Psalm 139

God's Attributes—Too Wonderful for Me!

¹Lord , you have investigated me,

and you know.

²You know when I sit down and when I get up.

You understand my thoughts from far off.

³You keep track of when I travel and when I stay,[#139:3 Literally you winnow my path and my crouching down]

and you are familiar with all my ways.

⁴Before there is a word on my tongue

you, Lord , already know it completely.

⁵You put a fence behind me and in front of me,

and you have placed your hand on me.

⁶Such knowledge is too wonderful for me.

It is too high—I cannot grasp it.

⁷Where can I go from your Spirit?

Where can I flee from your Presence?

⁸If I go up to heaven, you are there.

If I make my bed in hell—there you are!

⁹I rise on the wings of dawn.

I settle on the far side of the sea.

¹⁰Even there your hand guides me,

and your right hand holds on to me.

¹¹And if I say, “Surely the darkness will hide me

and the light will become night around me,”

¹²then even the darkness will not be too dark for you.

The night will be as light as the day.

Darkness and light are the same to you.

¹³For you created my inner organs.[#139:13 Literally kidneys . The kidneys were thought of as a center of emotion.]

You wove me together in my mother's womb.

¹⁴I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made.

Your works are wonderful,

and my soul knows that very well.

¹⁵My bones were not hidden from you

when I was made in the secret place,

when I was woven together in the depths of the earth.

¹⁶Your eyes saw my unfinished body.

In your book all of them were written.

Days were determined, before any of them existed.

¹⁷Your thoughts to me are so precious, O God!

How great is the sum of them!

¹⁸If I would count them,

they would outnumber the grains of sand.

I awake, and I am still with you.

¹⁹If only you would slay the wicked, O God,

so that bloody men would depart from me,

²⁰men who speak against you maliciously.

Your adversaries misuse your name.

²¹Do I not hate those who hate you, O Lord ,

and detest those who rise up against you?

²²I absolutely hate them. To me they are enemies.

²³Investigate me, God, and know my heart.

Test me and know my troubled thoughts.

²⁴See if there is any way in me that causes pain,

and lead me in the way everlasting.