Known by Him
TCF Sermon
May 20, 2007
Let’s start with a little quiz this morning. First, some historical facts.
Who’s buried in Grant’s tomb? Ulysses Grant
Which country makes Panama hats? Ecuador
In which month do Russians celebrate the October Revolution?
November. The Russian calendar used to be 13 days behind ours.
How long did the Hundred Years War last?
116 years, from 1337 to 1453.
From which animal do we get catgut?
From cows and sheep and horses
What is a camel’s-hair brush made of?
Squirrel fur
Where are Chinese gooseberries from?
New Zealand
Of course, anyone can learn facts like these. And the things we think we know, we sometimes really don’t know that well. But how about more intimate knowledge, not of history, but of individuals?
How well do you know your elders? Let’s start with Jim Grinnell. Who knows his middle name? (Wallace) How many of you knew that Jim was a milkman in his younger years?
How about Dave Troutman? Who knows what Dave’s undergraduate degree is in? (Art) Which religion was Gordon a part of before he came to Christ? (Hindu) How many of you knew that Joel Vesanen was a professional bus driver?
How many of you know which north African country Bruce Clutter lived in as a boy? (Libya)
In what city did Jim Garrett go to seminary? (Cincinnati)
Our knowledge is limited. We do know a lot, because we’re for the most part well-educated. And when we’ve spent time with people, we get to know them personally as well.
But we serve a God whose knowledge of us is completely different, and much greater, than our knowledge of facts, of history, or even of people we know well. Our great God is what we call omniscient. What that means is that He knows everything. He’s the original know-it-all. He’s the only true know-it-all. But He doesn’t just know facts. If He did, He’d be a lot like us. We could say that He could learn. God’s omniscience goes well beyond the relatively simple ability we have to see or hear or read something, and later recall it. Some of us are better at this than others.
But God can know some things that we cannot know. Turn with me to Psalm 139. This is one of the fullest expositions of God’s omniscience in scripture. It’s far from the only one, but it’s a wonderful meditation for us on what God knows, and not just in a general knowledge sense, but what He knows about each of us, each one of us as individuals.
This Psalm represents the peak of the Psalter, the (most mature) individual faith in the Old Testament and the clearest anticipation of the New. All the marks of intimate friendship – detailed knowledge, reading of minds, a hand on the shoulder to encourage or check – are here ascribed to God. His companionship is unbroken. source: Baker Commentary on the Bible
The Psalm starts with a look at God’s omniscience, goes on to explore His omnipresence, that is, God’s presence everywhere, and then His omnipotence, the fact that God is all-powerful. David, the psalmist here, asks God to examine him thoroughly to affirm his innocence. The first part, which we’ll focus on this morning, in the first six verses, is about God’s knowledge.
David recognizes that every aspect of his life was searched out and controlled by what the Lord knew. David then recognizes that he could not escape such omniscient control because of God’s omnipresence.
God has such control over David, because in His power, that is, God’s omnipotence, He created David, and planned his life in amazing, complete, detail.
Psalms 139:1-6 (NIV) 1 O LORD, you have searched me and you know me. 2 You know when I sit and when I rise; you perceive my thoughts from afar. 3 You discern my going out and my lying down; you are familiar with all my ways. 4 Before a word is on my tongue you know it completely, O LORD. 5 You hem me in--behind and before; you have laid your hand upon me. 6 Such knowledge is too wonderful for me, too lofty for me to attain.
As we read these first six verses of Psalm 139, we can see clearly that God’s knowledge is so much above and beyond what we can imagine or understand fully ourselves. That’s what David noted in verse 6, when he wrote “such knowledge is too wonderful for me, too lofty for me to attain.”
He didn’t mean wonderful here, in the sense we often use it. We say wonderful, and we mean something’s really good – it’s tremendous. David means “full of wonder.” He means “Wow!”
To be aware that (God) knows everything about the psalmist is knowledge that surpasses his comprehension, and even his imagination source: KJV Bible Commentary
That’s why he goes on to say that it’s too much for him to take in…too lofty for him to attain. God’s knowledge is so full of awe and wonder that we cannot fully grasp it.
