Our Personal God

[0:00] It is an honor to be with you all here this morning to fill in for Jason, and hopefully I can do half as well as we look at God's word this morning.

[0:14] Psalm 139, to the choir master, a psalm of David. O Lord, you have searched me and known me. You know when I sit down and when I rise up.

[0:26] You discern my thoughts from afar. You search out my path and my lying down and are acquainted with all my ways. Even before a word is on my tongue, behold, O Lord, you know it all together.

[0:42] You hem me in behind and before and lay your hand upon me. Such knowledge is too wonderful for me. It is high.

[0:53] I cannot attain it. Where shall I go from your spirit? Or where shall I flee from your presence? If I ascend to heaven, you are there.

[1:05] If I make my bed in Sheol, you are there. If I take the wings of the morning and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea, even there your hand shall lead me and your right hand shall hold me.

[1:20] If I say, surely the darkness shall cover me and the light about me be night. Even the darkness is not dark to you. The night is bright as the day, for darkness is as light with you.

[1:34] For you formed my inward parts. You knitted me together in my mother's womb. I praise you, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made.

[1:46] Wonderful are your works. My soul knows it very well. My frame was not hidden from you. When I was being made in secret, intricately woven in the depths of the earth, your eyes saw my unformed substance.

[2:03] In your book were written, every one of them, the days that were formed for me, when as yet there were none of them. How precious to me are your thoughts, O God!

[2:17] How vast is the sum of them! If I could count them, there are more than the sand. I awake, and I am still with you. Oh, that you would slay the wicked, O God!

[2:31] O men of blood, depart from me! They speak against you with malicious intent. Your enemies take your name in vain. Do I not hate those who hate you, O Lord?

[2:44] And do I not loathe those who rise up against you? I hate them with complete hatred. I count them my enemies. Search me, O God, and know my heart.

[2:56] Try me and know my thoughts. See if there be any grievous way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting. The grass withers, the flower fades, but the word of the God is everlasting.

[3:13] You may be seated. My note, my bookmarks are falling out.

[3:34] There we go. A.W. Tozer, in his book, The Knowledge of the Holy, begins his book this way. What comes into our minds when we think about God is the most important thing about us.

[3:52] For this reason, the gravest question before the church is always God himself. And the most portentous or important fact of any man is not necessarily what at any given time he may say or do, but what deep in his heart he conceives God to be like.

[4:13] We tend by a secret law of the soul to move toward our mental image of God. So in other words, if I can paraphrase, our conception or our understanding of who God is will help to orient us in our daily walk, in how we worship, the direction of our families, and ultimately the direction of our church.

[4:40] So this morning, as we begin, how would you describe God? What's some of the first things to come to mind when you think of who God is?

[4:54] Is he loving? Merciful? Powerful? Maybe he's limited. Maybe he's angry. He's unfair.

[5:08] Is God intimate and personal to you today? This morning? Have you built trust with God? Have you built a relationship with him? Or perhaps where you are right now, he is distant.

[5:21] Maybe impersonal. Maybe he's a philosophical, abstract idea. Something you haven't grasped personally yet. Maybe most importantly is your description and understanding of who God is biblical and accurate.

[5:37] Well, wherever you are this morning, as we look at Psalm 139, I want each and every one of you to be able to walk out of here with a right understanding of who God is.

[5:51] If our conception of God is the most important thing about us, then I think it behooves us to ensure that we have a right understanding of God, to dive into the scriptures, to look at it.

[6:02] If you're here this morning, and maybe you don't even agree with the premise of what I just read, well then let me, hopefully this next 30 minutes, will help to persuade you that you really need to think about who God is.

[6:18] By seeing who God is, we must strive to align our perspective and our conception, lest we violate the second commandment, and we create an image of God in our own making.

[6:32] So Holy Spirit, I ask that you will open our eyes, our minds, our hearts, that we may have the same understanding of God that David the psalmist has.

