One of the scariest prospects since the fall of man into sin is to be thoroughly known.We want to know and be known by others. There is a deep longing for this knowledge but also a great fear. We desire this sort of intimacy because we are God’s image-bearers. God knows himself infinitely. Father, Son, and Spirit are completely exposed to one another. There are no hidden thoughts, no secrets between them. The intimacy is perfect.
When the man and woman were created, they experienced this intimacy, immaturely but truly. That is one aspect of them being naked and unashamed. When they sinned, they hid. They hid from one another and God. But the desire to know and be known wasn’t taken away. We want to entrust ourselves to others without fear of rejection in complete love.
Shame keeps us from this. Shame makes us hide because we are afraid. Fear keeps us from entrusting ourselves to others. “What if someone genuinely knows me? They will see how ugly I am and reject me. I don’t like myself. How can anyone else like me?”
What if I told you that there is someone who knows you better than you know yourself and still loves and accepts you? That kind of love would cast out all fear of being known.
Psalm 139 describes that kind of knowledge; it is the knowledge that God has of us.
The Psalm begins and ends with God searching and knowing us. The first mention is that of the fact that God has searched us and known us.
Nothing about us is hidden from God. He knows us thoroughly; as I said, he knows us better than we know ourselves. God knows where I am and what I’m doing, my sitting down and rising up. God knows every thought that goes through my mind and understands them all. God knows how I conduct myself and the path of life I take.
God knows every word I speak even before it leaves my mouth (Ps 139:2-4). Nothing we say catches God by surprise since he knows our thoughts and the dialogue in our hearts.
If you are God’s enemy, this knowledge is frightening because you know that God can use it against you when you stand before him. But if you are one of God’s faithful people, these are comforting thoughts … though, at times, we are ashamed of how we think and act before God. Nothing I think, say, or do surprises God, yet he is still not ashamed to be my God, declaring his peace with me in Christ Jesus. He knows even the sinful thoughts, words, and deeds, and he provides forgiveness for all of them.God’s knowledge of me doesn’t make him push me away. Instead, he encloses me in front and back, putting his hand on me to shield and guide me (Ps 139:5).
Knowing my sin and my seeming insignificance within a vast world and long history of billions of people, God’s loving knowledge is too wonderful for me (Psa 139:6). It overwhelms me that he would take such great care.
God doesn’t know us from afar. He is imminent, close, no matter where we are.
There is no way we can flee his face. If we ascend to heaven, make our beds in the abode of the dead, or fly east forever, still his hand would guide and uphold us (Ps 139:8-10).The darkness is never too thick to hide us from God’s penetrating eye. The darkness is as light to him (Psa 139:11).
None of this is not meant to scare us but to comfort us. God is not always there, ready to destroy us. He is there to uphold us.
Each one of us is a wonder, a mighty act of God. He created our innermost parts—our kidneys—and knit us together in our mothers’ wombs (Psa 139:13). The phrase sometimes translated as “I am fearfully and wonderfully made” is more literally, “I am fearfully and wonderfully wondered” (Psa 139:14). When God works to deliver his people, he works signs and “wonders.” These are the mighty acts that he performs to crush his enemies and deliver his people. You and I are wonders. God made us with the utmost respect as an artist with his art. Each of us is, as we like to call it, “a miracle.” All God’s works are wonders, and we are works of God.
None of us was hidden even when we were in the darkness of our mothers’ wombs, which is described as “the depths of the earth” (Psa 139:15). God saw us, wrote down all of our parts in his book, and ordained all of our days. Your life and mine were specially ordained. You and I are not accidents, no matter how our conception occurred. God gives life.
For this reason, my life has purpose and meaning. Thoughts about God’s care for me are precious and are a source of joy (Psa 139:17).
There are people out there trying to destroy God’s wonders. The wicked hate God’s works. All that hate God love death. They seek to destroy life in all its forms.They hate God and rail against him, despising his image in themselves and others.Those who love God stand with God in counting them as enemies. We hate them with perfect hatred because they seek to destroy everything that is good, true, and beautiful (Psa 139:19-22).
The fact of God’s knowledge of us becomes a petition at the end for God to search us and know us, not for his own knowledge, but for ours (Psa 139:23-24). We want him to reveal to us what he knows, namely, our anxious thoughts, our fears … possibly our fears of being known.We want him to show us any hurtful ways in us and lead us in the way that leads to eternal life, which Jesus defines as knowing God the Father and God the Son (Jn 17:3).
Many Christians, especially Christians in the Reformed world, are scared of God knowing us. We are scared because we think God is like us or other people we know. We believe God will use his knowledge of us to beat us down, reject us, or put us to open shame in front of everyone else to exalt himself. That’s what we do in our hyper-critical attitudes. That’s what people we know do. Each of us is trying to hide our shame and trying to prove that we are better than the other guy because we think that will somehow deal with the shame of our guilt and deficiencies.
God doesn’t do this to us. When he exposes our sinful thoughts, words, deeds, and affections of our hearts, it is to correct us lovingly so that we can know him.
You are deeply loved and fully accepted by God in Christ Jesus. You are not an accident of history, a mere chance that God endures. You were specially knit together by God himself in your mother’s womb. Whatever others may think or do with their knowledge of you, the one who knows you best and could do you eternal damage doesn’t—quite the opposite. The one who knows you best loves you most, and accepts you fully in Christ Jesus. Receive this truth and live.
