Have you ever asked God to search you and know you?

January 14, 2020

“Hands against the wall, feet spread apart.” If you ever watch a crime drama on television, you have most likely seen the scenario played out in which someone who is in the process of being arrested is told to follow these instructions. After the potential criminal has assumed this position, the police officer frisks or searches the individual for weapons and drugs. Possessions are taken into custody, logged and placed in holding until the individual can receive them back. This would be considered a forced search.

Could you imagine a scene in which a criminal walked up to a police officer and asked him/her to search him to find all things that he should not be in possession of and remove them? The psalmist, in this case – David, asks God to search him and know his heart. While it had not been written at this point, I dare say that David could have sympathized with Jeremiah (17:9) in saying, “The heart is deceitful above all things and desperately wicked; who can know it?” Interesting enough, God’s response in Jeremiah 17:10 is “I, the Lord, search the heart . . .” So here in the psalm, David is asking God to do exactly that. He wants God to search him . . . to know the things that trouble him . . .to see the things that should not be there . . . and even to go forward and remove those things that are interrupting fellowship with God so that he might go forward in his relationship with God. He wants to be in complete fellowship with God, and he knows that God is the only one who can purge him of all that is in error.

How about you? Do you understand that only God can clean the filth from your heart? Have you ever asked God to search you and know you? Are you willing to let Him have His way with you? If so, might I challenge you to pray this prayer with David? If you are not willing, might I ask you, “why not”?