It was the long silence that hooked me. I thought the song was over, but just as I expected a new one to begin, the artist continued to sing Psalm 139. Because of that silence, I paid more attention. Something new was happening. I listened again and again over the next few days, wondering why we no longer sing the psalms. 

Psalm 139 in song form took me on a journey. From the plea to search my heart to the soft, pure landing place of how God made us, I felt as if my heart were traveling along the piano keys that formed the melody. The psalm was turned upside down: the plea for God to search our hearts creates in us a quest for who we really are. And, through the darkness, sometimes because of it, we find that we are “fearfully and wonderfully made.” 

These words were sung into my ears, with Psalm 139 on repeat in my car, through the school pick-ups and drop offs, work commutes and grocery store runs as I moved through my week. Then, one day, as I meditated on them, I wondered, “What do they really mean?”  

I assumed that the kind of “fear” the psalmist was referring to is the one that is full of awe rather than a wariness of danger. And “wonderful” is an easy enough word to interpret. But let’s go back to the Hebrew words for these. There is no single word for “fear” in Hebrew, so the context of the use of the word “yare” in this verse is important. We can translate this as “full of reverence or awe.” “Yare” is the Hebrew word that we translate as “wonderful,” and its meaning is “distinct, marvelous and set apart.” 

So, according to the original text, we are distinctly and marvelously created to be in reverence and awe of God. Whoa. Take a moment to sit with that. How does it make you feel right now? What does it bring up for you?