Forward Movement is an official, non-profit agency of the Episcopal Church whose mission is to create compelling content for Christian living. Since 1935 we have published the quarterly devotional Forward Day by Day, as well as pamphlets, booklets, and books that encourage and nourish people in their lives of prayer and faith.
SATURDAY, October 30
Psalm 139:1-17(18-23). You know my sitting down and my rising up; you discern my thoughts from afar.
God not only is near us, God knows us. God knows us better than any human person could possibly know us, even our own family. This is the God “from whom no secrets are hid.” When we pray, we can be sure we are not telling God anything God does not already know. We do not have to explain or excuse or dissimulate before God. We can be ourselves as we can be before no one else.
The psalmist knew this, although he believed God was “afar.” God had not yet come to earth in the person of Jesus Christ. The psalmist thought of God primarily as creator and helper, all-powerful and all-knowing. Christ taught us to know God also as a loving father who, if we will let him, will be with us and in us and a part of us always to help us become like him.
And so, because God knows us and is near us, we can talk to God and pray to God with the assurance that he really does hear us and knows us and is with us.
All of this seems very simple and hardly worth saying. But when we find ourselves neglecting our prayers, we might well ask ourselves if we really and truly believe that God knows us and hears us at all times. (1957)
PRAY for the Diocese of Jaffna (South India)
Ps 55 * 138, 139:1-17(18-23); Ecclesiasticus 35:1-17; Revelation 13:11-18; Luke 12:32-48
View the daily Lectionary Readings at Satucket.com.
Or view the Bible passages at Biblegateway.com.
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