Faith and Values: God’s ‘absence’ is a reflection of our own shortcomings

Has God left us?

Has he removed the blessing of his palpable presence?

How else might we explain the horrific headlines of late?

• Unborn babies’ body parts are quietly marketed and sold under the euphemism of “planned parenthood”;

• Christians are slaughtered, in the name of religion, their gruesome deaths filmed and distributed worldwide to sow fear;

• The institution of marriage is now redefined in ways once widely accepted as immoral, even deviant.

Has God left us?

This is the silent bewilderment of many Christians trying to make sense of cultural erosion around them, even as its pace accelerates.

Where is God? And why won’t he intervene?

If we’re to find answers, we must slow down and think biblically about the nature of God.

God is always present, everywhere and at all times, without effort. He is present by his very nature.

God is present when babies are harvested from the womb, he is present when his followers are martyred, and he is present even in the chambers of the U.S. Supreme Court, whose members seem to thumb their noses at him.

In that sense, God has not gone anywhere.

But those of us who believe these truths about God are still asking: “Where has God gone?” What we mean is this: “Why do we not sense his presence? Why do we not enjoy displays of his righteous nearness, his intervening grace, his powerful ability to straighten what is morally crooked?”

I’m afraid the answer to that side of the question has more to do with us than we’d like to admit. God’s presence is steady, but our enjoyment of his presence has much to do with the kind of lives we cultivate.

We cannot manipulate God to draw near to us. But we can cultivate the kind of lives that God is pleased to draw near to.

As a so-called Christian nation, we’ve asked God to leave our schools, our marriages and even the assignment of our gender. It is both ironic and ignorant for people to stiff-arm God repeatedly, then wonder why we don’t enjoy a sense of his presence.

I really believe God is allowing us to experience his relational absence purposefully. God is calling us to repentance. He beckons us to turn from self-centered, self-determined, self-gratifying lives and turn to him.

As always, God’s word – the Bible – is instructive.

“… The eyes of the Lord run to and fro throughout the whole earth, to show Himself strong on behalf of those whose heart is loyal to Him” (2 Chronicles 16:9).

The secret of enjoying God’s presence is actually not a secret. He’s longing to find a people loyal to him, consumed with his glory, in love with the God who loves us more than we’ll ever understand.

Instead, he so often finds people – even religious people, yes even professing Christians – utterly preoccupied with themselves, our loyalty aimed at our own comfort and pleasure, our love focused intensely inward – not outward.

Before Jesus Christ demonstrated his immeasurable love by dying on a cross for sinners, he made an amazing promise: “He who has My commandments and keeps them, it is he who loves Me and will be loved by My Father, and I will love Him and manifest Myself to him” (John 14:21).

Jesus promises his nearness – the palpable presence of God himself – to those who love him. And love for Jesus is measured not by mere words, a few songs sung once a week, but lives of steady, sincere devotion to God and his ways.

Is it possible, Christian friends, that God has not really gone anywhere – that we are the ones who’ve wandered?