The Omnipresence of God

Coming up next on Renewing Your Mind... We come now in this session to the omnipresence of God, and I think we're beginning to understand why God is so incomprehensible. This is to great Puritan, Richard Sibbes, said, How shall finite comprehend the infinite?

We shall apprehend him, but not comprehend him. Now this is not to say that we cannot know God. We can know God and we do know God.

That's what it is to have a saving relationship through Jesus Christ with God. It is to know God. And we are to grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. We are to grow ever deeper and ever closer to God, but we can never comprehend the fullness of all that God is. And this leads us now into these next attributes that begin with the Latin word omni, which means all. Omni means that God is all-knowing, that God is all-present, and that God is all-powerful.

Right there, that expands our minds to the outer limits, and we cannot grasp the whole of what that means, but we do want to look into the Scripture and see what our God is like. Who is this God that we have come to know? And He is omnipresent. And so as we look at this attribute of God, His omnipresence, there are four things that I want to tell you about the omnipresence of God. Number one, He is everywhere present. The Bible clearly asserts that God is all-present. This is to say He is everywhere present. At every place, at every point of His creation, there is no place within the universe from which God is excluded or barred.

As we've already talked about in a previous session, God is a spirit being, so therefore He does not have spatial dimensions. He has no limitations. He can be everywhere present at one time.

And let me go one step further. He can be everywhere present. In the fullness of all that He is at any one time. I don't know that I'm always there when I'm there. Sometimes my mind can be someplace else, and my body be right here, and I'm a divided soul, but God is always ever-present with the fullness of all that He is. The next for this is Psalm 139, verses 7 and following.

You'll recognize them immediately as I begin to read this. Where can I go from your spirit? The rhetorical question implies a negative answer nowhere. There's nowhere that we can go and escape from God's spirit. Or where can I flee from your presence?

Again, the question is, ask me. And the answer is nowhere. Now, listen to the explanation in verses 8 and 9.

It has a north, south, east, west compass metaphor without using these designations. If I ascend to heaven, you are there. Now, heaven is due north. It's up.

It's straight up. So, if I ascend to heaven, to the north, you are there. If I make my bed in Sheol, that's the grave, that's down, behold, you are there.

That would be south. If I take the wings of the dawn, now the sun rises in the east, the wings of the dawn. If I dwell in the remotest part of the sea, well, the Mediterranean Sea in the Holy Land is to the west. If I take the wings of the dawn, if I dwell in the remotest part of the sea, even there, your hand will lead me and your right hand will lay hold of me. No matter where I go, to the heights of heaven, to the depths of the grave, as far to the east as I can go where the sun is rising, transformed, you're already there.

In fact, you are so close to me, your hand is on me. All this is saying, there is no escaping God's presence. No matter where we go, whether it's life or death, time or eternity, land or sea, God, you are there. We know God is in the heights of heaven. We know that God dwells on a high and holy throne, but let's look at some verses and just document this. This is called the transcendence of God, that God is high in the heavens. You who are enthroned in the heavens.

There we have it. He is seated in the heavens. And, by the way, you know what the word heaven means?

Heights. And when heavens is in the plural, it's really the heights of the heights. That God is as high as any being in the universe. No one is above God.

In the organizational chart of the universe, God is by himself at the head. Psalm 97, verse 9, for you are the Lord, most high over all the earth, towering over the earth, no one on his level, God over all. We just read Isaiah 6, verse 1, I saw the Lord seated on his throne, lofty and exalted. That's where God is. God is ever and always on his throne in heaven.

In fact, when John, in the book of Revelation, in chapter 4, verse 1, as he was on the island of Patmos, he heard a voice saying, come up here, and a door was opened in heaven. Into heaven. And what does he see? What's the first thing he saw?

Not streets of gold, not gates of pearl, not a river of life, not who's there, who's not there. First thing he saw, a throne standing in heaven. To this throne. A throne standing in heaven and one sitting on the throne. It's very clear the message in the first century to the early church as they were beginning to be beaten down by the Roman Empire.