[6:45] Before we begin and dive in, let us go before God in prayer. Oh God, your word is more precious than fine gold and sweeter than purest honey.

[6:57] As we turn to look to your scripture, send your Holy Spirit to infuse your word with truth and grace, so the good news of your personal love and care and provision would shine before us this morning and delight our senses, so that we cannot help but to respond with wonder, worship, faith, and trust.

[7:21] Lord, help me now to proclaim your truth so that we may know you better. In Christ's holy name, Amen. As we look at the scripture, as we look at Psalm 139, depending on how your Bible breaks it out, you may see that there are essentially four stanzas.

[7:39] Verses 1 through 6, 7 through 12, 13 through 18, and 19 through 24. Each of these stanzas are made up of the first four verses.

[7:51] David provides a theme for us. And then the last two verses of each stanza are a little couplet that emphasize or reinvigorate that theme.

[8:01] If you are here this morning taking notes, I have a little line or term for each of these stanzas.

[8:13] They all begin with the sound N, but as my young daughter is learning, not every word that starts with an N starts with an N. Sometimes we're going to start with a K. So the first stanza is God knows you.

[8:27] That's the one that starts with a K. The second stanza is God is near you. The third stanza, God knit you.

[8:39] God created you. And the fourth stanza, God is the nemesis of the wicked. Not a common word, but I'll explain that one as we get there.

[8:52] Join me and look with me there at the first stanza. God knows you. Oh Lord, you have searched me and known me.

[9:04] When I go to Google and I'm searching for something on the internet, it's not because I know what it is before I search for it, right? But this is not the idea of God searching us as if God does not know something about us.

[9:18] This term here is used for a thorough examination. God is examining us, is searching us intimately and deeply. And the idea of knowing here is knowing us at an intimate, deep, personal level.

[9:34] The word for Lord here is Yahweh, Almighty God, Lord of hosts, the Almighty Creator God knows you. What an amazing and sobering thought.

[9:49] And then David goes on to describe some of the ways that God knows us. Verse two, you know when I sit down and when I rise up. God knows everything the psalmist does. Whether resting, watching TV, reading a book, working, exercising, using your phone, eating a meal.

[10:06] God knows what you are doing. He discerns his thoughts from afar. Before we take any actions, God knows our invisible thoughts.

[10:18] And not just your thoughts, but the motivations for the actions you have. These are thoughts that flitter through our mind and are gone again. Sometimes these are embarrassing thoughts as we think about what God has seen in our minds.

[10:34] These are the deep, heartful longings and desires upon which we dwell and mull over our heart longs for. Nothing is hidden from God.

[10:47] Verse three, you search out my path and my lying down and are acquainted with all of my ways. The concept of path here has to do with the public areas.

[10:59] When we go out to the store, we're at work, God knows. The idea of lying down is privacy and the privacy of your own home. The four walls of your house do not block God's view from what is happening inside of your house.

[11:16] There is nowhere we can go that God does not know about. Now one thing that David did not have to deal with is smartphones or computers. But God knows where you go digitally just as much as physically.

[11:31] The Lord is intimately acquainted with all of our ways. Look at verse four, even before a word is on my tongue, behold, O Lord, you know it all together.

[11:47] The Lord knows what you're going to say before you even say it. And then the negative phrasing here that David uses is a poetic way of noting the emphasis.

[11:58] Even before a word is on my tongue. The Lord knows what I'm going to say in five minutes, even though I don't know exactly what I'm going to say yet. Hopefully based on my notes, I have a semblance of any idea of what I'm going to say.

[12:11] But I don't know what I'm going to say in five minutes. The Lord knows perfectly what will come out of my mouth. Though we might try to conceal what we're thinking from other people, God knows.

[12:27] And the totality and the completeness is emphasized in that final word of verse four, all together. You and I cannot deceive God.

[12:39] God knows who I am. God knows who you are. God knows who you are. To emphasize this, David in verse five continues, you hem me in behind and before and you lay your hand upon me.

