A Fire by Night: becoming a people of God's presence
Introduction
“And the LORD went before them by day in a pillar of cloud to lead them along the way, and by night in a pillar of fire to give them light, that they might travel by day and by night. The pillar of cloud by day and the pillar of fire by night did not depart from before the people.” Exodus 13:21
"Jacob, why are we alive? "
A few years ago, I took our daughter to see Jacob Collier play the iconic Hollywood Bowl. It’s my favorite live music venue because it’s an open air amphitheatre, so you can take a picnic basket with you and you can see the Hollywood sign up in the hills beyond the stage. Our sons teased me because the prodigious British jazz/pop musician is quite eccentric and they see him as pretentious. To be fair, it is definitely musician’s music. Every song has multiple key and time signatures. You might call it snob rock. But the concert was magnificent - an outpouring of joy and beauty from a humble genius. It was a memory making night of joy with my daughter that I still treasure today. Around this time I watched a conversation on YouTube that Collier had with some of his fans after a similar concert in Barcelona. I was arrested by his approachability. The multiple Grammy award winner stood there on the curb without any entourage, surrounded by fans, in no rush to escape. Impressive. The conversation was mainly about his music until one of his young fans took a sharp right turn down Philosophy Street.
“Jacob, why are we alive?” she boldly ventured.
Visibly taken aback and speechless for a moment, his hesitant reply was a sincere, yet hollow echo of our cultural moment.
“It’s so fun being alive. We must be open to the world and the world will be open to us. It’s hard, but that’s what love is. Being open and trusting the world. Why are we alive? There is no reason. Not even one. But it’s worth celebrating.”
I’m not sure the fan was satisfied with his answer. I know I wasn’t. But it was a poignant reminder that genius is not the same as wisdom. All the talent and fame in the world was not able to answer the universal cry of the human heart.
How would you answer that burning question if it were asked of you?
Why are we alive?
Fun, open experiences of the world, for no particular reason? Is that why we are alive?
Thankfully, no.
Do you know that if you can answer that question rightly, you are far more wealthy and wise than any Grammy award winning, platinum selling genius who says there is no real reason to be alive?
Eli Wiesel, the Jewish Holocaust survivor, famously wrote, “If you can find your why, you can survive any how.”
Perhaps you’ve given up in the midst of hardship and pain because you don’t know your why? Perhaps you feel frustrated and empty because you’ve spent too much time sweating over your what, where and when, but have never stopped to do the hard work of your why?
One reason for this is that most of us are swimming in the murky waters of post-modernity, which tends to reject any grand coherent telos or reason behind our existence. It’s your narrative versus my narrative. No transcendent truth. No overarching reason and therefore, no ultimate hope.
The German theologian, Helmut Thielicke described human history as a dramatic play, in which God is the playwright. There have been acts and scenes before us. We’re born. We come out onto the stage of history. We have no idea what the story is. We have no idea who the heroes and villains are. We have no idea who the playwright is. We have no idea when the story began or when it ends, what our role is or what lines we’re supposed to say. And so, we end up with a life of great confusion and perplexity. This, contends Thielicke, is the human condition, and in that sense Jacob Collier has hit the nail on the head.
Enter the Biblical story. Thielicke proposes that the Bible tells us our origins, our Author and our future. That we come from God. That God is the playwright, and that we’re going to God. And in the middle, we’re here to be in relationship with God. In fact, he argues that God desires so strongly to relate to His creation that the Author writes himself into the story! When we meet the playwright and learn the plot and come to recognize the heroes and the villains, we find that we do, in fact, have a meaningful part to play in the author’s story.
To put it plainly, Thielicke contends that you and I are here to know God. That’s the ultimate reason we are alive.That is our why.
You may protest, “But, I do know God.” To which I would reply, “You may have met him, but you and I have not even begun to plumb the depths of what it is to know God.” We will spend eternity getting to know God. Jesus said it plainly in his high priestly prayer to his Father on his disciples behalf. “Now this is eternal life, that they may know you, the only true God and Jesus Christ whom you have sent.” (John 17:3)
Augustine of Hippo, the 4th Century African Church father, was converted after drinking deeply from the cisterns of worldly pleasure and coming up thirsty. Having finally been satisfied from the fountain of Christ’s presence, he famously concluded:
“Almighty God, you have made us for Yourself, and our hearts are restless until they have found their rest in you.”
