Never Alone

The truth is, most of them tap out not because of the grueling conditions, lack of food, or less than optimal living conditions. They tap out because mentally they can’t handle being alone for that long. Having no one to talk to or have any form of relationship with does a number on a human psychologically, emotionally, spiritually, even physically.

And that is because we were created for relationships. We were made to be relational creatures. And when I say that many of us think back to the Garden when God may Eve to be Adam’s helper and partner because God saw that for Adam to be alone was not good as God puts it in Genesis.

And while we were made for human relationships, companionship and interaction, we were also designed by a creator who wants us to have that some kind of fellowship with Himself. We were made to experience this life with God.

But if you know the story, you may recall that sin destroyed that connection between us and our creator. That humans and God had a schism placed between them as a result of disobedience and sin.

And while that deeply impacted the relationship dynamic between humans and God, it didn’t destroy it completely. We see in the Old Testament how God continued to interact with a fallen people, with a broken and sinful creation. The interaction was different for sure, but it was still there.

When we read through Genesis we see God interacting and presiding with certain individuals like Enoch, Noah, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and Joseph. And while these men experienced the presence of God in their lives, this was not the norm for most people.

For most people on the Earth God was distant and unknown. In fact that is why we see so many other religions and beliefs because you have all these sinful helpless humans who were mad for a relationship with their creator who weren’t experiencing one and so they were trying their best to create an experience through false religions and experiences.

The dynamic changes

And then we come to the descendants of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. The Hebrew people as they are referenced at this point in history. Joseph the son of Jacob and brought his people to Egypt to live. Joseph was a prominent man in Egypt, second in command answerable only to the Pharaoh himself.

Then for a while the Hebrew people, the Jewish people as they would one day be called had it pretty good. Many of them would have learned about the God of the Bible, the God who promised to give them a promised land, that they would be a blessed nation as God had promised their forefather Abraham.

But something happened in Egypt.

6 In time, Joseph and all of his brothers died, ending that entire generation. 7 But their descendants, the Israelites, had many children and grandchildren. In fact, they multiplied so greatly that they became extremely powerful and filled the land. 8 Eventually, a new king came to power in Egypt who knew nothing about Joseph or what he had done. 9 He said to his people, “Look, the people of Israel now outnumber us and are stronger than we are. 10 We must make a plan to keep them from growing even more. If we don’t, and if war breaks out, they will join our enemies and fight against us. Then they will escape from the country.” 11 So the Egyptians made the Israelites their slaves. They appointed brutal slave drivers over them, hoping to wear them down with crushing labor. They forced them to build the cities of Pithom and Rameses as supply centers for the king. NLT.

So for 400 years they remained slaves and the promises that were given to them would have faded from their memory. This God they were taught to believe would have seemed like a fairy tale told to their kids to give them some semblance of hope. They would have been beat down, tired, afraid for their future, and would have felt utterly forgotten by God. They would have felt alone.

But then along comes Moses. And he was appointed by God to lead them out of slavery. To lead them into the promised land. They would actually see the promise God made to Abraham fulfilled. But even then God was working with Moses, he still wasn’t in relationship with everyone.

So Moses leads them out and when he gets them out of Egypt God begins to give him instructions for how the people are to worship him. Because you have to understand that for 400 years they were in Egypt and saw religion through a certain lens. When it came to worshiping God, they didn’t know what was appropriate.

So God begins instructing them on building a tabernacle since there was not a temple yet. He gives them instructions on how to live through the 10 commandments. He tells them how to build the Ark of the Covenant and how the would be where God’s presence would by manifested. He gives them instructions on the priesthood and who would be a part of that and what their role would be.

And so he goes through all of this and says something to them that would have been completely new. God had not interacted with people this way yet. Here is what he says.

43 I will meet the people of Israel there, in the place made holy by my glorious presence. 44 Yes, I will consecrate the Tabernacle and the altar, and I will consecrate Aaron and his sons to serve me as priests. 45 Then I will live among the people of Israel and be their God, 46 and they will know that I am the Lord their God. I am the one who brought them out of the land of Egypt so that I could live among them. I am the Lord their God. NLT.

Did you catch the change. God says, from now on. I will not be a distant God, rather I will make myself present among you as a nation. That for the first time since the fall of humans into sin, God will reside with his creation once more.

This was huge for the Israelite people, the God of the universe had chosen them to be a people that he resided with. He was going to live among them. He was going to be present.

They might have felt all alone in Egypt for the last 400 years, but that was over. It was a new day and God was doing things in a new way. Never again would they have to be alone and out of the presence of God.

But if you keep reading your Bible you will come to find that while God’s presence was among them, it didn’t seem to stop them from rebelling against him time and time again.

Because this was merely a foreshadowing of what God was ultimately setting up to do. God wasn’t content to simply be present among his people. There was still a separation between them. God is Holy, and so there were rules for who could approach him and who couldn’t. And if you violated that, often times you would die because people didn’t reverence what it meant to have a Holy God living among a sinful people.

