All the days ordained for me were written in your book before one of them came to be. (Psalm 139:16)

As of my birthday this year, I had lived 14,975 days. That's about half the number of days the average American can expect to live. We normally measure our age by the number of years we have lived, but maybe David was onto something when he wrote the words of this psalm verse and described his life in terms of days.

We generally take for granted each day that the sun will come up, we will go about our routine and then go to bed that night. Unless we have something exciting planned, we don't expect one day to be much different from the next. But life has a way of changing our plans all too unexpectedly, doesn't it? We don't start off a day expecting to have a car accident, to lose a job, to hear an ominous diagnosis from the doctor or to go to the hospital. When you stop to think of it that way, isn't it foolish of us to assume that one day will be like the next as if we can control what happens? The book of James even tells us: "Now listen, you who say, 'Today or tomorrow we will go to this or that city, spend a year there, carry on business and make money.' Why, you do not even know what will happen tomorrow...Instead, you ought to say, 'If it is the Lord’s will, we will live and do this or that.' As it is, you boast and brag. All such boasting is evil" (James 4:14-16). It is the height of sinful human arrogance for us to live our lives as if we can count on what will happen on any given day.

But through David, the LORD invites us to look at our days God's way. David had some tough days. One day he had to fight the giant, Goliath. For many days he hid in caves, running from King Saul who wanted to kill him. And those were just some of the bad days David had. David even knew how miserable sin and guilt can make each day when for about a year he refused to confess his sin of committing adultery with Bathsheba and murdering her husband. Yet we don't find David complaining about how lousy those days were. Instead he calmly acknowledges to the LORD, "All the days ordained for me were written in your book before one of them came to be." Even before the day when David was conceived or the day he came from his mother's womb, David was on the LORD's schedule. The LORD knew everything that would happen on every day of David's life. And as we read Bible history and see David's life unfold, we see the LORD working on those days in such a way that in both good and bad times he guided David like a shepherd to bring him to heaven.

The same Good Shepherd knows every one of our days too even before we do--even before those days come to be. Even before the sun rises he knows the joys and sorrows that will fill those days. Perhaps today will be your last day on earth. Perhaps today you'll get tragic news. Those things might surprise us, but they won't surprise the God before whom all of our days are crystal clear. Remember, the LORD is our God who made this universe from nothing in six days and who raised our Savior from death on the third day. He is the gracious, forgiving God who has appointed a final day on which he will judge the world and take his believers to heaven. Though we are less powerful to control the events of our days than we think, the things that happen on any given day are not beyond the control of our almighty, all-knowing God. No matter how many days on earth he gives you, he has them already recorded in his book and he will use those days to guide you with his word to the endless day of heaven.

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. (Psalm 139:13-15)

If you see a stunt often enough, it no longer looks too special or out of the ordinary. If we saw a miracle every day, we'd get used to it and it wouldn't look very remarkable either. No wonder that David wrote the verses of our text to remind us of the miracle that we see every time we look into the mirror.

Every human being is a miracle, for we didn't just pop into existence on our own or by the chance process of evolution. We are nothing less than the carefully and deliberately planned creations of God. God created our first parents, Adam and Eve, when he was finishing his creation on the sixth day. Each of us has descended from Adam and Eve through the natural reproductive process, but nevertheless each of us is nothing short of a miracle in which God had a hand.

"You created my inmost being; you knit me together in my mother's womb," David says. None of us are here just because our parents chose to have children. God is responsible for shaping and forming us in the womb. There may be unwanted children and unplanned pregnancies--but not to God! He is the one who gets the credit for fertilizing an egg cell and causing that cell to multiply and grow into a complete human being. Though you may feel like you don't belong and may struggle for identity in this world, the fact is that God put you together, knitting you together much as a grandmother carefully and lovingly knits a woolen sweater. Regardless of the circumstances of your birth, you are no accident! God was responsible for putting you together, so you can rest assured that you do have a reason for being here.

And God put you together with amazing forethought. David had to confess that he was fearfully and wonderfully made. Because we live with the wonders of our bodies every day, we so often fail to appreciate these marvels of God's creation until something malfunctions. But stop to think about some of the systems and functions God has given you: A heart that beats without you even thinking about it as it pumps life-sustaining blood through your circulatory system--a system which could stretch around the earth twice if its parts were joined end-to-end. Eyes that blink an average of 13 times per minute and automatically adjust to let in the right amount of light for you to see. (The eye is such a wondrous creation that it stumped even Darwin.) Arms and legs that move in just about any direction. How can anyone who has studied medicine fail to notice the wisdom and power of a Creator in the wonders of the human body?

