In Psalm 139, David celebrates the detailed and intimate knowledge God has of him; that He has of all of us. In the second part of the psalm, he continues to celebrate that knowledge with some of the most important pro-life themes in the Scriptures. But then he makes a turn to expressing his passion for God in a way that is deeply uncomfortable for modern readers. What are we supposed to do with all of this? That’s what we are talking about today as we wrap up our series, Fully Known. Read on to find out.

The Way to Life

Little kids can get excited. Like, really excited. If you have little ones at home or still remember when yours were little, you perhaps know what I’m talking about. Little kids can get so excited they can’t hold it in, and they’ll start to do silly things to let it out. They’ll run in place, run all over the place, yell and scream, just kind of vibrate where they are standing, and so on and so forth. It can be pretty entertaining to watch. The nice thing about little kids and their excitement, though, is that they don’t tend to get destructive with it. Older kids and adults, on the other hand, can’t say that quite as consistently. 

When you get older, what we just call excitement in little kids will sometimes be called passion. Passion is a fine thing in and of itself. It’s good to be passionate about some things. There are things that fully warrant our passion. You should be passionate about your family. You should be passionate about your church. There are causes that should get you all fired up. That’s all well and good. What matters here is not the passion itself so much as how it is expressed. Expressing passion in the wrong ways (and especially if those passions themselves are disordered) can turn from positive to positively destructive very, very quickly. When we find something that gets us all fired up, if we don’t get fired up in the right ways and at the right times, the results can be decidedly less than helpful. We are going to get a glimpse of that in the Scriptures today as we finish up our look at Psalm 139. 

This morning we are in the second and final part of our teaching series, Fully Known. As we continue forward in these early days of 2026, it seemed right and appropriate to spend a little bit of time together reflecting on the fact that we serve a God who knows us perfectly. In a culture that is awash in loneliness and isolation, knowing there is someone who knows us perfectly and is always with us can be an incredibly encouraging thought. And indeed, that’s the idea that came out of the first part of Psalm 139 so clearly. God knows you and sees you. Even when nobody else does, He does. Even when nobody else is, He is. Now, that idea can be as challenging as it is encouraging if you are living in such a way that you know isn’t terribly reflective of His character, but if you are simply struggling under a load of loneliness, it can be a pretty powerful idea indeed. 

This morning, as promised, we are going to come back to the same psalm and look at the other side of it. As David was reflecting on God’s knowledge of him, he was getting more and more excited about the thought. He was filled with more and more passion. As we just said, that’s not necessarily a bad thing. Being passionate about God, in fact, is a very good thing. But the way David expresses his passion can be pretty uncomfortable to read, especially for hearts and minds that have been shaped by a Gospel-impacted culture like ours, and Western culture more generally. We’ll get to that in a minute, but first David celebrates God’s knowledge just a little bit further, and in the process reveals just how he could know us so very well. Let’s take a look at this together. If you have a copy of the Scriptures handy, join me in Psalm 139 again. We’ll pick up in v. 13. 

The question that lingered some last time was how God could know us so completely as He does. The easy answer is that He’s God and He knows everything, but that’s kind of a cop out answer. Knowing everything and knowing someone as intensely personally as David describes in the first half of the psalm here aren’t the same thing. No, the reason God knows us so intimately, is because He has known us from the very beginning. More than that, He is the one who created us in the first place. “For it was you who created my inward parts; you knit me together in my mother’s womb.” 

When you make something, you know more about it than anyone else. My dad had a friend once who owned a Ford Model A. This friend happened to be an engineer, and in the process of restoring the vehicle, he had taken it apart down to its individual nuts and bolts and then put it back together in perfect working order. He knew more about that car than anyone else in the world. 

God made you and me. As a matter of fact, He made every single person who ever walked on the face of the planet. All of them. He made all the creatures in this world. He made every thing in it. He is the great designer. And let’s be honest: Life is designed pretty well. Sure, you’ll sometimes hear about articles from skeptical scientists criticizing the design of one body part or bodily system or another, but those criticisms have uniformly been demonstrated to be without any real substance, and no one has proposed a system that works any better. In fact, many of our best design ideas have come from observing various designs in the natural world and copying them. 

