Bible Commentaries
Psalms 139

Verses 1-24

The conception of intimate personal relation between God and man is perhaps more remarkably and forcefully dealt with in this song than in any other in the whole collection.

The great facts are first stated. Jehovah’s knowledge of personal life is declared. He is familiar with every motion even to the simplest of downsitting and uprising. He knows thought afar off, that is, in the strange and mystic processes of its making. All ways and words are intimately know to the God Who is the nearest environment of human life. And from all this there can be no escape, for the Omniscient is also the Omnipresent. He is in heaven, but Sheol also is full of His presence. Distance is a human term only, and the uttermost parts of the trackless sea are also in the Presence. Darkness is light to Him, and has no hiding place from Him. The deep mysteries of being are not involved to Jehovah, for He presided in wisdom over all the mystic processes of the beginnings of human life. All this does not affright the singer, for he knows the love of Jehovah, and exclaims in glad praise for the presciousness of the unnumbered thoughts of God concerning him.

In view of all this it is hopeless for the wicked to attempt to escape from God, and the singer’s desire for separation from all such is the final word of the psalm. The way of separation is that of personal choice. He must and will separate himself. Yet he is also dependent upon God in this matter, and prays for His examination and leading.