“Here Be God”

Psalm 139:7-12

7I can never escape from your spirit!

I can never get away from your presence!

8If I go up to heaven, you are there;

if I go down to the place of the dead, you are there.

9If I ride the wings of the morning,

if I dwell by the farthest oceans,

10even there your hand will guide me,

and your strength will support me.

11I could ask the darkness to hide me

and the light around me to become night—

12but even in darkness I cannot hide from you.

To you the night shines as bright as day.

Darkness and light are both alike to you.

Eight years after Columbus discovered America, an English sea captain showed a map to King Henry VII. The map revealed all the unexplored territories of the world. Over some of these territories were the words “Here be dragons,” “Here be demons,” etc.

But if King David drew up such a map, over the unexplored territories on his map would be the words “Here be God.”

Bishop Selwyn, a pioneer missionary to New Zealand, knew that he would soon face the Maori natives, reputed to be vicious cannibals. On arriving, Selwyn wrote: “All visible things are new and strange, but the things that are unseen remain the same.” So he preached his first sermon on Psalm 139:9-10. In a way he was writing, “Here be God,” on his map.

John Franklin, the Arctic explorer who was searching for the Northwest Passage, wrote to his sister about the wonderful ways the Bible had become meaningful to him in the silence of the frozen north. Franklin never returned from that expedition. But years later another Arctic explorer came across Franklin’s ship and found his Bible, in which Psalm 139:9-10 was marked and underlined. Maybe Franklin, too, was saying, “Here be God.”

If it was true for Selwyn and Franklin facing treacherous unknowns, you can confidently write across the unknowns on your calendar: “Here be God.”

I know not where his islands lift

Their fronded palms in air,

I only know I cannot drift

Beyond his love and care.

JOHN GREENLEAF WHITTIER

Bible Networking

For more about how impossible it is to escape God’s watchful eye, read Amos 9:2-4.

Notable Quotable

“A heathen philosopher once asked, ‘Where is God?’ The Christian answered, ‘Let me first ask you, where is He not?’ ”

JOHN ARROWSMITH