When we shift gears to talking about human design, the beautiful complexity of the whole thing gets ratcheted up even further. There was a time when scientists thought life was pretty simple. As a result, they hypothesized some theories that purported to show how it could have all just happened by chance and random variations over time. Today, though, the only people who hold to such a notion are either scientists who are hardened ideologues and who are committed to the idea for reasons of worldview, not science; or non-scientists who have bought the skeptical party line because of their worldview commitments and don’t actually know very much about what they are talking about. Because the truth is that scientists have found life to be so mind-blowingly complex and elegant and unlikely that chance as an explanation falls miserably, embarrassingly short of adequately capturing an honest picture of reality. Design is really the only thing that makes any sense when you honestly examine the evidence. 

The person who did this designing, then, would be the one who knows the most about it. Well, as David identifies here, this person is God. Make this personal, though. God didn’t just design people generally (although He did). He designed a person, namely, you. “For it was you who created my inward parts,” David says. But this isn’t just some generic, assembly line creation on God’s part. It was personal. “You knit me together in my mother’s womb.” When you knit something, you generally do it by hand. Yes, they make machines that allow you to knit much faster and with mechanical consistency. We have just such a machine at home. But they didn’t have those in David’s day. If something was going to be knit, it was going to happen by hand, one stitch at a time. The knitter would know the scarf or the blanket or whatever else it was better than anybody else. She was involved intimately with its very creation. The same is true of you and me. 

This provokes David to praise. “I will praise you because I have been remarkably and wondrously made. Your works are wondrous, and I know this very well.” God did good work when He made you. He always does good work. It’s not in His nature to do any other kind. Okay, but what about people with birth defects, whose genes are distorted from what we know to be normal in some way that causes them and their caregivers pain and frustration. Didn’t God mess up with them? 

Well, for starters, we live in a world that is broken by sin, and that brokenness extends to our very genetic code. Because the time for the restoration of all things—including our genetic code—is not yet, God does not remove all of the effects of sin. We don’t often like that and even less often understand it, but it doesn’t make it any less true. We err in our thinking here when we assume that what makes a meaningful, worthwhile life is not having pain, physical brokenness, or inconvenience. What the Christian worldview helps us understand is that having a meaningful, worthwhile life is being able to enjoy God and bring Him glory by reflecting His character. The ways God enables someone to do that go beyond our ability to fully imagine. More than this, if we define having a worthwhile life as meeting with some ultimately arbitrary standard of normalcy, we are setting ourselves up to declare all kinds of people to have lives that are not worthwhile and thus not worth being protected or cared for or considered valuable. We’ve seen human cultures walk down that road over the course of human history, and it never ends well. In these cases, it is the most vulnerable—the very people for whom God expresses His most ardent passion in the Scriptures—who wind up paying a very steep price indeed. 

Many of you remember Mark Hinson. And if you’ve been around Mark, you know what an absolute joy he is. Mark has Down’s syndrome. He processes the world a little differently than you and I do. His parents have faced challenges in raising him that most of the rest of us won’t face and don’t understand. The world looks at someone like Mark who doesn’t meet the criteria of normal, and sees a problem in need of being solved. A few years ago the nation of Iceland declared that they had eliminated Down’s syndrome as a diagnosis in the country. By what medical miracle did they achieve this feat? None. They simply require genetic screening for it in utero, and kill all the children who are diagnosed with it before they are born. If we don’t understand that we have all been remarkably and wondrously made, and that God’s works are wondrous, that’s the kind of path we will inevitably travel as a culture. And the world will miss out on a whole lot of Mark Hinsons. We will no longer be a culture that celebrates life, but instead be one that advances death. 

Yet that’s not how God sees things. He loves us so much that He is intimately involved in our creation from the moment the spark of life first ignites. A few years ago that phrase, “spark of life,” was given fresh meaning when scientists discovered with the help of some fancy, microscopic photography that the moment an egg is fertilized and actually becomes a unique, living creature with its own, unique set of DNA—that is, the moment life itself begins—there is a literal flash of light. Every single time life is created, there is a microscopic fireworks show; a private celebration that the God who is everywhere, and who is with us at every point in our journey through this life from conception to natural death has to rejoice in that new life. 

