“Jesus Knows Me, This I Love”

Excellent or Praiseworthy is posted on Monday and Thursday nights.

“You know when I leave and when I get back; I’m never out of your sight.” — Psalm 139:3  from The Message

Where are you today?

Are you making the trek cross-country in order to be co-located with your spouse who is also active duty? Are you in the desert, far away from home? Or on a ship? Are you packing up for a move to a training base? Are you diligently working as a security guard during these nervous times? Are you burdened with too many unknowns and unmet expectations? Are you saying good-bye to a very close friend because of a re-assignment?

Are you thinking of the folks in Boston who experienced such horror, and praying for them and for our entire nation? Or perhaps you are called up to serve in Massachusetts because of this tragic event?

No matter where you are, know that God is with you. You are never alone.

When we need to be reminded of this truth as Believers, we go to Psalm 139. Tonight we total three Excellent or Praiseworthy postings in a row which make mention of Psalm 139. That is unusual for our devotional blog, but appropriate based on the mood of our country.

Psalm 139:1-18 is beautifully quoted on “Fighting Loneliness,” the posting from Charmayne, an Air Force wife, last Thursday. But tonight’s paraphrase of this psalm extolling God’s omnipresence and His omniscience is not from a military wife, nor from anyone associated with the military—but from an elderly Christian saint, Mrs. Frances Nash, who was battling cancer and recovering from multiple surgeries in 2002.

During her period of recuperation, Mrs. Nash began the project of taking each of the one hundred and fifty psalms and expressing them in her own words. She writes, “I was not foolish enough to attempt to improve upon the originals, I simply wanted to make them ‘mine’ by resaying them in my own common everyday language. It was the perfect project for someone recuperating. It lifted, encouraged and strengthened me, chasing away impatience, boredom and self-pity—replacing the recuperation-blues with praise.”  She closes her Introduction with this encouragement to you, “ . . . my hope is that the mere simplicity of my words, written about, and to, Someone who is indescribably holy, awesome and forgiving will bring praise and joy to your hearts also.”

O Lord, You have X-rayed me and seen through all my hidden secrets.
All my habits and whims are an open book to You.
When I wake up each morning You recognize all my words of the day before I speak them.
Quick and fleeting as some thoughts may be, not one of them escapes Your thorough understanding.
Wherever I go You accompany me;
You even stop with me when I must rest.
Your Presence surrounds me—covering, following, preceding me.
Lord God, Your fingers are on my pulse, knowing the health of my body, soul and imagination.

Even though I know this as fact, I still cannot grasp it complete, Father.
It is higher than my mind can reach.

May I not ever hide from You sometimes. Lord?
Is there no place I may go to escape Your total knowledge of me?

If my path leads me to joy, You are there in my joy.
When I am crushed by misery or fear—there You are beside me.
If I could ride upon the sunrise to the most distant parts of space,
You would already be there, with Your hand on my shoulder.

No matter whether darkness covers me or light illuminates me,
You always see the real me—just as I am.
The darkest dark is no hiding place. Darkness and daylight both exist by Your command,
So either way, we are still in Your spotlight.

While I was in the womb, Your protection held me close as You knitted me together—
Cell by cell and gene by gene.

I marvel in awe and wonder at the intricate interaction of my construction.
It is truly past human understanding.

And Lord—Your thoughts concerning me are as uncountable as grains of sand on the shore!
Each morning upon awakening, I realize anew that You are here with me.

So Lord God, keep me I pray from the stinginess of a praiseless heart, for that is unspoken blasphemy.
And Father, steer me away from those who are set against You.

Continue to search through me and know me.
Show me where hidden sin lies within me.
Then Lord, lead me along the path to wholeness.

Mrs. Nash completes her writing on Psalm 139 with this challenge, “To the well-known children’s song, ‘Jesus loves me, this I know,’ add another line, ‘Jesus knows me, this I love!’  Doesn’t this sum up what David (the author of Psalm 139) learned centuries ago? Even though God knows His own people totally, He still loves us totally” (p. 203).

So no matter where in the world you are tonight, our Lord is right beside you. And He loves you. Be encouraged.

Work Cited:

Nash, Frances, Let All Creation Praise Him, self-published by the author in Jacksonville, Florida, in 2002.

Questions to Share:

1. What comfort does it give you as a Christian to know that God is always with you—“Wherever I go you accompany me”?

2. Who will you pray for tonight to be comforted by the truth that God is with them?