will guide me.”

It also implies from morning to evening God will be there

So, again, We can’t outrun his presence

He is with you in the dark or the light

Psalm 139:11–12 NIV

11 If I say, “Surely the darkness will hide me and the light become night around me,” 12 even the darkness will not be dark to you; the night will shine like the day, for darkness is as light to you.

playing spook in the dark

David has the thought I will go hide in the darkness but immediately realizes that darkness is not dark to the God who see everywhere and everything

You may be able to hide from man but you cannot hide from God

Ask adam and Eve, ask Jonah.

You may ignore it but you will not evade it

God can do anything

This is the omnipotence of God and it ties it together in the most intimate and personal way: in our development in the wombs of our mothers

Right now there is a baby being formed in my wife’s womb.

We’ve decided not to know the gender.

We don’t know how much it weighs, we don’t know if it will have hair, if it will be blonde, black, or brown.

We don’t know. God does. The Psalmist says that He is knitting that child together right here, right now.

There’s some of us in this room who have lost children before we ever laid eyes on them.

Psalm 139 tells us that God knew and God knows your child

There’s is no one outside the knowledge of God

He can do anything

God formed you

Psalm 139:13–15 NIV

13 For you created my inmost being; you knit me together in my mother’s womb. 14 I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; your works are wonderful, I know that full well. 15 My frame was not hidden from you when I was made in the secret place, when I was woven together in the depths of the earth.

All that we are, God has made. He has formed.

God was involved in the intricate details of our conceptions and development.

James Merritt helps put in perspective how intricate and detailed God’s creation is:

Exalting Jesus in Psalms 101–150 The Lord Formed My Body (139:13–15)

A single thread of DNA from one human cell contains information equivalent to a library of 1,000 volumes or 600,000 printed pages with 500 words on every page. At conception, one embryo has the equivalent of 50 times the amount of information contained in the entire Encyclopedia Britannica. (“The Mystery of Creation”)

David marvels at this process and breaks out into praise.

We are fearfully and wonderfully made!

Even in the hidden, secret place of a mother’s womb, the Lord is there

The Lord ordained your life

Psalm 139:16 NIV

16 Your eyes saw my unformed body; all the days ordained for me were written in your book before one of them came to be.

Even when we were being formed and not yet fully formed

God ordained all the days of my life before one of them came to be

God has a plan for each and every one of us

It’s not as if when you arrive God goes, oh what am I going to do with this one now.

No! He knows, he ordains your life before you’re even formed!

And once again these truths inspire David to break out into praise to his God.

He essentially says, “God your thoughts toward me, down to the last detail is precious to me! I could sit here and count them over and over and over again and it would exhaust me to the point of complete fatigue but even then when I woke up you are still there with me.

God will deal with everyone

Here the Psalm takes a new and unexpected direction.

This great God who is omniscient, omnipresent, omnipotent. Who is good and faithful to humanity.

Is also just and righteous.

Remember, nothing is beyond his knowledge, presence, or power.

And here His character is applied to the moral order of things.

There is coming a day when God will make all things right.

God will deal with the wicked who oppose Him

Psalm 139:19–22 NIV

19 If only you, God, would slay the wicked! Away from me, you who are bloodthirsty! 20 They speak of you with evil intent; your adversaries misuse your name. 21 Do I not hate those who hate you, Lord, and abhor those who are in rebellion against you? 22 I have nothing but hatred for them; I count them my enemies.

David’s description of the wicked is striking.

These men are wicked murders who are bloodthirsty and who rightly deserve God’s judgment.

They are evil in their actions and evil with their words.

They use religion in their evil schemes and misuse the Lord’s name

Simply put, they hate the Lord.

And these men are David’s enemy because they are the Lord’s enemy.

And it says that David hates them!

now, how does this stack against Matt 5:44 where we are called to love our enemies.

well, to hate in this context is to reject and oppose.

So, it’s not a call out of love but a desire for what is right

David’s hatred here is a type of prophetic execution of what will happen at the last day when God casts all of his enemies into the lake of fire.

So we are still called to love even our enemies, and even in the midst of a hatred for what they do their should be a compassion and even desire for their salvation.

But we should also realize the truth that there is coming a day where all will be judged accordingly and the wicked and those opposed to the Lord will be cast away.

Which should lead us to the final point and then we will hit some applications for us.

God will lead the humble

David concludes the Psalm with a prayer of humilty

Psalm 139:23–24 NIV

23 Search me, God, and know my heart; test me and know my anxious thoughts. 24 See if there is any offensive way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting.

In light of his passionate words in 19-22 he knows that he needs his own heart examined by the Lord.

So he pleads to the Lord, search me God. Examine me. My thoughts my ways and show me.

Let’s take an evaluation then lead me and guide me in a different and better direction.

Application

How does the character of God shape the way you see him?

His omniscience, omnipresence, omnipotence

How does God’s involvement in your development and life and all life shape the way we see ourselves and one another?

What are those things in your life, where are those places, that you should be asking God to search, to test, to evaluate?

Where does there need to be humility and change?

How do we live a life of praise to the Lord?

By knowing that our life is planned and purposeful.

You aren’t an accident. You aren’t a screw up. You aren’t a mistake.

God formed you, knows you, is with you, and wants you.

Wants you to live a life of praise to Him.