God knows

He knows.  I know he knows.

At least I thought he knew.  My friend Ned has eyes that not only see you, but pierce you.  They don’t blink.  They don’t wander.  They cut through you and seem to examine your heart.  And so it was that when I met him my first thought was, “He knows everything about me.  I can’t hide anything from him.”

Of course, while Ned is perceptive, he is not all-knowing.  But there is One who is.

In one of the most well-known of his songs (Psalm 139), David reminds the singer and reader of God’s eternal presence and knowledge.  There is nothing God does not know.   He knows the insignificant events of life — the exact moment that I sit in my chair and when I arise again (v. 2a).  And He knows the most intimate intricacies of my life — my thoughts (v. 2b).  He knows the exact path I travel, no matter where I go (v. 3).  He knows every word I say — even before they are uttered (v. 4).  I can go nowhere to escape His presence — neither the farthest reaches of the universe, nor the greatest depths of the sea.  He is everywhere (vv. 7-8).  There is no time of day in which I escape His notice — neither the earliest moments of the morning, nor the latest parts of the night (vv. 9-12).

And why shouldn’t this be so?  After all, He made us.  Made us?  To say He simply made us is more of an understatement than saying Bill Gates is rich.  He designed us (v. 15).  He wove us together moment by moment while still in our mother’s wombs (v. 16).  He created the order for the events of our lives, even in eternity past (v. 16b).

To some this knowledge is startling, even stifling.  Not to the psalmist.  “How precious also are Your thoughts to me, O God!  How vast is the sum of them!” (v. 17).  The awareness of God’s knowledge of us is nothing to be feared, but something to be embraced.  It is not a burden, but a joy.  Because He knows my thoughts, because He is with me, because He watches over me, because He created me (for His glory), I am secure that He loves me.