Great is the Lord, and greatly to be praised; his greatness is unsearchable.
One generation shall laud your works to another, and shall declare your mighty acts.
One generation shall laud your works to another, and shall declare your mighty acts.
✙ Ps. 145:3-4 ✙
Last week I meditated on the 139th Psalm which begins, O Lord, you have searched me and known me. It should surprise no one, then, that human beings are a searchable lot—especially where God is concerned. By contrast, I read this morning that a single divine attribute—that is God's greatness—alone is unsearchable. Add to this one an infinite number of other unsearchable attributes, and God's unsearchability becomes unfathomable. No matter how sincerely I pray, no matter the fervor with which my congregation praises, no matter how beautifully the most magnificent cathedral choir sings, or even if all the choirs in earth and heaven join in, the immensity of the church's worship is no match for the unsearchability of God.
I am and always have been (throughout eternity!) contained within God. And God searched and knew us before we were conceived. And my life belongs to God, body and soul, inside and out, from beginning to end. The greater my praise, the more I become lost in the Divine—which is a good thing. Reflecting peculiarly Methodist theology, Charles Wesley put it this way in a 1745 hymn:
I am and always have been (throughout eternity!) contained within God. And God searched and knew us before we were conceived. And my life belongs to God, body and soul, inside and out, from beginning to end. The greater my praise, the more I become lost in the Divine—which is a good thing. Reflecting peculiarly Methodist theology, Charles Wesley put it this way in a 1745 hymn:
Made perfect first in love,If God is unsearchable, then there is no safer place to be than lost in God.
and sanctified by grace,
we shall from earth remove,
And see God's glorious face:
His love shall then be fully showed,
and we shall all be lost in God.
Holy One, hide me in your infinite love. And may my praise but bury me ever deeper in you, for you are all in all. This I pray in the Name of the One who taught me to pray...
