The Whereabouts Of God

"... While they say to me continually, 'Where is your God?'"  (Psalm 42:10, ESV).
"And ye shall seek me, and find me, when ye shall search for me with all your heart"  (Jer. 29:13, KJV).  
"Seek the LORD while He may be found; 
Call upon Him while He is near"  (Isaiah 55:6, NASB).  
"... Why should they say among the peoples, 'Where is their God?'"  (Joel 2:17, NIV).
"... Why my enemies continually taunt me, saying, 'Where is this God of yours?'"  (Ps. 42:3, NLT). 

Have you ever felt abandoned by God like Job?  He wondered that, too:  "Oh, that I knew where I might find him, that I might come even to his seat!" (Job 23:3, ESV).  Job was desperate and was confident it wasn't his fault or that he deserved it, but God was MIA to his reckoning.  Sometimes God withdraws from us to see what is in our heart!  Our faith is more precious than gold and must be tested, to see if we are going by feeling or faith; faith is what pleases God, not feelings or sentiment! We must learn to walk by faith and not by sight (cf. 2 Cor. 5:17).

 Sin separates us from God (Psalm 66:18 says, "If I regard iniquity in my heart the LORD will not hear me"), and God is not the one who moved, you did!   Even Job didn't realize that his sin was self-righteousness if you look at his boasting in Job 31.  In the end, he found repentance at the revelation of God's greatness and it humbled him.

The fact of the matter is that "he is actually not far from each one of us"  (cf. Acts 17:27, ESV).  God is never further than the mention of His name, but even some believers don't know Him by name--His name isn't "God!"  People often mock believers because it seems like their God has abandoned them, but the fact is that He will never leave us nor forsake us (cf. Heb. 13:8).   Jesus said in the Great Commission:  "...I am with you always...." Jesus name is, in fact, Emmanuel, and that is interpreted as meaning that "God is with us"!  That God is nearby is called the immanence of God as per Isaiah 57:15, which says, "This is the high and lofty One [re the transcendence of God] says--he who lives forever, whose name is holy:  'I live in a high and holy place, but also with him who is contrite and lowly in spirit, to revive the spirit of the lowly and to revive the heart of the contrite.'" In short, God is above and beyond, yet approachable! 

People often sarcastically inquire where God was in a disaster like 9/11, but people who were there will testify that Jesus was there all the time.  When they ask you where God is, simply ask them where He isn't!  Where was the church?  We don't need a mirror to see that we are walking miracles and, since everything is caused by God, miracles are only unusual events caused by Him, or they'd be called "regulars." There is a God-shaped blank or vacuum in our souls that only God can fill according to Blaise Pascal, and when God lives in our hearts we can communicate and fellowship with Him--that's why we are created in the image of God!  (We alone have the will to obey, the heart to love, and the mind to know God.) Animals never wonder about the whereabouts of God, nor ask, since they are oblivious to the spiritual world and knowledge.

Pascal said that in nature we don't see the manifest presence of God, nor the complete absence of God, but the presence of a hidden God. God wants us to find Him and doesn't show Himself to triflers, but those who seek with their whole heart (cf. Jer. 29:13; Isa. 55:6).  Isaiah announced, "Truly, you are a God who hides yourself..."  (Isa. 45:15, ESV).   It is not a matter of God hiding, but of whether we are looking for Him and seeking His face (as Jesus said in Matt. 7:7, "...[Seek] and you shall find...")! Take comfort in Jesus' promise that whenever two or three are gathered together in His name, there He is among them (cf. Matt. 18:20)!  Sometimes you may honestly wonder where God, is but then you might be finding out where the devil is!

If you think that they had it good in Jesus' day when He was with them, or that some people are more blessed by having had visions, we have it better than they did because we have the resident Holy Spirit and the complete canon of Holy Writ to guide us and for God to speak to us through.  You can find God's presence:  "I permitted Myself to be sought by those who did not ask for Me; I permitted Myself to be found by those who did not seek Me, I said, 'Here am I, here am I,'...." (Isaiah 65:1, NASB).  Christianity is not belief there is a God, but believing in the God who is there!  As Francis Schaeffer said, "He is there and He is not silent!"  In sum, ponder the song:  "Surely the presence of the Lord is in this place...." (cf. Gen. 28:16).    Soli Deo Gloria!

Christ's Credentials

Was Christ who He said He was?  The thrust of His teaching was self-centered, on the theme of His identity:  "Who do men say, that I am?" This was the turning point of His ministry and Peter was inspired by the Father to accurately pinpoint that He was the promised One, the coming Messiah, who was to be the Son of the living God.  To believe in Him was to believe in God the Father, and to reject Him was to reject His Father.  He said, that the Father and He were One, that He is in the Father, and the Father is in Him.  This was a shock to the religious Pharisees, who knew what He was saying and charged Him with blasphemy, saying that He was equal to the Father, calling Him Abba, or Dad.

