The focus of the worship service and sermon today was centered on part of Psalm 139. This is such a powerful passage of Scripture that hits us personally, especially as a multiple, and I just want to share it with you along with parts of the message we heard today:

To the Chief Musician. A Psalm of David.

¹O LORD, you have searched me [thoroughly] and have known me.

²You know my downsitting and my uprising; You understand my thought afar off.

³You sift and search out my path and my lying down, and You are acquainted with all my ways. {(my insert): where life’s journey is leading me; Your knowledge base about me/us and our life is complete}

⁴For there is not a word in my tongue [still unuttered], but, behold, O Lord, You know it altogether.{ You know what I’m going to say even before I say it; and You know what every part of me would say if they were out}

⁵You have beset me and shut me in–behind and before, and You have laid Your hand upon me.{You are always one step ahead of me, and You have my back covered}

⁶Your [infinite] knowledge is too wonderful for me; it is high above me, I cannot reach it.

⁷Where could I go from Your Spirit? Or where could I flee from Your presence?{Sometimes our awareness of ourself is so frightening & shameful to us that we want to run away and hind, especially when we take into consideration that You know us better than we know ourself}

⁸If I ascend up into heaven, You are there; if I make my bed in Sheol (the place of the dead), behold, You are there.{there is great comfort and assurance in knowing that if I were to succeed in hiding You would still be right with me, even in my hiding place – &there have been times when I would have chosen to hide in suicide, but even there God would be with me/us}

⁹If I take the wings of the morning or dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea,

¹⁰Even there shall Your hand lead me, and Your right hand shall hold me. {God’s plan for my life isn’t destroyed when I lose courage and hide; even when I have failed to respond to my circumstances in faithfulness, God will be faithful to stay with me/us}

¹¹If I say, Surely the darkness shall cover me and the night shall be [the only] light about me,

¹²Even the darkness hides nothing from You, but the night shines as the day; the darkness and the light are both alike to You. {Have you ever been in a cave and all the light is turned off? That extreme darkness makes a person feel very lost, small, and alone. Being found & held in the dark is an extremely comforting experience.}

¹³For You did form my inward parts; You did knit me together in my mother’s womb.{Even every part of every alter personality is completely known by You, God; because You were there and were involved & in control even when we were so traumatized that inward parts were being created.}

¹⁴I will confess and praise You for You are fearful and wonderful and for the awful wonder of my birth! Wonderful are Your works, and that my inner self knows right well.{ Oh most Holy Father, until my final breath I pray that in my heart of hearts I will eternally be confessing and praising You; I/We are full of awe and wonder when we think of the way You have created us from our very beginnings}

¹⁵My frame was not hidden from You when I was being formed in secret [and] intricately and curiously wrought [as if embroidered with various colors] in the depths of the earth [a region of darkness and mystery].

¹⁶Your eyes saw my unformed substance, and in Your book all the days [of my life] were written before ever they took shape, when as yet there was none of them.{ I need not fear of wandering off the path you have chosen for my life, or dieing prematurely; every day of my life has meaning and purpose because they are all part of Your plan.}

¹⁷How precious and weighty also are Your thoughts to me, O God! How vast is the sum of them!

¹⁸If I could count them, they would be more in number than the sand. When I awoke, [could I count to the end] I would still be with You. {I can never tire of learning from and contemplating the thoughts of God as they are expressed to me/us through the Scriptures and through His Holy Spirit communing with my spirit – I can never reach the end of them}

¹⁹If You would [only] slay the wicked, O God, and the men of blood depart from me–{In honest outpouring of my pain and distress I cry out to God to vindicate me before my perpetrators.}

²⁰Who speak against You wickedly, Your enemies who take Your name in vain!{I hate those who make themselves the enemies of God.}

²¹Do I not hate them, O Lord, who hate You? And am I not grieved and do I not loathe those who rise up against You?

²²I hate them with perfect hatred; they have become my enemies.

²³Search me [thoroughly], O God, and know my heart! Try me and know my thoughts!

²⁴And see if there is any wicked or hurtful way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting.{I/we can and do express all our thoughts and feelings openly and honestly to You, O God; and I need You to help me sort out what is pleasing to You from what dishonors You, because I want to do and be what honors and pleases You.}