[12:57] This idea of hemming in is to surround us. You and I cannot escape God's knowledge of us. He is behind us, scouting out before us. He's flanking on our left, guiding us on the right.

[13:10] Nothing is going to get past God to us without his knowledge. And under his watch, there is nothing we can ever do to outmaneuver or outsmart our Heavenly Father.

[13:25] Remember Jonah? What did Jonah try to do? He ran away from God's instruction to go and preach at Nineveh. He tried to go the direct opposite direction.

[13:39] Was there a point where God didn't know where Jonah was? No, of course not. God knew where Jonah was the entire time. He sent the storm to remind Jonah.

[13:51] And as they threw Jonah overboard in the midst of the sea, God provided a fish to swallow Jonah up to save him from drowning. It was the first recorded prayer meeting under the sea.

[14:05] The Lord's hand was there with Jonah to preserve and to protect and to guide despite Jonah's direct rebellion and disobedience.

[14:17] Similarly, the hand of God here in Psalm 139 is not a hand of oppression. It's a hand of care, of guidance, of provision and protection.

[14:29] I'm reminded of Jesus' reassurance. my father is greater than all and no one is able to snatch a single one of my sheep that hear the shepherd's voice out of my father's hands.

[14:43] John 10. There is no safer place to be than in the hands of the son and of almighty God. Now, before we look at verse 6, I want you to look down in your Bible and count the number of times that the words I and my are used while I get a sip of water.

[15:08] Would you have the number? Go ahead and shout it out. Go ahead. You have a number?

[15:25] Go ahead. I'm going to make this a little bit interactive. I don't know if Jason ever do this. How many I's and my's there, depending on your version of scripture there? I'm sorry, yeah, for verses 1 through 5.

[15:39] 1 through 5. I should have been more explicit. 8?

[15:58] Somebody's got 8? Anybody else have a different number? I've got 11 in my version of the ESV. I know, I have an older version of the ESV. 11 times in those first 5 verses, David uses the term my or I.

[16:16] What's the point of pointing this out? Couldn't David, the psalmist, have just said God knows everything? God is omniscient? He would have been correct, right?

[16:27] If he had just said God knows everything. But that's not what David chose to do. God's knowledge of us, God's knowledge of everything is not an abstract, theoretical construct.

[16:45] God's knowledge of you and I is deeply personal. It is experiential. Hence the title of my message this morning, our personal God.

[17:00] God knows my ins and outs, my likes, my dislikes, my habits, my hobbies, my weaknesses, my sins, my deepest desires and struggles.

[17:12] God knows everything about who I am. The false gods that were worshipped in the ancient Near East were not personal. those that didn't actually interact with people, with humans, were not caring, were not loving.

[17:32] In contrast, David, I think, is intentionally drawing a deep contrast in calling out the intimate, personal relationship that the Heavenly Father has with David.

[17:44] God is loving. He is caring. He wants to get to know us. And what is David's response to God knowing him, everything he does and says and thinks?

[17:58] Look there at verse six. Such knowledge is too wonderful for me. It is high. I cannot attain it. The psalmist here cries out and is praising God for his knowledge.

[18:12] At the same time, he is comforted and encouraged that God knows everything about him. Do you find God's intimate, personal knowledge of everything you say and do and think comforting?

[18:30] Or deep down, does it terrify us just a little bit, that God knows our deepest secrets? Dwell on that for now. We're going to circle back near the end here.

[18:44] So the first point is God knows you. The second stanza, God is near us. Look there at verse seven. Where should I go from your spirit? Or where shall I flee from your presence?

[18:56] These are purely rhetorical questions. The psalmist here is not necessarily trying to flee God, but rather it's a figure of speech. If I were to run away, where can I go?

[19:07] And he provides some examples. Verse eight, if I ascend to heaven, you are there. If I make my bed in Sheol, you are there. Whether I go to the skies, heavens, whether I go under the ground to the ground, Sheol, God is there.

