Psalm 139

I.

Yahweh, you have searched me and you know me;

You know when I stand up and when I sit down;

You understand my thought from a great distance.

You examine closely the path I walk and the place I lie down;

You are intimately acquainted with all my ways.

Indeed, there is not a word on my tongue, that you, Yahweh, do not know in its entirety.

You besiege me front and back;

You place your hand on me.

Such knowledge is too miraculous for me;

It is so inaccessible, I could never attain it.

Here ends the first segment of the Psalm for the 2^nd Sunday after the Epiphany, Series B

II.

Where would I get away from your spirit?

Where would I flee from your face?

If I would climb up to the skies, you would be there.

If I would spread myself out in the realm of the dead, you would be there, too.

If I would ride the wings of the dawn and take up residence in the remotest part of the sea,

Even there your hand would lead me,

Your right hand would hold me.

Were I to say, “Surely the darkness will overshadow me

And the light around me will be night,”

Even darkness is not too dark for you

While the light beams brightly as the day.

To you darkness is just like light.

III.

Here begins the second segment of the Psalm for the 2^nd Sunday after the Epiphany, Series B

Surely it was you who created my most deep-seated organs,

You knitted me together in my mother’s womb.

I praise you because I am awesomely wonderful,

Marvelous are your works.

You know well my inmost being;

My bone structure was not hidden from you

When I was made in secret,

Woven together in the lowest places of the earth.

Your eyes saw me as an embryo.

In your book my entire future was written down ahead of time.

My days were planned before one of them ever came into existence.

Preliminary summary:

How precious to me are your thoughts, God!

How expansive is their total.

Were I to enumerate them, they would outnumber the grains of the sand.

Were I to come to the end of this enumeration, I would still be linked with you.

Here ends the second segment of the Psalm for the 2^nd Sunday after the Epiphany, Series B

IV.

Oh, that you would kill the wicked, God!

Oh, that violent people would stay away from me,

Who defy you wickedly

Who talk falsely--your enemies.

Yahweh, do I not hate those who hate you?

Do not I loathe those who rise up against you?

With perfect hatred I hate them;

They have become my enemies.

V.

Search me, God, and know my heart,

Test me and know my disquieting thoughts,

See if there is any harmful way in me,

Lead me in the everlasting way.

© 2003 Ralph W. Klein