Coming to know God’s presence begins with how humans experience presence within themselves and with one another. An ages old topic — most notably from the time of Augustine — theologians, philosophers, and spiritual mystics have grappled with how to define God’s presence, generally through the relationship between the mind as subject and connecting with a truth as a known object (O’Collins 338). Further broken down, presence can mean being ‘present to’ someone or something, which is also ‘being to’ or ‘being in relation’ with someone or something (O’Collins 339).
Presence is also linked to consciousness: When we as humans are aware of ourselves, of others, and our surroundings, our perceived understanding of presence is a relational experience. Presence is something that happens because of the relationship to self and others, even if in different forms or expressed in varying manners (O’Collins 339).
Because the relationship to self or to others is embedded in the means to present, presence is a personal, often intimate encounter and with two core aspects: “the togetherness or relationship to other(s)” and the “distinction between each other.” In other words, presence involves a connection with someone or something else, where the connection itself — say the love between two married couple — may be mutually understood, yet the two people involved are still distinct (O’Collins 339, 340).
Presence can also be bodily or spatial. Being that humans are “embodied spirits” (O’Collins 341) and have been granted freewill, they can choose how they wish their bodies to be present with people, places, or things. Yet, as O’Collins asks, “how then can God, being purely spiritual and non-spatial, be present to human beings and so, in that sense, be located in space and time”(O’Collins 341)?
The short answer is that although God is independent of space and time, God is always involved and interacting with all creation, within all space and time. As such, the receivers of God’s presence experience God as bodily present. Which makes Jesus, as incarnate Son of God, the epitome of the divine delivering to the world a bodily, spatial means to have an eternal, present relationship with God. In addition, through the power of the Holy Spirit, who provides both the visible and invisible means to live a sanctified life, based on the relationship formed between humankind and Christ, Christ is present everywhere (O’Collins 341, 342),
Jesus’ presence also involves his mediation between the triune God and humankind. In everyday, earthly experiences, humans often mediate personal presence with one another through words, meals, affection, photographs, memories, etc. Humans also use their voices, actions, and other means to establish a special connection. Even if it not always immediate, presence is still always ‘mediated’ (342).
Further, the mediated presence, when brought about by love and the need for a sacred connection, is meant to mirror the eternally present love and relationship between Father, Son, and Holy Spirit — and which was manifested in Jesus’ earthly existence (O’Collins 343, 344). And through this existence, humans have come to know God, including his love and grace (Matt 11:27). Therefore, as the people of God, humans are to mirror this same spiritual love with another.
After all, Christ is the fully exalted, second Person in the Trinity; and by his death and resurrection, he made himself an eternal presence to all humankind (O’Collins 345) — including to all who suffer or may have not come to know Christ in the Gospel sense — so that humankind may not only come to know God and his grace, but also to love both God and one another as Jesus clearly instructed (Matt. 22:34-40).
Works Cited
O’Collins, Gerald. Christology: A Biblical, Historical and Systematic Study of Jesus. 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2009.