[19:24] These are the vertical extremes of David's world then. Verse nine, if I take the wings of the morning and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea, again, the wings of the morning, the sun is rising in the east.

[19:37] Where Israel was to the west would have been the Mediterranean Sea, the extent of the known world at that time, dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea. Israel was not a great seafaring nation, so David's understanding of the sea would have been a little limited, but he understands that if he goes to the farthest extent of what David knows the world to be then, God will still be there.

[20:00] So the east or the west? And not just that God will be there, but God's hand is on him. Look at verse 10. Even there your hand shall still lead me, and your right hand shall hold me.

[20:16] This is the leading, protecting, shepherding, and caring hand of the Lord that harkens back to what I was just talking about in verse five. That David's like, ah, maybe darkness, maybe darkness can hide me.

[20:33] Verse 11. If I say, surely the darkness shall cover me, and the light about me at night, but even the darkness is not dark to you. The night is as bright as the day, for darkness is as light with you.

[20:49] It might be difficult for you and I to see in the dark, but the dark does not hide us from God. God can see in the dark just like we can see here this morning.

[21:01] He sees everything that happens under the cover of night. Thus, as we see David here, both God's omniscience, God's knowing everything, and his omnipresence, God being everywhere, both of these things are comforting and encouraging to David.

[21:25] All of us have various moments of our lives, walked through the valley of the shadow of death, whether oppression or opposition in this world, loneliness, despair, depression, poverty, want, abuse, neglect, whatever your life experience is, God has been with you, and God is with you today.

[21:50] even more importantly, for those of us in Christ here this morning, who are walking by faith and holding to Christ's death on the cross as the payment for a penalty for our sins, we have now the comforter, the Holy Spirit, who has sealed us and is dwelling within us this morning.

[22:11] Almighty God has taken up residence in you this morning. This is something that we have in the New Testament, the New Covenant, that David would not necessarily be experienced fully in the Old Covenant.

[22:26] I'm reminded of Romans 8. There is nothing, neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor rulers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all of creation will be able to separate you from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.

[22:46] What a comforting reminder that God's presence brings to us. You might know that God is near.

[22:58] You might agree, but you really live like God is near. You can, and you should.

[23:08] You should shout out to him, God is near you. This is what David wants us to understand about God. God knit you together.

[23:24] God created you. Look at verse 13 with me. For you, you being God, for you formed my inward parts. You knitted me together in my mother's womb.

[23:38] God formed your inward parts. If these first two points, these first two stanzas of Psalm 139 don't get this point across, David is going to get even more intimate and more personal in the third stanza.

[23:53] This word knitted is often used for tapestries. If you've ever seen a tapestry of all the threads woven together to form a beautiful picture, if you flip it around, what's it look like? Y'all ever seen that before?

[24:04] It's a mess, yeah. You look inside of us, it might look like a jumbled mess, but God has created and knitted us together. God has formed our genes, our DNA, our organs, our muscles, our sinews, our veins, skin, hair, in just the way he wanted.

[24:27] Nowadays say, there's probably something about us that we wish God had made a little bit different. But he made you just the way he wanted.

[24:40] He gave you personality. He gave you a temperament. He gave you certain skills. He gave you certain abilities.

[24:52] He gave you a unique laugh. He gave you unique fingerprints. All of this is unique to you. And the psalmist David here in verse 14, he can't help but just stop himself and just praise God for what he has done for David.

[25:08] I praise you for I am fearfully and wonderfully made. Wonderful are your works. My soul knows it very well. I have a brother who is a medical doctor and I have a brother-in-law now who has just graduated from medical school and every time we get together and discuss about the beauty and intricacies of the human body, I cannot fathom how other people in the world can look at the human body, the genomes, the DNA, the structure of the eye, how they believe that they have been formed by random mathematical chance that originated in a pool of water.

