When I think about Psalms & the Desire for fulfillment, the desire for God, one of the first Psalms to come to mind is #139: “O Lord, you search me and you know me.”
One of the problems of being human, I find, is that frequently I experience what I would call an existential loneliness. I am aware that I am awake and alone in a beautiful but seemingly uncaring universe. I know that the first “and great” commandment is to love God with all my heart, soul, mind, and strength; I try and nothing seems to happen or make a difference. My interior seems like a desert waste needing water. As in Psalm 130 I find myself in the depths, close to despair, in an abyss of that existential loneliness. Sometimes my capacity for feeling sorry for myself seems to know no bounds. Then again there is Psalm 139 to provide the reverse perspective, in a sense seeing myself from God’s perspective, which is not necessarily always a good thing, it turns out, and might in fact be downright scary.
First the Psalmist, speaking for himself and for me, defines the intimacy involved in his relationship with God. God knows him thoroughly, the most telling line for me being: “For it was you who formed my inmost being, knit me together in my mother’s womb.” That sense of individuality I have was given to me; from my beginning God made me to be who I am and in that sense I was never alone. I couldn’t escape from the presence of God if I wanted to. Suddenly this divine intimacy is overwhelming. On the one hand I desire to see the Face of God; on the other hand seeing the Face of the God who is goodness itself might be terrifying for God knows that I may try to be good but that I am always missing the mark (hamartia).
Yet the knowledge of this divine intimacy is finally a rich and wonderful thing, something for which we owe God thanks and praise.
It is interesting that the Psalmist’s full realization of his relationship with God and the wonder of God turns him to desire God to slay the wicked Who betray the very nature of the divine goodness that ought to stand at the center of their lives. When I look at the movement of this Psalm, the parts become clear.
Verses1–6: the divine knowledge of the self ( from “You search me…”)
Verses 7–12: the impossibility of escape from the divine presence, the realization
Verses 13–16: God as creator and maker of the self
Verses 17–18: the wonder of God
Verses 19–22: the excoriation of the wicked in relation to the goodness and wonder of God
Verses 23–24: the appeal to God to maintain the relationship, the knowledge, and the goodness of the speaker in the sense in which he began the Psalm; in a sense we have come full circle. ( to “Search me”)
Psalm 139 (138) 1 For the Choirmaster. Of David. A Psalm.
O LORD, you search me and you know me.
2 You yourself know my resting and my rising; you discern my thoughts from afar.
3 You mark when I walk or lie down; you know all my ways through and through.
4 Before ever a word is on my tongue, you know it, O LORD, through and through.
5 Behind and before, you besiege me, your hand ever laid upon me.
6 Too wonderful for me, this knowledge; too high, beyond my reach.
7 O where can I go from your spirit, or where can I flee from your face?
8 If I climb the heavens, you are there. If I lie in the grave, you are there.
9 If I take the wings of the dawn or dwell at the sea’s furthest end,
10 even there your hand would lead me; your right hand would hold me fast.
11 If I say, “Let the darkness hide me and the light around me be night,”
12 even darkness is not dark to you, the night shall be as bright as day, and darkness the same as the light.
13 For it was you who formed my inmost being, knit me together in my mother’s womb.
14 I thank you who wonderfully made me; how wonderful are your works, which my soul knows well!
15 My frame was not hidden from you, when I was being fashioned in secret and molded in the depths of the earth.
16 Your eyes saw me yet unformed; and all days are recorded in your book, formed before one of them came into being.
17 To me how precious your thoughts, O God; how great is the sum of them!
18 If I count them, they are more than the sand; at the end I am still at your side.
19 O God, that you would slay the wicked, that men of blood would depart from me!
20 With deceit they rebel against you, and set your designs at naught.
21 Do I not hate those who hate you, abhor those who rise against you?
22 I hate them with a perfect hate, and they are foes to me.
23 O search me, God, and know my heart. O test me, and know my thoughts.
24 See that my path is not wicked, and lead me in the way everlasting.
From the Revised Grail Psalms
