Search Me Oh Lord

Psalms 139 is a candid, self-reflecting, self-effacing Psalm that Stops you in your tracks leaving you feeling vulnerable as much as reassured and comforted by God’s presence and knowledge of your life as your life stands as an Open Book before God.       The Psalmist talks about God’s hand & Spirit of his presence with him always and everywhere. Then about his hatred for those who hate God and how he wishes God would kill them. Then he circles back reflectively to “Search Me Oh Lord and see if there is any offensiveness in me” as you lead me in the way of everlasting life, which implies God knows and sees more about each of us than we know or see about or within ourselves.

Part of God leading us in everlasting life, includes being brutally honest with ourselves and with God, allowing God to expose our offenses against him and others, which since Genesis 3, is in our nature and ability to do. While it’s easy to say, we hate those who hate and offend God, we too can be offensive to God and people around us, every day. While we can’t control and aren’t responsible for the way people offend us, we can control & are responsible for the way we offend God and others. This Psalm is about that. It’s about each of us and God, and our relationship with God and each other, because to offend the one is to offend the other. Jesus taught that throughout the Gospels. In fact in Matthew 5:44 Jesus said to love our enemies and pray for those who persecute (offend) us, rather than hate them and wish God would kill them.

Maybe this Psalms is also about the difference between the easy and the hard. It’s easy to blame others, even rightly so. It’s hard to be brutally honest with our self and God about our faults, failings, and offenses against God and others, and say to God forgive me and fix me, change me.

Ultimately this is a solitary Psalm of personal reflection about God and self. God help me come to that place where I trust you enough to let you into every nook, cranny, and corner of my life, and expose and eradicate my offenses and make me a better me, for your kingdom glory as you lead me into eternity. While we can’t control and aren’t responsible for the way others offend us, we can control and are responsible for the way we offend God and others. And God sees and knows it.

I love the Psalms because they’re about God and each of us, personally, intimately.   Let the timeless truth and power of God’s word in Psalms 139 influence, impact and change your life today. Say "search me oh Lord" because your life is about God and you, in Jesus’ name.