Verses: Psalm 139Sample

Today marks our sixth day memorizing and meditating on Psalm 139 in its entirety! At the beginning of Psalm 139, the psalmist pointed us to a God who knows and sees all things and a God whose presence none can evade or escape; God is forever near and intimately aware (even our unspoken thoughts). In this week’s set of verses, another aspect of God is drawn out: He is the God who formed and knitted and made each of us.

“For you formed my inward parts; you knitted me together in my mother’s womb. I praise you, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made. Wonderful are your works; my soul knows it very well.”

Verses 11 and 12 reminded us that though we may try to run away from God, seeking to hide in darkness, darkness is as light to God. Bruce Waltke commented,

“The confessions segue from God’s transforming night/darkness to day/light to God’s fashioning the mortal in the darkness of the womb. The stanza represents God as a skillful weaver of embroidered cloth dedicated to creating his magnum opus. His studio is the dark chamber of a mother’s womb.”

Just as God was the Creator in Genesis who formed Adam’s frame out of the dust and breathed His life into it, God continues to be the Creator who forms and knits life together in the mother’s womb. We are not merely the result of DNA strands and luck, but rather of a loving and shaping God. Even your deepest inward parts (in Hebrew, “kidneys,” home to our desires and longings) were formed by God! In your mother’s womb, where no one else could know you, God did. You were known, formed, and knit by Divine hands.

As if it were not enough to know we were formed and knitted by God, the psalmist carries on by adding two adverbs to show God’s depth of care and excellence: we were made fearfully and wonderfully. No human on the planet is the result of chance or trembling confused hands but by God’s loving and wise hands. You were made in God’s very image! The psalmist couldn’t help but burst into praise upon the meditation of these truths. What about you? What is your response? God forms and knits; we must worship and praise; both with words of adoration directed at our Creator and through lives of adoration lived in His honor. Spurgeon exclaims:

“We cannot begin too soon to bless our Maker, who began so soon to bless us: even in the act of creation he created reasons for our praising his name, For I am fearfully and wonderfully made. Who can gaze even upon a model of our anatomy without wonder and awe? Who could dissect a portion of the human frame without marveling at its delicacy, and trembling at its frailty? The Psalmist had scarcely peered within the veil which hides the nerves, sinews, and blood vessels from common inspection; the science of anatomy was quite unknown to him; and yet he had seen enough to arouse his admiration of the work and his reverence for the Worker.”

Does your soul know it? Does your soul know it well? If it does, then let it praise Him!

Memorize & Meditate

1. Pray David’s words from Psalm 119 to God: “Open my eyes to see wonderful things in your law.” Ask God to reveal Himself to you in His Word, that you might know Him more. To truly know Him!
2. Read Psalm 139:13-14. What stands out? What’s encouraging? What’s confusing?
3. In your journal, write out verses 13-14. The intention here is to slow down a little with the passage and linger.
4. Listen to the Psalm 139:13-14 song by A Boy and His Kite.
5. Meditate on this powerful phrase: “I am fearfully and wonderfully made.” Do you believe that? As you walk through your day and interact with other people (those you may or may not enjoy), how might the reality they too are fearfully and wonderfully made impact your view of them? How might seeing others as lovingly knit by God shape your interactions? Ask God for the grace to see yourself and others as “fearfully and wonderfully made.”

Credits
Song by A Boy And His Kite
Devotional by Joel Limpic.