Even sin has not totally tarnished the beauty of this creation of God. Though we suffer illness, organ failure and death, we still remain the crowning achievement of God's creation. We are, after all, the only living creatures whom God took the time to form from the dust of the ground and breathe life into. More than that, we are the only creatures with a soul, designed to have a loving and perfect relationship with God as our heavenly Father. And to fix that relationship once sin had broken it, God sent his Son into the world as a human being also created in the womb of his virgin mother. Though he lives in a body totally unaffected by sin, Jesus Christ felt in his flesh the pain and suffering that our sins earned us. He went through the most traumatic bodily experience of all--death--in order to give us the blessed eternal joy of heaven. But this holy Savior suffered death on a cross and rose to life again to take our sins away and to restore the broken relationship with our Maker.

We are amazing creatures--not just because we are created in our Maker's image but also because as God's baptized people we are clothed in our Redeemer's righteousness. The next time you look into the mirror, take a moment to notice God's handiwork, and join David in praising the LORD who has fearfully and wonderfully made you.

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. (Psalm 139:11-12)

According to some studies, more crime takes place at night than in the daytime. There are probably a few reasons for that. Nighttime might be the ideal time to catch a crime victim sleeping. At night there will likely be fewer witnesses to report a crime in progress or speak to investigators afterward. But nighttime is also a preferred time for a crime because some criminals feel that the dark of night is deal for hiding a crime.

It shouldn't surprise us that people are more willing to commit crimes under the cover of darkness. St. Paul wrote, "Those who get drunk, get drunk at night" (1 Thessalonians 5:7). Jesus once said, "Everyone who does evil hates the light, and will not come into the light for fear that his deeds will be exposed" (John 3:20). Sinful human beings live under the delusion that doing something in the dark makes it harder for God to notice. Or at least we feel like we can overlook the things that our sinful nature wants to do if we're not so brazen as to do them in broad daylight.

David the psalmist knew differently. In our consideration of Psalm 139, we have seen that God knows our every thought and every word and that he is everywhere, unlimited by physical space as we are. In the verses 11 and 12, David pokes a hole in the absurd notion that darkness can hide a person from God.

"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," David says. Here David sounds like the sinner who hopes to get away with some sin by hiding it from God's sight. At one point in his life, David would have liked to hide his sins under the cover of darkness. The night he committed adultery with Bathsheba, David somewhere in his heart probably hoped God wasn't paying attention. It's equally absurd for us to hope the same thing. Whether the sin is some form of adultery, drunkenness or theft, doing it at night in no way hinders God from seeing exactly what we are doing. Pitch darkness is just as bright to God as the sun on a cloudless day. No matter how much we wish for a way to hide our sins from God, he sees them all. For God, night shines just as brightly as the day and does just as little to keep our sins from him. If we think there is any way to hide our sins from God and so to escape his punishment, we're only kidding ourselves.

But when we confess our sins to God and realize that he is gracious and merciful and wants to forgive us, the fact that darkness does not hide us from him is such a relief. He who created light at the very first moment of creation is also the light of the world, who entered this sin-darkened world in human flesh in order bring light to us spiritually blind sinners. God the Son came to earth not only to expose the sins we commit in the darkness but also to lift the veil of hell's darkness by doing away with it at the cross. In Christ we have true light--spiritual light. In him we have the clearly-lighted path to heaven because he washed away our sins and has risen from death for us. His word lights the way to heaven and it also lights our way through this life as it shows us how to live our lives of thanks to him.

It's also a relief to know that darkness is as light to God because then we know he won't fail to notice us when we need him. It's not unusual for people to feel more alone at night. Darkness wraps us up like a blanket and makes us feel isolated from the outside world. People who live alone feel more secluded and lonely at night. But darkness is as light to the LORD. When you wake up at night and there's no human contact, God still sees you just as if it were noon. And as he has assured us repeatedly in his word, he is with us always. As David says, darkness will not be dark to God. Our gracious and ever-present God is with us always and won't fail to see us when we need him and call on him for help.

Praise God that even darkness is as light to him!

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. Psalm 139:7-10

One of the fundamental laws of physics is that nothing can be in two different places at the same time. It is also a fundamental law of physics that no two objects can occupy the same space at the same time. Those truths are so obvious that we just take them for granted.

But how mind-boggling it is to consider those physical laws and think about what David says in these verses from Psalm 139. Although you and I and every other living thing can only be in one place at a time, the LORD himself who created this universe in which we live is not bound by the physical laws he created. At this very moment, God is with you. At the same time he is with some believer on the other side of the world. He is up there on the planet Mars. He is miles beneath the surface of the ocean where the sun never shines. There is no place in all of creation where God himself is not.

