The God Who is Here (Pt. 1)

I'm back.  Sorry for the absence.  I have some excuses, but none of them are good enough to mention.  Let's just say that I was giving those of you who complain about how long my posts are time to catch up.  Just joshin.  Any way, I'm back and here's what's been on my mind.  

I’ve been thinking lately about traffic lights.  Normally the only time I think about traffic lights is when I’m stuck at one because for some reason people like to wait until they are ready before they drive their automobile through a green light.  I’ve been thinking of them in terms of what they do in the middle of the night.  Their twilight operations; what they do when all of the traffic is parked; the time of night when some traffic lights have given up changing colors and have decided to just flash yellow or red.  This is the time of the night that makes you feel like you’re breaking the rules, like you’re some sort of rebel for being out this late.  Not all traffic lights have decided to give up their color changing ways; many of them are still there varying their colors, determining the flow of traffic.  As we sleep theses guardians of the intersection stand at their posts alternating their moods from green, to yellow, to red, reflecting on traffic that has already gone by. 

            There are a couple of chapters in the book of Job where God is revealing to Job how intimate and how involved He is with His creation.  He asks Job things like, “Do you know when the mountain goat gives birth?  Do you watch when the doe bears her fawn?  Do you count the months till they bear?  Do you know the time they give birth?”  This is a picture of a God who is very much interested in what is going on in the world He created, this is a picture of a God who is very much here.  I’m sitting here right now and I’m overwhelmed by the fact that God knows what the temperature is in my room, how the carpet feels on my feet, and how my fingers feel as they fall asleep from the lack of blood flow as I type out these thoughts.  All the while He is aware of what is happening with you and everyone else at this very moment as well as holding the entire universe together. 

            My favorite part of Job though is a question God asks in verses 25-27 of chapter 38.  God asks, “Who cuts a channel for the torrents of rain, and a path for the thunderstorm, to water a land where no man lives, a desert with no one in it, to satisfy a desolate wasteland and make it sprout with grass?”  See, God is so “here” that He is even where we are not.  Not only is God where I am, but also He is also where I’m not.  In the places that I neglect, the places I don’t think about, the places I am unaware of; there God is.  The funny thing about all of this is that I’m not usually aware of the places that I am in.  I don’t pay much attention to where I am right now, I’m usually thinking about where I need to go or wondering about where I once was. 

            Here’s the thing.  If God is there, “in a desert where no man lives”, where I’m not, then something tells me that He is here with me…now.  It isn’t a matter of Him showing up, it’s a matter of me meeting Him here in this place, where He already is.  Paul says it best when he says, “He is not far from each of us.  For in Him we live and move and have our being.”  Jesus is called, “Emanuel”, which means “God with us.”  We serve a God who is here.  A God who is all around you.  A God who is incredibly intimate with His creation.  A God who wants you to know Him.