'O, Lord, Thou has searched me and known me. Thou dost know when I sit down and when I rise up; Thou dost understand my thoughts from afar. Thou dost scrutinize my path and my lying down and art intimately acquainted with all my ways' Psalm.139:1-3.
While Anna and I were on a pleasure boat ride in a shallow lake, we observed the skills of a sporty boatman, who negotiated the boat with ease and confidence. He deliberately swayed the boat a few times to give a thrill of movement and speed, perhaps for the benefit of Aswathy and Anandit who were with us in the boat. After the ride, I enquired of him the reason behind his confidence. He recalled having known the lake for thirty five years and the current boat for five years. He learned swimming in this lake and used to fish here before he became a boatman, taking the tourists each day about thirty trips. He knew the boat, lake and what the tourists needed.
The way David, who wrote this Psalm, meditates on God's knowing of him, is a revealing truth about the character of God. God was intimately familiar with all that David was part of. David was aware of God's knowledge of his physical activities, thoughts, choices that he made and the happenings in his daily life. This dispelled from his heart any fear of being alone or lonely. One of my frequent experiences with people I meet at work is a sense of loneliness. David gave a strong refutal to this from his personal experience of God.
What does it mean to be Known by God! It is an experience of being loved. His knowing of each of us is to fill us with agape, the self giving love of God. Love is an overriding inner experience than, fear, anxiety or loneliness because love offers us a feeling of acceptance, belonging, rest and comfort.
St. Paul in 1 Corinthians 13, testifies of love as revealed in Jesus of Nazareth, as 'patient, kind..bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things...' (Vs 4-8). It is this Love of God which anchors us when we are swayed by guilt, disappointment, grief, ecstasy, anxiety or fear. God is accompanying us to love us and not to intrude into our lives. He cares enough to wait patiently for our return to respond to His love as portrayed in the character of the waiting Father in the story of the prodigal son. Love holds us together, lest we become fragmented with many inner contradictions. Love offers us the 'balm of Gilead' to heal our brokenness and nurse our wounds. Love liberates us from the pain or set backs of the past and carries us forward to love life and cherish the opportunities ahead.
A five year old boy who cane to visit us yesterday, looking at fish in the aquarium, told me, 'Someone must be caring for them'. God knows us and therefore He cares for us.
M.C.Mathew(text and photo)
No comments:
Post a Comment