We could try to fathom this mystery, but we would fail because it goes beyond our scientific reasoning. It is more important that we see what it means for us to have a God who is present everywhere.

If at any moment God is present at any given place, that means he was there the last time I sinned. Even though I can't see God, he was there and saw exactly what I did. No matter where I go today or what I do, God is already there. He will be an eyewitness of and a firsthand listener to everything I say and do. That's kind of a scary thought, isn't it? What if a parent or a police officer stood beside us 24 hours a day? We'd watch our steps and chose our words a little more closely and we'd be terrified of stepping out of line for fear that we'd get a slap on the wrist--or something more serious--right away. Isn't it even more terrifying to hear that God is everywhere and that I can't escape him, even though my sinful heart would like to get away from him so that I can sin without fear? That's impossible though. We're only kidding ourselves if we think can sin without the LORD being right there to witness the whole thing.

On the other hand, what a relief and a joy it is to know that our God who loves us and gave up his Son to save us is everywhere. Our Savior Jesus who was crucified as punishment for our sins and was raised to life because God forgives our sins is everywhere. That means no matter where I go, my gracious Father loves me and is watching over me. Even up in the highest heavens, David says, God is there. When you're up in the airplane looking down on God's earth, he is there too. If you're crawling through a cave or swimming underwater, God is there. Up or down, north or south, east or west, there is no place and no direction you can go where God is not. He's there to watch over you, to protect you and to see exactly what you're going through. He's there as your gracious, forgiving God who pardons your sins for the sake of our Savior Jesus. No matter where we are or how alone we feel, we are never truly alone. In the LORD we have a God is already everywhere we will ever go.

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. (Psalm 139:1-6)

How well do you know your best friend? Or your spouse? Or your children? Even if you do have an excellent relationship with the person to whom you are the closest, there are still things you don't know about him or her. While you might know each other well enough to finish each other's sentences, you can't always be sure what words are about to come out of that person's mouth or what that person is thinking--especially when he or she isn't with you.

But our God does know us that well. He's like a mind-reader. He knows us without limits, as David the psalmist declares in these verses from Psalm 139. Because the LORD knows us completely, the LORD knows even the most minute details about us. He knows when we sit down, when we get out of bed in the morning, where we go and what we do. He knows our thoughts from afar, David tells us. Though we can't see the LORD and he may therefore seem far away, he knows the thoughts going through our minds and hearts and he knows the words which are about to form from those thoughts.

How does it feel to know that God knows your every thought and word even before those thoughts and words have crystallized in the mind and on the tongue?

For us sinners, that's a shameful, even terrifying, concept. If God knows what I'm about to think before I think it, he knows the evil that I'm planning in my heart. He knows if I'm going to think up a way to strike back at someone who hurt me. He knows if I'm going to think indecent thoughts about the lusty images I see on television. He knows that I think there are things I'd love to do more than spend with him in his word. He knows the words I'm about to hurl in anger at my spouse or behind the back of my coworker. God knows all of our thoughts and words before they come into being, and he's not pleased with all of them. Since those thoughts and words are so often laced with evil intent, the LORD as a just God cannot put up with them. Those hidden thoughts and secret words of which we ought to be ashamed will not remain hidden from him because he knows us without limit. And he knows how to give us the unending torment we deserve for such sins.

But for repentant sinners who struggle with sin and guilty consciences, the fact that God knows us so thoroughly is great news! He knows the agony in our hearts as we look back on the sins of our past with regret and remorse. He knows when we wish we had not disobeyed him and when we long for him to have mercy on us. He knows how we want nothing more than to be cleansed of our sins in the blood of Jesus Christ so that we can stand before the LORD and joyfully call him our God.

And what a joy it is to know that our God knows every other thought in our troubled hearts as well! He knows when I lie awake at night, frustrated over the mess that sins have made in my life. He knows my fears about the report I'm going to get from the doctor or about my job which is on the line. He knows how dim the future looks to me as I get older. Not one of my problems or concerns goes unnoticed to my heavenly Father, who knows how to respond to all of them in love and for my eternal good.

The God who reads our minds knew exactly how to deal with our greatest fear--the fear of spending eternity separated from him in hell. God knew what it would take in order to save us from that punishment. And he was willing to pay that price. He punished his Son Jesus for us and took his sinless life as the payment for our sins at the cross of Calvary. Our risen Lord Jesus is now ruling over all things and does everything for our good. In Christ we are holy and blameless before our maker. And now we rejoice to call ourselves children of a heavenly Father who knows everything about us and knows to help us in our troubles.