By Tom Warner

Madelyn, our newest granddaughter, is just 6 months old. She’s beautiful, adorable, sweet, cute, precious, and more. Yet, she is pitifully helpless, requiring constant attention, needing someone with her, or at least nearby, every minute. Fortunately for her, everyone in her life loves giving her all that attention. But if she were left alone for an extended time, she would not do well. She needs the constant presence and care of others in her life.

Of course, she will outgrow the need for constant care, but she will never outgrow the need for others in her life. To be left alone would be tragic even as she grows into adulthood. God in Heaven knows that we all would be pitifully helpless if left alone. He came to us, to be with us.

God with Us

“God with us!” What a phenomenal assurance. It’s one thing to believe that God is. Most people acknowledge there is a God, but to believe the God of the universe is with us is something else. And to believe God is with me, as if to suggest God would somehow enter into my life, one mere human being, is beyond comprehension. But that’s the wonder and the greatness of our God. He took on himself the form of a man and entered into our personal lives. 

Practicing His Presence 

Centuries ago, Brother Lawrence was so moved by the amazing reality that God came to be with us, that he spent his life learning and practicing what it means to live in his presence. In his book, Practicing the Presence of God (CreateSpace, 2012), he wrote, “Think often on God, by day by night, in your business . . . Leave him not alone. You would think it rude to leave a friend alone who came to visit you. Why then must God be neglected? Do not then forget him, but think on him often and adore him continually. Live and die with him. . . . In a word, this is our profession. If we do not know it, then we must learn it.”

Tom Warner serves as Senior Vice President and Relationship Manger with Church Development Fund. He and his wife Brenda live in Carmel, Indiana and have two married children (a son and a daughter) and three granddaughters.