Can An Omnipresent God Move Around? -- Genesis 35:13

Then God went up from him in the place where He had spoken with him.

In Genesis 35:9 we read that God simply appeared to Jacob. Here in this segment of the text we gain a further understanding as how He may have done that. When God was finished meeting with Jacob, the scriptures say (35:13) He “went up from him (Jacob)”. One can assume, but never definitively, therefore, that God ‘had come down to meet with Jacob’ in the first place. Once again, the modern western mind has a dilemma. We have been taught that God is everywhere. We say He is omnipresent. If that is true, then why did He likely come down to meet with Jacob, and more certainly, why did He go “up form him”, from the place where He had spoken with Jacob?

My learning during a recent trip to Israel a month ago for a ‘rabbinical model’ pilgrimage helped me put it into perspective. The Jewish mind would have no problem with these two concepts. God is both omnipresent (from a divine perspective) and He is present in specific places and times (from a human author’s perspective). Both ideas can coexist with God.


I believe there is much to be gained by the believer with such an arrangement. Our almighty God is indeed everywhere at the same time. Understanding that, I receive the comfort and the peace of knowing He is fully in control and in charge of all events going on in the universe. He is able to see it all simultaneously and act accordingly as He deems appropriate. While my limited human capacity can fret about so much, His infinite authority is still in control of all. He is still on the throne and His plan for mankind is being fulfilled. I am thankful for that and realize it could not be any other way.

Yet this almighty God, in His role as a loving Holy Father, cares enough to come down and meet with one of His children. He cares enough to come meet with you and me, right where we are, in order to comfort us, assure us of His promises, share with us His plans for our lives, meet our very desperate needs, and so on. I am also very thankful for that. As a needy child, I could think of no better way for my Father to demonstrate His ongoing love for me.

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What A Man (or Woman) Wants from God

I had occasion recently to look at three separate portions of Scripture which I will call A (I Chronicles 4:10), B (2 Chronicles 7:13-18) and C (Matthew 7:7). They are reproduced for you below. Together they say a lot about us. In A, a man called Jabez calls on God to bless him and increase his material goods. He wants God's hand to be with him in whatever he pursues, so he will succeed. He also wants God's hand present for his safety and protection. In short, he wants to live without pain. And interestingly enough, God granted Jabez what he requested.

All we know about Jabez came from the previous verse (I Chronicles 4:9) which simply tells us "Jabez was more honorable than his brothers". Strong's Bible Dictionary, however, uses all the following interpretations of the word used here for honorable -- to be heavy, be weighty, be grievous, be hard, be rich, be honourable, be glorious, be burdensome, be honored. Not sure just which one applied to Jabez and why God granted his request so readily. What exactly may Jabez have been like to be so blessed? More importantly, what does it take to be successful in very difficult times that some of us are currently in? Some may be facing incredible personal challenges and difficulties. Others of us may be suffering collectively as a result of the economy. What does it take to succeed like Jabez in such times?

I believe that scripture portion B may give us a good idea as we listen to God speaking to Solomon, the son of David. God is basically telling Solomon what the secret of success, especially in adversity, is. But first let's talk about the adversity God refers to and compare that to what we may be going through. Here are God's examples:

1. drought (not having enough rain to grow crops to feed yourself and your family), or in today's lifestyle -- visiting the groceries stores to find nothing on the shelves -- that's adversity.
2. allowing locusts to eat up the land, so even if you had rain, nothing would grow, or in today's lifestyle -- allowing the immorality of man to destroy all that is good around us and within our families -- that's adversity.
3. pestilence (a fatal epidemic disease like the bubonic plague of old) to cripple or kill off your family, or in today's lifestyle -- Aids or Cancer or Mental Illness -- that's adversity.

God's formula for success will stand up to those levels of adversity and beyond. While some may be approaching that degree of adversity in their lives, the majority of us who believe we are suffering in North America today, are not playing anywhere near the same ballpark.

Now, here's the formula (even under extreme adversity -- which by the way, God Himself allows in order to deal with both the just and the unjust as they live their lives or for whatever personal reason He may choose -- for He IS God) -- here's the formula that will work for "His People" (condition number #1). We're talking about His people; those who know Him personally and have a personal relationship with Him. Yesterday, I was listening to a gospel song I had not heard before. It was about someone trying to enter heaven and finding out his name was not in the Book of Life. He argued he had been to Church, but admitted he had never knelt to pray. He had done some good things that he listed and felt his name should be there, but it wasn't. He had failed to accept Christ as personal Lord and Savior. In short, God was not able to include him in His "My People" that He refers to in passage B.

First comes the belonging to Him, then comes the obedience in four specific ways, for God says, if My People:
i. humble themselves (no more "I can do it myself; I know how to run a business; I know how to make money; I know how to succeed; I know how to get fit and healthy; etc."),
ii. pray (as a way of life, not as an obligation; continuously; believing He can; accepting if He doesn't wish to; but always giving Him the praise and glory regardless of His answer),
iii. seek My face (deeply searching to know Him and His will for us), and
iv. (the clincher) turn from their wicked ways (no exceptions; obedience to God has no loopholes).

