How Do You See God?

Linda and I spent a couple of days this week in my childhood hometown, La Crosse, Wisconsin, and I had an interesting encounter.I went back and visited the old church I grew up in. It’s a large and very ornate Romanesque style building, built in 1904. A door was open so Linda and I went in and wandered around, and a flood of childhood memories came, reminding me of the understanding I had of God back then. God, to me then, was big and powerful, but not personal. I don’t blame the church for my missing out, but I’m sure the huge vaulted ceiling with ornate stained glass picturing Bible scenes, and the towering organ pipes that thundered when played, had something to do with my impression of God. Services were formal and sermons were hard for a little boy to grasp. And I didn’t.No one was in the building and we later learned that it had been left unlocked by mistake. As we were leaving, I noticed an eighty-something year-old man stepping out of the parsonage. I caught up to him and asked if he were Pastor Roger Sachs. He turned around and told me he was.Pastor Sachs confirmed me when I was twelve. He was a quiet and seemingly emotionless man. But good and kind. He and his wife had adopted inner-city as well as handicapped children, and I remembered that from my grade school years. For a month or so during a time when my family was in upheaval, this pastor and his wife took me into their home. I know I didn’t express any appreciation then because it was a horrible time in my life and I didn’t want to be there. In fact, I remember getting up early and leaving their house every morning before I needed to, to walk the extra 8 blocks to get to my old bus stop for school before any of the other kids got there so that they wouldn’t know. But despite the absence of positive feedback from me, Pastor and Mrs. Sachs were good to me, fed me and housed me, when I had no place to go.While I was talking with Pastor Sachs, a young man in an old rusty car drove up and gave him some money, thanking him for his help, and told him he’d get the rest back to him shortly. And I thought, “This man has been quietly helping people in need his whole life. Now, well into retirement when he could be relaxing in Florida or Arizona, he’s still here, doing what he can to serve others."That’s probably where I missed it as a child. A sense of God cannot be grasped by a church building’s architecture. It was good that I understood God to be big and powerful (the theological term is “transcendent”). But to understand the personal nature of God (the theological term is “immanent”), his goodness and kindness, that is demonstrated through his people. Had I taken a few moments to watch a man’s quiet life of being Jesus to others, including to me, perhaps the nearness of God, his personal nature, would have become real to me.It did later, but that’s another story of a few other people.“Imitate God, therefore, in everything you do, because you are his dear children. Live a life filled with love, following the example of Christ. He loved us and offered himself as a sacrifice for us, a pleasing aroma to God.” – Ephesians 5:12 NLT