God Knows Everything — Keith Price

Spirit of expectancy. I really hope that's so. It's nice for us all to say, sure we have, but we never thought about it till I asked the question. Well, you really haven't. So have you already expressed to God a sense of expectancy that He is going to make you a person that's different from the one that came in here?

Don't answer out loud, just answer quietly. For between the cross and heaven, there's a whole lot of living going on. And I don't know about you, but I sure haven't arrived. There's an awful lot more that I need to not just know, but there's an awful lot more that I need to experience in my life.

Moving Beyond Knowledge Into Christian Living

I think so often, you know, we think it's as much as we know. It's what we know that's really going to make us better. Now, obviously, we've got to know something to experience it. But let me repeat what I said last night, that we're living in an age when knowledge and the multiplication of all facets of knowledge has become the be-all and end-all of living just about.

Used to be many years ago, I think it was not too many, just 40, 50 years ago, we were still in the manufacturing era. But now, as Naisbitt said in his book ten years ago, Megatrends, we're now in the information era.

Now, it's not what you do that counts. It's not what you make or manufacture. It's not what you live that counts. There's a whole lot of living going on. Oh, but there's a whole lot of knowing going on.

Whole lot of knowing going on, because we're in the information era. It's not what you do or what you actually know. It's now, do you have access to that particular site or website, wherever it is, that you can find out what you want to know, and then you're in.

My brother and sister, we have taken this longing for knowledge, and we've been sucked into this so that we've made the Christian life only knowing. We've got to have the knowledge. Without that knowledge, there is no living.

But when I have that knowledge, I say, Lord, I want to put that into practice. I remember a woman coming into my office in Montreal a number of years ago. I had met her before. She was the cleaning lady, and she was a new person, and I guess she'd been there two or three weeks, but she hadn't met me, and I had books from ceiling to floor, wall to wall in my office there.

She came in and was stunned to see me sort of there. Oh, she said, you work in here? I said, yes. She said, oh, I've been wondering as I dust these books. Well, she flicks them, she meant. I saw a flick in them once or twice, but she said, have you read all these books?

I said, well, I said, no, I haven't actually. I said, you know, I've got about 4 ,000 books, but at that time I had about 3 ,000. I'm sorry, about 3 ,000 books. I said that, but there was about 800 of them that I've never read.

She says, well, why is that? Well, what's the problem or something, you know? I said, well, you know, the problem is that I keep on reading one all over and over and over again. Shit, you do? Which one is it?

I reached behind on my credenza, and I picked out, I looked at it, and I said, Holy Bible. Oh, she said, I must be going or you'll be getting me thinking. Imagine that. I must be going or you'll be getting me thinking.

That's many people wouldn't say that, but they think that. But when she'd gone, I thought, you know, 800 books that I haven't read. Wouldn't it be wonderful to have a capsule that I could just pop into my mouth, throw a glass of water down, it goes in my throat, and bingo, I'd have all the knowledge in those 800 books just like that.

Wouldn't that be wonderful? And God stuck his arm out through the clouds and put me across the face and said, poppycock. Well, sort of. And he sort of put into my mind the thought, Price, it would be much better for you if instead of having a capsule where all the knowledge in those 800 books would become yours, if you had a capsule that would give you the will to do what you already know in the other 2 ,200 books.

That really had a difference on my life, made a difference in my life. So between the cross and heaven, there's a whole lot of living going on. And it's living it's meant to be, not just knowing. But we've come here to lay a basis for it.

The Bible Books That Sustain Christian Life

And tonight we're going to look into a wonderful, wonderful passage. I suppose if I were on a desert island and I knew I was going to be marooned there and I could take three books of the Bible with me, I would take, first of all, the book of Exodus.

Oh, Exodus. You say, goodness me, you wouldn't take Exodus. All the wonderful books and you pick Exodus. Yes. Why? Well, because if I didn't have the other books, I have found that that one reminds me in hieroglyphic form of all that's in the rest of the Bible in alphabetical form.

Oh, I see. So it gives me a clue. Oh, yes. I remember that. Oh, yes. That speaks of that. Oh, yes. I understand that. The second one would be, and I'm mentioning this specifically this week, because the second book that I would want to take would be the Gospel of John, because it would remind me more than any of the other Gospels of all the wonderful words of Jesus as he would talk to me, as he walks with me, as he talks with me, and he could speak to me and tell me what he told those disciples.

