Category Archives: Spirit

Where God Dwells


Where does God dwell? The scriptures teach us that God dwells in heaven, his holy habitation (Deuteronomy 26:15), but aren’t we also taught that God is everywhere? Being in a place isn’t the same as abiding there. God may be everywhere, but he doesn’t abide everywhere. Abide means to remain, dwell, or reside. I can think of five places, besides Heaven, where God makes his abode.

God is everywhere. The psalmist voices this in Psalm 139:7-10. “Where can I go to escape your Spirit? Where can I flee from your presence? If I ascend to the heavens, you are there; if I make my bed in Sheol, you are there. If I rise on the wings of the dawn, if I settle by the farthest sea,even there your hand will guide me; your right hand will hold me fast.” God is so vast that he fills and encompasses all of his creation and nothing is hidden from him (Jeremiah 23:24). So, everything and every place is within God’s view and overshadowed by his Spirit, but his abiding presence is limited to those places where he chooses to dwell. It is in these places where God imbues more of his Spirit and where he is more deeply encountered.

God Dwells in Love Itself

I John 4:16 says that “God is love. Whoever abides in love abides in God, and God abides in them.” Where love is present, God is present, and since God is love, he dwells in love. If we love with God’s love, we invite God’s abiding presence into our midst. God makes his abode in love itself. So, when we are in the presence of unconditional love, then we are in the presence of God and can experience him and his love at such times.

The above verse also implies that when we dwell in love, God dwells in us, since God dwells in love. It’s a wonderful circular flow of love. If we seek to experience God more, then we should seek to love as God loves, as love is an invitation for God to abide in us.

God Dwells in the Present Moment

God experiences all time at once: past, present, and future. But it is the present moment that he inhabits. We humans tend to focus on the past or future, but the active presence of God is found only in the present moment. Our fretful forays into the past or future happen within our minds and shift our focus away from God. If we wish to experience God, we will more likely do so when we inhabit the present moment. The present moment is real, the only real realm available to us. The past and future are not real realms that we can interact with—they are mental constructs that we cannot inhabit except through our memory or vivid imagination. When we inhabit the present moment, we engage what’s real and we can engage God who inhabits this present reality.

In my book, “Four in the Garden,” Creator says, “Only in the present, where We make Our abode, will you find Us and the peace We give.” Rehearsing the past or obsessing about the future doesn’t bring peace. God can give us peace if we stay anchored to the present and we entrust our past and future to him. With God’s help, we manage the present, moment by moment. When we jump out of the present, we cut ourselves off from God by engaging our repetitive mind.

God Dwells in Jesus

Colossians 1:19 says, “For God in all His fullness was pleased to dwell in Christ.” The fullness of God inhabits Christ who is the full expression of God. If there are degrees of indwelling, then Christ would be the most pure and glorious habitation of God, surpassing that of heaven itself. Christ is the image of the invisible God (Colossians 1:15). As such, he is the means by which we can understand and experience God because he is the revelation of God. By knowing and experiencing Christ, we come to know and experience God.

God Dwells in our Hearts

Ephesians 3:16-17 says that Christ dwells in our hearts through faith and that God’s Spirit is planted in our inner being. In John 14:23, Jesus says, “Anyone who loves me will obey my teaching. My Father will love them, and we will come to them and make our home with them.” The Father and Jesus offer to make their home in our hearts if we love and obey Christ. Our hearts become a dwelling place for his Spirit. We become a holy habitation for the triune God. Jesus knocks on the door of our hearts (Revelation 3:20) and we invite him to take up residence within us where we can have intimate relationship with him. He does not enter unless we invite him to do so by faith. Once Christ takes up residence in us, he is available to be our beloved companion and master over our lives.

God Dwells Among His People

2 Corinthians 6:16 says, “For we are the temple of the living God. As God has said, ‘I will dwell with them and walk among them, and I will be their God and they will be my people.’” In this verse, Paul teaches that Christ’s followers constitute God’s temple and habitation, made of people, not stones. This implies that God can be found in the midst of his people, and not in a specific location, such as a physical temple. We already concluded that God is everywhere, but it seems that the Spirit of God is especially present when his people gather to honor and worship him. God’s Spirit dwells in our hearts, but when we collectively function as God’s temple, he also dwells in our midst. Not only can believers experience God in this circumstance, but anyone who is present in this setting can experience God as well, because God’s Sprit is present.

In conclusion, if we seek out these places where God dwells, we will more likely be able to experience God. Better yet, if we can create a place within our hearts to be his abode and invite him there, then we can experience God in the most intimate way.

###

Rick Hocker is a game programmer, artist, and author. In 2004, he sustained a back injury that left him bed-ridden in excruciating pain for six months, followed by a long recovery. He faced the challenges of disability, loss of income, and mounting debt. After emerging from this dark time, he discovered that profound growth had occurred. Three years later, he had a dream that inspired him to write his award-winning book, Four in the Garden. His goal was to help people have a close relationship with God and to share the insights he gained from the personal transformation that resulted from his back injury. He lives in Martinez, California.

