Sermon XXII The Presence of God. (Fifth Sunday After Pentecost.)
“Indeed the Lord is in this place, and I knew it not.
How terrible is this place;
this is no other than the house of God and the gate of heaven.”
—Gen XVIII. 16,17.
These words were spoken by the Patriarch Jacob when he was journeying to Syria to visit his uncle. He had stopped for the night at a place which was afterward called Bethel, and as he lay on the ground with a stone for his pillow, the Lord appeared to him in a vision, and blessed him, and foretold his future greatness and increase. Then, penetrated with a sense of the nearness and greatness of God, with whom he had been conversing, he rose up and exclaimed: “Indeed the Lord is in this place, and I knew it not.” And trembling, he said: “How terrible is this place; this is no other than the house of God, and the gate of heaven.” Now, my brethren, we may make every morning and every night a similar declaration. Wherever we are, we may say: “Indeed the Lord is in this place.” Every spot on earth, on which a man tarries for a moment, becomes the house of God, and the gate of heaven. You understand what I mean. I am speaking of the omnipresence of God. Reason and faith both proclaim to us this great truth of the universal presence of God. He is present by His immensity to all creatures in the universe, whether living or inanimate. When God created the world, He did not leave it to itself. He sustains it by His presence and power, and it is in Him that we live and move and have our being. He is present to our intellectual and moral being as the light of reason and the object of the will, for without Him there would be no rational or moral life. He is present with us also as the source of that supernatural life which begins in baptism and ends in the uncreated vision of the Blessed Trinity in heaven. “He that loveth Me, shall be loved by My Father; and I will love him, and will manifest Myself to him. * * * And My Father will love him, and We will come to him, and will make an abode with him.” 175
O my brethren, what a piercing thought is this of the presence of God, if we did but realize it! Think for a moment of the doctrine of the real presence of our Lord in the Holy Eucharist. We believe that Jesus Christ, true God and true man, with His deity, His soul, His flesh and blood, is present in the holy sacrament of the altar. What consequences this doctrine has! The whole Catholic ritual, the ceremonies of worship, the respect paid to churches, the bowing of the knees, the incense, the lights, the music—all flow from this. In the early ages, during the times of persecution, it was customary for Christians to take home with them the Blessed Sacrament, that they might communicate themselves in case of necessity. Imagine that such were the custom now. Imagine you were to take away with you, this day, as you left the church, and carry to your homes, the sacred host which is kept in the tabernacle. How silently would you go along the streets! With what care would you seek out a place for our Saviour’s body to repose in! With what care would you go about your home as long as He remained your guest! How would your heart thrill as you reflected, on a awaking in the morning, that indeed the Lamb of God, once crucified for you, was now a dweller in your own home! Yet, if such were the case, if the Blessed Sacrament were actually kept in your houses and in your rooms, God would not be any more present to you than He is now. He is indeed present in a different manner in the Blessed Eucharist. That sacramental presence, that sweet, precious, consoling presence of the body once broken, and the blood once shed for us, is confined to the sacramental species. But the presence of the deity, the real presence of God, is just as much outside as it is inside the church; just as much with us when we are at home as when we are at Mass. Not if His footstep shook the heavens and the earth, as it will on the Last Day when He comes to judgment, would God be one whit closer to us or more present to us than He is now to everyone of us, every day, and everywhere. Even sin cannot separate us from God. We sometimes say that mortal sin separates a man from God. As a figure of speech, implying the loss of God’s grace and friendship which sin occasions, this language may pass, but taken literally it is untrue. A man can never be separated from God. That would be annihilation. Even when we are in sin, even when we are committing sin, God is with us and in us, the soul of our soul, the life of our life. Yes, here is a bond that can never be broken. Never can we escape that awful presence—never for a moment, here or hereafter. We shall not be more in God’s presence in heaven or less in hell than we are now at this moment. God is not a God afar off up in heaven. He is here. This whole universe is only God’s shadow. Every thing that is attests, not only God’s creating power, but His living presence. He is in the flames and in the light, and in the pastures, in the air, in the ground, in the body, and in the soul, in the head, in the eye, in the ear, and in the heart. He is in us, and we are in Him, bathed in His presence as in an ocean, breathing in it as in an atmosphere. This is what the Psalmist expresses so beautifully: “Whither shall I go from Thy spirit? or whither shall I flee from Thy face? If I ascend into heaven, thou art there; if I descend into hell, thou art present; if I take my wings early in the morning, and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea, even there also shall Thy hand lead me, and Thy right hand shall hold me. And I said: Perhaps darkness shall cover me; and night shall be light in my pleasures. But darkness shall not be dark to thee; and night shall be light as the day; the darkness thereof, and the light thereof, are alike to Thee.” 176
If we thought more frequently of this, how many sins should we avoid! When a man is going to commit a crime, he takes precautions against discovery. He seeks out a secret place. He chooses a fitting hour. Vain precautions! There is no secret place on earth, no lonely spot, no time of darkness. There is a proverb among men that “walls have ears,” and the counsel of the wise man is, “Detract not the king, no, not in thy thought; and speak not evil of the rich man in thy private chamber; because even the birds of the air will carry the voice; and he that hath wings will tell what thou hast said.” 177
What is it that has impressed on men this universal fear of detection? Is it not an unconscious acknowledgment of the presence of God? Yes, we cannot shut the door against Him. We cannot leave Him out. We cannot draw the blind before His eye. “The eyes of the Lord in every place behold the good and the evil.” 178 “Before that Philip called thee, when thou wast under the fig-tree, I saw thee,” 179 said our Lord to Nathanael.
