“O LORD, thou hast searched me, and known me. Thou knowest my downsitting and mine uprising, thou understandest my thought afar off.”
The Truth
David does not begin this psalm with theology. He begins it with the discomfort of being fully known. Not known the way a friend knows your habits, but known the way only God can know, down to a thought forming before you have finished thinking it. There is nowhere in you he has not already seen.
Most of us manage other people’s view of us carefully. We show the parts that will be received well and quietly file the rest away. That strategy does not work with God. He is not assessing the version of you that you present. He already has the whole file, including the parts you have never said out loud to anyone.
This should terrify a man with something to hide from an angry God. It should comfort a man who has come to know that this same God is merciful and gracious. You are not fully known and merely tolerated. You are fully known and still wanted. That combination, full knowledge plus real love, is rarer than anything else you will find.
Stop performing for God today. He already knows. Bring him the thought you were about to edit, exactly as it is.
Live This Truth
- Name one thought or struggle you have been editing before you bring it to God.
- Bring it to him today exactly as it is, with no cleanup first.
- Sit for a moment in the truth that he already knew it and stayed.
Prayer
Lord, you already know what I was about to hide from you. Let me stop performing and simply come, fully known and still received. Search me, and let me not run from what you find. Amen.
Carry this today
Fully known, and still wanted.