Psalm 139

“The Ultimate Miracle Baby”

(Psalm 139:13-18 and Matthew 1:18-25, September 11, 2011)

Psalm 139:13 … You formed my inward parts;

you knitted me together in my mother's womb.

14 I praise you, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made.

Wonderful are your works;

my soul knows it very well.

15 My frame was not hidden from you,

when I was being made in secret,

intricately woven in the depths of the earth.

16 Your eyes saw my unformed substance;

in your book were written, every one of them,

the days that were formed for me,

when as yet there was none of them.

The Catechism of Christian Unity (CoCU) contains this provocative question: 2. Why are you here? The answer is surprising. We rewrite the question when we hear it to be more like this: “What have you done for me lately?” But the God-centered answer comes to us from Jeremiah 31: Why are you here? God loved me with an everlasting love.

We are here because God is determined to love us with an everlasting love. This is what He determined to do from before all time. This is for His own glory, which is the best purpose there can ever be for anything, but isn't it amazing that what will bring such great glory to God will be His everlasting love for us?

God knows. People say that sometimes when they really mean that no one knows. But Psalm 139 says that God knows. In particular, the beautiful verses in the middle of the psalm tell us that God knows about a life before a child even experiences day one in the womb of his mother.

God made you. That was an outstanding achievement in so many ways, combining two lives into a new life... God knit you specifically together. We can never know the depths of that, but we can know that God did it and that it is a very praiseworthy work; we can know that very well.

What was hidden to your mother, God saw, and even planned. From the depths of an unseen world, God knew your name, and he knew something about you that you have no idea of: how many days you have ahead of you in your life, not just the number but what each day of your life will contain. He formed you and He formed each of your days fully.

More amazing than that: God saved you by coming into the world as you came into the world. God knew the baby Jesus. He formed Jesus by the Holy Spirit inside Mary. That was a miracle! And he formed all of the days of Jesus, including the day of the cross. This is the way He proved His everlasting love for you. This was part of His eternal knowledge and His holy plan: to send His Son to die for you before you were even born.

He was willing to be Immanuel, God with us. Because of that, we will always be with Him.