The Value of Sensing His Presence

God is everywhere, yet there are times and places where He makes His presence known in powerful ways. One important spiritual discipline is learning how to be aware of Him, to have that sense of His presence more and more.

There is good reason to do this. For instance, imagine the difference in life and behavior if you had your most admired person living in your house, or walking with you to work, or sitting next to you. Depending on the character of that person, I would be intimidated, or encouraged, nervous or assured, shy or bold, but definitely affected.

The psalmist, in this case David, knew the power in his life of realizing the presence of God. He said, “I have set the Lord always before me; Because He is at my right hand I shall not be moved” (Psalm 16:8).

In one Bible class I had the women imagine themselves sitting on a park bench with Jesus. They closed their eyes and each one did as David describes — they set the Lord before them. Some shared how the deeper sense of His presence they experienced by this simple discipline gave them deeper peace and great inner confidence.

My devotional author picks up on this verse as one way to help us do what we are created to do; glorify God. The more aware I am of His involvement in my life and that He walks beside me, the more aware I am of His glory and the wonder of who He is and what He does.

All of creation exists to glorify the Creator. It is like going to an art gallery. We first marvel at the paintings, but eventually our thoughts turn to the artist who created them. We can be delighted with the product, but take our hats off to the one who produced them.

Besides that, other than human beings, everything that is created glorifies God. “The heavens declare the glory of God; and the firmament shows His handiwork” (Psalm 19:1) and “The beast of the field will honor Me, the jackals and the ostriches, because I give waters in the wilderness and rivers in the desert . . . ” (Isaiah 43:20). The art hanging in space points to the artist, just as do the animals that He made.

When Jesus was born, the angels declared, “Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, goodwill toward men!” (Luke 2:14). The angelic host glorifies God. The only created beings that fall short are human.

When the human race fell into sin, we became far more interested in glorifying ourselves. In the process, we humans are on a constant quest for “personal satisfaction” and “personal fulfillment” not realizing that our focus misses the purpose for which we exist.

When I set the Lord before me and am aware of Him being at my right hand, when I am deeply aware of His glory and most focused on His power and goodness, my sense of well-being switches from externals (which ebb and flow) to that inner sense of being immovable, of having such a solid foundation in Him that nothing can touch me or make me fall.

The things of life that please me come and go. The presence of God is always as close as the next breath, and it is that sense of His nearness that fills me with awe and pleasure as I begin a new day with Him.