For more articles, visit http://www.rickhocker.com/articles.html
Website: http://www.rickhocker.com
Email: rick@rickhocker.com

The Indwelling Spirit of Christ

Our identity as Christians is based on our relationship to Christ. A common phrase to describe this identity is “who we are in Christ.” Our relationship to Christ as our savior gains us favored status with God, imparts Christ’s purity and righteousness to cover over our sinfulness, and grants us unrestricted access to God so we can have intimate relationship with Him. It takes a lifetime to fully understand these deep truths, but we cannot stop there. If we want to lay hold of God, we must explore a second stage. After we have laid the foundation of who we are in Christ, we must then discover “who Christ is in us.”

All things start with a focus on ourselves. Who am I? Why am I here? What do I want? As we mature, the focus ought to shift off of ourselves. The same holds true with our identity in Christ. After we have established who we are in Christ and have arrived at a comfortable level of security in our standing with God, it’s essential to move to a more Christ-centered focus. This shift in focus causes us to ask who Christ is in us. What can we know about the Spirit of Christ who inhabits us? What does it mean that Christ indwells me? How do I live my life to give space and freedom to this indwelling Spirit? I doubt I can answer these questions with great accuracy, but I hope I can inspire you to think differently about Christ.

Christ in Us

Christ said He had to leave the Earth so He could send another, a Comforter, to be with us (John 14). Christ knew He could only be in one place at a time, so He devised a way to be with many people at one time by sending His Spirit to dwell inside those who receive Him. This isn’t some second-rate, inferior replacement for Christ. This is the full package. Everything you believe about Christ is bundled in this package because the package IS Christ. He Himself dwells inside you, not a watered-down version. Because our lives still feel unremarkable, we tend to think that the package is more like a Jesus action figure that sits on our dashboard inspiring us on our journey, but not offering much practical use. The problem is not with the package, but with us not knowing what to do with it. It’s like having an Amazon Echo device sitting on our counter, but we don’t know how to engage it, so it sits there unused and ineffective.

In Ephesians 3:8, Paul refers to the boundless riches of Christ. Other translations use adjectives such as unfathomable, immeasurable, or infinite. The New Living version translates Paul’s words to say “the endless treasures available in Christ.” That phrase inspires me to imagine a treasure room filled to the ceiling with golden riches, all available to us in Christ. Why do we not utilize this treasure? We often neglect spiritual gifts because we feel unworthy or cannot believe they are ours to use. So our treasure room remains closed even though we’ve been given the key. Paul says in 1 Corinthians 3:22-23, “Everything belongs to you, and you belong to Christ, and Christ belongs to God.” The treasure IS Christ. His boundless riches are found in us because He dwells in us.

Christ by Faith

If Christ and all He possesses are found in us, then our first response ought to be gratitude. Let us be cognizant of what a great treasure we have, Christ in us. So how do we tap into this resource? We apprehend Christ by faith, believing that Christ’s fullness is available to us, believing we are worthy of such a gift, and believing Christ will manifest in our lives in response to our faith. God wants the Spirit of Christ to be a real and active force in our lives. That’s why Christ gave us His Spirit.

Let us exert more faith in Christ, not only the Christ who sits in Heaven, but the Christ who sits on the throne of our hearts. Let us depend more on the Spirit of Christ who inhabits us. We need to give God more opportunity to express Himself in our lives. The Spirit of Christ can only dwell where He is invited. Therefore, let us invite Him into our daily interactions, into our thoughts, and into our words. By compartmentalizing our lives, we limit God’s reach. God wants to infiltrate our lives in every aspect, but we get in the way. The older I get, the more I see how much I restrict God by my own fears and insecurities.

Christ to the World

I visualize myself as a portal or doorway between God and the world. Christ is inside me, and the world is outside me. Christ yearns to reach through this opening and touch the world He loves so much. But it’s up to me how wide an opening I give God to do so. How much will I open up my heart and life to God? I believe that my experience of the reality of God is directly proportional to the size of the opening I give Him. We create an opening for God by clearing a way that’s devoid of self and ego. It is an empty space that God can fill with Himself. It is a setting aside of my agenda and attachments.

In its ultimate expression, Christ in us becomes Christ in the world. Christ inhabits us to such an extent that we become His hands and feet in this world. I believe that is what Paul meant when he prayed that we “become mature, attaining to the whole measure of the fullness of Christ” (Ephesians 4:13). In this state, Christ inhabits us fully, filling every part of our lives. This fullness overflows our lives as the character and activity of Christ is made manifest to the world for others to experience. I often wonder if such a thing is possible for someone like me, but when I consider what an amazing resource I have in the indwelling Spirit of Christ, I’m reminded that all things are possible with Christ (Matthew 19:26).

###

Rick Hocker is a game programmer, artist, and author. In 2004, he sustained a back injury that left him bed-ridden in excruciating pain for six months, followed by a long recovery. He faced the challenges of disability, loss of income, and mounting debt. After emerging from this dark time, he discovered that profound growth had occurred. Three years later, he had a dream that inspired him to write his award-winning book, Four in the Garden. His goal was to help people have a close relationship with God and to share the insights he gained from the personal transformation that resulted from his back injury. He lives in Martinez, California.

For more articles, visit http://www.rickhocker.com/articles.html
Website: http://www.rickhocker.com
Email: mail@rickhocker.com