PCPC Women's Ministries

• Psalm 139

Description

Taught by Kari Stainback

Notes

In preparing for our series on Identity, Psalm 139 immediately came to mind. For there is no more wonderful Psalm, God's Word to us through David, of how intimately acquainted God is with us. Knowing He is with us, that we're always in His thoughts, in His care, helps us to not feel lonely, afraid or forgotten. And, if God knows us and loves us so intimately, there's no more secure place to be than resting in this knowledge of God.

Guess what this Saturday is...June 25th! It's Merry Half-Christmas! When I was in my first job out of college, I worked for Baylor and lived on campus in Waco. Summer's in Waco are the truly, "the armpit of Texas"...HOT! We instituted a "Merry Half-Christmas Party"....turned the air down to 62 degrees, lined our book shelves with Christmas cards, put a Christmas wreath on our door, sprayed our windows with fake snow and had a big time! It was a "cool" party!!!! We even had Christmas music going full blast. I do think we had moved from 8 tracks to cassetts played on boom boxes! Fun memories!

• "Santa Clause is Coming to Town".....remember that song?
"He sees you when you're sleeping, he knows when you're awake, he knows if you've been bad or good so be good for goodness sake".
SCARED ME....if I wasn't good, Santa would know...wouldn't get any presents.

When you are a Christian, you worship the God who is the great "I AM"....alive, with us and present!

It's God's Omnipresence....His attribute that He alone has, that He is God and He is EVERYWHERE....means that He is all around us, and within us. And that through Christ's sacrificial death on the cross for our sins and His subsequent resurrection...He is alive and yes, He is ever present to us. ...and He is God's greatest Present...gift to us!

In the late 1800's early 1900's a man named G.K. Chesterton was a prolific writer and author in England.
When The Times invited several eminent authors to write essays on the theme "What's Wrong with the World?" Chesterton's contribution took the form of a letter:
Dear Sirs, I am. Sincerely yours, G. K. Chesterton
What a humble answer ....great whit.

Another story....

"Standing on a London street corner, G.K. Chesterton was approached by a newspaper reporter. "Sir, I understand that you recently became a Christian. May I ask you one question?
"Certainly," replied Chesterton.
"If the risen Christ suddenly appeared at this very moment and stood behind you, what would you do?"
Chesterton looked the reporter squarely in the eye and said, "He is."

The Jesus who walked the roads of Judea and Galilee...the Jesus you read about in your Bible....is the One who stands beside us. The Christ of history is the Christ of faith.

I. The Lord's Presence is Everywhere

A. The Story of His Presence
*We begin in Genesis...when God was before there was anything...."in the beginning, God..." Creator all the universe...creator of man and woman, Adam and Eve. You know the story, they enjoyed constant presence with God, they walked and talked with together....until they sinned, they rebelled against God and His one prohibition, not to eat the fruit of the tree of Knowledge ...and the result, SIN...they ran from God's presence in fear...aware of their nakedness, their sin...hiding from God, the Holy God, their Creator and sustainer...Throughout the Old Testament, Abraham, God chose men He would talk to...from a distance. Moses, God said was the most humble man that ever lived, met with God on Mt. Sinai, to receive the 10 Commandments...God said, you can see my back but not my face....even then, Moses returned to the nomadic Israelites with a face that was WHITE having been that close to God's presence.

As the children of Israel wondered around the desert, they could see evidences of God's presence in the tabernacle...they could look out of their tent windows and see "yes, He's with us"

David had the idea to build God a permanent home, a Temple...and his son, Solomon carried it out...but still he said, "But will God indeed dwell on the earth? Behold the heaven and the heaven of heavens cannot contain thee: how much less this house which I have built." (I Ki. 8:27)
Paul in his famous Mars Hill sermon in Acts 17 says to the Athenians, ..."though He is not far from each one of us, for in Him we live and move and exist."

Last words of Jesus, after His resurrection to the Disciples....Very last chapter of Matthew 28:20 last verse: "...and lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age.

B. "Worshipping God Who is Everywhere - Psalm 139

• Ps. 139....teaches three of the "Omni's of God....Attributes of God that can only be true of God.

1. • vv. 1-6 - God's Omniscience - He Knows Everything
2. • vv.7-12 - God's Omnipresence - He Is Everywhere
3. • vv. 13-18 - God's Omnipotence - He is all Powerful
4. • vv. 19-24 - David's Response to God

Mainly, this is a psalm about God's Omnipresence...because He is everywhere He knows Everything and is the Creator...from the Beginning...all Powerful....

1. God's Omniscience-He Knows Everything vv. 1-6

vv. 1-2...You have searched me, examined me ...you know everything about me...when I sit and when I get up....you know my thoughts, wherever I go.
v. 4 - Before I say anything...you know it completely
God knows everything about us...not just what we know, when we look in the mirror, or one slice of our thoughts....He see past, present and future, He sees all of us....
v. 5...You go before me and behind me...or you hem me in (NASB)...
Lay your hand on me....connected to God...
Hand....not a literal hand, of course, it's a term that talks of God's authority, power and loving care.
v. 6 David is overwhelmed....such an intimacy of knowing us that is more than we can ever understand.

2. God's Omnipresence - He is Everywhere - vv. 7-12

Polarities described
v. 8 - Up and Down...Up to the stars or down Sheol (Heb. For "hell") the depths....God is there
v. 9 - Go East...sun in the morning rises in the East or to the West...far side of the Mediterranean Sea ...You are THERE!

Until I studied this, I always thought the psalmist, David was praising God, saying "look...that's amazing, wherever I go you are there".....but look at vs. 7 ..."Where shall I FLEE from your Spirit?"....that is the same word used in Jonah when he said "no" to God's call for him to go to Ninivah and prophescy...he didn't like the Ninivites and didn't want to go...so he FLED...and ended up in the Belly of a Whale!