Thielicke was riffing off the bold thesis of Augustine. If we are made for God’s presence we will only find our rest in God’s presence.
CS Lewis, the 20th Century British apologist, co-signed.
“Human history is the long and terrible story of man trying to find something other than God which will make him happy.”
This virus of restlessness and unhappiness from which we suffer today is because we are on a fool’s errand to try and find rest and happiness apart from the presence of God. The only cure for us is to become a people of God’s presence.
I realize that some of you may be doing the proverbial eye roll right now because this all seems quite mystical. Perhaps even simplistic. A people of God’s presence? Downright impractical. How does knowing God help me choose the right career? Help me find a life partner? Solve my debt problem? Relieve my anxiety or my addiction? Heal my broken marriage or my depressed child? Grow my church? Deal with the political mess we’re in? Are you suggesting endless hours of solitude up on a mountain?
Well, solitude would do many of us a world of good. But stay with me, won’t you?
Your why has a huge bearing on your what, your where and your when. It offers you the priceless gifts of perspective, resource and hope. Knowing God means knowing Someone greater than your current trial and stronger than your current storm. It means drawing from Someone deeper than your deepest longing. It means hearing from Someone wiser than your current complexity. Jim Packer, in his seminal book Knowing God, summarized what I am trying to say in this way:
“Once you become aware that the main business that you are here for is to know God, most of life's problems fall into place of their own accord.”
While knowing God does not seem that practical, it is the most fundamental root that resources us for every practical issue we face, enabling us to bear fruit in the most adverse conditions. As the prophet Daniel, whose dreams and interpretations in exile solved the conundrums of the King of Babylon declared,
“The people that know their God will be strong and do exploits.” (Daniel 11:32)
Dear reader, this book is firstly about your why. Every one of you is created for the presence of God. Of this truth, I so desperately want you to be persuaded. The prophets of the Old Testament spoke about their oracle. For instance, Jeremiah the prophet talked about an oracle concerning false prophets and false shepherds. (Jeremiah 23:1)The Hebrew word here is, massa, which means a weight or burden from the Lord. I have written books on worship, church planting, revival and emotional health. But I feel that the common burden of these books, the massa that I carry, is for the Church to be a people of God’s presence. Of course I want you as an individual to encounter God’s presence. But I pray as I write, that the story of the cloud by day and the fire by night would melt away any individualistic view of God’s presence, igniting your vision for the Church as a people who encounter and carry God’s presence into the world together. One cannot read these passages of Scripture without acknowledging that God dwells among a people. God leads a people by his presence, rather than merely, a person.
Hence, the burden of this book is to convince you of your great why and help you to live confidently from that why, by recognizing and responding to God’s presence in your life. I intend to do this by narrowing in on the wilderness years of Israel, following their dramatic Exodus from slavery in Egypt. While there are many instances in the Biblical narrative in which God demonstrates his presence with His people, few are as vivid as God dwelling with Israel as a pillar of cloud by day and a pillar of fire by night. (Exodus 13:21) I chose this portion of Scripture in particular because life seems to feel to many like a wilderness. The heat of our day and the darkness of our cultural mood are pervasive and oppressive. Yet, the cloud by day and fire by night stand as a sacred billboard, selling us on the promise that God is ever present with His people, even in wilderness seasons. Perhaps, particularly in wilderness seasons.
This is also the reason I settled on the title, A Fire by Night, instead of the more exact, ‘a cloud by day and a fire by night.’ For a start, A.W. Tozer had already written a book by that name. For the sake of brevity I will refer in this book to the mysterious phenomenon as the fire-cloud. But I chose to emphasize the fire by night as a reminder that God’s presence does not depart when night falls.
The fire-cloud powerfully demonstrates that God’s presence not only dwells with his people, it also moves before them. It is not only a comforting presence. It is a guiding presence, leading us as God’s people on his mission. Canaan awaits, but God’s people must break camp and follow the fire cloud when it moves, if they are to cross over the Jordan. So, the fire by night connects God’s presence with God’s mission. They are inseparable.
They are why we are alive.
Song: People of your Presence
