God is not a belief to which you give your assent. God becomes a reality whom you know intimately, meet every day, one whose strength becomes your strength, whose love, your love. Live this life of the presence of God long enough and when someone asks you, “Do you believe there is a God?” you may find yourself answering, “No, I do not believe there is a God. I know there is a God.”
~Ernest Boyer
We are made for God alone, who can only be pleased when we turn away from ourselves to devote ourselves to Him.
~ Brother Lawrence of the Resurrection (c. 1614 – 1691)
Preserve me, O God, for in you I take refuge.
I say to the LORD, “You are my Lord;
I have no good apart from you.”
As for the saints in the land, they are the excellent ones,
in whom is all my delight.
The sorrows of those who run after another god shall multiply;
their drink offerings of blood I will not pour out
or take their names on my lips.
The LORD is my chosen portion and my cup;
you hold my lot.
The lines have fallen for me in pleasant places;
indeed, I have a beautiful inheritance.
I bless the LORD who gives me counsel;
in the night also my heart instructs me.
I have set the LORD always before me;
because he is at my right hand, I shall not be shaken.
Therefore my heart is glad, and my whole being rejoices;
my flesh also dwells secure.
For you will not abandon my soul to Sheol,
or let your holy one see corruption.
You make known to me the path of life;
in your presence there is fullness of joy;
at your right hand are pleasures forevermore.
~Psalm 16
~Psalm 16
Surely beloved, we all know the theological truth that G_d is everywhere. He is omnipresent. And we say that with confidence, for true it is. We often see His work with our eyes, we reach out and touch His creation in the face of a child, and we may hear His rhythm in beautiful music of worship.
And, then in one moment, everything is different. He is there. No, not there. Here. Right here with us in the moment. Time stops. Everything flees but Him. Somehow, He is with us in a way that goes way beyond anything a simple human can understand. The joy is absolutely overwhelming. Surely, if it were to be any more intense, we might not hold together. For flesh and bone and brain and soul are just not real enough to bear the weight of His impending glory.
It is not anything we can “do.” He is not a thrill-ride to be conjured up or ridden for our pleasure. He is G_d. He comes only into a place made clean by Himself. Into a place that has been fully set aside for His use, that is occupied with nothing else.
But, when He comes, He comes fully into us. All the joy, all the power, all the fellowship, all the communion of the Trinity is extended to us by virtue of our unity with Christ, by His work on the cross on our behalf.
We begin to understand something of infinite worth. G_d is literally abounding with joy! He is so very full and real and good and just plain happy to be with us. There is no need on His part. He just Loves us… always and forever.
We begin to understand that, because He is who He is – and that He never changes – that we can abide in His presence in every moment. He is ever present. And we can live in that place.
We begin to understand something else. That the agony Jesus went through on that night in Gethsemane was not really about the horrendous beating and crucifixion He was about to face (though that surely was part of it). It was more about the fact, that for the first time in forever, Jesus was about to be separated from the only state of Being that He had ever been. He was about to be, for the first time, alone and separated from G_d. He was about to become sin for us. And He – of all Persons – understood that to be separate from the presence of G_d is the most horrible thing ever.
He understood fully that Life in the presence of G_d is the only true Life there is. Anything else is just a miserable replica. Anything else only ends in separation and death from Him. But, Life in His presence is a life simply saturated in all that is good. It is a place of infinite power, quiet, purpose, clarity, righteousness, joy, and profound peace.
As we surrender to the work of His Spirit in our lives, He transforms us by the renewing of our minds and an aligns our understanding to be in alignment with Him. We begin to see that the only place in the universe we ever want to be is right here with Him. Surely, we are free to go anywhere we choose.
But why would we?
The presence of God is not the icing on the cake, He is the cake!
~Che Ahn