Don't you worry. There is one seated on his throne. Jesus is the Caesar of Caesars, and he is the King of Kings, and the Judge of Judges, and the Lord of Lords.

That was the message, and that is the message for us in this hour. That God is in his heavens, and God is upon his throne. God is high and lifted up. Ecclesiastes 5, 2 says succinctly, God is in heaven.

I dwell on a high and holy place. Even when we read the account of the Tower of Babel, do you recall that? They were trying to build a ziggurat up to the heights of heaven.

What a laughable thing. And it says in Genesis 11, verse 5, that the Lord came down to see. I mean, this little sand pile down here, I mean, that's so small and I'm so high, I'm going to have to come down to even kind of squint to look at it. That's how high and mighty and lifted up is the Lord. He's in the heights of heaven. And how this fact, as we look up to him, it just lifts our spirit, and it lifts our hearts.

If we have only a horizontal gaze, we will be discouraged. But if we have this vertical gaze to the heights of heaven, our heart soars above the circumstances. But there's something else that I want you to note, and that is not only is he in the heights of heaven, but third, he is near on the earth. He is transcendent, but he is imminent.

Not only is he far away, but he is near. Now let me tell you, that's the best of both worlds. You can't have a better God than this. A God who is high and ruling and reigning, but a God who is also in the trenches with me. A God who is in the pit with me. A God who is in the pit with me. A God who is walking with me through the valley of the shadow of death. A God who is with me in the nitty gritty of life. A God who is with me in the tough times. A God who is with Daniel in the lion's den.

A God who is with Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego in the fiery furnace with them. For you are with me. Your rod and your staff, they comfort me. What a comfort it is to know that we're never alone. That God plus one still makes a majority. That God is with us, and God is in us, and God is for us, and God goes before us, and God is under us, and He is over us. And He comes in behind us to guard us and to protect us. Our God is with us.

What a glorious truth this is. Deuteronomy 4 verse 39 says, He is God in heaven above and on the earth below. Isaiah 57, 15. I love this verse.

Listen to this text. Exalted one who lives forever, whose name is holy. Now He will tell us that God lives in two places.

He has two addresses. I dwell on a high and holy place and also with the contrite and lowly of spirit. God is in the highest place in the universe, and He is in the lowest place on the earth. With those who are bowed down and even beaten down under the heavy blows of life and who have a low and contrite spirit, God says, I am with that one who is lowly and contrite in heart. He promised the church in the Great Commission, lo, I am with you always, even unto the end of the age. He says to us in Hebrews 13 verse 5, I will never desert you, nor will I ever forsake you. God is with us in every adversity.

He is with us in every trial. He is with us in every storm of life. In fact, I think we could even go so far as to say He is never any closer to us than when we need Him the most. Jeremiah 23 verse 23, Am I a God who is near, declares the Lord, and not a God far off?

Do I not fill the heavens and the earth? Right there God says, I am a God who is far off and I am a God who is near. He is everywhere, the heights of heaven and with the most humble and lowly of heart.

Ephesians 4 verse 6 says, one God and Father of all who is over all, that's His transcendence, and through all that is His eminence, and in all, think about those prepositional phrases, over all, through all, in all, that is God's omnipresence. He's in the heights of heaven. He is everywhere on the earth. He is near to us.

He is close to us. He is also in the depths of hell. There is no place where God does not exist, and it is even God Himself who is inflicting His own wrath in hell. It is God Himself who is carrying out His own vengeance upon the unbeliever in hell. Revelation 14 verse 10 is really the key text on this mind expanding truth. He, referring to the one who is an unbeliever, will drink of the wine of the wrath of God, which is mixed in full strength, in the cup of His anger, what a metaphor that is, and He will be tormented with fire and brimstone.

Now listen to this. In the presence of the holy angels, and in the presence of the Lamb, this wrath, this vengeance will be executed in the very direct presence of the Lamb. And I believe it is reasonable to make the implication that it is the Lamb Himself who will be the executor of His own wrath in hell.