I wish you thought more of this; I am sure it would save you from many a sin. I have read of a holy man who, on hearing a person say that circumstances were favorable to the commission of a shameful sin, because no one was present, exclaimed: “What! are you not ashamed to do that before the living God which you would be ashamed to do before a man like yourself?” Even the eye of a dog has restrained men from the commission of crime—how much more ought the eye of God! Listen to the language you hear as you pass through the streets. The sacred names of God and Jesus Christ, how they are bandied about! Would men speak so, if they realized that God and Christ were then and there present? Would they insult God to His face? Suppose our Saviour were to appear to one of these men as he was pouring out his oaths and blasphemies, in the guise in which He was as He journeyed to Calvary to die for man, with sorrow in His eye, and sweat and blood on His forehead, with weak and faltering steps, and lips mute, but full of appealing love and agony; would he still go on with his dreadful oaths? No! The knee would be bent, the head would be bowed, and the very ground on which He walked would be regarded with reverent awe. Why so? Merely because he saw Him with his bodily eyes? Would it not be the same, if he were to close His eyes, and yet be aware of His presence? And is He not present to you as truly as if you saw Him, hearing each imprecation and blasphemy which you utter? Oh, spare Him! spare those sacred ears; spare His majesty and His goodness, and cease to profane His holy name. Tertullian, speaking of the early Christians, says they talked as those who believed that God was listening. Let the thought of God’s presence be deeply graven on your soul, and it will teach you to use the language of a Christian—at least it will cure you of blasphemy.
It will cure you also of another sin of the tongue: that is of falsehood. Lying implies a virtual denial of God’s presence, as well as blasphemy. When you lie, you forget the there is One who know’s the truth—who is Himself the Eternal Truth; and you act as if He knew not, or would be a party to your fraud. Every lie is, in this respect, like the lie of Ananias and Sapphira—a lie to God.
Oh! how much must God be displeased by all the sins He witnesses. It is said of righteous Lot, that from day to day he vexed his righteous soul at all the sins which he witnessed in Sodom, where he dwelt. How must the Holy God be vexed every day at all the dark deeds, the injustices, the impurities, the falsehoods, the deceits, the treacheries, the cruelties, to which men compel Him to be a witness! Is it not a necessity that Christ should come with ten thousand of His saints to take vengeance on the ungodly! Would it not seem, otherwise, that God made Himself a party to our sins by keeping silence? “These things hast thou done,” says the Almighty, “and I was silent. Thou thoughtest unjustly that I shall be like to thee: but I will reprove thee, and set before thy face.” 180
David committed adultery in secret; but God declared to him that He would punish him before all Israel, and in the sight of the sun. So the Judgment Day will bring to light every secret thing, and manifest, in the sight of all, those hidden sins which have been committed in the presence and with the full knowledge of God. They have never been hidden from God, and the disclosures of the Last Day are only the Presence and the Knowledge of God asserting and manifesting themselves to men. The thought of God, and of His Omnipresence, is thus the greatest preservative against sin.
