The security of God watching

Sometimes this concept of God's care for us, his watching over us, can be intimidating, God sees everything we do can be terrifying but sometimes we can get a great understanding of what is so great about this concept and why it is good for us. This is the understanding we get when we look at Psalm 139, a beautiful Psalm about God's protection.

First the Psalmist opens with discussion of God's knowledge:
You have searched me, LORD,
and you know me.
2 You know when I sit and when I rise;
you perceive my thoughts from afar.
3 You discern my going out and my lying down;
you are familiar with all my ways.
4 Before a word is on my tongue
you, LORD, know it completely.
5 You hem me in behind and before,
and you lay your hand upon me.
6 Such knowledge is too wonderful for me,
too lofty for me to attain. (Psalm 139:1-6 NIV)
The Psalmist knows all about God's knowledge of him, he knows that God is aware of absolutely everything he does and it doesn't bother him. Verse 5 speaks more of protection than it does of restriction and verse 6 speaks admirably of God's knowledge, it is so far above what our knowledge is, and we can never attain it because God is so great.

And so the Psalmist continues, speaking of God's presence:
Where can I go from your Spirit?
Where can I flee from your presence?
8 If I go up to the heavens, you are there;
if I make my bed in the depths, you are there.
9 If I rise on the wings of the dawn,
if I settle on the far side of the sea,
10 even there your hand will guide me,
your right hand will hold me fast.
11 If I say, “Surely the darkness will hide me
and the light become night around me,”
12 even the darkness will not be dark to you;
the night will shine like the day,
for darkness is as light to you. (Psalm 139:7-12 NIV)
The Psalmist asks the question Where can I go? It's not a question out of fear or a desire to run away, but rather standing before God in awe of his greatness. It is a statement of protection, God is great and protects us, there is no where we can go that is away from him, he can always protect and help us, even if we're in North Korea.

God's ability to see us even transcends space & time:
For you created my inmost being;
you knit me together in my mother’s womb.
14 I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made;
your works are wonderful,
I know that full well.
15 My frame was not hidden from you
when I was made in the secret place,
when I was woven together in the depths of the earth.
16 Your eyes saw my unformed body;
all the days ordained for me were written in your book
before one of them came to be.
17 How precious to me are your thoughts, God!
How vast is the sum of them!
18 Were I to count them,
they would outnumber the grains of sand—
when I awake, I am still with you. (Psalm 139:13-18 NIV)
God's protection of us is the ultimate. Not only does he protect us when we're alive but also in the womb. God has created us so that we can reproduce and created a system that we can be protected in that process. God knows and God watches out for us even in the womb.

We are precious to God, says Psalm 139. Sometimes we don't always feel like that, but Psalm 139 assures us otherwise and reminds us that God loves and protects us.