God who probes
Psa
17:3
Though you probe my heart and examine me at
night, though you test me, you will find nothing; I have resolved
that my mouth will not sin
What
a staggering claim before God: you will find nothing. I suspect
many insecure Christians would balk at this. To be able to say if
God tests me for sin He will find nothing? Yet that is the truth!
Let's examine this verse more fully.
God
who probes our heart? Yes, the Bible says similar things a number
of times:
O
LORD Almighty, you who examine the righteous and probe the heart
and mind (Jer 20:12),
acknowledge the God of your father, and
serve him with wholehearted devotion and with a willing mind, for
the LORD searches every heart and understands every motive
behind the thoughts. (1
Chron 28:9),
The
lamp of the LORD searches the spirit of a man;it searches
out his inmost being (Prov
20:27)
And
he who searches our hearts knows the mind of the Spirit
(Rom 8:27)
all
the churches will know that I am he who searches hearts and minds
(Rev 2:23).
These
verses show us a particular truth that can be very nervy that God
sees us through and through and nothing in us is hidden from Him.
He knows every thought. The nearest thing we have in science fiction
is telepaths, who can read the mind. We probably don't think about
this most of the time, that if Jesus was standing in front of us in
the flesh, he would know exactly what we were thinking and feeling:
Jesus knew what they were thinking and
asked, "Why are you thinking
these things in your hearts? (Lk 5:22), they
watched him closely to see if he would heal on the Sabbath. But Jesus
knew what they were thinking (Lk 6:8), Jesus
knew their thoughts and said to them
(Lk 11:17).
Oh yes, you were unwise to stand before Jesus and think wrong thoughts!
But
it's more than this: though you test me! The idea of the
Lord testing us also appears in Scripture a number of times:
Ex
16:4 In this way I will test
them and see whether they will follow my instructions
said the Lord to Moses about the people and the way they should collect
the manna.
Deut
8:2 - Remember how the LORD your God led
you all the way in the desert these forty years, to humble you and
to test you in order to know what was in your heart, whether
or not you would keep his commands.
Judges
2:21,22 I will no longer drive out before
them any of the nations Joshua left when he died. I will use them
to test Israel and see whether they will keep the way of the
LORD and walk in it as their forefathers did.
The
intriguing thing about these three examples is that you would expect
the Lord to know how the people would respond, but it is as if He
wants their response to be publicly seen, so there is no question
about how He dealt with them. The purpose of a test therefore is to
reveal the true state of affairs. When the Lord tests our hearts,
He wants to reveal their state so that we too know our state!
It's
then that we come to David's assertion you will find nothing. David
was so sure that he had sought the Lord and put any thought of sin
from him, that there was nothing left for the Lord to find. The New
Testament challenges us with this. John wrote: I
write this to you so that you will not sin. But if anybody does sin
(1 Jn 2:1) i.e. he didn't expect to find us sinning. Paul
also wrote similarly, Shall we go on sinning
so that grace may increase? By no means! We died to sin; how can we
live in it any longer? (Rom 6:1,2). The Christian
today should be free of Sin; that's what the combined work of the
Cross and the Spirit is about.