Experiencing God’s Love: Psalm 139: God Knows Me Better than I Know Myself

Is the thought that God knows you better than you know yourself scary or comforting? An ancient believer found great comfort in the idea that he was perfectly known by God.

PSALM 139: GOD KNOWS ME BETTER THAN I KNOW MYSELF

INTRODUCTION

How would you feel if you knew that your best friend could read your mind and know what you were thinking at every moment?
That might be very uncomfortable for many of us because we know that we have thoughts that we would be ashamed for others to know.

Many of us take great care to present our “best selves” to each other.
We are so anxious to have other people think well of us that we make every effort to hide our faults and display our virtues.

The only trouble with this effort is that none of us really knows ourselves very well.
Parts of me are hidden from myself.
People spend good money with psychiatrists and psychologists to have them tell them about their deepest thoughts and desires.
But maybe if we knew all about ourselves we would be even more depressed because then we would be confronted with the sin we keep buried within.

Long ago an ancient believer wrote a psalm in which he rejoices because God knows him inside and out—even better than he knows himself.

Read Psalm 139.1-6

I. The writer of this psalm finds great comfort in the knowledge that God knows his every thought.

A. I have read that in Victorian times parents would sometimes put on the wall of their child’s room a picture of a big eye with this Bible verse under it: “Thou God seest me” (Genesis 16.13 KJV).

This was supposed to remind the child that whatever he or she did, God was watching.
The parent hoped the picture of God’s watching eye would lead to good behavior, even when the parent wasn’t looking.
That eye probably frightened more children than it helped.

I remember that that one of the first memory verses I learned in Sunday school was that verse from Genesis: “Thou God seest me.”
I don’t know whether it improved my behavior or not.

B. Theologians explain to us that God is omniscient and omnipresent.

Omniscient means that God knows everything.
Omnipresent means that God is everywhere.

Our psalmist isn’t concerned that God knows everything or that God is everywhere.
What thrills him is that God knows him—inside and out.
What thrills him is that God is here, with him—right now, and always.

C. When I read this psalm, I think about a story of Jesus.

One day Jesus sat down on a well near the Samaritan city of Sychar. He was all alone.
A woman came to draw water.
They had a conversation and Jesus told her about the living water that he would give her that would gush up within her to eternal life.
In their conversation, as recorded in John 4, the woman confessed to Jesus that she had had five husbands, and that she was living now with a man who wasn’t her husband.
Then they talked about worship and Jesus explained that God is worshiped in spirit and in truth.
We don’t have all the conversation, but in the end the woman was so impressed that Jesus loved her, even though he knew all that she had ever done, that she left her water pot and ran into the town to tell her neighbors: “Come see a man who told me everything I have ever done! He cannot be the Messiah, can he?”
Even though we might think she had a lot to hide, she is excited and happy to meet a man who knew her so intimately.
I think that what gave her such comfort is that she knew that—even though he knew all the faults and mistakes and sins of her past life—he loved her anyway.
This woman had not known that kind of forgiving love before.

The ancient believer who wrote Psalm 139 was comforted to know that his God was so great and wise that nothing about him escaped God’s attention.
He was glad that he was so important to God that God had made a study of him, and God knew him better than he knew himself.

Maybe we have thoughts and actions in our life that we are ashamed of, and we know we can’t hide those thoughts and actions from God, but the great thing is that God loves us anyway.

II. Let’s look more closely at the psalm.

A. “O Lord, you have searched me and known me…” (v1).

Our psalmist realized, as we do, that he didn’t know himself very well at all.
Sometimes we may even lie to ourselves—and sometimes we may even believe our lies.
One of my prayers is that God will show me the sins that I am blind to, so that I come to him for forgiveness and cleansing.
One of my prayers comes from a hymn by Charles Wesley. It goes like this:

“Show me, as my soul can bear,
The depth of inbred sin;
All the unbelief declare,
The pride that lurks within;
Take me, whom thyself hast bought,
Bring into captivity
Every high aspiring thought
That would not stoop to thee.”