The third book that I would take would be the book of Psalms. Oh, it's all right. Most of you, if you were young at the back there, all you young people, you're going, what in the world would you take Psalms for?

Well, it's a wonderful book. You know, if you're over 50, well, you just close your eyes and your Bible falls open to it, right? If you're under 30, there's, at the beginning of the Bible, you've got an index page, and it'll tell you where the Psalms are, because you don't get to know the Psalms until life gets rough, right?

Well, tonight and tomorrow night, and then again on Thursday and Friday, we're going to look into a marvelous Psalm, and I want you to turn to it. It's Psalm, the 33rd Psalm, the 33rd Psalm of the fifth book of Psalms.

I saw you getting worried there, Don. Now, of course, if you've got a proper Bible, it'll divide the books of Psalms up into its five books, and the first book of Psalms begins, believe it or not, with Psalm 1.

Isn't that wonderful? But the fifth book of Psalms begins in Psalm 107, so all you've got to do is count 33 Psalms from there and turn to that Psalm, will you? And if you can't count, then just turn to Psalm 139.

All right, 139. Now, you've got it before you. I know there will be at least half a dozen people here say, never going to read the NIV. All right, that's fine. Let you do it. I wish you'd learn a little bit about the history of the Bible, and learn how we got our Bible, and you'd know that no English version can properly, absolutely represent properly.

I need so many in order to show me what it really means. So, don't please get hooked on any one. I'm not hooked on this. The only reason I use this is because Zondervan did a good marketing job on it, and it is such a good marketing job that where I go across North America, I ask in many places, and two-thirds of every group of Christians, just about two-thirds of the Christians, use the NIV.

Now, that's not necessarily, as I said the other day, I don't think it's the most best rendered, particularly in the New Testament. I happen to think the Old Testament, the philosophy of translation is wonderful, far better than the others, because it's difficult sometimes to translate, but the poetic books of the Bible differ more than all the other books.

The translations differ more in the poetic books than any other books of the Bible. So, if you're going to use another version tonight, and you're just coming, then that's fine, you use it, but you'll probably think I'm on verse 13, and I'm verse 10.

In fact, I'll be on neither of those verses tonight, because we're only going to do the first six, so you'd be wrong on both counts. But I'm just asking if you wouldn't mind tonight using this, and I've given you that sheet with Psalm 139 in the NIV on it, and that means that at least we can use the same version, and we'll know where we're going, all right?

And if you get upset about it, then I won't look if you leave, all right? I want us to read together. Would you join with me? Oh, my word, I've taken all that time just introducing this. Well, I've still got an hour and eight minutes, is it?

No, no, I'm right. Would you read with me, then? Let's stand to read the Word of God. When I go to other countries, particularly in Eastern Europe or other places, I love for folk to stand to read. The usher shut the door.

Nobody comes in when you're reading the Word of God. They stand. So we're going to read from the NIV, and we'll read, in fact, I think, the whole psalm. Let's read it together. O Lord, you have searched me, and you know me.

You know when I sit and when I rise. You perceive my thoughts on my tongue. You know it completely, O Lord. You hem me in, behind and before. You have laid your hand upon me. Such knowledge is too wonderful for me, too lofty for me to attain.

Where can I go from your Spirit? Where can I flee from your presence? If I go up to the heavens, you're there. If I make my bed in the depths, you're there. If I rise on the wings of the dawn, if I settle on the far side of the sea, even there your hand will guide me.

Your right hand will hold me fast. If I say, surely the darkness will hide me, and the light become night around me, even the darkness will not be dark to you. The night will shine like the day, for darkness is as light to you.

For you created my inmost being. You knit me together in my mother's womb. I praise you because I'm fearfully and wonderfully made. Your works are wonderful. I know that full well. My frame was not hidden from you when I was made in a secret place.

When I was woven together in the depths of the earth, your eyes saw my unformed body. All the days ordained for me were written in your book before one of them came to be. How precious to me are your thoughts, O God.

How vast is the sum of them. Were I to count them, they would outnumber the grains of sand. When I awake, I am still with you. If only you would slay the wicked, O God. Away from me, you bloodthirsty men.

