Omnipotent. Omnipresent.
If you’re like me, perhaps you haven’t heard those words since you were a kid in church class. I had to stretch my memory. “Oh, yeah. There’s words for that: Omnipotent—God can do anything. Omnipresent—God is everywhere.”
Without the fancy Latin, however, those words are exactly what our song “Holy Places” is about. And, oddly enough, I think a more mature faith isn’t about wielding those two impressive words. It’s about getting closer to living in the truth of them.
As I write this, it’s August, when people often vacation or continue to get outdoors to enjoy the summer beauty. Whatever season it is for you now, I hope you can use your memory, or cell phone pix, or souvenirs to remember some stunning places you have seen. The United States is blessed with some jaw-dropping sites that immediately come to mind, like the Grand Canyon, Niagara Falls, etc. I was thinking of redwood forests in California, especially Muir Woods, when I wrote the first line of this song. Muir Woods has such a holy, majestic, and serene vibe that delegates from nations around the world gathered there in 1945 to honor the recently deceased President Franklin D. Roosevelt, as they were organizing the United Nations for peace.
Yes, there are places that astound us with their scale or power. And our God, as Creator, is way more powerful than any of them! “Omnipotent” is the word. Awe is the feeling.
God, of course, didn’t just create this amazing world/universe/sentient life to then leave them all alone. God’s power has been shown in deeds over our history, and many have been recorded in the Bible, as God called people into relationship. Sometimes these acts were huge. You might think of the Parting of the Red Sea, as God split the waters for the Israelites, formerly slaves, to escape before Pharaoh’s charioteers (Exodus 14:5-31).
Sometimes, though, the acts were much smaller in scope. One example is Jacob having a vision in a dream, relaying God’s promises to him (Genesis 28:10-22).
And sometimes, as in Jacob’s case, the Old Testament people felt it was important to mark and remember those spots where they had felt God’s working presence. They could do this by naming the place or setting up a stony monument (Genesis 28:18-19, as well as 1 Samuel 7:7-13, especially verse 12).
In the New Testament, Jesus did miracles, too. It’s true that in “the Holy Land,” there are churches built at some sites attributed to acts of Christ. But, we really don’t know where many of Jesus’ actions specifically occurred. One of the best-known, largest-scale miracles is the Feeding of the Five Thousand (Matthew 14:13-21, Mark 6:30-44, Luke 9:10-17 and John 6:1-13), but the location is vague. Matthew, Mark, and Luke write that it was a remote, deserted place, away from towns (e.g. Matthew 14:15).
It doesn’t bother me that sites of so many of these sites can’t be pinned down. Actually, it’s comforting, to picture Jesus acting generally in small towns or within people’s homes. It brings the cosmic concept of “God With Us” (Matthew 1:22-23, quoting Isaiah 7:14) right into our regular, earthly lives.
I have felt God working in humble, everyday places from my own life—and I remember clearly where I was when heavenly encounters or interventions have been given: at a light switch in my childhood home, beside my ironing board here, driving up State Line Road in Kansas City, ….
“Do I not fill Heaven and Earth?”—God’s declaration in Jeremiah 23:24—feels like a fair statement to me. Jesus, as well, did promise to be with us always (Matthew 18:20, Matthew 28:20). So we can say, with Biblical authority, that God is all-present here on Earth. But that’s just the beginning!
Before Jesus was crucified, he promised his disciples, whom he called “friends,” that he would ask God that the Holy Spirit come to be within them (John 14:15-17). Later, throughout the book of Acts, the Holy Spirit is shown as filling people. And, we do teach children about Jesus “living in our hearts.” Thus, God’s presence transcends “place” as we commonly understand it. We do feel the presence of God in our interior selves through the Holy Spirit. That is the point behind my phrase “fully near” in the song. Many people will tell of such interior callings and “nudges” in their lives.
For me, the Spirit often speaks by reminding me of Bible passages. (Frequently, it’s just part of a phrase that comes to mind, and I have to Google the bit I remember to track down the whole passage. Still, that works!) Jesus explained to his disciples that one of the actions of the Spirit, indeed, was to remind us of his teachings (John 14:25-26). In an Old Testament story about the prophet Elijah, God’s voice is described as coming as a “whisper” or "still, small voice" (1 Kings 19:1-18, especially verse 12).
Sometimes, however, God leads much more overtly and directly. Think of Moses and the Burning Bush (Exodus 3:1-4:17) or a voice from heaven declaring Jesus as the Son (e.g. Matthew 3:16-17 and Matthew 17:1-5). Think of Paul’s life-changing encounter with (the “late”) Jesus as he traveled the road to Damascus (Acts 9:1-19). With reference to the big-time arrival of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost (Acts 2), the connection could seem more like a powerful, roaring wind.
The bottom line is that I wanted to say this: Please don’t think God’s presence is limited to churches! See Acts 17:24-28, where the Apostle Paul preaches about these same ideas. And I guess I wanted to raise my own “Ebenezer,” like that stone raised in 1 Samuel 7:12—to thank God for sustaining presence and interventions in my own life. Here, a song is my stone.
