Breaking Down Barriers:
Recognizing God's Presence in Your Life

Pastor Meyer’s Sermon

Sunday, April 15, 2007

Grace, mercy, and peace be to you from God our Heavenly Father and from our risen Lord and Savior, Jesus, our Christ. Amen.

There was a little boy who upon smelling the aroma of cookies baking, came running into the kitchen just in time to see his mother taking the cookies out of the oven. And so he went up to her and said, “Mommy, can I have a cookie?” And the mother said, “No, it will spoil your dinner.” “Oh, Mommy,” he began to cry and whine but the mother was stern and said, “No, it will spoil your supper.” And so the little boy stormed out of the kitchen. And it was quiet for a little bit. And then the boy came back into the kitchen and he said, “Mommy, do you believe God is everywhere?” And the mother said, “Yes, I believe God is everywhere.” “Is God on the moon?” the boy asked and the mother said, “Yes, He’s on the moon.” “Well, is He in China?” “Yes, yes, He’s everywhere,” the mother said. And the boy was silent for a second and he said, “Mommy, is God in my tummy?” And she said, “Well, I suppose so that He’s in your tummy.” And so the boy said with a deep and stern voice, “God wants a cookie.”

But as you’re thinking about that story, has the thought come through your mind that maybe you need to learn a little bit about what that boy was learning, how to look for God in our daily lives and how to have such a profound awareness of God working and God active in our lives? Because, you see, recognizing God at work and God in our lives is something that’s a challenge for us. In fact, it can even be a barrier for us in our relationship with God because there are so many times where it’s hard for us to think that God is with us, that we think God is distant, that He’s someplace out there, that He’s not too concerned about us. And so it seems we don’t see Him working and active in our daily lives.

And so this story we had this morning about David, it’s a rather unusual story. But we see that when you read through David’s life, you can see several experiences of God working and being present in his life. You see, when David was quite young, He was anointed to be the king of Israel and even though young David was respectful and loyal to Saul, Saul was starting to get very jealous of David because David’s popularity was growing, even after the David and Goliath episode. David’s popularity was growing to the point that even the Israelites were singing songs about David, songs that started out like, “Saul flamed his thousands but David flamed tens of thousands.” And so as these songs about David had started to inch up on the Top 40 chart list in Israel, Saul’s jealousy turned into an insane jealousy, even to the point that he wanted David dead. And so David had to run away for a run for his life and Saul set out to hunt him down.

Now in the midst of running from Saul, it would have been easy for David to not pay attention to God’s presence in his life. After all, who has time to feel God’s presence in your life when you’re running away from someone who’s trying to kill you. That’s hard for us to imagine, isn’t it? But I also think it’s hard for us to imagine sometimes that we can actually feel God is present and working in our lives. Maybe we have thoughts that are going through our minds like, “Who has time to feel God’s presence when I have bills to pay?” Or, “I’ve just lost my job. What does God’s presence mean for me now?” Or, “How can we focus on feeling God’s presence when we have so much conflict and fighting in my family?” You see, it is so easy for us to lose sight of God and His daily presence when we’re wrestling with so many difficulties in our lives right now.

Now, if you would have asked me what am I basing my message on for this week, I would have said, “Well, I’m basing it on a man who had to go to the bathroom.” And that’s what the story is. I imagine that the story was probably told as a funny story in its time but the point the story makes is no joke. You see, the point is it’s based on the faith that God will be present and work even in places where it might seem the hardest to imagine Him at all, especially in a cave where King Saul turned aside to relieve himself. And that is what God is teaching David. And that is what He is teaching us today, that He’s teaching us there are God hunts and there are God sightings every day in our lives. In other words, we need to learn where and how can we see and recognize God’s presence in our lives.

And in our story for this morning, God shows through David that there are several God sightings we can see in our lives. One thing David sees as a God sighting is when he experiences this unusual timing. For instance, King Saul and his men were chasing David. And Saul has taken 3,000 of his best men to go after David. David only has about 600 of his own and that outnumbers him 5 to 1, which is not a good idea if he’s captured or caught in a certain area where he cannot escape. And so he runs into the hills and there are thousands of caves on the hillside. But when Saul decided that he needs to take a break, he chooses the exact same cave where David and his men are hiding.

Now David’s men thought this was David’s opportunity to strike and kill Saul but instead David looked at this as an unusual timing because, you see, he knew it was wrong for him to kill God’s anointed one, the king of Israel, Saul. And so he took the opportunity to provide evidence that it was not his intent to harm King Saul. David wanted Saul to know that he was on his side and so David recognized this unusual timing as a God hunt sighting.

And so God invites us to look for the same kind of unusual timing, those things that we call “things that just happen.” You know, what are the odds you would run into the person you were just praying for that morning or what are the odds that you would hear the exact message you needed to hear on the radio? What are the odds that you would find the right house next to the right school and if you hadn’t driven that way that day, you never would have found it? What are the odds that after just talking to your spouse but not before about financial difficulties that you would receive a check in the mail that day from a friend or from a relative that said, “Just because I love you.” What are the odds?

Now some people would say that it’s coincidence but God says He has a plan for each and every one of us. He told us that in Jeremiah 29. He said, “For I know the plans I have for you,” declared the Lord, “Plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.” He has plans for each and every one of us. So when these coincidences occur, I figure if God is able to put the sun in space and able to put the earth in the right orbit to provide the right atmospheric conditions and environment and all the right elements to enable a robin to get a worm out of my front yard, then I think I can give God the benefit of a doubt. Because I know He has a plan for me. And I’m always amazed that when God is involved, coincidences seem to happen quite frequently.

