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Search me, O God, and know my heart: try me, and know my thoughts: and see if there be any wicked way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting.

I. SOME THINGS IMPLIED IN THE TEXT.

1. The imperfect knowledge of his own character. Though it lies so near to us - not a far-off country. Though it is the most important of all knowledge. Knowledge of the body important; but that we can trust to another - not this. Sin creates darkness.

2. That he was aiming at the perfection of his nature. It is only such as he who want to know themselves better. This is the idea of a Christian; and all other aims are poor and selfish.

II. SOME THINGS STATED IS THE TEXT.

1. That he was willing to know the worst of himself. Men generally are afraid to know themselves. If we think our child is in danger from some disease, we ask to know the worst; and so of our own bodily disease. But not so with the soul. Men try to keep out of sight and forget their true selves.

2. That he was willing to be tried - to submit to the means by which this knowledge could be gained. Put me to the proof. Few know what they are asking for in using this prayer. "Try me, so as to show me what I am." The axe willing to be proved is put on the grindstone, and then taken into the forest. The wheat - "try me" - is bruised; the gold is cast into the furnace. Christ tried the rich young man in the Gospel.

III. THE PRAYER OF THE TEXT. Founded on the conviction:

1. That God alone is able to show us what we are. We want a revelation from heaven for that. It is not self-developed knowledge, nor is it a sudden, but a gradual, revelation. No man knows himself till he has known Christ, his true and better Self.

2. That God, and not himself, is his Savior. "Lead me in the way everlasting." Ways that last - God leads us into them, keeps us in them, and draws us onward along these ways. - S.

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KJV: Search me, O God, and know my heart: try me, and know my thoughts:

WEB: Search me, God, and know my heart. Try me, and know my thoughts.