Think about what it would be like for someone to have that kind of knowledge, to know absolutely everything about you. Would that be unnerving? Kind of scary? Would you think that’s a good thing or a bad thing? I’m talking about you having absolutely no secrets at all? With this person, there’s nothing that’s just in your mind, just in your heart. Nothing that you do while you’re alone that this person doesn’t know. That’s what David was recognizing here.
There are things about each one of us we’d rather people not know. Some things are embarrassing at best, or shameful at worst. How about those words that slipped out…or those thoughts we had…how about those things we’re sorry about and even ashamed of? We can probably all think of things we’ve said that we’ve regretted. Wouldn’t it be nice, knowing that God knows in advance the things we’re going to say, if He sent us an email, and said, “Bill, at 10:45 a.m. Thursday, you’re going to say something really stupid. Don’t do it. Use a gag in your mouth if you have to.”
Of course, now I should probably expect an email from Jim Grinnell signed as if it was from God, saying, “Bill, at our next elders meeting when we’re talking about such and such, keep your mouth shut.”
It reminds me of the Lord of the Rings, and the all-seeing eye of Sauron. Remember, that huge, flaming eye that seemed to see almost everything. It acted sort of like a searchlight. But, it also seemed you could hide from that eye if you were careful. That’s a big difference between the fictional all-seeing eye of Sauron, and the all-seeing eye of God.
Of course, if it was just what God could see, if He had physical eyes like us, we’d at least have the privacy of our own thoughts. But David tells us we don’t. And other scriptures affirm this truth. When we say God knows everything, it’s not just everything He can see or hear. It’s everything we think and feel.
Psalms 44:21 (NIV) … he knows the secrets of the heart
1 Kings 8:39 (NIV) for you alone know the hearts of all men…
1 Chronicles 28:9 (NIV) the LORD searches every heart and understands every motive behind the thoughts
John 21:17 (NIV) "Lord, you know all things”
Hebrews 4:13 (NIV) 13 Nothing in all creation is hidden from God’s sight. Everything is uncovered and laid bare before the eyes of him to whom we must give account.
David points out in this Psalm that God knew him so well, it’s as if God scoured every part of his life, as if he sifted through all the details of his thinking and his attitudes to know everything there is to know about David. The word searched in Hebrew originally meant to dig. It’s as if God digs through all our thoughts to truly know us.
The Lord knew every move he made; the two opposites of sitting and rising represent all his actions (this is a figure of speech). God knew not only David’s actions; He also knew his motivations. Afar evidently refers not to space but to time. The daily activities of the psalmist were also thoroughly familiar to the Lord. The opposites of going out in the morning and lying down at night represent the whole day’s activities (another figure of speech). But the one sample that epitomizes God’s omniscience is in verse 4. Before the psalmist could frame a word on his tongue, the LORD was thoroughly familiar with what he was about to say. source:Bible Knowledge Commentary
Now, we don’t even always know what we’re going to say before we say it, do we? Sometimes we do, but sometimes we don’t. However, God does know. He has searched us. He knows us. David made this very intimate. He didn’t say what I just said, in a generic sense – He knows us. He said, God, you know me.
There are other places in scripture where it affirms God’s knowledge of global events, of human history. But here, it’s the individual life. Your life, my life. Your mind, my mind. Your heart. My heart.
It’s not just that God knows everything. We sometimes say that God is omniscient, and by that we mean that God knows everything there is to know. And that’s certainly true. You can read in Job 38-39, where God says to Job, "Do you know how the foundations of the earth were laid and do you know how the sun sits in the sky and do you know how this happens and that happens?" The answer that Job gives is obviously, "No." And the implication is that God does know all that. He knows everything. But that’s not David’s point here. His point is not that God knows all the mysteries of history and the riddles of the universe. Rather, David’s point is that God knows me. Source:Alan Smith
It’s estimated there will be 6.6 billion people in the world this year. But God is just as intimately acquainted with you and me as He is with the child in the African jungle, the old woman in Iraq, the young man in China. What an amazing thought! No wonder David said this idea is too full of wonder for him to fully grasp. God knows our thoughts. Every one of them. Before we even think these thoughts ourselves. That’s not only an idea that brings us wonder, but is also a bit scary if you think about it. What this means is that we can’t get away with anything.
