When You Want to Feel Significant

My students look at me and beam, proud of their work and excited that I notice. Many of these fragile young people are uncertain of themselves and their place in our classroom. They want to know they matter and that I see and hear them. They are delighted when I acknowledge them for who they are.

We also want to be acknowledged and understood. The Psalmist feels the same way:

“O Lord, you have searched me and you know me.” (Psalm 139:1 NIV)

The Psalmist understands these feelings. Like all of us, he is longing to be seen and heard. The desire to matter in our world is a strong one.

Throughout this Psalm, the author David is aware of how our wonderful God expends great effort to fully understand who we are. He is thankful we have a God who is actively involved in our lives, searching us and knowing us.

There is nowhere we can go where God is not with us. He is a part of each step in our day – not just in the amazing moments or the tragic ones, but in each instant. Every action we take is in His sphere of observance.

God knows not just what we say or do, but what we think. He understands us to the depths of our being. His ability to grasp our modes of operating is without measure. God gets us – all parts of us. We might try to cover up our thoughts and actions, but our loving God is intimately and thoroughly aware of anything that is going on with us at any level.

While God does direct us and guide us through the mistakes we make and our less than stellar choices, His in-depth knowledge of us focuses on providing care for us. Later is Psalm 139, David speaks of God being on all sides of us – offering protection and safety that surpasses anything this world can offer.

Everything we do is like an open book to God. We can take this as a negative – that we are being watched all the time so we’d better not mess up – or we can take this as a positive and realize God sees every struggle, trial, need, or care we have and wants to help us. He designed us each with our own special gifts and abilities and He wants to aid us in using them.

What do we do with a God who knows all our secret fantasies and hidden motives? While we might try to bury these thoughts in ourselves, we cannot keep them from God. We can embrace His knowledge of us, knowing that we matter a great deal to Him.

It is beyond our comprehension or imagination how amazing our God is and how His intricate knowledge of us influences our lives. Every decision and every action, every word spoken and every location, He knows and leads. We are significant to Him always, no matter where we are in our life journey.

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