[25:50] I can't fathom it. I was going to list off some amazing facts of the human body but I was already running long so I'm going to mention one. The ability of the human body to heal itself is amazing if you think about it.

[26:05] from a little paper cut to a broken bone to viruses to disease God has created the human body to recuperate to heal itself.

[26:18] Just astounding. Everything about how our bodies point to a designer and a creator. David continues God's eyes saw our unformed substance.

[26:52] Even before we were God saw us. In your book were written every one of them the days that were formed for me when as yet there were none of them.

[27:10] God has been near you not just since you were born but he has been with you since you were in your mother's womb. If he goes further he knows all of your days that were already written down in his book the idea of a journal or a commentary before you existed for a single day God knew everything about you.

[27:37] No one else can see this book. No one not even yourself can ever change any part of what God has written. You cannot add a day you cannot subtract a day for God has already numbered your days.

[27:52] Everything that I do everything that you do God already knows. His knowledge is complete and perfect.

[28:05] Now I'd be remiss here if I didn't point out that this passage is one of the strongest evidences from the Bible in support of the personhood of the preborn. One of the common phrases that the world uses is that I can do whatever I want with my body.

[28:21] this assumes that the preborn is just a part of a woman's body. Based on the science we have today and the evidence of scriptures here this morning, especially some of the pronouns that David uses here, which clearly distinguishes his body, his preborn body, from his mother's body, we have a distinct and biblical evidence for the personhood of the preborn.

[28:48] We do well to understand why we protect the preborn. What is David's response to all this knowledge of what God has done to knit him together?

[29:02] Look there at verse 17. How precious to me are your thoughts, O God! How vast is the sum of them! If I could count them, they are more than the sand.

[29:14] I awake and I am still with you. This idea of precious is that they're worthy they're heavy. How many are God's thoughts?

[29:26] More than the sand. God's thoughts encompass our entire lives. He knows what is best for us, not today, not just tomorrow, not just next month, not in five years, but for eternity.

[29:44] Being able to retain this much information is unfathomable to me. Talking to the guys here first, let's be honest, you and I can barely have two or three thoughts at the same time, right?

[29:57] Ladies, maybe you can handle a hundred thoughts at the same time, but that is still well short of what our Heavenly Father can fathom all at the same time. He knows our thoughts.

[30:10] He knows the thoughts of everyone here this morning, including those who are daydreaming and not paying attention to me while I'm joining on up here. If you're daydreaming, God knows your thoughts.

[30:21] Come back, hear me out, listen to this. God personally knows you. God is personally near to you. God writing all the days of our lives point to a big truth of scripture that God is sovereign.

[30:42] This is a big word that means that God is powerful. He is in control of everything. This can be a comfort and a consolation to us because we know that nothing can happen to us that God already doesn't know.

[30:59] In plenty, in want, in health, in pain, in comfort, in suffering, we often want to know how our lives are going to turn out.

[31:10] What is the Lord doing? But David says here, I trust you, O Lord, for your thoughts are precious. They are worthy. You have written all the days of my life.

[31:23] I can't begin to fathom and count your knowledge. It is too wonderful for me. Now the matter of God's sovereignty is a heavy topic and we don't have the time or place this morning to dive in and fully unpack it, but one application that I do want us to consider this morning.

[31:41] It is not wise or fruitful for us to ever have to worry or be anxious about what's going to happen tomorrow. The Lord in the Gospels himself warns us not to be anxious for tomorrow, for our Heavenly Father knows all that you need.

[31:58] What does he say next? But seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things, food, clothing, housing, provision, will be added to you.

[32:09] We are to live by faith day in and day out. Our understanding, our grasp of God's provision and plan for us should strengthen our faith as the Lord works everything out for our good and his glory.

[32:29] Trusting in God should increase our love and affection for him and increase our passion and zeal for worshiping him. David is pretty clear in stanza four that not everyone acknowledges this God.

