“A Prayer about What we Don’t Know”
“Psa. 19:12 Who can discern his errors?
Declare me innocent from hidden faults.
13 Keep back your servant also from presumptuous sins;
let them not have dominion over me!
Then I shall be blameless,
and innocent of great transgression.”
We don’t know what we don’t know. And it is quite likely that many of the things we no for sure are wrong. Blind spots are the norm rather than the exception for our species.
The ancient psalmist, after raving on and on about how wonderful God’s communication through nature (Psalm 19:1-6) and through God’s Law (verses 7-11) suddenly makes a sharp turn (verses 12-13. He realizes that no matter how wonderful nature or God’s Law may be, he—the psalmist—may not be able to make good use of what God has to say. Why? Hidden faults!
The Hebrew word order in verses 12 and 13 (13 and 14 in the Hebrew Bible) is interesting. Usually, word order in Hebrew is verb, subject, and object. If a word other than a verb occurs at the beginning of a sentence or clause occurs first, it often suggests that this word is being emphasized.
In the case of verses 12 and 13 (13 and 14 in Hebrew), the object is batting lead-off. Here is my very literal translation, which will help to illustrate how this is done in Hebrew:
“Hidden faults, who can discern?
From hidden faults, cleanse me.
Moreover, from presumption, spare your servant.”
And then the psalmist prays, “Don’t let these things rule my life.” In other words, the psalmist prays about he-knows-not-what. But he does know that the problem is in himself, even though he also knows that he doesn’t know precisely what the problem is.
And that is probably a good prayer for all of us to pray. The truth is this: No matter how much or how loudly God speaks through nature or through his Word, I may have a hearing problem.The problem isn’t that I can’t hear. The problem is that I refuse to hear. And it is my own chosen ignorance about my own hidden sins that keeps me from hearing God’s voice.
Ultimately, it isn’t the sins of our parents, or our husband, or our wife, or our boss, or our fellow church attender, or the Muslims, or the Jews, or the atheists, or the Republicans, or the Democrats—it isn’t any of those other individuals or groups, that keeps any of us from hearing God speaking to us. And, to make it very personal, it is my sins that I don’t know about—and that I don’t know that I don’t know—which will drown out the voice of God.
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