This Lenten season I have been reading I Am with You, by Kathryn Greene-McCreight, which was the Archbishop of Canterbury’s Lent book for 2016. It is a biblically rich and pastorally sensitive reflection on the presence of God with his people. This quote from Erasmus has really stuck with me over these past few weeks:
Vocatus atque non vocatus, Deus aderit.
Which means, “Called or not called, God will be there.” Or, in Greene-McCreight’s looser rendering, “Like it or not, God is with you.” Sometimes God’s presence is discomfiting and even frightening. His nearness often means judgment. His presence often brings rebuke and chastisement. His providence often spells sorrow and pain. But he is still there with his chosen people, sanctifying, prodding, sustaining, pulling us to glory.
And when the dust settles, God’s people know: the threat of his absence is even more terrifying than his sometimes uncomfortable presence. And so we give thanks, knowing that our Triune God is still with us. Even in death, we know that our crucified and risen Christ has promised to remain with us to the very end of the age (Matt. 28:20), like it or not.
I think of the psalmist’s wonder: “When I look at your heavens, the work of your fingers, the moon and the stars, which you have set in place, what is man that you are mindful of him, and the son of man that you care for him?” (Psalm 8:3–4, ESV) But I also think of Job’s complaint echoing the same wording but not the same sentiments: “What is man, that you make so much of him, and that you set your heart on him, visit him every morning and test him every moment? How long will you not look away from me, nor leave me alone till I swallow my spit? If I sin, what do I do to you, you watcher of mankind? Why have you made me your mark? Why have I become a burden to you? Why do you not pardon my transgression and take away my iniquity? For now I shall lie in the earth; you will seek me, but I shall not be.” (Job 7:17–21, ESV)