Skylight Photo by BeckyI read Psalm 139 this morning. I knew it would jar against my feelings. Maybe I was just hoping for something strong enough to jar me all the way out of them. No such luck…not that I believe in luck.
My night was full of the kind of dreams that jut out from awake thoughts to highways and byways in my imagination, taking the scenic route to confusion. My eyes opened to a too-warm, stuffy sunlit room and my spirit felt a sense of kinship with the cider vinegar that’s been sitting a little too long in my pantry. Matt kissed me goodbye and I lay there curled up wishing Alice’s wand would work just this once. I wasn’t asking for much--just a cup of coffee with 3 teaspoons of sugar and a good amount of cream. (Yes, now that you mention it, it does taste like candy.)
Since Alice was busy I got my own coffee, grabbed my Bible, and headed back to the bed. Not that I had great expectations, but what else is there when you feel like vinegar? I decided on Psalm 139. I was giving God an opportunity to show up in a gloriously divine manifestation. One of those windows which seem to open up in your soul from heaven through the written Word and God brings the words of a passage to life as if to say, “I’m speaking this directly to the deepest part of your soul and I want you to know that I mean it for you.” And despite all your hurts and doubts you believe it not because you want to but because the peace and purity of spiritual light that you experience persuades you to put all your questions to rest and just enter into the grace of the moment.
But not today.
You hem me in behind and before, you have laid your hand upon me.
Funny how when you don’t exactly trust God His constant presence isn’t necessarily a comfort. Ok, so it’s not funny. And it’s not that I don’t trust God. I do, in the transcendent sort of way. You know what I mean--He is worthy of my trust because He can’t lie, He can’t deceive, He is always good, always love, and always sovereign. So what’s not to trust? Well despite the fact that all that is true of God because it transcends all that I can see or understand or know…I’m still left with what I can or can’t see and feel, understand and know. Right now it doesn’t feel like God is honest, or good, or loving, or sovereign. And I don’t feel like I can trust Him. And that is the truth.
So I feel like I’m hemmed in by a God I don’t really like, that I can’t really trust, and I can’t get away from.
So what’s a girl to do? There only seem to be two directions when it comes to God--toward or away from. Yet, if Psalm 139 is true, than away from isn’t really possible either. It’s actually denial. So I decided it is more in line with reality to try to sit toward God and read His Words that don’t feel true and acknowledge that somehow they are true in some transcendent way even though His manifestation in my life seem at odds with that conclusion. Feels like old vinegar.
Dear God, could you send me a spiritual compass…so I would know exactly which way toward You is? And somehow, could You take all of Your transcendent, holy, faithful, love and manifest it in my life in a way that I could see it, feel it, understand it, know it ,and trust it? It seems like such a little thing for a God as big as You. It’s not like I’m not tryin’ here. After all, I did get my own coffee.
(That last line’ll come back at me when I hit verse 24.)
My night was full of the kind of dreams that jut out from awake thoughts to highways and byways in my imagination, taking the scenic route to confusion. My eyes opened to a too-warm, stuffy sunlit room and my spirit felt a sense of kinship with the cider vinegar that’s been sitting a little too long in my pantry. Matt kissed me goodbye and I lay there curled up wishing Alice’s wand would work just this once. I wasn’t asking for much--just a cup of coffee with 3 teaspoons of sugar and a good amount of cream. (Yes, now that you mention it, it does taste like candy.)
Since Alice was busy I got my own coffee, grabbed my Bible, and headed back to the bed. Not that I had great expectations, but what else is there when you feel like vinegar? I decided on Psalm 139. I was giving God an opportunity to show up in a gloriously divine manifestation. One of those windows which seem to open up in your soul from heaven through the written Word and God brings the words of a passage to life as if to say, “I’m speaking this directly to the deepest part of your soul and I want you to know that I mean it for you.” And despite all your hurts and doubts you believe it not because you want to but because the peace and purity of spiritual light that you experience persuades you to put all your questions to rest and just enter into the grace of the moment.
But not today.
You hem me in behind and before, you have laid your hand upon me.
Funny how when you don’t exactly trust God His constant presence isn’t necessarily a comfort. Ok, so it’s not funny. And it’s not that I don’t trust God. I do, in the transcendent sort of way. You know what I mean--He is worthy of my trust because He can’t lie, He can’t deceive, He is always good, always love, and always sovereign. So what’s not to trust? Well despite the fact that all that is true of God because it transcends all that I can see or understand or know…I’m still left with what I can or can’t see and feel, understand and know. Right now it doesn’t feel like God is honest, or good, or loving, or sovereign. And I don’t feel like I can trust Him. And that is the truth.
So I feel like I’m hemmed in by a God I don’t really like, that I can’t really trust, and I can’t get away from.
So what’s a girl to do? There only seem to be two directions when it comes to God--toward or away from. Yet, if Psalm 139 is true, than away from isn’t really possible either. It’s actually denial. So I decided it is more in line with reality to try to sit toward God and read His Words that don’t feel true and acknowledge that somehow they are true in some transcendent way even though His manifestation in my life seem at odds with that conclusion. Feels like old vinegar.
Dear God, could you send me a spiritual compass…so I would know exactly which way toward You is? And somehow, could You take all of Your transcendent, holy, faithful, love and manifest it in my life in a way that I could see it, feel it, understand it, know it ,and trust it? It seems like such a little thing for a God as big as You. It’s not like I’m not tryin’ here. After all, I did get my own coffee.
(That last line’ll come back at me when I hit verse 24.)
Psalm 139
For the director of music. Of David. A psalm.
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.
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 created my inmost being; you knit 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 outnumber the grains of sand. When I awake, I am still with you.
19 If only you would slay the wicked, O God! Away from me, you bloodthirsty men!
20 They speak of you with evil intent; your adversaries misuse your name.
21 Do I not hate those who hate you, O LORD, and abhor those who rise up against you?
22 I have nothing but 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 See if there is any offensive way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting.
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