[32:47] This God that knows you, that is near you, that has knit you together. There are people, maybe even within the church, that conduct their lives as if God did not know them, as if God is not watching them, as if God did not know their very being.

[33:04] we see a rather jarring shift in David's tone and content, the vengeance of the Lord. Or as I put it, to keep my Baptist not alliteration consonants, no I should have looked that up, whatever, to keep the ends going, God is the nemesis of the wicked.

[33:28] The nemesis is retributive justice. A common definition might be arch enemy. A little more archaic definition that's not as common now, it's the agent of someone's downfall.

[33:43] God will bring vengeance and God is the nemesis of the wicked. Look at verses 19 with me. David shifts his tone and says, oh that you would slay the wicked, oh God, oh men of blood, depart from me.

[34:02] They speak against you with malicious intent. Your enemies take your name in vain. Do I not hate those who hate you, oh Lord? And do I not loathe those who rise up against you?

[34:14] I hate them with complete hatred. I count them my enemies. This is what's called an imprecatory prayer.

[34:26] This is David praying out to God, calling for God to show his vengeance, to bring his vengeance against the wicked. These are men that have blood on their hands.

[34:37] They're murderers. They deny God's very existence. They deny that God is present. They are blasphemers who speak against God. These are people that hate God.

[34:53] Maybe our first thought as we're reading Psalm 139 is where does this come from? this was a nice poetic psalm, uplifting, encouraging, and David turns around and is like, kill them God.

[35:09] I don't think it's completely out of left field though. For the first 18 verses of this chapter, David has been meditating on who God is. The immensity of God's knowledge, his care, his love, his sovereignty, have caused David to worship him, to esteem God, to wonder at how big and great he is.

[35:37] And when you and I love and appreciate God as much as David does here in Psalm 139, you and I ought to find anything that is against God to be revolting, despicable, something that needs to be opposed.

[35:55] men, wouldn't the love for your wife and your children cause hatred and justice to rise up, of someone to desire evil on them, going to the worst to defile them?

[36:12] Mothers, ladies, wouldn't your mother bear instincts kink in if somebody came after one of your little ones? You would hate the evil.

[36:23] evil. You would hate the evildoer because of the object of that evil, somebody you love, somebody you cherish. evil. I don't see David in Psalm 139 being any different, just the object is different.

[36:42] David's hatred is directed at those who oppose God, still evil. As I was preparing, I was listening to Alistair Begg preach on one Psalm 39, and I couldn't put it any differently, so I'm just going to quote him and paraphrase it to make it a little bit shorter.

[36:56] He puts it this way, David sees how evil evil is, but we often fail to. As a result of this, we are uncomfortable with God's justice and wrath.

[37:13] We fail to see how holy God is. A holy God cannot stand evil, evil, and he must punish evildoers.

[37:30] I'll posit that if you are uncomfortable with a passage like this this morning, maybe you don't fully understand God's wrath and justice against sin and evil. Maybe you're too comfortable with the evil that is around us.

[37:46] We must hate evil. We are often unsure what to do with this, but imprecatory prayers are not something that we just find in the Old Testament.

[37:58] Jesus himself references Psalm 69, another imprecatory prayer, multiple times. We see it in John 15 and Matthew 27. Jesus himself, before he goes to the cross in Matthew 23, has a series of curses, promising vengeance on those that oppose him.

[38:17] The apostle Paul also uses Psalm 69 in Romans 11. And maybe the most poignant language is what Paul says in Galatians 1, where he uses very strong language against those preaching another gospel.

[38:33] If anyone is preaching another different gospel, let them be accursed. That is damned. They are anathema. They are to be cut off. Is that the way you think about evil?

[38:48] Nearby to where Calvary Redeeming Grace meets, there is a so-called church, the so-called preacher, that twists the gospel into a message of hope, not based on Christ, but on an amalgamation, a syncretism of personal empowerment, of spiritual meditation.