But God’s knowledge is even deeper than that. Look at v. 15: “My bones were not hidden from you when I was made in secret, when I was formed in the depths of the earth.” There’s that detailed, intimate knowledge again. But this time David takes us in a new, deeper direction. “Your eyes saw me when I was formless.” When we were “just a clump of cells,” as the world likes to sometimes describe nascent life as if that “clump of cells” could possibly be anything other than a fully unique human creature, God saw us then. He knew us then. He knows His children perfectly no matter where they are on their journey. 

There’s still more. “All my days were written in your book and planned before a single one of them began.” Now, that line could lead us down a path of talking about God’s plans for us in all kinds of speculative detail, but I don’t think that’s David’s point. His point is that the God who is not bound by time, and can see all things including those future to us, knows us completely before we have even left the starting blocks on our race through this life. He has that knowledge of every single person who has, does, or will yet walk the face of the earth. He even has that knowledge of those who don’t get much of a chance to walk very far or at all for one painful reason or another. He knows them and loves them too. He knows and loves every single creature He’s ever made. Or, as one particularly wise elephant named Horton once put it, “A person’s a person no matter how small.” 

Now, the implications—and in particular the pro-life implications—of what David says here are as staggering as they are obvious. As followers of Jesus we must be fervent defenders of life no matter what form it happens to take. The size of a person doesn’t make any difference here. The tiny person, still growing in a mother’s womb is just as valuable as the newborn baby living outside of it. The level of development doesn’t make any difference either. After all, a toddler is less developed than an adult, but we don’t talk about killing them. Okay, well, sometimes we do, but we don’t really mean it. The environment of a person doesn’t affect her value. In the womb; out of the womb; in a hospital; out of a hospital; on the moon; under the sea. No matter where we are, we are created by God and valuable. And how dependent a person is doesn’t impact things. Some full grown people are totally dependent on others, but they are still fully human and deserving of life. 

We could keep exploring the implications to just this part of the psalm, but there’s still more to go. David pauses here to just marvel at the reality of all of this like he did back in v. 6. “God, how precious your thoughts are to me; how vast their sum is! If I counted them, they would outnumber the grains of sand; when I wake up, I am still with you.” The fact that God could know everybody like this is just mind-blowing. We can’t get our minds wrapped fully around it. We think we are going to wake up from this whole reality like a dream, but awake or asleep, the truth is still the truth. God really is this big; God really is this good. 

And at this point, David’s passion for God has been building and building. He’s so excited about this God who knows Him so well that He can’t contain it. Everybody should share in this knowledge. There’s no way anyone could reject it. In fact, for someone to reject this must mean there’s something wrong with them. They’re getting in the way of this incredible truth’s being proclaimed far and wide. They need to be stopped. “God, if only you would kill the wicked—you bloodthirsty men, stay away from me—who invoke you deceitfully. Your enemies swear by you falsely. Lord, don’t I hate those who hate you, and detest those who rebel against you? I hate them with extreme hatred; I consider them my enemies.” 

After reading almost all of a psalm that is so encouraging and uplifting, these four verses hit like a bucket of ice cold water to the face on a cold day. Where did this come from? Is this really the same David who wrote songs celebrating the love and graciousness of the Lord here spouting off about how much he hates God’s enemies and wants God to kill them? Yeah, it is. Well, what are we supposed to do with this? We keep firmly in mind a crucial principle for understanding the Old Testament. Just because we read something in the Scriptures doesn’t mean those words or that thought are being commended to us as models to follow. Sometimes actions and ideas that are counter to God’s clearly expressed character are unequivocally condemned so that there’s no question on how we are supposed to think about a particular scene. But sometimes they aren’t. Sometimes the author treats us like grown ups who can use godly wisdom to discern for ourselves whether or not something should be accepted as normative or rejected as an example of how not to think or speak or act. 

That being said, look closely here at just exactly what David expresses and how he expresses it because that matters. Does David say he wants to kill God’s enemies himself? He certainly expresses his complete and utter disdain for them. He rejects them morally and emotionally. If someone isn’t right with God, they aren’t going to be right with David. We should all have such a finely tuned righteousness radar. We should be so in tune with God’s righteousness that we recognize quickly when someone is just putting on a deceitful show of righteousness and isn’t right with God at all. We shouldn’t tolerate those kinds of people. The apostle Paul more than once counsels a church to kick out and otherwise not to associate with people who claim Christ but don’t actually follow Him. They are false teachers who sow division and lead baby believers astray. Those kinds of people are God’s enemies, and they should be ours as well. 