Verse 2 says “you perceive my thoughts from afar.”
Verse 3 says “you are familiar with all my ways.”
Verse 4 says “Before a word is on my tongue you know it completely, O LORD.”
Have you ever had the kind of close relationship with someone, that it seems they know what you’re going to say before you even say it? That can be the most annoying, or sometimes the most beautiful, thing about a long marriage, or a longtime friendship.
My wife Barb knows me. She knows my demeanor. She can tell if I’m in a good mood or a bad mood. After being married almost 29 years, she often knows what I’m going to say before I say it. Even if we’re not usually fairly predictable, we are, after being with someone that long.
But with God, this knowledge is so much greater. Barb may be able to complete a sentence for me sometimes, but God always knows what I’m going to say before I say it. God knows everything about us. Barb just knows a lot about me. She certainly knows me more fully and completely than anyone on earth, but her knowledge of me pales in comparison to our great God.
God knows everything you’ve ever thought about. Think about that for a moment. God knows that you just thought about that.
Jesus said in Matthew 10:30 that the very hairs of your head are numbered. That’s an amazing thought. Of course, it’s more amazing for some of us than for others.
But the idea isn’t that God concerns Himself with mental trivia. You’d sure hate to play Trivial Pursuit with God. It’s just that God knows everything. Everything about you and me. Everything you do. Everything you think. What I do in private, what I do in public. Sometimes that means He might know more about me than I want to Him to know.
You may have heard the phrase: “Character is what you have when no one’s watching.”
This Psalm tells us that there’s never a time when no one is watching. There may be times when you’re totally alone – that is, there are no other people with you. But there’s never a time when God is not there with you, knowing your every thought, witnessing your every deed.
In 1 Corinthians 4:5, Paul wrote that the Lord: “will both bring to light the hidden things of darkness, and reveal the counsels of the heart.”
If we’re not living in a right relationship with the Lord, that’s a truly frightening thought. Today, God knows your thoughts and sees all you say and do. But on judgment day, these secrets will no longer be secrets. We can’t hope that God just happened to not be paying attention one day. We can’t hope that God will be surprised by anything we’ve ever thought or done, that He’ll learn something and say, “Oh really!”
But, it’s not all scary. We noted a moment ago how well Barb knows me. Of course, that doesn’t just include knowing how I think, or being able to complete my thoughts sometimes, because she knows me so well. It also means she knows the worst things about me. She’s seen my bad attitudes. She’s seen my shortcomings. But she loves me. She’s committed to me.
And perhaps that’s where the (grace) comes (in). You’ve got this whole psalm where (we read), "God, I can’t get away from you. You’re searching, looking, digging." And then at the end you beg him to search a little more, beg him to test you, to see if there’s anything not pleasing. You say, “God, find out those thoughts that carry me away from fellowship with you. Show them to me so that I can understand them and their effect on my walk with you.” I just don’t think you’d say that to somebody who you didn’t know loved you. "Search me and know my heart" could only be spoken by someone who feels completely loved and accepted. These words could only be spoken to someone who unconditionally loves the person he is watching. He sees every square inch of my life – and still he loves me. He knows my successes and my failures; he sees my strengths and my weaknesses; he understands how holy and unholy I can be. And even though he expects me to bring my life closer and closer to what he would like for me to be, he never
withholds his love. source: Alan Smith
So, I think the knowledge that God knows us this well should be sobering and thought-provoking, even to believers. Yet, I think to those who aren’t devoted followers of Christ, this probably should be a scary thought.
But for those of us who long to be made into the image and likeness of Christ, we should welcome this intimate knowledge of us by God. Why?
