Discoveries

I have been getting blessed reading the Psalms and having Strong's Concordance at my fingertips.  Amazing how knowing the roots of words or multiple meanings of words can turn on a light in my heart.

Especially Psalm 139.

It was my mother's favorite Psalm.

v15 "I was made in secret and curiously wrought..."  curiously wrought means "embroidered in variegated colors."

What a glorious concept!

While God was in the process of creating you, individual you, He was hand-embroidering you with the colors He delighted in - your laugh was one color, your way of looking at things, the small wonders of His creation that delight your heart - all were individually chosen and placed just so, like the stars.  And - like the stars - He knows you by name, too.

v16 "Thine eyes did see my substance..."  As the tiniest of 2-celled embryos, God knew you.  He knew who you are, He knew what you would do with your life, every sin you would commit - and He loved you (the quintessential Proud Papa - that's Him!)

"...and in Thy book all were written..." ("members" is not in the original) In other words, I am a full person in God's eyes, all of my attributes are there, I am not just a clump of cells - and like my Father,  I am.  

"... which in continuance were fashioned..." - that is a potter's term meaning "to squeeze into shape."  The Potter was already fashioning my clay into a vessel and, yes, some days I can still feel the squeezing going on ! (incidentally, this is the same term used in Genesis when He formed Adam out of the ground - the only thing handmade of all creation, a hands-on creation by the King of the Universe - that's YOU!)

"...when as yet there were none of them." Before I was even conceived, He had thought of me, knew how He would shape me, what attributes He would give me, and had numbered every second of my life, every hair on my head.

v.17"How precious also are Thy thoughts unto me..." the word "precious" also means "costly" - Yes, my every breath, my every thought is precious to Him - but I also  cost Him His most precious possession, His only Son.  Knowing that more fully than words could ever express, He still chose for me to be created.  Before the foundation of the world He chose me - and was willing to pay the price for that  choice.

Grace, and grace alone.

I will probably never be able to completely comprehend what a privilege it is to be called by Him, to belong to Him, as long as I live on this earth.  In heaven, where I am promised the ability to know even as I am known; will I then understand the cost? It seems impossible to me -  no matter how long I meditate on the cost, I keep coming up with new aspects of the tally - His heart broken, His Son broken, His Son bled like the Passover lamb to "make Him kosher", to tolerate my sin, to equate each sin with the supreme agony of not just the cross, but every second lived confined to a human body - and that for eternity!!! To never again have the freedom of existing without boundaries, He will forever restrain Himself to exist within the parameters of His flesh.  So much, so very much He gave up.  When our Father tore the curtains in the Holy of Holies from the top down (tearing the clothes is a sign of deep mourning in the Jewish culture) He was revealing the broken Father heart that sacrificed everything He valued.  Everything! for me, for you.

Everything.

Grace alone.

Selah.