But what does David say that he is going to do about this? Read it carefully. Nothing. David’s not going to do anything about this. Instead, what does he say? “God, if only you would kill the wicked.” God, these people are your enemies, so I’m going to leave it in your hands to deal with them. Isn’t that what we are supposed to do? Now, if David talked about how he was going to do the killing, we would have a real problem on our hands. But he doesn’t. He puts the whole thing in God’s hands. And I should add this, the thought of God’s killing His enemies is an uncomfortable one to us, but this was a mindset that made sense in David’s time and place. It was how people thought then. We understand through the lens of the Gospel that this isn’t what God calls us to do, but had David heard the Gospel yet? Did he know and understand the teachings of Jesus? No. How could he? Those wouldn’t come along for another thousand years. Instead, God met David right where he was, received his efforts to move in His direction from the place he started at, and grew him forward from there. Thankfully, that’s what He does with us too. And given where David’s culture was more broadly, he was way ahead of his time. The evidence of God’s shaping and growing in his heart is obvious. 

Perhaps more importantly than even that, though, is where David ends the psalm. He has been celebrating God’s knowledge of him, and he has expressed his great passion for God (even if in terms that are hard for us to fully appreciate). Here at the very end, he submits himself fully to this God, so that He can live in light of this knowledge. “Search me, God, and know my heart; test me and know my concerns. See if there is any offensive way in me; lead me in the everlasting way.” 

“God, I know that you know me, so know me all the way. I’m giving you complete and unfettered access to my heart. If there are things in me that need to be changed, change them. If there are parts of me that need to be grown and matured, grow and mature them. Where I need transformation, transform me completely. I am fully submitted to you. Lead me in the way that ends in life.” That’s the “everlasting way” he’s talking about at the end there. He’s asking for God to lead him to His kingdom; the very kingdom whose way was opened for everyone to enter by Jesus’ death and resurrection. David was crying out here at the end for what we now know is the good news of the Gospel. “God, know me fully so that I can have that!”

Friends, I think this is the point where this psalm should land for all of us. When we strive to pursue this God who knows us so very well, life is always going to be at the end of that journey. Even if we have some places in us that aren’t quite where they need to be, we can pursue Him anyway. Pay attention to how Jesus interacted with the people who came to Him in the Gospel accounts of His life and ministry. It made absolutely no difference where they came from or what was in their background. It didn’t matter how many rough edges they had or how rough those edges happened to be. If they were sincerely moving in His direction, He received them. All of them. And He gave them life. Life is found when we pursue the God who knows us. Life is found when you pursue the God who knows you. 

Pursue Him because there’s no hiding from Him anyway. Pursue Him because He knows you. Pursue Him because He created you. Pursue Him even if your efforts are halting and ugly. Pursue Him even if you are moving in His direction for reasons that are mostly selfish and small. Pursue Him because He not only can but will give life to all those who come to Him in Christ. Life is found when you pursue the God who knows you. 

As for what this actually looks like, it is remarkably simple. The apostle Paul said that beginning this pursuit takes just two things. It takes a belief and a confession. He said that if we confess with our lips that Jesus is Lord—in other words, if we acknowledge fully and freely that He is who He claimed to be and what the resurrection proved Him to be—and if we believe in our heart that God raised Him from the dead—that is, if we are willing to accept historical reality as it actually is rather than merely as we want it to be—we will be saved. Life will be ours in Christ. Life is found when you pursue the God who knows you. 

If this confession and receiving of life is something you have done, great. Make sure you are living like it. Make sure you are living like someone who has fully embraced the life that is truly life. Be a beacon of the life of God’s kingdom as you live toward those around you from out of the ethos of His kingdom—with kindness and gentleness and compassion and mercy and humility and hospitality and love. Be a defender of life by working for justice for those who are most vulnerable whether they are very young or very old or somewhere in between. Constantly submit yourself to God for Him to fully know you even as He does. Life is found when you pursue the God who knows you. 

If, on the other hand, this life is something you have not received, or are not totally sure you have received, today is a great day to address that. There’s no sense in waiting for some future date when you can get everything worked out appropriately. You won’t accomplish anything by that save delaying your enjoyment of the life that is truly life. Submit yourself to the God who already knows you perfectly through Jesus, and receive the life He longs to give you. Life is found when you pursue the God who knows you. Pursue Him and live.