It’s dramatic.  It’s joyful.  It makes for a good story.  It’s usually preceded by the telling of some harrowing or gut-wrenching situation in someone’s life.  And then “God shows up”.  Help arrives.  A prayer is answered.  The problem is solved.  The story-teller’s faith is renewed and all is love and light in the world.  But is it biblical?

 

I’m not hatin’ exactly.  I love it when others recognize that a gift or blessing comes from the Lord.  And the “God shows up” part of the story fulfills the fantasy of every little boy who loves super heroes and every girl who waits for the knight on the white horse.  But the phrase just isn’t biblically sound.  The fantasy falls apart when you still have cancer.  Or your family continues the struggle to pay the bills.  Or you fail the class, or get passed over for promotion.  What if your anxiety disorder persists?  Does that mean God’s not there?  That’s not biblical either.

 

So what does the bible say?  In John 16:33 it says, “In this world you will have trouble.”  NIV  But in Psalm 46:1, “God is our refuge and strength, an ever-present help in trouble.”  And according to Romans 8:35, we cannot be separated from His love by any kind of trouble (“hardship or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword”).  And maybe most important to this discussion, Deuteronomy 31:8 says God promises His people that He “will never leave you nor forsake you.”  Then jumping all the way to Matthew 28 in the New Testament, “surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.”

 

So when we feel like God shows up, what is probably more accurate is that we WOKE up.  We tune into His presence and acknowledge where He is working.  Then we join Him there.  What a privilege that the God of all creation has His hand on us, participating in our story,  and He invites us into His glory.