Our Intimate God

Dr. Richard J. Henderson September 9, 2007

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Luke 14:25-33
Psalm 139

Introduction

Members of a church group go to a lecture at the local seminary. The speaker is well-known as a brilliant thinker and a highly respected author. The auditorium is full as the wise professor gets up to speak. He lectures on the attributes of God.

"God is omnipotent. God's power goes beyond any force we know. One cannot imagine the invincibility of God. God's potentiality is greater than the human mind is able to conceive.

"God is omniscient. God's awareness supersedes not only any human subject, but the intellectual grasp of the species. The insightfulness of God is beyond the grasp of humankind.

"God is omnipresent. God infuses all of creation with God's ambient spiritual presence. God fills creation with God's being."

After the lecture one of the church members asked his friend what he thought of the speech. He was a tall, lanky man with a farmer's tan and a hint of a southern drawl. He said, "I don't know about all that, I wasn't even sure what he was saying most of the time. I just know that my God is closer than the best friend I've ever had."

Sometimes the simplest explanation is the best. In many ways Psalm 139 is saying what that ordinary man said.

This is my favorite Psalm. It speaks to the intimate God we believe in. I use it at most funerals because I believe that is a time when we need to be reminded of how close God is to us.

I

In beautifully poetic words this Psalm says that God is personal. The God we believe in is not an abstract principal or a convoluted theory. God is personal. God is intimate.

We hear a lot of talk about God as a higher power or a creative force, but the Psalmist says that God examines me and knows me, God reads my thoughts from far away, and God knows what I am going to say before the word makes it to my lips.

Remember, Jesus said that for God even the hairs on our head are numbered. God's spirit is closer to us than the breath we breathe. God is closer to us than the best parent possible and loves us more than we love ourselves.

I remember a phrase I heard early in my ministry that has stayed with me the whole time: "God knows me through and through, and loves me still and all." Even though God knows us intimately, God still loves us completely.

II

This Psalm also says that God is inescapable. "Where could I go to escape your spirit? Where could I flee from your presence?" The answer is nowhere. The author makes his point dramatically, in contrasting opposites - God is present no matter how far east or west we go, in light or in total darkness (it is the same to God), whether we live in heaven or in Sheol. Sheol is the dark, netherworld of departed spirits. It can often refer to hell. The Psalmist says that God will go through hell with you.

God's intimacy is a closeness you can't escape. You can't go where God is not.

We realize that not everyone thinks of that as a good thing. Even the language of the Psalm hints at this. It talks about "escaping" and "fleeing." Those are terms for getting away from something, wanting to leave it behind.

And yet God is present with us no matter how far down we go, no matter how seriously we mess up our lives. We may deny God, but God will never leave us. God never leaves us behind - even if everyone else has.

III

The intimacy of God is so close that God formed us before we were even aware of God, or anything else. The Psalmist's wording is beautiful - "you created my inmost self, and put me together in my mother's womb. You know me through and through from having watched my bones take shape when I was being formed in secret, knitted together in the limbo of the womb."

God loves us before we are even born, before we are capable of loving back. A few years ago Billy Crystal wrote a children's book titled, "I Already Know I Love You." It's something like that with God, except God already loves us as we are being formed.

IV

The God who knows us and loves us also holds us and guides us through our lives. God takes us into his care and shows us the way to a whole life. God is not just close to us but gives us direction for living. The Psalm says that God's hand is guiding me, God's right hand holding me. And at the very end the Psalm says "Make sure I don't follow hurtful ways, and guide me in the way that is everlasting."

Because God cares, God wants us to live the right way. God doesn't want us to hurt ourselves or other people.

God surrounds us with his love and helps us find the healthy way to live. It isn't always the way we want to go, and it surely isn't the easiest way, but the way Christ taught us is the best way. The One who leads us is the One of infinite wisdom.

Conclusion

Francis Collins is one of the pre-eminent scientists of our day. He is the scientist who headed up the International Human Genome Project. This project successfully revealed the sequence of DNA in the human genome.

Collins was brought up in a secular family where religion was not trusted. As he developed as a scientist, he became a confirmed atheist. Church was a thin cultural veneer, and religion was a crutch.

Just as he was about to finish his PhD from Yale, he decided his real interest was in medicine, so he enrolled at the University of North Carolina. During his training there he had an experience that changed his life. As he was doing rounds and talking with his patients, he was impressed by the number of people of strong faith who faced death without fear. He thought: if religion is a crutch, it is a powerful one.

One day an elderly patient, with whom he had talked many times, told him about her faith - about how she believed in a God who intimately loved her and would stand with her even in death. She asked him what he believed. In the face of such strong faith, Collins stammered that he didn't know. That experience haunted him.

He finally realized that while he had approached everything from a logical point of view, he hadn't given religion the same chance. So he then began to approach Christianity as a scientist, exploring if it could be held as a logical response to our world. He discovered that it can, and he has become a devout and thoughtful Christian.

An ordinary woman talks about the intimate God she trusts and how that God stands with her through every part of life, and because of that the life of one of the foremost scientists in the world is changed forever.

God knows us intimately, holds us closely, will never leave us, and leads us through life. Thanks be to God.

Amen

© Richard J. Henderson 2007