They speak of you with evil intent. Your adversaries misuse your name. Do I not hate those who hate you, O Lord, and abhor those who rise up against you? I have nothing but hatred for them. I counter my enemies.

Search me, O God, and know my heart. Test me and know my anxious thoughts. See if there is any offensive way in me and lead me in the way everlasting. You may sit down. Father, in your Son, the Lord Jesus Christ, are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge.

Grant us therefore now that reverence and humility without which none of us can understand your word. In the strong name of Jesus we pray. What I'm going to do is to take four evenings to look at this psalm.

Reading Psalm 139 as a Whole

Now, you read it so well together, but I know there was a section of the psalm you wished wasn't in there. You frankly didn't want it in there. In fact, when you read it, you don't like reading that part at all.

In fact, you hope that when anyone preaches on it, as they likely have, they'll miss that part out altogether. We cannot do that with any of scripture. And if that's the way we feel about verses 19, 20, 21, and 22, we have not the knowledge to understand why they're there.

This man, when he uses language like that, doesn't in fact have any personal venom or vindictiveness against anybody. Take this man, David, when he said about Absalom, he wished that the foxes, that the jackals, would eat them in the desert.

David knew he was God's anointed, and even Absalom, his beloved son, shouldn't try and usurp that place. And so he speaks against him, and counts him as an enemy, and cries out against him, and wishes him dead.

But when Absalom dies, oh my son, Absalom, Absalom, my son, how I wish I had been that one, not you. Because there was nothing personal about it. It was his way of expressing to God that whoever were God's enemies were his enemies, because he loved God so much.

Now, you won't understand it until we get to it, but I want you to know we're very much going to look at that, because it's an important part of the psalm. But I know you like the other parts, you like the nice parts.

And we've got three lovely parts for three lovely evenings, and we're going to come on the fourth evening to that part. Let me give you an outline of the psalm. The first six verses, and if you just want to draw a line under the six, and then draw a line under 12, and draw a line under 18, then you'll have a line already under 24.

So there's 24 verses divided into four parts of six. That's the way it's divided up. The first part, one, two, three, four, five, and six, is about God being all-knowing. He knows everything. Everything there is to know, God knows.

The second part, verses 7 through 12, says God is everywhere. There's no place I can ever go that I can get away from God. Thankfully, Lord, there's no place I can go that I'm not going to be able to be in your presence.

The third part, which is verses 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, is God is all-creating, and it shows us how he creates in the womb. From the moment of inception, God is there supervising, God is there as the architect of your body and mine, and he puts it together in the womb.

And I suppose we could say if the first section is all-knowing is his omniscience, we could say that the second section, his being ever-present, is his omnipresence, which just means he's always present.

We would like to say the third part is his omnipotence, but I'm not too sure I would likely put it that way, because as I study it, it isn't quite in that line, but it's very near there. So for your own sake, if you like, you can say his omniscience, all science knowledge, omniscience, having all knowledge.

His omnipresence, verses 7 to 12, he's present everywhere. And his omnipotency, he's potent, he's powerful, he has all omnipower, so he's all-powerful. But really it's limited to the creation of the human body there, but nevertheless it's there.

The last part is David's response to all that, and so he comes to the last few verses from 19 to 24. What I'm going to do actually on the last night is, on Thursday night, I'm only going to take four of our six verses.

13, 14, 15, and 16, I'm going to take those. And you notice there's a space, because there is indeed a different thought. From verse 17 to 24, I'm going to take it all together on the last night, because this is his response.

Verse 17 and 18, his response, his thoughts about God as he looks about. Verses 19, 20, 21, and 22, his response or his thoughts about others as he looks around. And finally, verses 23 and 24, his response or his thoughts about himself as he looks within.

So we're going to see all those last three things together on Friday night. But let's have a look, let's start off in the first six verses here. I realize I'm, this is, I don't know, I love the Psalms.

I suppose if I had to pick one book that I could just preach from all the time and no other book, I've got to declare the whole counsel of God. But I'd love, I'd love to immerse myself in the Psalms. I've had the joy of preaching my way through the Psalms a number of times.

There's still six or seven that I can't understand, and I guess I'm going to have to preach those somewhere in the back corner in heaven. But frankly, I don't understand them all, but I read them and did my best.

