There is a verse in the 121st Psalm that reads . . .

There is a verse in the 121^st Psalm that reads, “He who keeps Israel will neither slumber nor sleep.”  A freer translation might be:  “You will never catch God napping.”  On the one hand, that can be a comforting thought—especially in a day and age when some people seem to think that God is either missing, absentminded, or utterly uninterested in what goes on here.  But on the other hand, the idea that you will never catch God napping can also be a little unnerving.

Years ago, I visited a church that had a painting of the “all-seeing eye of God” right above the pulpit.  It was meant, of course, to symbolize the omniscience of God.  But to be honest, I found myself growing more and more uneasy as this huge, unblinking, expressionless eye kept staring out at me during  the whole service.  “He who keeps Israel will neither slumber nor sleep.”  Depending on how you hear it, that can be either a joy or a concern!

Just for fun, let’s consider the “concern” part first.  With the relentless, all-seeing eye of God constantly watching us, we are suddenly forced to drop all of our pretences, because the “calm, cool, and collected” façade we portray to the world is as transparent as glass to God.  The status symbols we think will improve our image—the luxury car, the big house, the degrees on the wall—won’t make us look any more important to God.  The good works and charitable donations that we think will exhibit how caring and philanthropic we are don’t impress God in the least.

God sees us and knows us just as we are, with all of our flaws, frailties, and failings.  When we stand before the Almighty, we can’t Photoshop our image.  That’s the bad news.

Here’s the good news.  We don’t have to!  God’s all-seeing eye has no interest in exposing our flaws just for the sake of humiliating us.  Neither is God interested in comparing us to other people.  The fact that we will never catch God napping may seem intimidating at first.  But it should also bring us a great deal of comfort, because the all-seeing eye of God is framed by the face of One who loves us through and through!