“How precious also are thy thoughts unto me, O God! How great is the sum of them! If I should count them they are more in number than the sand: when I awake, I am still with thee.” (Psalm 139:17-18)
When Heather was little, her family would go camping at the beach. They stayed in tents and cooked over an open fire. Every day, Heather and her twin brother Mitch would go swimming in the ocean! They had so much fun playing in the water, walking along the beach, and, of course, playing in the sand. Mitch and Heather built too many sand castles to count, and one time they even built a car made of sand! Sometimes, Heather wondered if it was possible to count all the grains of sand on that beach. She tried once to count just a bucket full of sand, but as you can imagine, she gave that up quickly! Why? Even in a single bucket, there was way too much sand to count!
The Bible says that God’s thoughts about His people are more in number than the sand. Imagine counting all the piles of sand on a beach. It would be hard to count all the piles of sand on just one single beach. Now imagine trying to count all the piles of sand on all the beaches of the world! Even more incredible is the thought of trying to count every single grain of sand in every pile of sand on every beach in the world! In our wildest imaginations, we could not pretend to understand a number that big!
Like Heather, we would probably give up counting before we got through just one small bucket of sand. The numbers are just too much. Those kinds of numbers are exactly how the Bible describes how many thoughts God has toward His people.
Not only are God’s thoughts toward His own countless, but they are also precious thoughts. That means He cherishes His people and that He plans only good things to do for them, and through them. Here on Earth, we may sometimes feel forgotten or left out, but we can always go back to God’s Word and remember that God is thinking precious thoughts about us!
Psalm 139 speaks of how closely God pays attention to those whom He created, and especially how He feels about people who trust Him and obey Him by His grace. There are many other Bible verses that describe how countless and wonderful God’s thoughts are toward His own. Psalm 40:5 says, “Many, O Lord my God, are thy wonderful works which thou hast done, and thy thoughts which are to us-ward: they cannot be reckoned up in order unto thee: if I would declare and speak of them, they are more than can be numbered.”
What a great and good God He is!
God’s thoughts toward His people are countless and precious.
My Response:
» Is it easy to imagine how many grains of sand there are on a beach?
» Is it easy for me to believe that God thinks about those who trust and obey Him?
» How should it help me to remember that God thinks so often and so favorably toward His own?