But I think there is something else going on here.
Maybe the psalmist has been misjudged and criticized and accused by others.

He finds comfort in knowing that God does not judge him so harshly, because God knows his heart, and God knows his limitations and God knows how much he loves his Lord and how earnestly he wants to please him.

B. “You search out my path and my lying down, and are acquainted with all my ways” (v3).

God knows our past, and he knows where we are going.
He understands the road we are on.
He understands the difficulties we have faced and the difficulties we will face in the future.
And our Lord will be with us to the end of the road.

C. “Even before a word is on my tongue, O Lord, you know it completely...” (v4).

Sometimes words come out of my mouth that I don’t intend.
They just seem to jump out to embarrass me.
But God knows me better than I know myself.
I never surprise him.
I have secrets from other people, and even from myself.
But I have no secrets from God.

D. “You hem me in behind and before, and lay your hand upon me…” (v5).

God has been with me all the way, watching me, hemming me in, keeping me from danger, and guiding me along life’s road.

When the psalmist says, “He lays his hand upon me,” This is what I think he means:
God chose me, he draws me to himself, he makes me his own, he is by my side forever, and when I wander, he will bring me back.

E. “Such knowledge is too wonderful for me; it is so high that I cannot attain it” (v6).

The psalmist trembles at the wisdom of God.
But he is not terrified; he is filled with wonder and gratitude because he knows that God loves him.

Toward the end of the psalm the psalmist says,

“How weighty to me are your thoughts, O God!
How vast is the sum of them!
I try to count them—they are more than the sand;
I come to the end—I am still with you” (vv17-18).

As a dear child is always in the thoughts of his or her mother, so we are always in the thoughts of our God.
God always keeps us in mind and is always caring and feeling what we are feeling.

Recently a friend said to me, “I don’t like to pray for myself. I figure that God has more important things to attend to.”
No, God has you in mind as if you were the only person in the world.
God is infinite. He has each of us in his mind as if each of us were the only person in the world.

And God remembers me, even when I am forgetting him.
I may feel myself to be far from God, but he is near to me.

CONCLUSION
Finally, at the very end of the psalm, the ancient believer looks into his heart.
He welcomes God’s searching gaze and says,

“Search me, O God, and know my heart;
test me and know my thoughts.
See if there is any wicked way in me,
and lead me in the way everlasting” (vv17-18).

Why does he invite God to search him and know him, when he has already professed the certainty that God already knows him so thoroughly?
I think that in these last lines our believer is asking God to show him his heart as God sees it.
We really know ourselves only as we look at ourselves from God’s point of view.

Boldly he asks God to show him any wickedness lurking within and lead him in the ways of God—the way everlasting.”

In these last lines, the psalmist is in a humble mood.
He doesn’t shrink from God’s gaze. He longs for it.
He knows that his only hope is that God will keep his eye upon him and that God will reveal God’s self to himself and lead him to his glorious destiny, which he calls “the way everlasting.”

St. Paul wrote in one of his letters:

“Now we see in a mirror dimly,
but then we will see face-to-face.
Now I know only in part;
then I will know fully,
even as I have been fully known” (1 Corinthians 13.12)

It is sad for the unbeliever to come to the end of life and think, “It is almost over; life will end soon.”
It is not sad for the believer to come to the end of life and think, “This temporary part of life is almost over; real life will begin soon.”

Connecting with God in Prayer: John 13:13 & 15:7-8

We all know we should pray, but for many of us praying is hard. It is like picking up a telephone and talking to someone who is silent.

JOHN 14:13 & 15:7-8: WHAT GOD PROMISES ABOUT PRAYER

INTRODUCTION

Sometimes I come to you because I think I have the answers. This time I come mostly with questions.
I am going to talk to you about prayer—something I’m not very good at.
The Bible tells us that prayer is powerful in its effects.
Jesus told us that if we pray with faith, we will receive.
St. Paul tells us to pray without ceasing.
But for me prayer is hard.
It is hard to keep up a one-sided conversation—because I don’t hear God’s voice answering me.
A lot of my praying is more from a sense of duty than a joy.
I suspect that when I get to heaven and find out what my prayers have accomplished, I will wish I had prayed more.

