“What comes to our minds when we think about God is the most important thing about us…”

-A.W. Tozer 

I was thinking: God is omnipresent. 

 “Do not I fill heaven and earth?” declares the LORD. Jeremiah 23:24

We take for granted that God is everywhere, though we do not really understand what it means. Does it mean occupying all the space that exists, or is there more to it? English Puritan Stephen Charnock (1632–80) wrote a treatise on the existence and attributes of God, helping draw distinctions on God’s location. Charnock said, “Heaven is the court of his majestical presence, but not the prison of his essence.”

Not only is God everywhere, but in an extraordinary sense we live and move in Him, says the apostle Paul in one of his greatest speeches. He contains everything that there is, including us. Paul says to the Athenians, “The God who made the world …is not far from any one of us for in him we live and move and have our being as some of your own poets have said, ‘We are his offspring.‘” (Acts 17:24,28)

To live and move in God challenges my understanding. Is it by the uninterrupted presence of his providence that our souls and bodies move in their goings and operations? Perhaps preacher and theologian Tim Keller (1950-2023)  said it in a way that unpacked it for me: “The only person who dares wake up a king at 3:00 a.m. for a glass of water is a child. We have that kind of access.”  

His presence is not mere observation, as Paul knew,…“Neither death nor life… nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God.” That is an everywhere God. 

Prayer: 

God, we know you by faith, enjoy you by love, but cannot fully comprehend you with our minds. Thank you for your presence. Amen. (notes from Vol 1, The Works of Stephen Charnock, p. 446)