Psalm 139: Known Before You Explain

You know when I sit down and when I rise. You discern my thoughts from far away. Before a word is on my tongue you know it completely.

Read coldly, that is surveillance. The psalm reads it as comfort, and the difference is who is doing the knowing.

Then the writer tries to imagine somewhere out of reach — the heavens, the grave, the far side of the sea, the darkness — and finds each already occupied.

It ends by inviting the search rather than escaping it: search me, and know my heart.