This "Where can I flee"....is a statement of rebellion...

"I don't like it that you are everywhere....I don't have any freedom to make my own choices...do what I want to do.

YEARS AGO - summer after college - "Freshman Ten"...Diet with Dad..made a deal, no sweets, getting weight off.
Home for dinner...."hey you went to Baskin Robbins today, why'd you break our deal"....I never saw my dad there...and no one was in that store that I knew...Got me....Dad wasn't omnipresent...I still don't know how he found out....I HAVE A REBELLIOUS HEART, and yet, my father was offering me guidance and protection....I didn't see it as good.

All of God ...All of His attributes is everywhere. He is completely present at every point in time and space.

v. 10....begins to warm up to this Presence; can't decide..do I want this or not....ambilence..."Can't live with God, can't live without Him." Yet, David needs His hand...His care,

v. 11....the darkness (literal, yes...but also all the darkness of suffering, the unknown, rejection, grief)...can be suffocating....it can cover me....

v. 12....Darkness is nothing to you....because God knows everything and is Everywhere.....David is completely safe and so are you and I ...because this hand of God won't let us go...God can't lose us.

3. God Omnipotence - He is All-Powerful vv. 13-18

David recognizes God's power..."For"...in V. 13 ...explains the preceding verses...Since God can create a person, He certainly knows him intimately and is with him everywhere....WE ARE SURROUNDED BY HIS POWER

V. 13-16...from conception all the way to death...forming, knitting, fearfully and wonderfully made...intricate weaving in the depths of the earth..

v. 16...such a comfort...."in your book were all written the days that were ordained for me, When as yet there was not one of them.

.....Barbara Ryan left that verse on my phone the night my father died...
Thought of it this weekend, dear friend died suddenly last Monday on the ski slopes...leaving behind a widow and 4 young sons.

NOTE....3rd widow of dear college friends in 18 years who's lost her husband suddenly leaving behind young sons. All three where Christians, one didn't have as deep a foundation of faith in Christ...that kind of blow shatters even the most steady follower of Christ....As I hugged Delynn on Saturday...she told me as I'm sure she'd told many others of the faithfulness of God's amazing presence in this tragedy.

God is always present..but He shouts in our pain and whispers in our joys.

Build your foundation of Faith now....life will contain suffering and it will surprise you...don't wait to grow in your knowledge of God and His Word until a time when you have more time....

V. 18....Is the Climax of the Psalm...

"When I am awake, I am still with You....

Never saw this before....At the beginning of the psalm, David says "When I get up, when I rise up in the morning...why would this be the climax of the Psalm, if he is just saying the same thing.

David is saying...God has such a strong grip on me...His Hand is holding me so close that even when I go through this life to heaven when I die, God will be with me.

"I'll wake up in my resurrected body with the Lord holding my hand".

Mark 5 - Jesus took the hand of Jairus' daughter....even though she was dead...His hand reached through death and brought her back to life...

So too....David has gained the assurance God is for him....he so has His hand on him....that he trusts him.

(time...not just one sitting wrote these psalms...months!)

4. David Response to God - vv. 19-24

As David gets closer to God...He hates the wicked and those who are enemies of God....and yet, He sees the same evil, enemies within himself.

What began as a Psalm asking God to search him all around him, examine his ways...ends with the knowledge of this amazing God who has a grip on His life of love and power ...that David wants to be closer to him, to draw near to this God who is present everywhere.

He says, "search me...know my heart...see if there is anything in me that causes you sadness...and lead me in life that will be forever with You.

Another Psalm, Psalm 22 "My God my God why have you forsaken me."

Cry of Jesus when He was on the cross separated from His Father....only Jesus didn't refer to God as his father...so great the separation between Jesus and His Father as He bore the weight of God's wrath for Sin...not knowing the presence of God...that was Jesus' greatest suffering...even more than the cruelest of all painful deaths. This was the greatest pain.

Why? So you and I can know this Presence...the One who is right behind us, as Chesterton said.

II. The Practice of the Lord's Presence

A. Obstacles to Practicing God's Presence
• busyness - the enemy of spirituality
• noise of technology - instant gratification of it all.
• shame...."it's true for others, not for me"....subtle pride
• self....more focused on what I want than on the Lord, His will and Others

B. Positions to Practice God's Presence
• Learn and study and meditate on God's Word
• Prayer
• Learn from more mature Christians
• Periodic times away...(i.e. the Reflective Retreat)
• Watching and Waiting

III. Responding to the Present Risenness of Christ

• How do we know if it's really God's presence I'm knowing in my heart or is it just my imagination?
• My friend, Vicki knows how to practice God's presence...she's been going through a hard time lately, mother passed away last year, her brother has early on -set of Alzheimer's disease, her dear friend is struggling with breast cancer. She sent this e-mail, as a prayer request to some of her friends:

"I have been spending time in the Psalms. David and others spent time weeping and crying out to God here. They also spent time worshipping. I have decided to spend more time worshipping God-mostly in song. I just put the music on and sing away. At home, in the car, wherever. It pleases him and it lifts my soul. So, for now-I'm keeping my eyes on Him-diving into the Word and letting him speak to me. He is the author and perfecter of my faith-let Him perfect. And worship him. He will be near because He inhabits the praise of His people!" ....Vicki

Questions for your Discussion Groups:

• Read Philippians 4:5b-6. How does knowing God's presence help us with our worries and fears?
• Read Psalm 34:18. How does the Lord's presence help us when we are sad?
• Share a time in your life when you have you known God has been present to you?