So this message is as much for myself as much as it is for you.

I. Here are two promises from John’s Gospel: John 14:13 and John 15:7-8.

John 14:13:
“Whatever you ask in my name, I will do it,
that the Father may be glorified in the Son.”

John 15:7-8:
“If you abide in me, and my words abide in you,
ask whatever you will, and it shall be done for you.
By this my Father is glorified, that you bear much fruit,
and so prove to be my disciples.”

A. First we will consider John 14:13: “Whatever you ask in my name, I will do it, that the Father may be glorified in the Son.”

We learn from this saying that when we ask, we are to ask in Jesus’s name.

To ask in Jesus’s name is to ask as his representative.
It is to ask, not for my sake, but for Jesus’s sake.
It is to ask only for things that I have reason to believe Jesus wants.
When I went to college my father put his name on a check.
When I got to the registrar, I filled out the check and put in the amount and handed it to the clerk.
She accepted it—even though I didn’t have a checking account—because my father’s name was on it.
My father trusted me to make it out to the University of Kansas and for the proper amount.
This is kind of like how prayer works.
God gives us a book of checks with Jesus’s name on the signature line, for us to fill out and cash.
But it is very important that what we write on that check is according to God’s will.

Another thing we learn from this verse is that the purpose of prayer is to glorify the Father.

This isn’t because God is vain and proud and craves our admiration.
It’s because only when the Father is honored in my life, can I be in right relationship to God.
And my happiness depends on my being in close fellowship with God our Father and his Son Jesus Christ.
When we want something very much, it is easy to fool ourselves by thinking that what we want so much must be what God wants us to have.
So we have to be open to the idea that sometimes—often—we will pray for things that we will not receive.
Could it be that we might pray for healing—or for the pain to go away—but God intends that we prove our faith by the way we handle our adversity?

Peter writes of our rejoicing in our hope of resurrection but adds: “…though now you may have to suffer various trials, so that the genuineness of your faith, more precious than gold which though perishable is tested by fire, may redound to praise and glory and honor at the revelation of Jesus Christ.”
How we handle suffering proves to us and to others that our faith is genuine.

Sometimes pain can make us cling closer to God.
Sometimes affliction can help us understand the afflictions of others, so that we can comfort them.
Sometimes troubles can make us long for heaven, and suffering can prepare us for our homecoming.
These are some ways God uses suffering in our lives.

B. The second saying I want us to consider is John 15:7-8: “If you abide in me, and my words abide in you, ask whatever you will, and it shall be done for you. By this my Father is glorified, that you bear much fruit, and so prove to be my disciples.”

Here again we are invited to ask “whatever we will.” But here again, there are conditions.

The first condition: “If you abide in me…”

Jesus has compared his Father to the gardener, himself to a grapevine, and his people to the branches in the vine.
Only as the branches remain attached to the vine can they make fruit.
He expresses the union of the branches and the vine by saying that the branches “abide in the vine.”

He says, “I am the vine, you are the branches. He who abides in me, and I in him, he it is that bears much fruit, for apart from me you can do nothing.”

The idea is that we are made to live our lives in union with Jesus, our Savior.
I pray that whatever it Christ wants will be what I want.
When people are very much in love with one another, they have one will because they both desire the same things.

Jesus knows best and he always has my good at heart, so my aim is to have his mind in me.
The Bible speaks of having “the mind of Christ.” That is our aim.
When our mind is one with the mind of Christ we are ready to pray with confidence.

The second condition: “…and my words abide in you…”

It is by having Jesus’s words constantly in mind that we truly “abide in Christ.”
His commandments are constantly in our minds—especially the commandments to trust and to love.
We go to the Bible to find Christ’s words to us.
To live in union with Jesus we need constantly to be meditating on the words of Christ and the words of the holy writers of our Bible.
It’s not just the words we remember. It’s the words that we do—the words that live with us.