Now when we’re reading through our story about David, we see there’s another God sighting David has, too. And he clues us into what he sees as an obvious answer to prayer in Psalm 57. Because, you see, Psalm 57 starts out that David wrote this when he had fled from Saul into the cave. And this is what he wrote, “Have mercy on me, O God. Have mercy on me for in you my soul takes refuge. I will take refuge in the shadow of your wings until the disaster has passed. I cry out to God most high, to God who fulfills His purpose for me. He sent from heaven and saved me, rebuking those who hotly pursue me. God sends His love and His faithfulness. I’m in the midst of lions. I lie among rabid beasts, men whose teeth are spears and arrows, whose tongues are sharp swords. Be exalted, O God, above the heavens. Let your glory be over all the earth. They spread a nest for my feet and I was bowed down in distress. They dug a pit in my path but they have fallen into it themselves.” The encounter with Saul in the cave reminded David that God was still interested in him. To David, this was an incident that was an obvious answer to his prayer, that God would be present and that God would protect him.

Now every week, we gather here on the weekends and we pray together. We pray the Lord’s prayer as a church family. We send out information in the Weekly Word so we can pray for those who need prayers. We make phone calls to the prayer chain so prayers can be said for those who are in need. And we also sit here and we pray silently. And every week, we get our answers to our prayers, the answers we had hoped for, for instance, people to get well and soldiers to come home safely and travelers arrive at their destination and good decisions get made and also grieving people find comfort. And these things are happening all the time and I encourage you to notice them. I encourage you to write them down in a prayer journal to celebrate it because often times we fall into the rhythm of our lives where we just say our prayers but then we go about our lives not noticing how our prayers have brought results.

And it’s easy for us to build a barrier to tell ourselves that a lot of that stuff that happens would have happened anyway without our prayers, that after all, we have this wonderful immune system. We have the sun that shines every day. We have people who use their common sense to solve problems and so on. Or maybe sometimes it appears our prayers aren’t even being answered at all and we’re wondering if God even hears them. It’s like the little girl who prayed, “Thank you, Lord, for giving me a baby brother but what I really asked for was a puppy.” There are times we don’t get what we ask for. There are times the Lord just answers our prayers with a no. There are times where the loved one does not recover or the soldier does not come home or the decisions made turn out to be wrong. And some of our deepest felt prayers are answered with a no.

And I want to tell you this morning that I truly believe if we were intent at looking around our lives to see what God is doing for us, we would find ourselves with a deep trust in His love. And when the answer to prayer is no, even when it tears us apart, even when it doesn’t seem fair, even when our hearts are breaking, we can still trust God is watching over us with a wisdom that’s far beyond our own.

And that’s what we get from this story of David because, you see, David was promised by God that he would be a king. It was taking a long time for that to happen and he had the opportunity. It would have been easy for David just to help it along by going up and killing Saul but David was focused on seeing God’s present involvement in his life, particularly in the small ways. Because sometimes we get caught up in seeing God in the big deal that we miss Him in the ordinary. Sometimes we’re so busy trying to see God in a spotlight than seeing Him in the footlights and we’re looking for God in the sensational when God is right there in the ordinary everyday.

So this week, I encourage you to go on a God hunt. As most of us begin to learn and to see what we’re trained to look for, have you ever noticed certain objects you never paid attention to, once you start paying attention to them, you see them everywhere? For instance, my father started working for Dodge as a car salesman and before he was working for Dodge, I didn’t really pay attention to the makes and models of cars out on the street but when he started working for Dodge, I started paying attention to the different models that Dodge makes. And I didn’t really notice them all that much before. So when I started thinking about them, it was easy for me to find them.

And so we take note of what we are trained to see. And that same principle holds true for our relationship with God. Why do some people see God at work in their lives where others do not see them? It is because we see what we are trained to see. And the question is are you looking for God’s presence in your life? Remember the two clues from David’s story. Remember unusual timing and an obvious answer to prayer.

And on the front of your Weekly Word, it has a little box over in the corner that says “God Hunt Sighting” and I encourage you during this week to write down some times when you see God working in your life, when you see a God sighting and when you do that, you’ll start to feel that barrier breaking down as we realize that God is not so distant after all but alive and active in our lives.

And soon we’ll see ourselves as this young boy. He was just a young boy who on the week’s first day was wandering home from Sunday School and dawdling on the way. He scuffed his shoes into the grass and found a caterpillar. He found a fluffy milkweed pod and blew out all the filler. A bird’s nest in a tree overhead so wisely placed on high, it was just another miracle that caught his eager eye. A neighbor watched his zigzag course and hailed him from the lawn and asked him where he’d been that day and what was going on. “I’ve been to Sunday School,” he said and turned a piece of sod. He picked up a wiggly worm and said, “I’ve learned to look for God.” “A good way,” said the neighbor, “for a boy to spend his time. If you tell me just where God is, I’ll give you a brand new dime.” The boy looked at the wiggly worm, recalled the robin’s nest, the caterpillar, the milkweed pod, the grass, and all the rest. He stood up tall and answered the man and his voice was no way faint, “I’ll give you a dollar, Mister, is you’ll tell me where God ain’t.” Amen

Copyright 2007 Gloria Dei Lutheran Church