Advent: God in our Midst (The Presence of God)

My wife thinks I am a person of extremes. When I get hot in the car I (even in the winter), I tend to crank the cold air dial all the way down (even though others may not be hot). When I get cold in the car (even in the summer), you might even find my turning on the heat. When it comes to food I tend to be the same way. I like salt, so I often tend to oversalt foods. Friends back in High School used to accuse me of having a little French fries with my salt. I like garlic too. Recently we started cooking a turkey once a month and stretching it into turkey salad and turkey soup (some of my absolute favorite foods). When I first started making turkey salad I did it with a little sprinkle of garlic salt. But as time went by I thought real garlic and sea salt might be better so I experimented by crushing a clove of garlic and mixing it in with the salad. It was good but in my tendency to be extreme, I wasn’t so sure that another clove would be better the next batch. But when the next batch came around I thought, “one more clove won’t make enough difference”, so I added three to it. While I ate it (I didn’t want to admit I had overdone it), even I thought it was too much. None of the rest of the family would eat it. A little moderation with the garlic would have done nicely. Moderation is a word we think highly of in our culture, even an approach to being healthy in our lifestyle. Can we eat salt? Yes, but only in moderation. Can we drink alcohol? Yes, but only in moderation. Or this one, “Dad, can we blow up stuff in the backyard?” Yes, but only in moderation boys.

And so moderation is usually an admirable approach to life. And while this may be true about some things, it is not true about everything. For example, if you want to be an Olympic athlete but are only moderately committed to your training, you won’t find yourself competing at the Olympic level. It is your commitment to training – to the exclusion of other things – that sets you apart as a potentially elite athlete.

The same thing is true of being a Christian. If you want to call yourself a Christian and remain moderately connected to God and his kingdom, you won’t find yourself set apart from anyone else in the world. It is God’s presence that sets a Christian apart. As Moses leads the Israelites out of Egypt and to Mt. Sinai to meet with God, we learn lots of things about the importance of the presence of God along the way. As we look carefully at the text in Exodus 33 we can see clues to what it is like when God remains outside the camp, what it means for God to move inside the camp, and how that move is possible without our destruction. Ultimately, we find that the very idea of the presence of God in our midst comes to fruition and fulfillment in the coming of Jesus Christ.

 

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