Known, Enclosed, and Overwhelmed Text: Psalm 139:1-6
Introduction: Privacy is a Pagan Lie
We live in an age that is schizophrenic about being known. On the one hand, our entire culture is a vast, desperate project of self-revelation. Men and women meticulously curate their lives on social media, broadcasting their meals, their vacations, their fleeting opinions, and their emotional states to anyone who will look. They crave to be seen, to be noticed, to be validated. Yet, on the other hand, this same generation is terrified of true exposure. They demand privacy. They encrypt their messages, cover their webcams, and rage against the surveillance state and the corporate data miners. They want to be known, but only on their own terms. They want to be the authors of their own story, the editors of their own lives, carefully presenting the flattering parts while hiding the shameful bits in the dark.
This desire for selective, curated exposure is nothing new. It is the ancient religion of Adam, hiding in the bushes, stitching together his fig leaves. It is the religion of Cain, who believed he could commit murder in a field and then walk away as though God were a local deity, confined to a particular jurisdiction. The modern man believes that if he can just get enough encryption, enough anonymity, enough legal protection, he can carve out a little space of darkness for himself where he is sovereign, where no one sees, and therefore, where no one can judge.
Into this frantic and contradictory mess, Psalm 139 strides like a giant. This Psalm is a hymn to the omniscience and omnipresence of God, and for the modern rebel, it is a horror story. But for the child of God, it is the deepest comfort imaginable. This psalm teaches us that the concept of ultimate privacy is a pagan lie. There are no hidden places. There are no encrypted thoughts. There is no corner of the universe where the writ of God does not run. You are utterly, completely, and exhaustively known. And the great question the psalm places before us is this: does that fact crush you with terror, or does it fill you with overwhelming wonder?
David, a man well acquainted with sin and failure, a man with blood on his hands and adultery in his past, does not find this truth terrifying. He finds it wonderful. He is not trying to escape this all-knowing God. He is reveling in Him. And in these first six verses, he lays the foundation for this worship by describing the sheer, unblinking totality of God's knowledge of him.
The Text
O Yahweh, You have searched me and known me.
You know when I sit down and when I rise up; You understand my thought from afar.
You scrutinize my path and my lying down, And are intimately acquainted with all my ways.
Even before there is a word on my tongue, Behold, O Yahweh, You know it all.
You have enclosed me behind and before, And You have put Your hand upon me.
Such knowledge is too wonderful for me; It is too high, I cannot attain to it.
(Psalm 139:1-6 LSB)
The Divine Investigation (v. 1-3)
David begins with a declaration of the result of a divine investigation. God has already done the work, and the conclusion is settled.
"O Yahweh, You have searched me and known me. You know when I sit down and when I rise up; You understand my thought from afar. You scrutinize my path and my lying down, And are intimately acquainted with all my ways." (Psalm 139:1-3)
The word "searched" here is not the fumbling search of a man looking for his keys. It is the expert, penetrating investigation of a master detective who misses nothing. And the result of this search is that God has "known" him. This is the Hebrew word yada, which speaks of a deep, relational, and comprehensive knowledge. It is the same word used for the intimacy between a husband and wife. God's knowledge of us is not like a spreadsheet of data; it is personal, total, and immediate.
David then provides a series of illustrations to show just how total this knowledge is. "You know when I sit down and when I rise up." These are the most mundane, unremarkable activities of life. Getting up in the morning, sitting down for a meal. God is not just interested in the grand, dramatic moments of our lives, our coronations or our great battles. He is attentive to the rhythm of our ordinary existence. To God, nothing about you is boring or trivial.
But His knowledge goes deeper than our actions. "You understand my thought from afar." This is a staggering claim. God does not need to be near us to read our minds. He knows our thoughts before they are fully formed, while they are still coalescing in the depths of our hearts. He knows the motive behind the deed, the unspoken assumption behind the word. The modern man thinks his mind is the one truly private place, the last citadel of his autonomy. David tells us that God has an open copy of the key to that citadel. He knows what you are thinking right now, and He knew it from "afar," both in distance and in time.
