Episode #316 God’s Already Here (Even in the Mess) – Everyday Awake

Hey, friends. Most mornings I wake up mid-sentence. Some of you know exactly what I'm talking about. The to-do list starts talking before I do, there's kids to get off to school, emails that are waiting, people that need things and more than enough priorities to fill my day. But lately I have realized something. We don't actually have to start the day alone and then go find God later. We can wake up in God's presence. Every breath of the morning is already filled with God because he chooses to be close to us, and that's what we're talking about in today's episode.

Now, I remember a morning that felt very different than this. It was after a bad night of sleep and a string of just surprising things that kind of felt like they were ruling my schedule, plus all of the things I was already anticipating doing. And so I was moving fast, so fast that I didn't really recognize how anxious I felt. It was in the middle of unloading the dishwasher and running through this mental checklist of all the things that had to get done, in the small amount of time that I had to do them, when a thought landed in my mind and in my heart. It was gentle and also clear:

You are not in this alone.

And so I froze there for half a second. The plates clinked, the water still ran into the sink. The noise going on around me and in my mind was still going on. But that sentence changed the atmosphere because it was an invitation to slow down and to notice. It wasn't a harsh reprimand, even though it brought about a course correction for me. God was already there. I was just late to noticing.

Now this reminds me of Jacob's story, which is recorded for us in Genesis 28. Jacob had deceived his father, pretending to be his older brother so that he could get the blessing that was given to the firstborn. Jacob is running from a family disaster of his own making. And so we pick up the story in Genesis 28 when Jacob has left Beersheba and goes to Haran and he comes to a certain place and stays the night there because the sun had set.

And picking it up in verse 11, it says, “Taking one of the stones of the place, he put it under his head and lay down in that place to sleep.”

So he's sleeping with a rock for a pillow.

“And he dreamed that there was a ladder set up on the earth, and the top of it reached to heaven. And behold, the angels of God were ascending and descending on it! And behold, the LORD stood above it and said, “I am the LORD, the God of Abraham your father and the God of Isaac…”

And he goes on to tell him, “I will be with you wherever you go.”

And this is the verse I wanna focus on for us today.
Now, Jacob wasn't looking for God. Remember, he's in this chaotic circumstance of his own doing. And in his culture, people believed that God's lived in fixed geographies, mountains, temples, shrines. I can relate to that even in ways as a culture present day, where we can think that God is closer or is listening better when we're in a church building or in a group setting, or we're receiving prayer from someone that we perceive to have a close walk with God.

But Jacob's dream shatters that idea. The words that God himself spoke to Jacob affirmed to him. “Hey, I will go with you wherever you go. I am with you. I'm not just in this place.” God shows up in exile and trouble, not only in perfection, and that's really good news for the rest of us because his presence isn't a prize that we have to earn through quiet mornings or religious milestones. His presence is in the air that we breathe, before we even notice he's near. Where we are right now, whatever room or location you are in, God is there with you. We can find him in the moments where we didn't notice him before, just as Jacob proclaimed “Surely the Lord is in this place and I didn't know it.”

Maybe today isn't about trying harder to find him. Maybe it's about slowing just enough to realize that he's already here with you. In your kitchen, in your commute, in the conversation that you're dreading. When Jacob said, “Surely the Lord is in this place, and I didn't know it,” he wasn't confessing failure. He was waking up. He was being awakened. One from a dream, but two, from this mistaken, limited thinking that God wasn't where he was, that God wasn't in the mess. He woke up to the truth that God was there with him. And he woke up as the Lord spoke to him, affirming his own presence. That's what awareness of God feels like. Not striving, just waking up.

So before you rush into whatever's next, take a deep breath. You are already standing on holy ground. It just looks like your everyday life.

And here's a question I invite you to take to God to see what else he might wanna share with you on this topic:

God, where are you already present in my life that I've been overlooking?

Then pause there. Let him answer in the ordinary moments that follow.

Have a good talk.

And if you've been encouraged by this content, please share it with a friend and help them grow in their conversational relationship with God too!

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