Reflections on Psalm 139

Good morning everyone.

I'm having a bit of a low day. We were up in the night with a crying Sophie and now she's exhausted, I'm exhausted, and I have sent an exhausted husband to work as well. 

I feel overwhelmed and guilty for not having enough patience, for not being strong enough to protect my husband from sleepless nights, and for not really knowing how to help my daughter or what the matter is. I feel weak and inferior compared to other mums who run businesses, study for degrees, home school their children, and still get dinner on the table.

This morning I rushed around the house doing little bits and bobs but eventually I decided to turn to the Bible and see what wisdom I could find in there. I felt led to Psalm 139, which is one of my favourite chapters in the Bible, probably because I'm feeling low and it offers comfort.

Today, I saw something new in it that spoke to me.

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.

I've always read those words negatively, as in, the writer wants to run away from God and finds he cannot, even though he tries. Today, God gave me a positive message: wherever I go and whatever I do, God's Spirit will be with me. In my tiredness, frustration, and feelings of failure, He is with me.

Search me, O God, and know my heart; test me and know my anxious thoughts.

See if there is any offensive way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting.

God knows the state of my heart and knows all my worries, anxieties, and emotions. He is moulding me and using all the circumstances, upsets, and joys of my life as lessons to shape my character and to help me understand His goodness and grace. His way is the way everlasting. 

Whether you turn to the right or to the left, your ears will hear a voice behind you, saying, 'This is the way; walk in it.' (Isaiah 30:21)

The God who made this also made this also made me, and Sophie.

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.

All the days ordained for me were written in your book before one of them came to be.