“The eternal God is your refuge,
and underneath are the everlasting arms”
(Deut 33:27, NKJV)
In its very nature blood points to that which is concealed, cherished, a clear symbol of intimacy. In the previous teaching we expounded on Eph 2:13 – “But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ.” I do not want to miss the chance of using the blood of Jesus to point out a facet of God’s reconciliatory love. God is a God of intimate closeness. He is naked, and not distant.
In one of his amazing songs, Into the sky, Jason Upton relates a story of him and his son Samuel, who prays – “Hey Jesus, are you still on the cross, or are you feeling better? And if you are feeling better, will you come down and play with me? Won’t you come down, down, down, to the next-to-me-place …”
Our experience of faith is often so rigid that it limits God. No wonder Jesus made this strict statement in Matt 18:3 – “Assuredly, I say to you, unless you are converted and become as little children, you will by no means enter the kingdom of heaven.” Although we often hear this Scripture we almost instantly forget it, as if it’s some thought of the day found in the newspaper, right next to a comic strip, bearing beautiful but ultimately unpractical wisdom.
Little Samuel Upton had the faith to have Jesus come down from the theoretical cross to the “next-to-me-place” to come play with him. It is Jesus’ nature to play – just have a look at the Old Testament prototype of Jesus as the Wisdom of God (1 Cor 1:24) in Prov 8:30-31 – “Then I was beside Him as a master craftsman; and I was daily His delight, rejoicing always before Him, rejoicing in His inhabited world, and my delight was with the sons of men.”!
In his book Homo Ludens the philosopher Johan Huizenga teaches us that play is an intimate action that presupposes a “next-to-me-place”. If you no longer feel like playing, you walk away from the playmate – there occurs a separation, a severing.
God’s language is always one of “next-to-me”. After Adam hid from Him, God asked “Where are you?” (Gen 3:9), and it is not as if He did not know where Adam was J . Hide and seek only works if you can be found. (Remember that macabre joke that was doing the rounds a few years ago – what is crouching, green and hiding deep in the forest? Last year’s hide-and seek champion.) Ps 48:3 states that God, in his palaces, made Himself known as a fortress of rock. In Ps 91:2 & 9 David prays – “I will say of the LORD, ‘He is my refuge and my fortress; my God, in Him I will trust.’ … Because you have made the LORD, who is my refuge,
even the Most High, your dwelling place …” We know that Prov 18:10 speaks of the Name of the Lord as a strong tower, one into which the righteous run for safety.
Jesus wanted to gather the children as a hen protects her chicks under her wings (Matt 23:37)! Indeed we can ask as Moses had in Deut 4:7 – “For what great nation is there that has God so near to it, as the LORD our God is to us, for whatever reason we may call upon Him?” Indeed – the eternal God is a refuge. And under us – his eternal arms.
- Sela: Can you be a child before God? Seek the next-to-me-place that you might have lost.
- Read: Num 2; Zech 11; Ezek 3
- Memorize: Ezec 2:8
- For a deeper understanding: Listen to Jason Upton’s album Between heaven and earth.