But most of the Psalms are marvelous, and as you get into the feel of the Psalms, and you get to know a little bit about marvelous poetry of the Jewish people, then it's wonderful to see the devotion and the worship.

In my own quiet times, as I call out to God, I use the Psalms so much. Oh, there's so much material there that we pray back to God and realize it in our own lives. So let's look at the first six verses then, that God is all-knowing, he is omniscient.

God’s Omniscience: He Knows Everything

The first verse in the Hebrew scriptures, which is the top of our Psalm and doesn't have a verse number, we won't take, but you can see what it says. It's for the director of music, whether it was Asaph or whatever it was, or later, perhaps earlier than that.

And it's of or from David usually, and it's obviously a Psalm, a song. This was the hymn book of the early church, of course, and no wonder it's in five books. Don't we get hymn books, we put them together and somebody else writes some more, and then we get another hymn book, and in the end somebody says, why don't we put them all together in one?

Well, that's what they've got. And these were the hymns that the early Christians sang. So let's start at verse one, and we're just going to look for the first little while, and maybe that will have to be it tonight, at verses one to four.

I'll pick up five and six. You know, I do tend to get behind sometimes, but don't worry, we'll catch up. But look at verses one to four, they're packed with truth, there's so much here. I don't know we could spend all week on these verses.

But look what it says, I want you to notice the expressions, the two words, you know. You know, that's provided you're looking at the NIV, and they occur three times in the first four verses. Verse one, O Lord, you've searched me, and you know me.

Verse two, the second time, you know when I sit and when I rise. Verse four, before the words are in my tongue, you know it completely, O Lord. Those three you knows will divide it up nicely for us, and we'll just have three little points here, because it will bring this whole matter, and put it in a way that we can understand.

The first you know that I want to talk about, and frankly, this is you know, period. That would be the heading, you know, period. Don't just put a full stop, write the word period. You know, period, and you know what I mean.

It's because in actual fact, the word me that's got there anyway, some versions don't put that in, but it isn't actually in the original text at all. It's put in to make up the sense, but sometimes I think they put in words to make up the sense, and they destroy other possible meanings of that.

So here, in actual fact, what it says here, O Lord, you have searched me, and yeah, you know. You know, and some good versions will have that too, although they're bad in other parts, those versions are, but this is good.

I like to use different ones, but you know, that's what it says, and in actual fact, the word search there isn't the word just for search, it's the word investigated. It's like a police investigation, but more than that.

O Lord, you have investigated me, and oh, you know. Not just you know me, that's true, he does, and we'll get much more into detail in a few minutes in the other verses, but frankly, you know. All there is to know, you know.

There is nothing that you do not know. So God knows everything there is to know, everything that we will know later, everything that we did know, or past generations did know, and we don't know now, forgotten, everything that's to do with time, but as I said this morning or last night, that's just a dot on the circle of eternity, and he knows everything about eternity, and everything about things we don't even have words for.

God knows every single thing. He's fully knowledgeable. He is omniscience. He has all knowledge. There is nobody that comes near that. You know. Now, when he said that generally, he now comes on to the specifics, and let me move on to the next two sections because of time.

God Knows Every Movement

The second you know, which is in verse two, is now linked with another verse. Let me show you, if you want to know the two sections, the two headings from here on, here they are, you know when I sit and when I rise, and if you want to know more about that, you'd have to look in all of verse three because it's tied in with the first line of verse two.

So you know when I sit and when I rise because you discern my going out or my lying down. You're familiar with all my ways. God knows, or you know, my every movement. That would be the second heading.

Not only you know, period, but you know my every movement. Four, verse 2a, you know when I sit, when I rise, and then all verse three, you discern my going out and my lying down. You're familiar with all my ways.

And the third you know, by the way, is in the end of verse four, but it's tied in with, I don't want to confuse you, but you see, the way that the Hebrew poet does it is that he makes the general statement in verse one.

Then he says, all right, now in verse two, I'm going to give you one line to sum up what I'm going to say in the rest of the paragraph. So the first line, you know when I sit and when I rise, he says, you want to know more about that?

Okay, read all of verse three and you'll find out more about my movements. Now then, let me tell you the other thing I'm going to talk about. Verse 2b, you perceive my thoughts from afar. You want to know more about my thoughts?

