I think not. There’s always something we hide, either out of embarrassment or fear of rejection.

But even though we aren’t fully known by those around us, we are fully known by God.

That’s a little scary to me, because there’s nothing I can hide from him. And yet, perhaps there’s peace to be found knowing I can’t hide anything from Him.

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Let’s look at what Psalm 139 says about being fully known.

Verse 1: “O Lord, you have searched me and known me!”

 God knows my heart without me telling Him everything – that’s intimacy. He knows the good, the bad, the hopes and fears, the desires. “The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately sick; who can understand it? I the Lord search the heart and test the mind, to give every man according to his ways, according to the fruit of his deeds.” (Jeremiah 17:9-10 ESV)

Verse 2: “You know when I sit down and when I rise up; you discern my thoughts from afar.”

God knows the small actions I take. He knows all about me and loves me anyway. Then why should we bother praying? To build relationship with Him and admit our dependence on Him.

Verse 3: “You search out my path and my lying down and are acquainted with all my ways.”

God knows everything I do – nothing is hidden from Him (I can’t hide).

Verse 4: “Even before a word is on my tongue behold, O Lord, you know it altogether.”

I can’t hide my thoughts. What is in my heart matters, because my heart influences my words: “You brood of vipers! How can you speak good, when you are evil? For out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks” (Jesus speaking in Matthew 12:34 ESV).

“Know this, my beloved brothers: let every person be quick to hear, slow to speak, slow to anger;” (James 1:19 ESV)

Verse 5: “You hem me in, behind and before, and lay your hand upon me.”

 Why lay his hand? To bless me, to guide me, to still me, to comfort me with His presence, to give reassurance ( as seen in Genesis 48)

 “Hem” = to surround, to encircle

Verse 6: “Such knowledge is too wonderful for me; it is high; I cannot attain it.”

 I’ll never fully grasp it, and that’s OK. As my Children’s Church students and I often say: God is God, and I am not. In fact, I can find comfort in my lack of understanding. “O Lord, my heart is not lifted up; my eyes are not raised too high; I do not occupy myself with things too great and too marvelous for me. But I have calmed and quieted my soul, like a weaned child with its mother; like a weaned child is my soul within me.” (Psalm 131:1-2 ESV)

 “The secret things belong to the Lord our God, but the things that are revealed belong to us and to our children forever, that we may do all the words of this law.” (Deuteronomy 29:29 ESV)

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El Roi is Hebrew for “The God Who Sees Me”. This name of God is used in Genesis 16 when Sarai banishes Hagar, and God speaks to Hagar in the wilderness. He promises to take care of her and reminds her that she isn’t alone, and she calls Him the God who sees her. 

So what does this mean for us?

Even if we don’t want to be known, we are anyway – by God.

We may have the illusion of being fully known by others, or of fully knowing them, but it’s probably not true (think Social Media).

So we ask ourselves. . . How does all this change me?