Psalms 139:1-24 “O Lord, You have searched me and known me. (2) You know my sitting down and my rising up; You understand my thought afar off. (3) You comprehend my path and my lying down, and are acquainted with all my ways. (4) For there is not a word on my tongue, but behold, O Lord, You know it altogether. (5) You have hedged me behind and before, and laid Your hand upon me. (6) Such knowledge is too wonderful for me; it is high, I cannot attain it. (7) Where can I go from Your Spirit? Or where can I flee from Your presence? (8) If I ascend into heaven, You are there; If I make my bed in hell, behold, You are there. (9) If I take the wings of the morning, And dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea, (10) Even there Your hand shall lead me, And Your right hand shall hold me. (11) If I say, "Surely the darkness shall fall on me," Even the night shall be light about me; (12) indeed, the darkness shall not hide from You, but the night shines as the day; The darkness and the light are both alike to You. (13) For You formed my inward parts; You covered me in my mother's womb. (14) I will praise You, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made; Marvellous are Your works, And that my soul knows very well. (15) My frame was not hidden from You, when I was made in secret, And skilfully wrought in the lowest parts of the earth. (16) Your eyes saw my substance, being yet unformed. And in Your book they all were written, the days fashioned for me, when as yet there were none of them. (17) How precious also are Your thoughts to me, O God! How great is the sum of them! (18) If I should count them, they would be more in number than the sand; When I awake, I am still with You. (19) Oh, that You would slay the wicked, O God! Depart from me, therefore, you bloodthirsty men. (20) For they speak against You wickedly; Your enemies take Your name in vain. (21) Do I not hate them, O Lord, who hate You? And do I not loathe those who rise up against You? (22) I hate them with perfect hatred; I count them my enemies. (23) Search me, O God, and know my heart; Try me, and know my thoughts; (24) and see if there is any wicked way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting.”
And so, in order to establish the truth from scripture, that God knows us intimately before we are ever born, I have once again quoted four witnesses that all confirm that same truth to us. The four witnesses are the Lord Jesus, God the Father, the apostle James and the apostle Paul. The first witness quoted above, is the Lord Jesus Christ. In this passage, Jesus is speaking about Himself as the Son of Man and not as the Son of God, for when Jesus came to the earth He laid aside all of His godlike attributes and became a man (Philippians 2:7). And so, through the prophet David, Jesus is telling us in this passage just how intimately God the Father knew Him as a man, before He ever became a man. We know that David is not speaking about himself in this passage, because David was never “skilfully wrought in the lowest parts of the earth”, but our Lord Jesus was, when God the Father raised Him from the dead, from the lowest parts of the earth. The reason I have quoted the whole Psalm, is because in it, Jesus reveals to us just how perfectly God knows us, before He ever creates us. For example, the verse that states that God knew the thoughts of Jesus from afar is more accurately translated, long before. In other words, long before Jesus thought as a man, God already knew those thoughts. And so, clearly Jesus teaches us that God had already searched Him and known Him before God formed Him. Jesus went on to say, that God had searched His heart to see if there was any wicked way in Him. And so, if God knew the perfect Son of Man intimately before He ever formed Him, then we are certainly not any different, and therefore God knows each one of us intimately before He ever forms us, including how each of us will exercise our free will in eternity. Michael E.B. Maher
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