“A searching examination”
By Rev. Michael Stonhouse
Meditation – Sunday, January 14, 2024
Psalm 139:1-6,13-18 (Forward, p. 77) CEV p. 640
It is simply amazing what modern medical diagnostic tools can now do. In addition to what might now be labeled as ‘routine’ measures, such as X rays, we now have cat-scans, electrocardiograms (ECGs) and magnetic resonance imaging (MRIs). But even these have their limits. When my father was finally diagnosed as having final stages of pancreatic cancer, I was told that the location of the pancreas, shielded as it is by other organs, made it impossible to examine by remote means.
It is here that God has no such disadvantage. His knowledge of us, and His examination of us, is not quite so limited. In fact, it extends far beyond any such physical factors. As today’s psalm details, He our thoughts and our words before we even get around to speaking them, and in fact, knows our hearts, our inmost desires and intentions. And so, there is no hiding from God, and no use in trying to dissemble them. (I so love the language of the old 1959 BCP Morning and Evening Prayer services where we are advised not to dissemble or cloak our manifold sins and wickedness before the face of Almighty God our heavenly Father—see pp. 4, 18).
And it isn’t just a matter of what we are like in this present moment. He also knows our pasts and our futures. There is nothing, nothing at all, that is hidden from Him.
All of this could easily be taken as invasive and even as frightening, which is quite natural if there are things that we would prefer to keep hidden—even if this is impossible with God. But let us look at it in a different light, namely, as a kind of spiritual diagnostic tool, a method by which God can pinpoint where there is a spiritual problem in our lives and then help us to deal with it. Taken this way, it then becomes something entirely beneficial and helpful to our lives, something that is infinitely good for us. Let us then see it, treat it, in this light. Thanks be to God that this is even possible.
Forward notes: “Indeed, there is not a word on my lips, but you, O Lord, know it altogether” (verse 3).
“I have a terrible habit I am trying to change. Sometimes when I feel doubt or uncertainty, I say unkind words to myself. These depreciating words are
almost on autopilot for me—even uncontrollable at times, like a nervous twitch.
“I have learned over the years that when those words escape my lips, I must stop and reverse their effects by saying new words: ones that affirm and comfort and remind me who I am and whose I am. This psalm is filled with such words. It is a litany of wonderful reversals, a praise song for the magnificent creations that we all are. The psalm is a beautiful enumeration of the many ways God knows us inside and out and an incantation to remind us of our inescapable God. No matter where we go, God is always with us and knows us completely. We are fearfully and wonderfully made by God.”
Moving Forward: “Do you unleash verbal abuse on yourself? Read this psalm as a tool to curb such criticism.”