Psalm 139

Preacher: Emmanuel Njoroge

Sermon Text: Psalm 139

This Psalm is a Psalm of covenant relationship between God and his people. It is meant to help us understand what God’s covenantal commitment to his people looks like and secondly how God’s covenant people are to respond to God’s covenantal commitment to them. We can divide it into four parts: the first part is from verses 1 to 6 where we see the omniscience of God; that is God knows all things. The second part is from verses 7 to 12 where we see the omnipresence of God; that is God is always present everywhere. The third part is from verses 13 to 16 where we see the omnipotence of God; that is God works powerfully in his creation. And lastly verses 17 to 24 where we see how God’s covenant people respond to God’s covenantal commitment to them.

God’s covenantal commitment to his people is seen in his knowledge, in his presence and in his power.

I. Look with me at verses 1-6, the Psalmist begins with a personal conviction of God’s omniscience.

It is not just that God knows all things but that God has a personal, comprehensive, and exhaustive knowledge of the Psalmist. “O LORD, you have searched me and known me!” Friends this is not just general knowledge or passive knowledge, this is a redemptive and relational knowledge that is anchored on God’s redemptive covenant with his people. It is a knowledge that singles out and goes all out for its recipient. God knows his people deeply and personally. Look with me at some of the ways the Psalmist expresses and experiences God’s knowledge: you know when I sit down and when I rise … you discern my thoughts…you search out my path and my lying down…you are acquainted with all my ways …even before a word is on my tongue you know it all together…there is no aspect of the Psalmist’s life that God is not aware of: God knows the Psalmist in and out.

O friends, don’t we often long to be known in this manner? Don’t we all have an innate longing and desire to know and be known deeply and personally? We often take pride in knowing people and being known by people: we especially take pride when the people we know and are known by are important people. We build tribes around people, around ideas, around common interests etc. We love to be known by others for something, and to rally ourselves around others. In my own country the trending phenomenal at the moment are the millennials and the Gen Z who are known to be bold, ambitious, tribeless, politically partyless, and leaderless. They are revolutionary in their thinking and acting, discontent with the status quo and want to see significant change in the social, religious and political spheres in Kenya. We do things to be known by others and to know others, we say things to be known by others and to know others.

But friends, do you know that you are known by God? God knows you in such a way that no one else will ever know you! God knows you in such a way that you will never know yourself! Do you see how the Psalmist concludes that section: “Such knowledge is too wonderful for me; it is high; I cannot attain it!”

Dear friends here’s what it means that God knows you: it means that he cares for you and loves you deeply. It means that he is not surprised at all by anything in your life. Not your sins, not your weaknesses, not your mis happenings, it means that he is not thrown off by you at any time. It means that he never snobs you, it means that his demeanor toward you never changes, it means that he is for you and for your good at all times. It means that he will never cancel you. It means that he will always accept you and will never abandon nor forsake you. He is committed to you in covenant love.

Have you ever felt like you do not fit in? have you ever been looked down on by people around you? Have you ever felt worthless and disregarded? Do you ever fear getting exposed in your sin, your weakness, your struggles? Not so with God, he knows all about you and he deeply loves you nonetheless.

Because God truly and deeply knows you he pursues you at all cost! Even the cost of his Son whom he gave to die on the cross, who voluntarily in covenant commitment gave of himself to atone for all of our sins and make known to us God’s covenantal love toward us. God knows you and I. Here’s the language of redemption in verses 5, “you hem me in, behind and before, and lay your hand upon me.” Friends, behold God’s covenant love for you!

II. Secondly, in verses 7 to 12 the Psalmist shows us how God’s covenantal commitment to his people is expressed and experienced in his omnipresence: God is always present with his people.

In verses 7 the Psalmist asks: “where shall I go from your Spirit? Or where shall I flee from your presence?”

Now we must remember that this Psalm was written by David the king. This is significant because we know that a few decades after David’s reign, God’s presence departed from the people of Israel because of their persistent rebellion against God. God’s Spirit withdrew and God’s glory departed and the people were exiled. David the king was a messianic figure who embodied the messianic fulfillment of the reality of God’s ever abiding presence among his people. The fate of the people of God depended on the king: in Deuteronomy 17 God gave laws concerning Israel’s king from verses 18 it reads, “And when he sits on the throne of his kingdom, he shall write for himself in a book a copy of this law, approved by the Levitical priests. And it shall be with him, and he shall read in it all the days of his life, that he may learn to fear the LORD his God by keeping all the words of this law and these statues, and doing them, that his heart may not be lifted up above his brothers, and that he may not turn aside from the commandment, either to the right or to the left, so that he may continue long in his kingdom, he and his children, in Israel.”

As long as the King’s heart was right with God the king would experience the ever-abiding presence of God. This does not mean that God is not always present even with the wicked, but it is the manner in which he is present that we must seek to understand. Toward the wicked, God’s presence is expressed in wrath and judgement. Toward the righteous, God’s presence is expressed in covenant love. We see that in verse 10 where the Psalmist says “your hand shall lead me, and your right hand shall hold me.” This is redemptive language.

