Is God here? Is he over there? Since I can’t see him, how do I know where he is? If he is listening to prayers given in Indonesia, can he really hear my prayers in south Texas at the same time?
Q: Where is God? A: God is everywhere.
(Psalm 139:7-12; Jeremiah 23:23-24; Acts 17:27-28)
Where may we look to find this invisible God? The list would be much shorter if we gathered a list of all the places he isn’t. In fact, that list would be blank. In the beautiful song of praise that is Psalm 139 we see a magnificent proclamation of the majesty of God. The psalmist says there is nowhere where he may go to get away from the presence of God. Is he there in heaven and in the grave? Yes. Is he in the farthest places to the east and the remotest parts of the west? Yes, he is there. The psalmist knows that neither the radiant brightness of day nor the gloomy darkness of night will hide him from God.
This trait of God is what theologians have called “omnipresence”. Omni means “all or every” and presence is just like it sounds, “present.” So, when we say that God is omnipresent, we are saying that God is everywhere. While this word isn’t in the Bible, like Trinity, it is a useful shorthand to describe what the Bible teaches about God.
We see the same idea expressed in Jeremiah 23:23-24. When God asks, “Am I a God at hand, and not a God far away”, he isn’t denying his omnipresence. God is proclaiming that he is not an idol that you can point to and say, “Here he is.” God fills the heavens and the earth. There is no sin that can be hidden from God, because he is there. When you think you have found a hiding place for your sin, even if it is within your own heart, let this passage of Scripture disabuse you of that notion. There is no dark corner where you can flee from the presence of God.
Paul describes God in this same way in his address at Mars Hill (Acts 17:27-28). God is not far from any of us, not because he is “near at hand,” but because he is everywhere. He isn’t some idol that can be kept in a temple. He isn’t a deity that we can control by keeping him locked away. We can’t keep him in the dark about our thoughts, our words, or our actions by closing him up in a dark closet. Further, this is not a God who can only act in certain places or at certain times. He is not the God of the mountain, or of the sea alone. He does not only rule in the summer or the winter. His presence does not wax and wane with the phases of the moon. He is everywhere, always.
So Christian, remember, when you are feeling as though God is nowhere to be found, that your feelings are lying to you. God is there because he is everywhere. Yet, there is a special way in which he has drawn near to those who have trusted on him through the Lord Jesus Christ. Christ himself has given us this promise when he says, “And behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age” (Matt 28:18).
Yours in Christ,