How is God Present With Us?

It seems to me that God must be all we can imagine and far more than we can imagine. He simply will not stay in any box we put him in, in our current experiences. I am amazed how our perception of him changes in our life time.

In a worship service several years ago, I was musing how we viewed the presence of God with us throughout my life time. It seems this has shifted some from one decade to another. In earliest years we imagined that God was able to be everywhere and so could be around us and see us and knows all things about us. As we became Christians, it was Jesus the Lord and Savior who was our companion. He promised in the Great Commission to be with us always and we felt he was in his Divine person who used to be human earlier. As the Charismatic movement came along, God lived within us by His Holy Spirit who filled us, empowered us for service and to live the Christian life. Later in my teachings in Belize, it was that Spirit who was really the Spirit of God and the Spirit of Christ and I wondered for some years if the Holy Spirit had any other identity than that of being the outreach of God and Jesus. Only two persons of Divinity and one Spirit for them. I have never read this confirmed by any writer nor anything in Scripture to indicate other wise. Now most recently, in the last month, I again experience Jesus as a person who speaks and makes his presence known and felt in my spirit as well as emotional if not physical feelings. I can’t quite describe or explain this, but it is like the real Jesus, close to the historical Jesus is present and speaks to us in our hearts and minds and clearly doesn’t want us to let him out of our fellowship. Several months ago I was asking myself if I loved Jesus. I had little feelings although I had a strong commitment to follow him in all ways, including living a life of obedience and no compromise with sin. Now, this Jesus is near and it is such a great experience, I can say I know I truly love him and never want to have him leave me in the way he is present presently. I would cleanse my life from anything to make him feel at home with me. It is also an emotional thing where I had to cry tears the other morning as I reviewed some of his many kindnesses to me in my life. I hope Jesus stays with me always in this way. I would do anything to have him stay. I believe he wants to stay close.

Yet since I wrote the above about 3 years ago, God is still showing himself in new ways. When I read about the vastness and supposed age of the universe, I just wonder how he would even want to keep contact with each person even in one world such as ours. But I wonder if he can still think of us also, what a wondrous God we have. It is mind-boggling also to read of our amazing body, (Reader's Digest, September 2013) “100 billion neurons, ( or brain cells), which each “fire” (talk to each other) five or 50 times per second” traveling as fast as 270 miles per hour so that we can recognize an object and identify it, i.e. a cat or ball. It is equally hard to imagine that each DNA molecule may have 80,000 distinct parts, scientist being proud they can a map them, but each hold information equivalent of a set of encyclopedias. Or a heart that can beat 100,000 times in day for many years. I am beginning to wonder if life goes on like a clock God made and wound it up, or whether God is the life where ever it exists. In all this, is God still personal caring for me? I just get the feeling I know a lesser amount of all he is than ever in my life. Do I know one percent of who he really is? I don't know.

Yet when I start talking to him in prayer each morning, he becomes so real my eyes water as I set before him my concerns for the day for me, my acquaintances, as well as my concerns for the Middle East and all world problems which only he can solve. He has made me and all his faithful children partners to help him bring in his Kingdom where the world once more will be as he originally intended. I don't know what side of God I will see tomorrow and the day and year after that. I doubt that I will ever see all of God, probably not even in the next world. But I only know, He will be more than..!

                                                             My Dreams

Taking off from the worship service today, I have several dreams which I would like to see accomplished. The Pastor suggested we write down our dream and then list 5 steps we can take to accomplish them. I highly recommend doing this for any serious Christian reading this blog!

I first thought about the matter that I would really like to see all of our grandchildren get married to Christian spouses of like mind and see them commit themselves to a life of service and ministry, whether their lives would be spent focused in mission or a vocation in which the call to bring Christ to the world in some way would be a central goal of their lives.

The second goal came to my mind, that of wanting to live after this life in the future generations through my writings, realizing that we know so little of the character of our near ancestors beyond where they lived and moved around.

A third dream is to see a better world where there is peace, basic sufficiency, and a knowledge of the Gospel. This we are working on by intercessory prayer for missionaries, for God's spirit to enlighten the hearts of those who hear the gospel, and for God to tame down the madness of men and ethnic groups and nations so that humanity might have security and decent living.

The first goal of a continuing legacy can be worked at by

        a. Fellowship with the youth as much as possible and have a relationship with all of them;

        b. Praying they will find spouses of equal commitment to service and mission;

c.       Let our concern for a mission be an example to inspire them;    

 d. Intercede for them regularly as they make choice and  training for life.

The second dream can be worked at by

           a. Learning how to market my writings by relating to a professional in publishing;

           b. To learn what can be done through the social media of website, blogging or other;

           c. To continue writing but with an audience and media in mind;

           d.  Relate to family through mass e-mail of current  and new writings.

The third dream can be worked at by

           a. being informed specifically of world events in the nations and evangelism and relief efforts        by organizations;

           b. Praying intercessory for missionaries and relief workers;

           c  Pleading for God to work by his sovereign powers to bring down government and ethnic strongholds that destroy human society through oppression, violence, and corruption;

          d.  Praying for the national churches to be burdened with the needs of the world and the churches and God to call forth workers into the global field of needs;

           e. Praying for political sanity and wisdom  in our government to work out problems that are for the good of this country and other countries;

           f. Helping with our own financial resources as possible to support the work of churches in carrying out the gospel mission of message and alleviation of poverty.

                                                                                                   September 2012

                                                                                                                                 

                                                     ME AND DAD

                                                  From My Biography

My earliest recollection of my father is when Christmas would be only a few days or a week away, he would take us little ones on his knees and sing “Silent Night”. Of course he sang it in German as “Stille Nacht”. Then one of us would ask him how many nights until Christmas. It was an expression of love to us to teach us one of his many songs that he loved and wanted us to know. It is not hard to imagine sitting there perhaps as a 2-3 year old, nestled in his arms as he sang to us. Actually I don’t remember his voice as much as the fact that we would excitedly always ask him how long until the Day.