Okay, read verse four. Before a word is on my tongue, you know it completely, O Lord. So he's saying, all right, I want you to know that these are the three areas. God knows, period. Secondly, God knows my every movement.

And thirdly, God knows my every thought. Those are the three things. So let's have a look at God knows my every movement. Notice what it says in verse two. You know when I sit and when I rise. So God is fully aware when I'm sitting and what I'm doing when I'm sitting.

I'm sitting to contemplate God or to meditate or to mend something or whatever it is. He knows what I'm doing. I'm sitting. When I rise, he knows when I go off to work or what activity I have to go out to weed the garden or whatever it is.

God is fully aware of every activity, every single activity. There is nothing that he does not know about me because it says, doesn't it, in the end of verse three, you're familiar with all my ways. So you know when I sit and when I rise.

So you know when I'm active and when I'm quiet. You know, in fact, in verse three now, to sum it up more, you discern my going out and my lying down. It's parallel to sitting and rising, as it were. You know when I go out, you know the social part of my life.

You know my lying down. You know the secret part of my life. You know my going out, the daytime part of my life. You know my lying down, the nighttime part of my life, unless you're on shift work, and that's the way it goes.

So you're saying, God, you understand everything. The private parts and the public parts, the secret parts and the social parts. You know my lying down and you know my going out. You know my sitting and you know my rising.

You're familiar with all my ways. Now, he couldn't say it more completely and more comprehensively than that. I want us to think about this because when we think about God being all-knowing, it will either comfort us or it will terrify us.

If tonight already, before I've said anything, your reaction is not really wonderfully comforted and not really absolutely terrifying, and you're somewhere in the middle. Dare I suggest we need to examine our lives to see if we've got used to Scripture, if we've got used to knowing all the Word of God, or if we don't care so much about God, although it's unlikely.

We probably wouldn't come out on a Monday night if we didn't. But it's very likely that we get so used, so familiar with Scripture that these truths don't come right with tremendous force to us anymore.

But as I read the Scriptures and ponder them and meditate over them, oh God, I'm so thankful I'm a Christian. I'm so thankful for that cross. I'm so thankful that although there's a place between the cross and heaven and there's a lot of living to do, that when I'm doing that living, you in actual fact know everything about me.

So Lord, even when I blow it, and I do often, Lord, you knew my intentions and you know I was crying, I was taking two steps forward, one step back, two steps forward, one step back. Lord, you know all that.

Thank you, it's so comforting for me to know that. But if you don't know Jesus tonight, or if your life is being lived as if you're not a Christian, then it must be a terrifying thing for you to understand tonight that God knows every little thing, every movement in your life, every movement.

The Illustration of Knowing Larry

My next door neighbor is Larry. I know Larry. You say you know Larry? Yeah, I know his name, so I know Larry. Is that all you know about Larry? Oh, well, I know a little more about Larry. I mean, I know him, that's after all something I know, so I know him.

It says God knows me, and I know Larry. But I know a little more about Larry. I know a little bit about Larry's habits. You see, we live in the same road, and Harry lives in Heritage House. I live in Heritage Lane.

Heritage House had a lane about twice as long as this aisleway here, I suppose, and it led up to Heritage House, and then they decided to build two houses on either side some years ago, and I live in one of those next to Larry's house.

He lives in the big house, I live in the small house. But I know Larry. Oh, yes, I not only know Larry, I know his habits. I know when he goes out, and I know when he comes home. I can see Larry because our house is high up looking down on the road there, and I can see Larry, and I know, if I call him Harry, I mean Larry.

Anyway, and I know Larry, and I can see him going out, and I know when he goes out, I can see what he's wearing. He's going to be back 25 minutes, almost on the dot. How do I know? Well, because he's going for a walk.

Well, how do you know he's going to go the same place? Always goes the same way. How do you know? Because I know Larry. He goes down there, down Heritage Lane, along up Cardi. He goes up through Marigold Park, walks up over past where all the dog stuff is on the park there, and then he just goes all the way down to Grange.

He walks all the way down Grange, gets onto West Burnside, walks all along West Burnside, comes back to Heritage Lane, walks up, 25 minutes. Yes, I know Larry. I know his habits. But you say, wait a minute, is that all there is to know about Larry?