But this is not all. The thought of God’s perpetual and universal presence is our greatest strength and consolation. What a comfort it would be to have a friend, who loved us truly, who was most sincerely desirous of our welfare and happiness, who was very wise and able to help us in difficulties, never variable or capricious, but always true and faithful and trustworthy! The possession of such a friend will go as far as any thing earthly can go to make one perfectly happy. Now, each one of us really has such a friend. Such a friend? Ah! far better, far wiser, far more loving—even the good God! God, in the Holy Scriptures, represents the soul of man as a garden, in which it is His delight to walk about. What an idea this gives us of the familiarity a man may have with God. Why do not men take advantage of this loving condescension? Why do they not converse with God? Why do they not think of Him? The face of Moses shone after he had been talking to God on Mount Sinai, and our countenance would be light and joyous if we dwelt more in God’s presence. Oh, to think of it! When we walk in the streets, when we sit down and rise up, there is one ever at our side—no, not at our side; but in us—our very life and being; God, the Beautiful and Good. God, Who made the heavens and the earth; the God of our fathers. God, Who has been the comfort and stay of the just in all ages, Who talked with Abraham, and went before the children of Israel in a cloud by day, and a pillar of fire by night. God, Who gave manna from heaven, Who spoke by the prophets, and in the still, small voice on Mount Horeb; Who awoke Samuel, as he lay sleeping in his little crib in the priest’s chamber, and chose David, the youth, fair and of a ruddy countenance, to be the prince of His people; and who, in these last days, hath revealed Himself in His Only Begotten Son, full of grace and truth.
He it is Who is with you and me, even from our youth unto this day. O thou who art afflicted, tossed with tempests and not comforted, what dost thou want?—what wouldst thou have? The Eternal God is thy refuge, and underneath thee are the everlasting arms. Thou hast but to open thy soul, and floods of comfort and strength will pour into thee. Art thou weak? He is thy Strength. Art thou sad and lonely? He is thy Consoler. Art thou guilty? He is thy Redeemer—the God ready to pardon. Does the world allure thee? His Beauty will make its attractions pale. Is thy heart weary and inconstant? He is unfailing and unchanging. O source of strength, too much slighted! O happiness, too often blindly rejected! In the presence of God there is pleasure and life. “They that hope in the Lord shall renew their strength; they shall take wings as eagles; they shall run and not be weary; they shall walk and not faint.” “For He is a covert from the wind, a hiding-place from the storm, as rivers of waters in a dry place, and the shadow of a great rock in a weary land.” 181
Learn, then, my brethren, to keep yourselves in the presence of God. To forget God, what is it, but to plunge ourselves into sin and misery. To remember God, what is it, but to be strong and happy. “Walk before Me, and be thou perfect,” said God to Abraham. That is the secret of perfection, the way to heaven. It is not necessary to go out of your own mind. It is not necessary to lift the eye to heaven, or bend the knee. Closer than the union of soul and body is the union between God and thee. Quicker than thought is the communion between thy soul and its Maker. “Thou shalt cry,” says the Almighty, “and I will say: Here I am—yea, even before thy call, I will hear, and even while thou art yet speaking I will answer.” 182
Practise, then, attention to the presence of God. I do not speak so much now of daily prayers, and of your devotions in the church. But when you are abroad in the busy world, or in your homes, accustom yourselves from time to time to think of God. Complicated pieces of machinery require the care of an overseer from time to time, lest they get out of gear. So we must think of God from time to time during the day, and keep the powers of our soul in harmony with the will of God, lest they fall into disorder, and the work of life be hindered. It is not a work of very great difficulty. The chief difficulty lies in its simplicity. It is so much easier to pray than we think, that oftentimes we have already prayed when we are perplexing ourselves how to pray, and busying ourselves with preparing to pray. God is in us, in the very centre of our soul. He knows its most secret thoughts, and thus a simple act of the will is enough to bring us into communion with Him. To realize this is to be men of prayer, to be as happy as it is possible for us to be in this life, and to begin here that contemplation of God which will constitute our everlasting beatitude in heaven.
Notes
175 St. John xiv. 21, 23.
176 Ps. cxxviii. 7-12.
177 Eccles. x. 20.
178 Prov. xv. 3.
179 St. John i. 48.
180 Ps. xlix. 21.
181 Isai. xl. 31; xxxii. 2.
182 Isai. lviii. 9; lxv. 24.