Verse 3 continues this theme of exhaustive surveillance. God scrutinizes his "path and my lying down." This covers all of life, both our activity and our rest. The word "scrutinize" means to winnow or sift, like a farmer separating wheat from chaff. God examines every step we take and every moment we are still. He is "intimately acquainted with all my ways." There are no secret habits, no hidden addictions, no private patterns of thought or behavior that are off His radar. He knows it all.
Foreknowledge and Encirclement (v. 4-5)
The scope of God's knowledge extends not just to the present and the past, but to the future as well.
"Even before there is a word on my tongue, Behold, O Yahweh, You know it all. You have enclosed me behind and before, And You have put Your hand upon me." (Psalm 139:4-5 LSB)
This is a direct assault on human pride. We like to think our words are our own, that they spring spontaneously from our will. David says that before the electrical signals even reach your larynx, before you have decided on the precise phrasing, God knows the completed sentence in its entirety. This is not a good guess. He knows it "all." This demolishes any notion of an open theism where God is learning as He goes. Our God is the God who declares the end from the beginning.
This total knowledge leads to a sense of total encirclement in verse 5. "You have enclosed me behind and before." The image is that of a siege. There is no escape. God is in the past behind us, and He is in the future before us. We are hemmed in. For the man at war with God, this is the ultimate claustrophobia. But for the man who is at peace with God, this is the ultimate security. We are surrounded, not by an enemy, but by our Father. We are garrisoned by God Himself.
And then, the touch of grace: "And You have put Your hand upon me." This is not the hand of a policeman arresting a criminal. This is the hand of a father on his child's shoulder. It is the hand of blessing, of consecration, of ownership. It is the hand that guides and protects. To be known this completely and still be touched so gently is the essence of the gospel. He knows every vile thought, every selfish motive, every wicked deed, and yet His hand upon us is one of grace.
The Breaking Point of the Mind (v. 6)
David's meditation on these truths brings him to the breaking point of human intellect. He cannot contain the idea; the idea contains him.
"Such knowledge is too wonderful for me; It is too high, I cannot attain to it." (Psalm 139:6 LSB)
This is the proper response of the creature before the Creator. It is not confusion or frustration, but worshipful awe. The knowledge is "too wonderful." It is beyond our pay grade. We are finite beings trying to comprehend an infinite attribute, and our minds, like small circuits overloaded with too much power, simply blow a fuse. We cannot "attain to it." We cannot climb high enough to get a top-down view of God's mind.
This is a necessary and healthy place for every Christian to come. We must be humbled by the sheer bigness of God. Our temptation is to try to shrink God down to a manageable size, to make Him a slightly larger version of ourselves. We want a God who fits into our theological systems, a God we can explain exhaustively. David reminds us that the true God will always shatter our categories. He is not just smarter than us; He operates in a completely different dimension of knowledge. True theology does not result in a proud mastery of the subject, but in a humble doxology before a God who is, and always will be, beyond us.
Conclusion: The Terrifying Comfort
So what do we do with this? How do we live in a world where we are perpetually and perfectly known? For the unbeliever, the message is simple: you cannot hide. Your secret sins are an open book to God. Your attempts to build a life apart from Him are a fool's errand, because you are living and breathing and thinking within the very mind of the one you are trying to escape. Every thought you have that rebels against Him is a thought He comprehends perfectly. The only sane response is to drop the act, confess your rebellion, and flee to the one who offers mercy.
And how does He offer that mercy? He offers it because this all-knowing God was not content to know us from afar. In the incarnation, the eternal Son, the Word through whom all things were made, entered our world. He who knew all things took on a human mind that had to learn and grow. And on the cross, Jesus endured the ultimate exposure. He was stripped naked, not just of His clothes, but of His glory, bearing the full, naked shame of our sin. He who knew all our secrets was treated as if He were nothing but a secret sinner.
Because of this, for the Christian, the omniscience of God is transformed from a terrifying threat into a profound comfort. He knows your every weakness, and yet He calls you His child. He knows the impurity of your motives, and yet He accepts your faltering worship. He knows the sin you will commit next week, and yet His hand of grace is still upon you. He knows you better than you know yourself, and He loves you more than you can imagine. This knowledge is indeed too wonderful for us. It is too high. And we should praise Him for it.