WONDERFULLY AND FEARFULLY MADE

The very well-known passage in the book of Psalm tells us how God created each one of us:

Psalm 139:13-18
For You formed my inward parts;
You covered me in my mother’s womb.
I will praise You, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made;
Marvelous are Your works,
And that my soul knows very well.
My frame was not hidden from You,
When I was made in secret,
And skillfully wrought in the lowest parts of the earth.
Your eyes saw my substance, being yet unformed.
And in Your book they all were written,
The days fashioned for me,
When as yet there were none of them.

How many of us, because perhaps of some discontent with our appearance or background or a lack of acceptance from others, struggle with this truth that we are fearfully and wonderfully created?

Yet, the Scripture is clear. God carefully and beautifully crafted each one of us. And only with a firm grasp of this truth can we live to the fullest that God has for all of us.

God wonderfully and fearfully made us for a wonderful plan.

Many people in the world today tend to seek acceptance from others. The problem is people give approval more often than not based on outward appearances. God Himself said this to Samuel in 1 Samuel 16:7: “Man looks at the outward appearance but God looks at the heart.”

God made us with such great care and precision for a purpose. He created us with real attention and wisdom. Every experience we've had, everything about what we look like, and all our gifts and talents (or the lack of it) are designed and allowed by God for a reason.

When God made us, He was pleased with the whole package of what He made. People only see the physical and judge beauty based on very superficial standards. People make judgments based on snapshots. But God sees the entirety. He knows that the sum of all our parts and experiences is exactly what can help us realize His divine purposes for us.

Take the life of Leah. This was a woman who must not have been attractive considering how her father had to deceive Jacob just to get her married. As a result, she suffered in her marriage being unloved by her husband. She also had to contend with her beautiful sister, Rachel, who was the second wife of Jacob and the one he truly loved.

Because she was unloved, the Lord opened Leah’s womb; while Rachel was barren for a long time (Genesis 29:31). Leah wrongly thought that if she bore many sons for Jacob, he would love her in return (Genesis 29:32-35). However, even this did not gain for her the acceptance of Jacob that she was longing for. Yet, it was precisely this lack of human acceptance that led to the perfecting of God’s work in her life.

The names of her sons reveal her journey towards God’s wonderful plans for her. The names of her first two sons show her hope that Jacob would love her. By her third son she declared that Jacob would finally be attached to her. With her first three sons she strived to earn Jacob’s love.

But with her fourth son she declared that she will praise the Lord. By the time Judah came, Leah, rather than seek Jacob’s acceptance, learned to praise God. The lack of acceptance taught her how to look to God instead.

It was her imperfect appearance together with her imperfect experiences that caused her to learn to praise God, to praise Him despite not having the acceptance of man. Unlike her sister Rachel, who was attached to the idols of their people, as seen by the fact that she stole her father’s idols, her imperfect situation taught Leah to look to the true and only God and praise Him in the midst of her painful circumstance.

Further, by the end of her life we see the beauty of God’s work completed. It was Leah who shared the grave with Jacob rather than Rachel. It was also from Leah’s line that Jesus came forth. What a precious work that is in Leah’s life!

God desires for us to see that nothing about who we are is an accident. 

He carefully fashioned each one of us. All of us were beautifully made. Everything about us was made to perfect our understanding of the truth that God loves us. Just like Leah, we may have imperfections, imperfect looks, and imperfect situations that God can use to perfect His work in us.

It’s time to be thankful. Does our soul know very well that God made us beautiful? Are we thankful for God's design? Certainly, His thoughts towards us are good.

The wonderfully and fearfully made can also be wonderfully and fearfully restored.

The God who fearfully and wonderfully made us is also a God who can wonderfully restore us.

As we go through life, we are prone to wander and make decisions that are going the opposite direction of God’s wonderfully and fearfully made plan for our lives. As a result, our lives end up shattered, leaving us with broken pieces.

There was a woman in the Scripture who was just like that. She was a known sinner in the city. She knew that Jesus was eating in a Pharisee’s house. She must have encountered Jesus prior to this because when she came in, she knew who Jesus was and she did something remarkable.

While Jesus was sitting at the table with the Pharisees, she broke an alabaster flask of fragrant oil before Him. It’s that alabaster flask that women wore around their neck or kept in the house. It was a costly (valued at a year’s wage) necessary possession of women that was broken in their wedding night.

She presented herself to the Lord Jesus with her broken pieces of a life. She overcame shame and the fear of being rejected. She pressed in to the Lord Jesus. And there the woman with her broken pieces broke the only thing that wasn’t broken in her - her alabaster flask.

This time, she was breaking something in her not because she was making a wrong decision but because she was offering to God her best. She washed His feet with her tears and anointed it with oil from her precious flask.

This was not taken well by the Pharisee with whom Jesus was dining. Jesus did not reject her broken pieces. Instead, He accepted her and restored her. He declared:

Luke 7:44-50
Then He turned to the woman and said to Simon, “Do you see this woman? I entered your house; you gave Me no water for My feet, but she has washed My feet with her tears and wiped them with the hair of her head. You gave Me no kiss, but this woman has not ceased to kiss My feet since the time I came in. You did not anoint My head with oil, but this woman has anointed My feet with fragrant oil. Therefore I say to you, her sins, which are many, are forgiven, for she loved much. But to whom little is forgiven, the same loves little.”

Then He said to her, “Your sins are forgiven.”

And those who sat at the table with Him began to say to themselves, “Who is this who even forgives sins?"

Then He said to the woman, “Your faith has saved you. Go in peace.

In the Bible, we are likened to vessels. He is our Potter and we are the vessels made of clay (Jer.18). God does not throw away the broken vessels. What He does is He takes broken vessels and remolds these to be vessels of honor who will glorify His Name (2 Tim. 2:20-21).

Moving forward, may we find our worth in knowing that we are wonderfully made and are restored to win the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus (Phil. 3:14).


Works Cited:
Caram, Betsy E., Women of Influence and Distinction. 1998. Waverly: Zion University Press. PDF file.