No, there's more than there is to know about Larry. In fact, I know something of what Larry believes. I really know Larry. Do you really? Yeah. I was in my garage not long ago, and you know, Larry said to me, you know, I know that Larry goes to a church not far away from there, and it's an Armstrong Church, a worldwide Church of God, and I know that Larry goes there, and we've talked about it, and so on, talked about the Lord, and so on.

And in fact, although I know Larry, I know Larry doesn't really know me, because Larry asked me to come and preach at his church. However, maybe I don't know Larry, because as you likely will know, probably about a third of the worldwide Church of God, the Armstrong movement, has become thoroughly evangelical, and has now become a Evangelical Fellowship of Canada.

It may be that Larry belongs to one of those churches, and I'm the one that doesn't know. But anyway, I know Larry. Oh, but Sandra, his wife, says to me, do you think you know Larry? You don't know Larry.

You only see him outside the house and look at him. I really know Larry. I see him inside the house, and inside the house, he may do things that he wouldn't probably do in public, and I know Larry very well, because I seem to.

In fact, not only that, but I see Larry, not only when he knows I'm seeing him, but I see Larry doing things that he doesn't know I'm seeing him. Oh, now it's getting a little tough. Oh yes, but Larry says, wait a minute, you've misunderstood here.

You've misunderstood, and you've misconstrued that whole thing. You don't understand me. But in actual fact, Sandra probably knows Larry better than Larry knows Larry, because Sandra can see more objectively, and Larry's always got some excuse.

But on the other hand, Larry does know what his intentions were. But you see, all this knowing, and all this knowing, so Sandra knows Larry better than I do. I only know Larry 0 .2. Sandra says, no, maybe you know 0 .4, not even half of one.

But she says, I know him 0 .6, 0 .8. I know him. In fact, I can go right up to one. I really know Larry, and I know all kinds of things that Larry does, and everything that happens. I'm up to one. Ah, now God says, all right, if you think that's really knowing somebody, if somebody knew you like that, you'd probably be a little concerned too, maybe, if they weren't the kind of person you wanted to know you.

But God says, look, you've only gone from zero to one. I want you now to jump from one right up to a hundred, and that's how I know you. I know every little thing about you. I know every movement, and I know the reason for every movement.

I know everything that went through your mind when you actually decided to do something. That's what God is saying. I want to ask us therefore, if during our activities every day, whether at Elim Lodge, or whether in company, or whether in private, or whether with our own family, or whether on our own, whether in fact we really are consistent people who do the same thing in private as we do in public.

What about work? At work, what happens if the boss isn't around? You work in the same way as you did when the boss is around. Or maybe you're retired now, many of you are, but think back on it. Or what about that business deal you had the other day when the other person didn't know something and you did?

Was it a shady deal and you're a Christian? What about at home? What about the television? What about sitting down in front of the television? Does God say yes? He sees when I sit down, not only to meditate, but to watch television.

And God's right there between you and the television. Now then, do you watch the same things in public with others in the room as you would watch on your own? I mean, God's there between you and the TV, so he knows all of that.

And what about going into that email stuff? What about all the internet and all the stuff that you may get on there? What about that? What kind of roots or whatever they call it, I don't know at all. But I wonder where you're going.

Is he absolutely thrilled with what's filling your mind? So many young people get upset. They say, oh, I wish I knew whether God wants me to go to Queen's University or whether he wants me to go to Western University.

University of Western Ontario, I don't know where to go, you know, and so on. I really want God's will. Do you know, God is, yeah, he's interested in that, but God is much more interested in what passes through your mind and what you're studying while you're at either one of those places.

He's much more interested in that even than in the actual place you're going. And we don't realize that. What passes through my mind? What do I feed my mind with? So, Lord, here we have it. You know my every activity.

God Knows Every Thought

Not only you know, period, but you know my every activity. But look at the third part. You know, period, you know my every activity, for when I sit and when I rise, when I go out and when I lie down, and all my ways.

But thirdly, you know my every thought. Verse two, the last part. You perceive my thoughts from afar. Verse four. Indeed, before a word is on my tongue, you know it completely, oh Lord. And what do we call a word when it's not yet on my tongue?