I cannot count the times in my life when I have  wanted to escape my life.  From deep grief upon the death of a beloved pet to out-of-control frustration with a professional colleague; from anxiety over a child's health to the empty space that a relationship has become, life is just too hard sometimes.  When we haven't the resources to sustain balance and we know we're just about to fall off the edge, we want "wings like a dove" that will take us to some far-off place of peace and rest.  Sometimes, in those times, we forget God.  Sometimes we feel as though God has abandoned us.

Psalm 139, verses 1-17, describe such an intimacy between God and us that it leaves no place where God isn't.  And how awesome is it that even if we "take the wings of the morning and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea," that even there-even in the most remote place, the darkest place-even there, God holds us fast?  God keeps us.  God keeps us. 

Gracious God, for whom darkness is not dark and 

or whom no place I go is too far for you to reach,

 give me grace to see you wherever I have fled; 

nd grant that I may know the endless depths of your care for me.  

This I ask in the name of Jesus, through whom you revealed yourself 

and your love to me.  Amen.