Again in this saying, Jesus tells us that our purpose is that the Father may be glorified: “By this the Father is glorified, that you bear much fruit and so prove to be my disciples.”

II. So much for the promises. But it is the problems that sometimes make us lose heart when we pray.

A. What about faith? The Bible says we have to have faith. But how can we have faith when we’ve been disappointed so many times?

I don’t know the entire answer to that question.
I know that it’s impossible to make ourselves have faith.
I know also that sometimes we have faith and pray and are still disappointed.

But there’s one kind of faith we can all have.
We can all have faith that when we pray, God hears us.
And if you don’t have faith, pray anyway. Faith will come.
One of my favorite prayers in the Bible is the prayer of the father of the epileptic boy in Mark 9. Jesus tells him that if he has faith all things are possible. The poor man cries out, “I believe; help my unbelief!”

Think of it this way. Just tell God what’s on your mind and let him sort it out.
Keep praying, keep talking to God, keep crying out to him—and leave the results to him.
The important thing is to be in communication.
We don’t have to be always talking. Sometimes I just like to rest in Jesus.

I read about an old woman who lived alone.
Someone asked her what she did with her time.
She said, “I take my Bible and I let God talk to me. Then I pray and talk to God. And when I’ve talked to God and let God talk to me, I just sit still and let God love me.”

I heard about an old peasant in France. His priest noticed that he would often come to church and just sit—seemingly doing nothing.
His priest asked him: “What are you doing here, day after day?”
“Well,” he said, “I look at God and God looks at me—and we’re happy together.” This man had learned to pray without words.

B. Another problem: Sometimes I am quite sure that the thing I am praying for is God’s will, but God does not grant my request.

Suppose a friend is suffering dreadfully, and her suffering is destroying her faith. You beg God to deliver her from her affliction, but she continues to suffer.
These are things that I can’t understand, but we have to accept that we don’t always know what’s best.
Sometimes God’s ways are dark. Some of God’s children walk in darkness. The psalm calls it “the Valley of the Shadow of Death.”

Sometimes we pray for a loved one that he will come to God, but he keeps wandering far away.
Let us remember that God can draw a soul to himself, but a person has to make a choice.
God wants lovers not slaves. He forces nobody. He respects our free will.
So keep praying for that one, that God will bring into his life good influences and draw him to himself. But remember, each of us must choose God for himself.

C. There are many things that we know God wants for us. These we can ask for without any doubts.

One of my most frequent prayers is for stronger faith.
Another is that God will make me useful.

God wants us to overcome the sins that stumble us up and hurt the people around us.
We can pray against our sins—anger, pride, selfishness, envy, complaining, superiority.
And we can pray for the character traits that should replace our sins—kindness, courtesy, humility, gentleness, thoughtfulness, thankfulness.
We need not doubt that these prayers are God’s will for us.
So let’s pray that God will make us holy, useful, fruitful Christians—a blessing to those around us and worthy of our Lord Jesus.

CONCLUSION

The story is told of a man who ordered something from a catalog.
On the order form were the words: “If we haven’t the article you order in stock, may we substitute?”
He wrote “yes.”
When the order came, found that what had ordered was not in stock, so they had sent something worth double what he had paid.
Ever after that, he would always answer the question at the bottom of the form—“If we haven’t the article you order, may we substitute?”—with a big “YES” so bold that they couldn’t miss it.

As I look back over my life I can remember many times when I didn’t receive what I asked for in prayer.
But as I look back I also see that things worked out.
Even though I didn’t get what I asked for, something good happened—sometimes better than what I asked for.

So let us pray, confident that God hears us, that he loves us, and that he will work through all the circumstances of our lives for our good and for our happiness.

After all, he has all eternity to make it up to us for the disappointments and afflictions of our life on earth.

So keep praying and don’t be discouraged.
And if you are discouraged, tell God about your discouragement.
But, above all, keep taking to God.