Psalm 139
1 O Lord, you have searched me and known me.
2 You know when I sit and when I rise; you perceive my thoughts from afar.
3 You search out my path and my lying down and are acquainted with all my ways.
4 Even before a word is on my tongue, behold, O Lord, you know it altogether.
5 You hem me in, behind and before, and lay your hand upon me.
6 Such knowledge is too wonderful for me, too lofty for me to attain.
7 Where can I go from your Spirit? Where can I flee from your presence?
8 If I go up to the heavens, you are there; if I make my bed in the depths, you are there.
9 If I rise on the wings of the dawn, if I settle on the far side of the sea,
10 even there your hand will guide me, your right hand will hold me fast.
11 If I say, “Surely the darkness will hide me and the light become night around me,”
12 even the darkness will not be dark to you; the night will shine like the day, for darkness is as light to you.
13 For you formed my inward parts; you knitted me together in my mother’s womb.
14 I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; your works are wonderful, I know that full well.
15 My frame was not hidden from you, when I was made in the secret place, when I was woven together in the depths of the earth.
16 Your eyes saw my unformed body; all the days ordained for me were written in your book before one of them came to be.
17 How precious to me are your thoughts, O God! How vast is the sum of them!
18 Were I to count them, they would be more in number than the sand; when I awake, I am still with you.
19 Surely you will slay the wicked, O God; depart from me, you bloodthirsty men.
20 For they speak against you wickedly; your enemies take your name in vain.
21 Do I not hate those who hate you, O Lord, and abhor those who rise up against you?
22 I have a fierce hatred for them; I count them my enemies.
23 Search me, O God, and know my heart; test me and know my anxious thoughts,
24 and see if there be any offensive way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting.
Psalm 139 is a profound meditation on God's omniscience and omnipresence, expressing awe at God's intimate knowledge of the psalmist and the assurance of God's guidance and protection.