Sometimes we say the expression, if you don't believe in Christ, if you don't commit your life to Christ, you will go to hell away from the Lord. Those in hell only wish that they were away from the Lord. They only wish they were left alone. They only wish they could escape from the wrath of the Lamb.

They only wish that they were no longer in His presence. Now, this needs to be reconciled with 2 Thessalonians 1.9, which says, these will pay the penalty of eternal destruction away from the presence of the Lord and from the glory of His power. Well, this word for presence here is a Greek word that means away from the eye of the Lord, away from the countenance of the Lord.

And the idea is the Lord will turn His face away, no longer to extend any grace, even common grace, but that the Lord will turn away any smile of His countenance as they will be forever under the execution of His wrath. So the Lord is in the heights of heaven. The Lord is everywhere on the earth. In fact, even when we read the account of the ark and when God says to enter the ark, God says, come in as though God is inside the ark.

Come in. God is in the depths of hell. God is everywhere present. Let me tell you two things about this truth. It's comforting and it's convicting. It's a two-edged sword.

It plays both sides of the aisle. And I know you're out ahead of me as you're thinking this through. First of all, it's comforting, is it not, to know that God is with me in every adversity of life, every difficulty of life. I'm never on my own. His grace is always sufficient and with me. He will never leave us nor forsake us.

God is in the trenches of life with me to help me, to comfort me, to encourage me. But this also means that I can never escape the Lord as well. And there are people who, like Jonah, try to run away from God, try to run to another city, try to run to another state, try to run to another wife or to another family. And they think they can escape the Lord.

What fools they are. You can never escape the Lord. He is everywhere present. Now, this is a very convicting truth that God is everywhere present. And so, therefore, we cannot run away from our troubles. We cannot run away from our problems as though we can avoid God in having to deal with situations. No, God is everywhere present. So, this truth of the omnipresence of God, only God is omnipresent. Let us be encouraged that the devil is not omnipresent. The devil roams about like a roaring lion seeking someone to devour. There's only one devil and he can only be in one place at one time. It's his minions that we most wrestle with.

It is his underlings. It is his demon spirits that we most really combat. It would be like a man going to Europe to fight World War II and saying he fought Hitler. Well, you probably didn't fight Hitler.

You probably fought German soldiers. And so it is in spiritual warfare with us. Let us rejoice that only God is omnipresent, not the devil. Well, as we bring this session to a close, I trust that we will give much thought to this truth and that our minds will yet be enlarged again, this incomprehensible God. Yet we can clearly understand these truths, can we not, that God is ever and always present with us, and we can never escape Him. What should strike fear in the unbeliever is great comfort for those who trust in Christ. Our Heavenly Father is always present to help and guide us, no matter where we are. Dr. Stephen Lawson has been our teacher today on Renewing Your Mind as we air portions of his series The Attributes of God. Because misconceptions about God are rampant, we need to know who God is, how He has revealed Himself in Scripture. In this 16-part series, Dr. Lawson shows us how a right understanding of God's attributes affects every aspect of our lives. We'd like to send you this 2-DVD set when you contact us today with a donation of any amount. We'll also include Dr. Lawson's new book. It's titled Show Me Your Glory, Understanding the Majestic Splendor of God. Our telephone number is 800-435-4343.

You can also make your request and give your gift online at renewingyourmind.org. The Dutch theologian Abraham Kuyper said, Does the Lord turn Himself unto our prayer only after long delay? Is He not omnipresent? Is not every whispered and stammering prayer known to Him before there is yet a word on the tongue? Our message today on God's omnipresence helps us understand how it's possible for God to be with us even in our darkest moments. I think you'll find this series helpful. So contact us today and reserve your copy of The Attributes of God, along with Dr. Lawson's book Show Me Your Glory.

Our number again is 800-435-4343, and our web address is renewingyourmind.org. Well God's omnipresence is just one of His incommunicable attributes. Tomorrow we'll focus on another aspect of His being that He alone possesses—His omniscience. He is all-knowing. Please join us Tuesday for Renewing Your Mind.