First we qualify, then we follow the rules. Then He comes through. He's going to hear you; He's going to forgive you your sin; He's going to heal your own personal land. And we better be doing some of that praying right in our churches. I know a lot of discussion goes on about who and what the church is these days. And I agree it is not a physical building. But it is a physical body of believers. So some of that praying (or a lot of it) better be done in the communion of that body of believers because God specifically says in 2 Chronicles 7:16 that is He particularly tuned in to prayer that occurs in His House; because that's the place He has chosen and consecrated to be used to glorify His name forever. And besides, that's where His eyes and His heart are and will be. You can't avoid the Church -- both the universal Body of Christ and the local body of believers. Don't stay home on Sundays unless you're dying of illness. There's no excuse no matter what your mind comes up with.

Then God speaks to Solomon about Solomon. "Okay, I'll hear my people if they humble themselves, pray, seek My face, and turn from their wicked ways. But you Solomon (and that goes for each of us), you "walk before Me; you do according to all that I commanded you; and you keep my Laws, and I will establish your throne, Solomon!" Or, "I WILL increase your territory, Jabez. I WILL bless you Ken, Mary, Sally, Fred. That's a promise."

And that promise was carried right through to the New Testament when we check passage C. If we ask, it will be given to us; if we seek, we will find; and if we knock, it will be opened to us. But you see, it's all part and parcel of passage B. Passage A is what we want. Passage B is what God expects and promises. Passage C reconfirms the arrangement for the 21st century.

Passage A
1Ch 4:10 Now Jabez called on the God of Israel, saying, "Oh that You would bless me indeed and enlarge my border, and that Your hand might be with me, and that You would keep {me} from harm that {it} may not pain me!" And God granted him what he requested.

Passage B
2Ch 7:13 "If I shut up the heavens so that there is no rain, or if I command the locust to devour the land, or if I send pestilence among My people,
2Ch 7:14 and My people who are called by My name humble themselves and pray and seek My face and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven, will forgive their sin and will heal their land.
2Ch 7:15 "Now My eyes will be open and My ears attentive to the prayer {offered} in this place.
2Ch 7:16 "For now I have chosen and consecrated this house that My name may be there forever, and My eyes and My heart will be there perpetually.
2Ch 7:17 "As for you, if you walk before Me as your father David walked, even to do according to all that I have commanded you, and will keep My statutes and My ordinances,
2Ch 7:18 then I will establish your royal throne as I covenanted with your father David, saying, 'You shall not lack a man {to be} ruler in Israel.'

Passage C
Mat 7:7 "Ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you.

Discover for yourself, if you already do not know, that God is in the business of saving the lost and blessing the found.

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The First 3,346 Years

At Genesis 25:10, we come to the end of the world’s first 3,346 years since God created it. Man and woman enter the picture and are given benefits beyond belief as well as a pleasant responsibility to take care of the earth. However, through the deception of the serpent Satan, they are encouraged to disobey and contravene what God had asked of them for their own good. This disobedience introduced sin into the world and with it, the fall of mankind. Adam and Eve are evicted from the Garden of Eden and life became very difficult for them.

One of their sons murders his brother and the corruption of mankind continued to slide so much that God wanted to start all over again. To do so, He had to destroy every living thing through a flood. Only Noah and his family were spared, along with the animals God had instructed Noah to take into an ark that he had build to God’s specifications.

God then promised that He would never again destroy the world in that way. Abram comes into the scene and God selects him to be the Father of God’s chosen people, the Israelites through which God was going to bless all of mankind. From Genesis chapter 16 to the early parts of chapter 25, we followed the story of Abram, how his named was changed to Abraham, and finally having a son, Isaac, through his wife Sarah, formally called Sarai. Prior to Isaac’s born, Sarai, being anxious to give Abram a male heir, gives him her Egyptian maid, Hagar, who bears him Ishmael. Sarai then requests that Hagar and Ishmael be sent away. God pursues His own plan and the promise He made to Abraham in spite of the assistance that Sarah and he were trying to give Him. Eventually Sarah dies, Isaac marries Rebekah, Abraham takes another wife named Keturah who bears him six sons, and eventually the Patriarch Abraham dies at age 175.

But the foundation has been set for a great people to rise up through which God would bless all mankind. The story may have begun with Adam, Eve, Noah, Abraham, and Isaac, but it continues to this very day with you and me, and those that may well come after us. We are just as much a part of this story as the characters we read about and studied. The exact role we are to play is a function of our faith in, and relationship with, the God who created Adam and was a Friend of Abraham’s.

Living in the 21st however, we, however, have the benefit of being involved with more of the triune God than Adam or Abraham were. We have been ransomed by the blood of Jesus Christ, God’s only begotten Son, and being guided every day of our lives by the Holy Spirit of the Almighty.

As we close this volume, I hope you will join me, as God may permit both of us, on the next journey of this incredible story starting some 3,346 years after creation.

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My Job as a Leader in Ministry (I Thess. 5:14)

This morning I was struck by the following verse: "We exhort you [we request of you], brethren, warn [admonish] them that are unruly, comfort [encourage] the feebleminded [fainthearted], support [help] the weak, be patient toward all." I Thess. 5:14.

As I read that I wondered whether or not that would make a great verse for everyone in the ministry (including pastors, Ministry Centre Directors, missionaries, and all Christian leaders). Surely, if we are doing our job right this very day, having committed our time to the Lord -- there will be those that we can request things of; there will be those we need to admonish or warn; there will be those we will need to comfort; there will be those we need to help or support; and then we need to be patient with all that we come across -- in the ministry and outside of it. Boy, do we ever need to depend on Him today!

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