We may bring more questions to these verses than they were meant to answer, though one general theme permeates every line: God is somehow involved in every detail of our lives, including our formation. Poetic language is used to express the unfathomable fact that God sovereignly crafts us according to his will.
This general theme of God’s role in our development can at least set the stage for understanding how to approach some of the difficult issues concerning the unborn. Difficult issues such as: Are birth defects God’s will? What about miscarriages? Are some methods of birth control acceptable or are they all just attempts to control what belongs to the Creator of life?
Certainly, prenatal and neonatal technologies have extended the range of ethical concerns for our day (such as abortion on demand, artificial insemination, in vitro fertilization and cloning). Psalm 139 provides a good foundation on which to build a Biblical framework for addressing these tough issues. But more than anything else, these verses assure us that God is deeply and personally concerned for each human life—even before birth.
