Near & Far

Like many people throughout history I wonder why God often feels near by and yet far away. There are times in prayer and worship when I sense the Presence of God quite clearly and times when I sense His voice and direction. And yet there are other times when I feel very much alone and wonder where exactly God is at. There are circumstances that I pray about and very little seems to change; there are issues where His direction seems shrouded in mystery.

There are times when I feel God leading the way and dynamically at work in my life and yet there are others when it feels like God has gone on vacation or put his MSN/ichat on 'Be right back'!

This has been the experience of multitudes throughout church history, including King David and the other Psalmists. Certainly that is why so many of the Psalms bring comfort in such challenging times.

All this has led me to recent meditation on Psalm 43

2You are God my stronghold. Why have you rejected me? Why must I go about mourning, oppressed by the enemy?
3 Send forth your light and your truth, let them guide me; let them bring me to your holy mountain, to the place where you dwell.
4 Then will I go to the altar of God, to God, my joy and my delight. I will praise you with the harp, O God, my God.
5 Why are you downcast, O my soul? Why so disturbed within me? Put your hope in God, for I will yet praise him, my Saviour and my God.

Previously in Psalm 42 (which traditionally is considered the first half of Ps. 43), the Psalmist asks "Why have you forgotten me?" (v. 9). Then is Ps. 43:2, he says that he feels that he has been rejected by God and oppressed by the enemy. He cries out for the Lord to cause His light to shine and His truth to guide him, and asks God to lead Him to His holy mountain, which is a reference to God's Presence (it's also a clear reference to the House of Prayer, but hey, that's for another post!).

The Psalm is concluded with a confident assertion that the Psalmist will experience God's nearness and will respond with joy and delight and worship. He ends with a recurring statement to stop feeling sorry for himself and remember to trust in God.

I love the Psalms because they're so dramatic. Some might say melodramatic! I'm a melodramatic kind of person, so I connect very easily with statements of feeling rejected by God and then turning around and stating that God is my joy and delight!

So which is it? Is God near or is He far? I believe that the answer is that we experience Him as both near and far. It's not at all satisfying an answer, but given the testimony of Scripture itself, that has been the experience of countless people and seems to be the way God chooses to reveal Himself!

Some people have become so tired of this kind of roller coaster experience of faith that they have chosen to get off the ride entirely. While I understand that temptation, I am 'haunted' by the reality expressed in Psalm 42:7

7 Deep calls to deep in the roar of your waterfalls; all your waves and breakers have swept over me.
8 By day the LORD directs his love, at night his song is with me--a prayer to the God of my life.

It's that experience which causes me to continually pursue God...when He feels near and even when He feels far.