Presence is good, relationship is better.

Fast forward to the Gospels and we see God bringing to fruition what was foreshadowed in Exodus. That God wanted to be among his people, but not only did he want to be present, he wanted to have a relationship with them.

How many here know that people can be present in your lives but not have a relationship with you.

You have to remember, we were man to be in relationship with God, not just to have him be around us. We weren’t made for God to be in the room, but for us to know him personally as we would any close friend.

But you know sin, it ruins that possibility because God is holy and cannot be in relationship with sinful people.

That is until Jesus. If you are a Christian you know that Jesus’ death on the cross paid for our sin, and his resurrection defeated it once and for all. Paul says that we have been imbued with the righteousness of Christ. That when we put our hope and trust in him, when God the Father looks at us, he no longer sees our sin, but instead he credits us with the righteousness of His son. Praise God!

10 For since our friendship with God was restored by the death of his Son while we were still his enemies, we will certainly be saved through the life of his Son. 11 So now we can rejoice in our wonderful new relationship with God because our Lord Jesus Christ has made us friends of God. NLT

18 Now all of us can come to the Father through the same Holy Spirit because of what Christ has done for us. 19 So now you Gentiles are no longer strangers and foreigners. You are citizens along with all of God’s holy people. You are members of God’s family. NLT

This is what we call good news friends! Not only is God present in our lives when we accept Jesus as our savior, but he makes us his friend and part of his family. We have fellowship with him.

We are told in Hebrews that God says he will never leave us or abandon us.

But, have you ever felt otherwise. I mean we know that God is not only present, but wants to be in relationship with us through Jesus. But, do you ever find yourself in a season where you might not say it out loud, but you don’t really feel God’s presence, let alone a relationship with him?

Perhaps you find yourself in a difficult season of life, you have experienced tragedy, financial hardship, broken relationships, someone has hurt you deeply. Perhaps God didn’t answer a prayer the way you had hoped, or things didn’t go like you had expected them to.

It is often in those difficult time that we can forget that God has promised to never leave or abandon us. But it is in those times that we must dig even deeper.

18 The Lord is close to all who call on him, yes, to all who call on him in truth. 19 He grants the desires of those who fear him; he hears their cries for help and rescues them. NLT

Or maybe you find yourself struggling with sin. You’ve messed up over and over again and despite your best efforts you have fallen short yet again. And we can buy into the lie that surely this time is the last time God will forgive me. His patience have got to be run out by now. You feel as though you have finally pushed him away.

The truth is that couldn’t be further from the truth. When we fall short, Jesus draws even closer. Why? Because he loves us. He wants what is best for us.

39 And this is the will of God, that I should not lose even one of all those he has given me, but that I should raise them up at the last day. NLT

The bible says there is nothing that can separate us from God’s love for us, that includes our falling short.

God is present, and he can’t be any more present than he currently is if you are a believer. But I believe that the reason we don’t often sense his presence, is because we aren’t taking advantage of the fellowship that he offers.

Remember, God’s presence is good, but personally knowing him is better. Having a relationship with him is what he desires.

And when we don’t have a strong relationship with him, it is easy to not sense his presence. And while his presence is promised, he won’t leave or abandon, relationship with him is up to us.

The demands of the relationship

While his presence is guaranteed when we come to faith in him, there are things that we must do to have a relationship with him the way he intends us to.

Holiness

8 For once you were full of darkness, but now you have light from the Lord. So live as people of light! 9 For this light within you produces only what is good and right and true. 10 Carefully determine what pleases the Lord. 11 Take no part in the worthless deeds of evil and darkness; instead, expose them. NLT

God is still Holy. The same God who struck people down with death who did not reverence his holiness in the Old Testament still demands holiness today. Especially from his people who have His Spirit living within them.

We are to live called out lives that intentionally strive to separate ourselves from sin and evil. Our lives must look different.

James tells us that when we make friends with the world, or the sinful systems of this world we have made ourselves enemies of God. We cannot have fellowship with a Holy God and at the same time live consistently unholy lives.

Obedience to His will

24 Those who obey God’s commandments remain in fellowship with him, and he with them. And we know he lives in us because the Spirit he gave us lives in us. NLT

Jesus tells us that if we love him we will obey him. We cannot live in disobedience to his word and yet expect to have fellowship with him.

And as I said a moment ago, when we aren’t in fellowship with him, it is very easy to lose the sense of his presence in our lives, not that it isn’t there, but we will miss it.

Closing

I don’t know your struggles any more than you now mine. But what I do know is that we all have them. We all go through seasons in our lives where we feel alone and that no one is there for us.

The fact is, if you know Jesus, God promises to be there for you. But to experience that. The sense his presence and to live in that truth, we need to have regular fellowship with him. God extends it to us, we have to receive it do something about it. And if we don’t, then his presence in our lives will only be a theoretical concept, rather than and experienced truth.

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