Ubiquity isn’t a word I hear a lot in everyday conversation. Or any conversation, come to think of it.

But maybe you know one of its synonyms: omnipresence. That word is probably more familiar. It is one of the adjectives that we use to (partially) describe God: omnipresent, omnipotent, omniscient….

“God is everywhere,” we say. Or, “Jesus was there in the hospital room with us.” Or, “I felt the Spirit’s presence as much there as any time at church.” Or something else along those lines. God’s everywhere!

We can say that because the triune God is actually here in the very room where I am typing these words onto a keyboard. Exactly as He is where you are reading the words. And — lest we imagine that because there is a time lag between my typing and your reading, so maybe God zipped from one place to the other — let us affirm that God is in both places at the same time. All the time.

The thing that caught my attention, though, when the word ubiquity crossed my mind recently is that I think some of us usually think of the Lord’s presence with us, with all of us wherever we are, in a way that actually limits Him.

How do you picture God’s presence with you?

Like, right now, I’m imagining you looking at a screen as you read these words. There’s a little fuzziness to what I’m thinking because I suppose I’ve only met a very few of the people who will read this. And because you’re reading it either on a laptop or your phone or tablet. You could be standing or sitting, indoors or outside. There are lots of variables I don’t know, though I have a general idea.

But, again, how do you imagine God’s presence with you? Think about Jesus. Is He sitting in that chair on the other side of the table, or the one over in the corner? Is the Father sort of standing behind you, looking over your shoulder as you read? Is the Spirit some sort of effervescence bubbling up between you and other people near you? All at the same time?

Here’s what I am realizing about all this: those images of God limit Him because, for example, Jesus isn’t just sitting in that chair over there. He is sitting in ALL the chairs. And not just that, but He is sitting on the table. And standing next to the table. All at the same time.

But, wait, there’s more! God is not only standing next to and sitting on the furniture, He is also under the table and the chairs. And this: God is IN the furniture. Everywhere means everywhere, right?

Which also means that God is not only in the room with me as I type and with you wherever you are reading this, but also that God is in the walls of my office, and upstairs, and next door, and on and on. He is next to you, and in the furniture and walls in your rooms as well. And outside.

And, since God is everywhere, what this also means is that God is in me. And, of course, in you. All the time. Not just sort of squishing about between the organs in our bodies. No, God is within the various parts that make up our bodies. And God is not just fitting Himself between the cells that make up our bodies, but God is inside the cells themselves. And inside the organelles within our cells. And in the atoms that make up the molecules that make up our cells, and the furniture, and the trees and clouds and stars and galaxies and everything that is. All the time.

Because everywhere means everywhere. God is omnipresent. God is ubiquitous.

Hundreds of years ago theologians argued about that word ubiquity. In particular, they talked about how it relates to Christ in Communion, the Sacrament of the Altar. Fully digging into that would take more space than I have here, but take a moment and ponder what it can mean that God is everywhere when you take communion. Christ is there with you. He is sitting in the pew, at the altar, under the pew and altar, in the air above you, in the walls, in the bread, in the wine.

I don’t pretend to be able to explain that scientifically. I don’t pretend to know HOW that can happen, how it takes place, or even really how He is differently present in the bread and in the wine before, during, and after the communion service. But I know that He is present. Because He is always present. All the time. Everywhere. God is omnipresent. God is ubiquitous.

And since God is universally present at all times and in all places, we are aware of His presence together with other believers in other places and other times. That unites us with them, too, with all humanity. Which means, perhaps sadly, that we are also united in Christ with victims around the world. And with perpetrators. With both the oppressed and their oppressors. We share the pain and the guilt.

If that last bit is sad, at least there’s also a comfort in our being united with them. It gives us direction for action, for activity, for mission. Being united with them makes it easier, I think, for us to do something to relieve the pain and even to stop the oppression. It really gives us motivation to do so. It gives us a foundation on which to build. It calls us, dare I say it, to Kingdom action.

Saint Paul urges us toward this action in Ephesians 4 by telling us to “live a life worthy of the calling you have received.” He then sketches characteristics of a person who lives that way. It is someone who is humble and gentle and patient. Paul concludes that thought by writing in Ephesians 4:6 about “one God and Father of all, who is over all and through all and in all.” I believe he thought of God’s ubiquity in the way I’ve been writing about it: God everywhere and everywhen, uniting us into one body, calling us to one hope in one Lord with one faith and one baptism.

God everywhere. God ubiquitous.

first posted on 2019-06-10