“Where Do We See God?” Lent 4 Joshua 5:9-12 March 10, 2013 This sermon was preached by Guest Preacher, Pastor Tom Jolivette of Luther Seminary at Trinity Lutheran Church, Eau Claire, WI

Has there ever been a time in your life when you knew that God was with you? You heard a voice that cannot be explained – and it gave you answers, or a calm that can’t be described? You had a dream of “God with you” that was so real, it changed your life? An unexplained healing happened and the only explanation was that it was a miracle? You experienced an angel in human clothing, standing by your side in a time of crisis?

Stories abound about people seeing and experiencing God in visible and obvious ways.

Imagine if you were the people of Israel. God had been visible to them for 40 years! As they left Egypt, heading for the land promised by God, the Red Sea parted so they could cross on dry land. As they travelled across the desert, they were led by a large cloud during the day and a pillar of fire in the sky during the night. When they had been traveling long enough to begin having internal troubles, God gave them the 10 commandments as a code so they could live together peacefully. And every day, they received food from the sky – Manna – so they could be fed in the desert. For 40 years, God was visible to them every day in their daily bread.

When they left Egypt, they left with a promise from God of a new home in a land that was on the other side of the desert. It had fertile soil and good water. There they would have plenty.

But on the way – as a sign of God’s presence and God’s leading - God fed them every day with manna. Every day it fell like snow. Every day it nourished them for the journey. Every day it filled them up. I’m sure it got boring and monotonous. You can almost hear the children complaining, “Mom, what’s for dinner? Oh, no. Not manna again!”

But every day that the manna fell to the earth, and every day when the people of Israel ate the manna, they knew that God was with them. They saw God.

You can imagine the joy, then, as the people of Israel finally crossed the Jordan River and entered into their promised land. They made it. God’s promise had come true. It was a good land, with good soil, and plenty of water.

Giving thanks to God as they gathered in this new land, they remembered the night they left Egypt and the special meal they prepared. And on the 14th day of the month they ate the same meal – the Passover meal – to remember and celebrate. The next day, for the first time in forty years, they ate a meal prepared from grains grown from the earth – instead of manna from the sky. And with the eating of that meal, the manna stopped falling. The daily reminder of God’s presence was no more.

They needed the daily food to make the journey. They needed God’s visible presence to remind them why they were in the desert and where they were going. During the journey, they needed the assurance from God that God was with them.

And now, at the end of their journey, in the land they had been promised, having eaten fresh food from the land, their daily encounter with a visible God stopped.

When life returned to normal. When the need to see God wasn’t as great. And when God’s need to be seen wasn’t as great, God slipped into the background.

Where did God go?

Had God abandoned them when God wasn’t seen daily?

How would the people of Israel know that God was still with them?

Though not as obvious, God was still with the people in their daily living. God was present in the land – that was fertile. Present in the water – that gave life. Present in a new homeland – long promised and now a reality. Present in their daily meals, prepared from the work of their hands. Present in their families and in their festivals and in their worship. God was still very present with the people of Israel – but from that day forward, not as visible.

Like the People of Israel, there are times in our lives when we desperately want to “see” God, to know that God is with us. There are times when God is obvious to us, and for that we are grateful. But in most of life, in our daily routine, in the working of the soil of our lives, we don’t think about God’s presence. We don’t’ cry out to God for help – and God is not obvious to us.

But the point of the story from Joshua is that God was just as present with the People of Israel in the working of the land as God was in the daily manna, falling from the sky. The good news is that God is with us – always.

There is a story by CS Lewis called “The Chronicles of Narnia”. Narnia is another world, where animals talk and heroism in battle takes place. Several children from England were mysteriously transported to this other world to help free the Narnians from all forms of evil.

There are similarities to the story of the Israelites traveling to this new land and the journey of these children in the book, “The Voyage of the Dawn Treader”. In this book, the children are transported to Narnia through water, instead of a desert. Instead of seeing God in the parting of the Red Sea or daily manna, they see God in the form of a Lion named Aslan.

As the children were called from their bedroom in England to Narnia to help in a quest, Aslan becomes visible to them and helps them in their fight. And now, having come through their challenges, they are saying good-bye to Aslan, knowing that they were parting ways and may not see him again.

VIDEO FROM NARNIA

“It isn’t Narnia, you know. It’s you. We shan’t meet you in our world, and how can we live never meeting you?

“But you shall meet me, dear one.

“Are you there, too, sir?

“I am, but I have another name. You must learn to know me by that name. This was the very reason why you were brought to Narnia, that by knowing me here for a little, you may know me better there.”

How do we see God?

My Dad knew something was up with his health. The day he was to go to the doctor to find out what the test result showed, he attended chapel at Waldorf College, where he worked. The preacher used the text from Isaiah 40, “You shall mount up with wings like eagles, you shall run and not grow tired, walk and not grow weary. “ He instantly felt a peace he could not explain.

His diagnosis was cancer. He battled it for over seven years. Throughout that battle, the calm he felt in chapel, hearing those words from Isaiah, stayed with him. And in that calm, he saw God.

My friend Joel has been afflicted with heart disease since he was 42. Now, sixteen years later, after over 20 stents, triple bypass surgery, two cancer surgeries and kidneys that have failed and require dialysis three days a week, he is looking at limited medical options.

One day, not long ago, as he was pondering his situation, he heard a voice. He doesn’t know if it was an “out loud” voice or a voice inside his head, but to Joel, the voice was very real. The voice asked, “Do you love me?” Joel answered, “Yes, I love you Lord.” The voice asked, “Do you trust me?” Joel answered, “Yes, Lord, I trust you.” And the voice said, “Then walk in that trust.”

That message sustains Joel in these difficult days. And in that voice, Joel experienced God.

Luther Seminary is going through tough days. Because we are spending more than we are taking in, we have to reduce our expenses. That means that people and programs will be reduced. There is high anxiety as the day of those announcements comes near. One third of our faculty and one fourth of our staff will not be retained. That’s a lot of pain.

You can imagine the prayers being prayed these days. You can imagine the requests for God to become visible to us these days, to intervene and to help. I don’t know what people have experienced. But I do know that God is with us.

Where do we see God?

It is sometimes in the manna that falls from heaven, the voice that clearly speaks to us, the calm that overwhelms us. And in those times, we are deeply grateful that God is made known.

But more often, it is in the normal living of our lives that the invisible presence of God is made visible to us. Most days, we know God by other names. By the name of the rain and in the sunshine. By the name of our intellect to be able to figure things out. By our strength to make things happen. In our courage to face difficult times. And in our hope, that sees us through even the darkest of days. In our friendships. In our church. In the food we eat. We know God by the love of our spouse. And the trusting eyes of our children. And for those of us so fortunate, in the hug of a grandchild.

God is with us.

All that we have is a sign of God with us.

Where do we see God?

In the voice or in the calm. In the ordinary and in the urgent. In the daily bread and in the feast. In our lows and in our highs. In the visible and in the hidden.

God is with us.

Amen