[39:11] I must confess that almost every time I drive by this so-called church, I have prayed one of these imprecatory prayers against this church. I have asked God to stop the deception that is happening within the walls of this church, that they would close their doors and the blaspheming might stop.

[39:30] But while I can pray that God would surely show his justice against those who are twisting his words, preaching a false gospel, I can hate what they preach.

[39:40] I can speak out against it as I'm doing right now, but that doesn't necessarily mean that I am the means of meting out God's justice. I think it's important, as you pointed out here, that David himself in Psalm 139 is not the means of God's judgment.

[40:01] David is not talking about personal vengeance, this is divine vengeance. Instead, David is directing his prayer to God, he's asking God to direct and to display his justice on the wicked.

[40:15] This is justice that God has already promised to those that disobey the law and the prophets. He is calling for God to be vindicated against those who deny his omniscience.

[40:28] He is asking God to demonstrate his presence to those that deny that he exists. He wants God to demonstrate his power to those that deny his authority.

[40:42] I think in these verses, 19 through 22, David is aligning himself with God as he makes God's thoughts his thoughts. The psalmist wants to distance himself from the wicked and he calls for God to be his witness that he hates evil.

[40:58] This is essentially an oath of fealty, of loyalty to God. David's saying, these are the Lord's enemies. I loathe them.

[41:09] I rise up and stand up against them. I count them as enemies because they are God's enemies. What do we do to our enemies today?

[41:21] Jesus in Matthew 5 says we are to love our enemies and to do good to those who persecute us. We as Christians today are called to share the good news of the gospel.

[41:34] This is our mission. Vengeance is mine, God says. I will repay. So understanding and knowing that God is the nemesis of the wicked.

[41:49] What is David's response? Look there at verse 23. Search me, O God, and know my heart. Try me and know my thoughts.

[42:02] See if there be any grievous way in me and lead me in the way everlasting. I think David sees evil for what it is.

[42:13] He knows God is going to destroy the wicked. And David looks at himself and he cares for his own holiness. He turns to God and asks God to examine him so that God can then reveal what God knows to David so he can repent of that sin.

[42:33] He can confess it to God that he can stay in the way everlasting. In a wonderfully poetic way David is repeating essentially exactly how he started the psalm.

[42:47] O Lord you have searched me and know me. But rather than stating a fact as he does in verse 1 he calls out for God to do this again to search him to examine him.

[43:02] This is a posture of humility. The idea of try here is like a trial. Bring forth the evidence. Lay out the evidence.

[43:12] Let it be weighed. Is there any grievous way in me? Now while I was studying this one of my first thoughts was who is David to say something like this?

[43:26] David was not perfect. In fact David committed some grievous sins that I would guess many of us have not committed here this morning. He committed adultery with Bathsheba.

[43:39] He then tried to cover it up by murdering her husband. He isn't being overly self-righteous here I don't think. He's aware of what he's done.

[43:52] He knows his own heart. But despite all of this being laid bare before God including his deceit, his sins, his wickedness he can still say search me oh God.

[44:08] How? How can you do something like that knowing who you've done, knowing who you are? Because he knows that he's been forgiven and those sins have been covered, have been forgiven, have been atoned for by God.

[44:24] With his sins forgiven he can then confidently approach this all-knowing, all-present God. For the Lord is merciful and gracious, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness.

[44:39] May God's gracious kindness lead us to repentance and his grace assure us to trust him so that our joyful prayer may echo David's. Search me oh God.

[44:53] This is a bold prayer. I would encourage you if this is not a regular practice to make it a regular practice. But I would caution you that this is not something that should be done just to check off a box on your to-do list.

[45:08] God will reveal your hidden sins. We must be humble and concerned with our holiness. So the four stanzas God knows you.

[45:23] God is near you. God has knit you. God is the nemesis of the wicked.

[45:36] In conclusion this morning I want to return to that initial question I asked in the intro. How would you describe God this morning? Does your God resemble the God of Psalm 139?