Oh friends, since the fall, the ultimate question throughout the Bible has been, how will a holy God ever dwell with sinful man? How will fallen man ever experience God’s presence not in wrath and judgement but in grace and love? Adam broke the covenant and was put away from God’s presence! Israel as a nation broke the covenant and were put away from God’s presence! Hosea points this out: “But like Adam they transgressed the covenant; there they dealt faithlessly with me…” God says…and the consequence is that they were cast out of God’s place: Eden and the promised land. But throughout we see God covenanting with himself to love an unfaithful people. David himself is a perfect example. His reign was not a perfect reign. He was not a perfect king. He committed adultery, murder, made alliances with kingdoms who would later lead Israel into idol worship: he failed as a king, as a husband, as a father and the consequences would be generational, leading to the downfall of Israel as a nation, yet here he was writing this Psalm speaking of God’s ever abiding presence! Do you see the wonder and mystery of God’s covenant commitment to be present with a sinful people in covenant love?

Oh friends, the wonder and mystery of God’s covenant commitment to be present with a sinful people in covenant love is expressed and experienced in the gospel. Romans 3:21-26 says, “But now the righteousness of God has been manifested apart from the law, although the Law and the Prophets bear witness to it—the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ for all who believe. For there is no distinction: for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and are justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom God put forward as a propitiation by his blood, to be received by faith. This was to show God’s righteousness, because in his divine forbearance he had passed over former sins. It was to show his righteousness at the present time, so that he might be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus.”

You bet, Adam had faith in Jesus, David had faith in Jesus! Do you have faith in Jesus? It is only in Jesus that God’s covenant love is expressed and experienced perfectly. He is not only the King whose heart is ever right with God he is also the very dwelling place of God: he is God with us. In Him the fullness of God dwells and through Him we experience the presence of God.

III. Thirdly, in verses 13-16, the Psalmist shows us how God’s covenantal commitment to his people is expressed and experienced in his omnipotence: God’s power is always at work on behalf of and for his people both in creation and in redemption.

From verses 13 the Psalmist begins to speak of what God did: God formed his inward parts, God knitted him together in his mother’s womb; his frame was not hidden from God when he was being made in secret, intricately woven in the depths of the earth, God saw his unformed substance, and God wrote in his book all the days of the Psalmist. The Psalmist bursts in praise: “I praise you for I am fearfully and wonderfully made. Wonderful are your works; my soul knows it very well.”

Friends, God’s power is revealed to us in his work of creation and in his work of redemption. These are inseparable works of God. “Wonderful are your works; my soul knows it very well.” We must as often as possibly ponder on God’s works in creation and in redemption. Therein we encounter his power and in that we become more acquainted with his covenantal commitment toward us. Do you see the extent to which the Psalmist speaks of God’s power? From before his existence to the intricacies of his formation, to the details of all of his life with nothing left out: God works in our lives and for us to display his power.

Friends, are you aware that the details of your life with no exception: the good, the bad, the ugly were written in God’s book before time and he is in control of it all? This doesn’t mean that we are robots being controlled with God’s remote. It means that God is committed to us in covenant love and his power is at work in us in such a way that we not only know him as our creator but also know him as our redeemer.

Through his power God makes known to us his knowledge of us. Through his power God makes known to us his presence with us.

Friends, what is God’s power if not the gospel? Paul with conviction writes: “For I am not ashamed of the gospel for it is the power of God unto salvation for all who believe.”

God’s knowledge of us is redemptive. God’s presence with us is redemptive. God’s power toward us is redemptive!

Friends this has a lot of implications in how we live together as a community.

It informs how we seek to pursue relationships one with another.

Is our knowledge of self and of others redemptive in nature? Do we seek to pursue one another redemptively? Do we seek to know one another as we have been known by God? Are there relationships with fellow believers that you have given up on for one reason or another? Do you realize that the difficulties we often encounter as we seek to do life with one another are meant to help us grow in redemptive knowledge and express that one to another? The more we know and experience God’s love the more we show others God’s love.

Is our presence often intimidating or is it often welcoming? Are you only concerned to build a clique of your own and build community around that or are you a person that goes out of your way to love and serve people with whom you have nothing in common. You see we have nothing in common with God: he is creator and we are creatures. He is holy and we are sinful, yet he has gone out of his way in a redemptive manner and brought us into his presence!

Friends, we cannot be or do any of these things without the work of God’s power in us and through us! This is why we desperately need the gospel daily. This is why we need to build our communities, friendships and relationships around the gospel, because therein, we find the power of God that works in us and through us for his glory our good and the good of others.

IV. Lastly, the psalmist shows us how to respond to God’s covenantal commitment to us as God’s people who are known by God redemptively, and with whom God is present redemptively, and to whom God’s power is at work redemptively.

We are going to see three specific responses:

a. In verses 17-18, we see a response of thinking God’s thoughts. In other words, we are to be a people who are preoccupied with thinking about God. Thinking about his omniscience, omnipresence and omnipotence. In other words, we are to be a people who are always thinking about the truths of the gospel.

b. In verses 19-22, we see a response of abhorring that which God abhors. We are to never take sides with the enemies of God but rather abhor them. We should not entertain sin and any form of worldliness, whether in ideology or in practice. This means that we must be constantly aware of the Devil’s schemes to distort the truths of the gospel. In today’s world issues of identity, gender, justice is being boycotted by the enemies of God and we must be vigilant in defending the truth and abhorring all that is from the enemy of God.

c. In verses 23-24, we see a response of laying our hearts bare before God. We must not be naïve to think that we are infallible, that we know it all, that we are the standard of truth. Only God is infallible. He is creator and we are creatures. He is all knowing and we are not, he is all powerful and we are not! We must look to him at all times to help us navigate the complexities of our lives and the world that we live in. Our posture and desire ought to be God-ward at all times.

Amen.