Sunday, May 21, 2006

intimacy

O LORD, you have searched me and you know me.
You know when I sit and when I rise;
you perceive my thoughts from afar.
You discern my going out and my lying down;
you are familiar with all my ways.
Before a word is on my tongue
you know it completely, O LORD.
You hem me in—behind and before;
you have laid your hand upon me.
Such knowledge is too wonderful for me,
too lofty for me to attain.
Where can I go from your Spirit?
Where can I flee from your presence?
If I go up to the heavens, you are there;
if I make my bed in the depths, you are there.
If I rise on the wings of the dawn,
if I settle on the far side of the sea,
even there your hand will guide me,
your right hand will hold me fast.
If I say, "Surely the darkness will hide me
and the light become night around me,"
even the darkness will not be dark to you;
the night will shine like the day,
for darkness is as light to you.
For you created my inmost being;
you knit me together in my mother's womb.
I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made;
your works are wonderful, I know that full well.
My frame was not hidden from you
when I was made in the secret place.
When I was woven together in the depths of the earth,
your eyes saw my unformed body.
All the days ordained for me were written in your book
before one of them came to be.

Psalm 139: 1-17

7 comments:

amy said...

But doesn't intimacy go two ways? He might know all there is to know about you and me, but it sure feels like he hides a whole lot of himself from us...

lorie said...

Interesting that you say that, Amy, because that is the very issue I'm struggling with and why I was reading this passage.

I take very fact that he drew me to this passage a few days ago, while I was writing a fairly angry poem about doubt and its effect in my life, and drew me again to it the night I posted it (when I couldn't put anything I was struggling with into words), as him showing himself to me at a time when I felt as if he WAS, as you said, "hiding himself from me." The circumstances around it all point to him revealing that he sees me and what I'm dealing with, and he is not apathetic to it.

I just had to have it pointed out to me. (Because I'm really slow that way...)

amy said...

I think I'm just slow that way as well...

amy said...

And I must be honest with you. I've stopped trying to get to know God...got tired of searching but never finding. My stance these days is that if he wants me to know him, he knows where to find me. If he's true and if his word is true, then he'll do just that. If not, then so be it. That probably sounds pretty rough, but actually its working out well for me.

lorie said...

Mmm... good stuff, Cindy. And I hear you Amy-- I've been there for about the last six to nine months. And he HAS "found" me, but it hasn't always looked like what I thought it SHOULD look like. Part of the freedom has been in letting go of my expectations/perceptions. Or at least in TRYING to...

amy said...

Thanks guys. Your words are so true. I just sometimes need reminded.

Anonymous said...

hey cindy,

I really loved what you wrote below:

"Sometimes when we view a piece of art too close we aren't able to really see the full beauty of it. Step back, have a seat, and take it all in at once."

thanks!
Maybe your should be a philosphy major after all

Angela