He was enthusiastic about his children, picking them up and sometimes in a high pitched voice call us “lieb kindly”, translated loosely as "beloved child". From our earliest days, we were important to him and he enjoyed being with us when the day’s work was done, or even when he came in for dinner, or even when we would go out where he was working. I have more feelings about those encounters then actual incidences that come to my mind. It seems he would always talk to us, although he would also be in deep meditation or rehearsing some relationship with some else and talking to himself barely audibly. He was a sociable person, not content to just be tight lipped. He was communicating whether the person spoken to was there or not. Sometimes we would ask him what he said. He was probably surprised and wondering what we had heard.

Occasionally I made the trip to town with him to do some shopping for groceries or what ever else we needed. Our horse Bobby was never in a hurry and would take about an hour to travel the 7 miles to town. As Dad would go from store to store, I would try to keep up with him. I don’t know if he was always in a hurry, but he knew where he was going and wanted to get his business done. He told me some of his business, like going from one grocery store to another because he knew the price of what he frequently bought, literally saving a penny here and there. He knew the value of a few cents. I suppose that thriftiness bid me well when I was in college twenty years later and had my own sense of economy on what was affordable and where I should buy my things.

I was also with Dad many times when he wanted us to help him on the farm. I suppose he both wanted train us and to have our help. I would drive the horses when we put in hay as the loader brought the hay up behind the wagon and he or a brother would load the wagon to get the most on without loosing any on the way to the barn.  Later I could do that job of placing the loose hay around the wagon until we had a high load. Dad also wanted us around when he “made fence”, either a new fence, or repairing where the cattle had weakened it. He taught me to use a post hole digger, and to sight up posts in a straight row.

I remember once as we were working on a fence in the lane near the barn, he was teaching me a Bible verse, word by word, having one finger designated for each word- five in the first phrase; German words I can still repeat 60+ years later. Only years later did I learn where we find it or what it meant. Scripture was important to him and he also wanted us to know Scripture. He probably helped us memorize verses for Sunday School also, although I don’t recall just what they were. He read to the family a chapter of the New Testament every morning and every evening, and then led in a prayer as we knelt down as a family. Rarely did we go off to bed before he would lead us in this devotional. He cared for our Spiritual discipline in Scripture and prayer, setting an example for us as Mom would help keep it orderly, which was not usually a problem. We realized it was a normal part of our daily life. He did not explain Scripture; he just read it, usually. He did not teach us to pray; he was just an example. It was something he believed in even though it must have taxed him after a day’s work and just before bed. But he never forgot, nor excused himself. Even when we came home from Bible study on Wednesday evenings we knelt to pray, perhaps skipping the reading; after all we had been to Bible study. 

 Sometimes Dad confided to me things in his heart and memory that he could have kept to himself; that Mom had some preference for a girl when I was born; that he had convictions for overseas mission work before marriage, but it was too big a hurdle to perhaps need to leave the Amish church and attend to college; and Mom’s anxiety at some time later, perhaps at the pending birth of a child, the feeling that they had to go to the mission field. He just wanted to spill some secrets even as I find myself doing at times. To these deep feelings I was sometimes the confident.

In the 60’s there was an ordination for the ministry at our church. When I was not even a nominee among 7 others, he comforted me that perhaps those who voted for the successful candidate would likely have voted for me. He also gave be a beautiful affirmation of my sense of call. “I would like nothing more than that you would enter the Christian ministry”, he confided, something most unorthodox for a humble Amishman to say.

I remember his sadness when we left for Belize in 1986 and in subsequent times. He always seemed conscious that we might not meet again, though it was never expressed openly that I recall. I suppose there was usually a little hug and kiss as had been the practice whenever we parted in younger years. He was always telling stories of bygone days when we were back for vacations from Belize. Even after his stroke which hindered his short term memory, he would recall many things of bygone days. Especially interesting to us was his courtship with several women after my mother died. He was so candid and detailed I just had to record some of that at times.    

One memory of some sadness remains for me. After he had the stroke and at times was not so rational, he stayed with us for a week one summer as we stayed on Marion Street in Elkhart. At first he did not want to go into the house with us but stayed in the car and on the sidewalk. But when a black man came along, he was persuaded to come in. Most of the time he was rational but rather glum, like we were holding him captive against his will. At one time he said very unkind words about me about how bad I was.  I didn’t take it too personal as I understood his mental state. But it was sad because he was my Dad and he did not feel good toward me. His last years were marked by some depression, I believe, as he increasingly had to be dependent on his children and was loosing control of his life. He outlived his better days by a few years. One worker at the home where he spent his last weeks remarked, “That was not the Elam that I knew.” Nor the Dad I once had.

Many times in my memory from my childhood to his old age, it seems Dad treated me like I was special. Not that I was more special than my siblings, but that I was someone he cared about and gave particular attention to. He enjoyed me when I was a child. He lead me the best he could in my growing up years. He respected me above tradition in my mature years. It was not hard to forgive him in his fading years and accountability. In his negative comments on Marion Street, I assured him he was not responsible for his remarks. He insisted he was, to me only proving my point. Dad is now gone 18 years, but his memory will live in my mind as long as I have it. My life no doubt is a fulfillment of some of his dreams to serve the Lord locally or abroad, without the necessity of providing for himself as he sometimes lamented, detracting from ministry. Yes, Thank you, Lord, for the Dad that helped bring me in this world, led me, and showed me the way I should go. May I always pursue the path he set before me.