Anyone can say that they are who they choose, but do they have the credentials:  I mean the character that is consistent, that confirms, that doesn't belie the claim; the signs and wonders to accompany the claim and make it authentic that sets Him apart; the witnesses to verify that it is not on His own authority that He makes the claims.

Jesus claims were one of a kind:  His character unique; His conduct unprecedented; His credentials unequaled; His works and signs unmatched!  No one has ever surpassed or excelled, neither predecessor nor disciple, His qualifications and merits to deity.  He is the one and only Son of God and we cannot compare Him to any mortal; even if we called Him Jesus the Great or the greatest man who ever lived, that would not do Him justice, nor satisfy us.  We don't compare Him to others, nor contrast Him, for there is no equal in any category of personality--the greatest charismatic person who ever lived.  You cannot add to His name, simply Jesus will do, for He is the Savior and His purpose is to save us from our sins, as it is written in Matt. 1:21.

He made the claim that He was God in the flesh and had the moral authority to do it, for He even challenged the authorities to find fault with Him and charge Him with sin--at His trial the only charge that stuck was political and not moral.  The disciples, who were close to Him for three years (and normally familiarity breeds contempt), had the consensus that He committed no sin.  ("In Him was no sin, " says 1 John 3:5; "committed no sin," in 1 Pet. 2:22; "had no sin," in 2 Cor. 5:21.)

The closer you get to Him, the more you realize you are a sinner, not Him!  For instance, Peter confessed: "Depart from me, O Lord, for I am a sinner."  The leaders of other faiths are flawed in character, yet Christ stands out as the model of perfect manliness and godliness.  What they say is that He had no sin, He did no sin, He knew no sin!  If He were one, He couldn't save sinners!   His challenge was: "Can you prove Me guilty of sin?"  This was the greatest sign or miracle!

There is circumstantial evidence that is compelling, and this is evidence that is admissible in a court of law, we have eyewitness accounts of His resurrection and many facts cannot be explained apart from believing He rose from the dead.  The written records verify His life, secular and clerical--there is no doubt of His historicity, so you must come to terms with Him and not dismiss as fable, myth, or even legend. Psychiatrists have examined Him and find Him to be perfectly balanced and His sermons are not the rantings and ravings of a madman-quite the contrary--He is perfectly balanced and the ideal man, someone whom all of us can emulate.  Even intellectuals have called Him the model of mankind, and someone to imitate. Even the testimony of the close disciples cannot be dismissed so easily.

What His enemies said:  They tried to trap Him in His words and accuse Him of blasphemy and couldn't believe He associated with known sinners and publicans, their favorite command, the Sabbath, was the main thrust of their attacks, for they could not bear someone breaking the traditions of the elders, but Jesus called Himself the Lord of the Sabbath--mind-boggling to them.   The way He came eating and drinking they accused Him of gluttony and of being a drunkard and that His religion was frivolous.  They accused Him of having a demon, but He had authority to cast them out and said that Satan would not be divided against himself, casting demons out.  Three unlikely enemies (Pilate, Judas, and the centurion) all concluded that He was innocent blood and righteous ("Truly this was the Son of God!").

Look at the way He taught:  As one having authority (cf. Matt. 7:29).  He never footnoted His sermons nor quoted the authorities:  He didn't speak by authority, but with authority.  His only source was Himself (what the Father told Him to say) and the Scripture.   He illustrated His teachings with signs and wonders or miracles to do lessons and proof that He was the Son of God in the flesh: Like feeding the multitude to prove He's the bread of life or raising the dead to prove He's the resurrection and the life.

Now anyone can claim to be God, for instance, Father Divine did, but can you prove it:  The ultimate proof of Christ's claim is His resurrection which has many infallible proofs (Acts 1:3) and is the one sign that sets Him apart as the incarnation of God, who demonstrated victory over death and hell. The prime difference between His claims and those of others is the caliber of His life and that He offered proof to verify it.

For instance, if I claimed to be born of a virgin, you might think I'm unbalanced, but if the caliber of my life demonstrated no sin, you might take me more seriously.  Not only His sinless morality, but His witnesses of John the Baptist, the most popular prophet of the day, and the over 500 who say Him rose from the dead, even what His enemies conceded unbeknownst to them, and the signs of His miracles (for if He had performed none, He would have ended up a mere footnote in history), and if you take away these miracles His witness is not credible, but the teachings themselves are such sublime words that only God could have originated them.

He came teaching and preaching (practicing what He preached and preaching what He practiced) but He upset the whole religious apple cart (the establishment) and the Pharisees were jealous of His influence and power over the people.  What can you say, but that there is no hypothesis that fits the facts better than the one that He is indeed the Son of God, who came to visit and save man, by becoming one of us.   Soli Deo Gloria!