We want to change. We want God to deal with us. We want to be absolutely open and honest before Him, because we recognize that He knows about our sin, our failures, our attitudes anyway – so why not be open and honest?
And we also know He loves us, and wants to work in our hearts, in our spirits, to make us more like Jesus. Being a wholehearted follower of Jesus means we willingly expose ourselves to God’s searching. And it means we welcome the insight he gives us about ourselves, because we have a desire to be like Jesus.
Think for a moment what makes you feel loved? What is it about how people who love you that makes you feel their love is genuine, that they are for you? The circumstances may be different for you than they are for me, but I think there are a couple of things that are often common.
One thing is that we were known. We feel loved by people who know us – Not just facts about us, but they know us more intimately. They know us more deeply than others. The other thing is that these people, whose love we feel confident in, accept us. And these two things go together. Because if someone knows you, the good, the bad and the ugly, but doesn’t accept you, you don’t feel loved by them.
And if someone accepts you, but doesn’t really know you, you don’t feel truly loved by them, because you realize they don’t really know this person they claim to love. When someone knows a lot about you and chooses to love you, and remain committed to you in spite of the bad things they know, along with the good, you feel truly loved.
So, for love to be true, to be complete, we need to be known by someone, and accepted. Both need to be present for us to feel loved.
To be accepted without being known is shallow. To be known but not accepted is terrifying. Complete love must have both. source:Brian Bill
Here’s another interesting thought about this passage. Verse 5 says: You hem me in--behind and before; you have laid your hand upon me. You know what that makes me think of? You parents remember when your children were just learning to walk. They were really unsteady, and you constantly worried that they’d fall, and hit the corner of the coffee table, or worse yet, the fireplace. So you would often hover around them as they took those first steps. You’d walk close to them, with your hand on their back or near their sides, so you’d catch them if they fell.
I believe, in some ways, this is what God is like with us. His constant presence hems us in, and is ready to keep us from hurting ourselves. His complete knowledge of each of us is protective in ways we can see, and in ways we often cannot see. But whether we can see it or not, scripture affirms it’s true.
I’m guessing that most of us basically understand this truth about God – this truth that He knows all and sees all. We’ve learned it since we were little. But many of us also live as if it’s not true. We may know and understand that God knows our hearts and our thoughts, but in the day-to-day of life, we live as if we can keep secrets from God.
Since God sees and knows everything…everything I do, I say, I think, then what does that mean to me? For one, He can encourage and equip me to do what’s right, to say what’s right, to think what’s right. He can and does use this knowledge to accomplish His purposes in us, to mold us and shape us into the image and likeness of Christ.
1 Corinthians 10:13 (NIV) 13 No temptation has seized you except what is common to man. And God is faithful; he will not let you be tempted beyond what you can bear. But when you are tempted, he will also provide a way out so that you can stand up under it.
Especially with our understanding of what God knows and when He knows it, this is a very encouraging passage of scripture. God knows in advance what trials and temptations we will encounter. He promises here, in His faithfulness, to provide us a way out of temptation. He sees and understands the struggles going on in each of our minds. He sees these things coming before we do, and He’s already prepared an escape from temptation, as well as strength to stand strong under trial.
What’s more, because we know that God knows us intimately, it should also be a motivation for us to stand strong in Him. I don’t want to sin when He’s watching me. And remembering that He’s always watching me, I don’t ever want to sin. When you know a cop is on the highway with a radar detector, that’s not the time you want to push the speed limit, is it?
So, even though being known so intimately by the Creator of the Universe could indeed be a frightening thing, the thing that makes it wonderful instead of scary is the love and mercy of God. It should cause us to seek Him, to draw on the resources that only the Holy Spirit can give, to remember His presence with us moment by moment.
Let this knowledge today be a motivation for us rather than a frightening thing. Let this understanding of God’s total knowledge of us, combined with the understanding of His great love for us, be a part of His working in us to make us holy, that we, as it says in Hebrews 12:10, “may share in His holiness.”
Pray