[45:52] Referring back to Tozer, another quote, he says, a right conception of God is basic not only to systematic theology but to practical Christian living. Where our understanding of God is inadequate or out of plum, the whole structure must sooner or later collapse.

[46:12] God is so in other words if you and I fail to understand who God is, if we fail to live like God knows us intimately, if we fail to understand and to live like God is near us, if we fail to understand that God has knit us together, he knows every part of us, if we fail to understand that God is the nemesis of the wicked, we will fail in our day-to-day lives.

[46:38] As we look to honor God in our homes, our workplaces, school, gyms, church, wherever you go, is this your God?

[46:55] I love how Spurgeon put it in one of his sermons. We may judge as to our position before God by this test. Is the thought of his constant observation of us a subject of joy?

[47:08] or of dread? I'll say that again so I can not trip over my own words. Is the thought of his constant observation of us a subject of joy?

[47:20] Or of dread? If we dread it, surely we have the old spirit of bondage that is the law and sin still upon us. But if we find joy, if we rejoice in it, then we may know that we have received the spirit of adoption by which we can cry out, Abba, Father.

[47:44] If you're here this morning and you are not walking in faith of Christ's sacrifice on the cross, God's knowledge of everything you say, do, and think should terrify you.

[48:00] God sees everything you do and he will punish those who have sinned against him. The justice and wrath of God against those that oppose him is thorough and complete.

[48:16] I would implore you this morning to cry out to God for his mercy. Do not be among the wicked who will be slain by the Lord.

[48:29] The Lord himself has offered a way of escape. The Lord's kindness to you should drive each and every one of us to repentance. If you are unsure or would like to know more, I would love to talk to you more afterwards or anybody you've seen up front here this morning.

[48:46] Today is the day of salvation. Today is the day to know that you can live in comfort in God's ever-present. Christians, brothers and sisters, I want each of you here to walk out of here with confidence and comfort, knowing that God's knowledge and his presence in your life is not a means of dread, but of joy.

[49:16] David wrote this about a thousand years before Christ came. We can look back now, two thousand years later, and we can see Christ dying on the cross, appeasing God's wrath, making you a child of God, that you do not need to be afraid of the Father.

[49:38] God knows you. God is near you. God has knit you together, and those in Christ no longer need to live in fear, but we can walk in the way everlasting.

[49:52] God is God. Just let that sink in for a moment. He is a personal God who cares for you, who guides you, who protects you, because you are his adopted child.

[50:06] This understanding of God should cause us to delight in him, to worship him, to love him, to serve him, to live for him each and every day.

[50:18] is this your God? I hope so. May we always orient our knowledge of God according to how God describes himself in his word.

[50:31] May God's gracious kindness lead us to repentance, and his grace assure us to trust in him, so that our joyful prayer may echo David. Search me, oh God.

[50:42] Know my heart. Lead me in the way everlasting. You bow with me in prayer. Lord, you have searched and known me.

[50:55] You know who I am. You know what I do. You know where I go. You know what I think. You know what I'm going to say before I even say it. You are near me always, in the heavens, in death, east, west, in the midst of the darkest trials.

[51:16] Lord, you have formed my inward parts and knitted me together. Lord, before I have lived a single day, you had already written all my days in your book. Oh Lord, how majestic you are.

[51:30] How transcendent are your thoughts and your ways. How wonderful are your thoughts. Despite knowing who I am, Lord, you still care for me, for each one of us here this morning.

[51:43] Lord, may you bring peace and repentance to those here this morning who are wrestling with the dread of the terror of who you are, knowing that you see all.

[51:57] May you correct how we view who you are, that we may worship you well, that we may live our lives consistently, day in, day out, that you may be glorified.

[52:09] Lord, may we be a humble people that pray a bold prayer that you search us and know us intimately. May my attitudes, actions, motives, and thoughts be laid bare.

[52:21] May you lead me in the way everlasting. I pray all this in the glorious name of Jesus Christ. Amen.