Holy Ground: The Lord Is Near

Good morning. I want us to stay in Philippians this morning, and I want us to give it enough time to say what Paul is actually saying. Because I have been wanting to learn how to pray. I do not mean I have never prayed. I have prayed before meals. I have prayed at bedsides. I have prayed with people after church. I have prayed when I did not know what else to do. Most of my life as a Christian has been, when in doubt, pray. When you are in need, pray. When fears seem to be crashing on you like waves, pray.

But there is a difference between knowing prayer matters and knowing how to come before God when your heart is hurting. There is a difference between knowing what you are supposed to do and sitting there with something you cannot fix, something that has made you afraid, something that has brought you to the end of yourself, and wondering, “Lord, what do I even say?”

There was a moment at my last assignment that I still think about. It was during COVID, and there was a school board meeting in an auditorium. It was one of those rooms where you could feel what people were carrying. There was division. There was fear. There was anger. There were people hurting, and people were not seeing one another very well. I was asked to pray, and I remember asking God for His presence. I prayed for peace. I prayed for unity. I prayed for God to do what only God could do in a room like that. I do not remember every word I said. I do not know whether it was a good prayer. I just remember praying.

When that meeting was over, I walked out to our Pacifica. I got in, and before I drove away, I just sat there. I began to weep, and I prayed again for God’s presence. I believe God met me there. I do. I do not know if I was the only one who noticed His presence that night. I dunno. But I knew that I had been met by God.

And while I sat there, Luke 19 came to my mind. Jesus is looking over Jerusalem, and He weeps. He is looking at people He loves. He sees their pain. He sees their rebellion. He sees what is coming. He sees that they have missed the time of God’s coming to them. And Jesus weeps.

Jesus is not looking at them like they are a problem to solve. He is not standing at a distance, frustrated because people should

know better. He sees them. He loves them. He is near, and He cares.

That moment stayed with me, because I began to wonder what we do with moments like that. We have them. Something breaks open in us. A verse gets through the noise. We sense the weight of the presence of God. We know, somehow, that He is near. But then we can go back to life as if we did not just come face to face with the living God. We treat it like a kind gesture from God. He met me. He touched my heart. That was nice. And then we go back to tending the same fears, holding the same burdens, living as though nothing really changed.

I do not think the question is only, “Have you ever had a moment with God?” I think the deeper question is, “What does it mean to live like you have met Him?”

That is where Philippians began to open up for me. Most of us know chapter 4, verse 6.

PHILIPPIAN S 4:6 “Do not be anxious about anything, but in every situation, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God.”

We know that verse. We quote that verse. We put it on pictures. We say it to one another when life gets hard.

But I have to be honest. When I read that verse, there have been times when I got anxious just reading it. I read, “Do not be anxious,” and I think, how? It almost lands like somebody saying, “Don’t worry. Be happy.” And I know that is not what Paul is saying, but when your heart is already overwhelmed, it can feel like one more thing you are supposed to get right. One more command you are failing at.

Because my worry is real. Your pain is real. The thing that keeps you awake at night is real. The grief is real. The fear for your child is real. The marriage that feels strained is real. The sickness is real. The decision you do not know how to make is real. The ache in your heart over something you cannot change is real. I do not ever want to stand in front of someone who is hurting and act like their hurt is not hurt, or their pain is not pain.

Paul is not doing that here. Paul is writing from prison. He knows what it is to suffer. He knows what it is to be uncertain about what comes next. He knows what it is to have people turn against him, to feel weakness in his body, to not know how things will turn out. So he is not saying, “Just push it down. Smile harder. Pretend you are okay. Pray better.” He is saying something deeper, and I think we miss it when we begin at verse 6.

Because that is what I had done for a long time. Anxiety would come, and I would tell myself, “Lay it down. Give it to God.

Pray.” And that is biblical. We are told to cast our cares on Him because He cares for us. But I began to realize that I was treating prayer almost like a procedure. Anxiety comes. I am supposed to get rid of it. I am supposed to lay it down correctly. I am supposed to pray long enough until I feel better. Then I would read, “Do not be anxious,” and it felt as though I had one more burden to carry.

But one day, while I was trying to learn how to pray, trying to lay down anxiety that honestly I did not know how to lay down, I looked one verse back. I had been staring at verse 6, “Do not be anxious,” but I had not stopped long enough at verse 5.

PHILIPPIAN S 4:5 “The Lord is near.”

And something clicked for me. My anxiety did not instantly disappear. The situation did not immediately change. I did not suddenly know what to do. But I saw that before Paul tells me what to do with my anxiety, he tells me where I am.

The Lord is near.

Then I began asking why Paul put that sentence there. Why does he say, “The Lord is near,” right between rejoicing, gentleness, anxiety, prayer, thanksgiving, and peace? Paul did not just drop that sentence into his letter for no reason. He has

been taking us somewhere all through chapter 3. So I started looking back.

Look at chapter 3, verse 8. Paul says, PHILIPPIAN S 3:8 “I consider everything a loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord.”

Think about the man saying that. Paul had a résumé. He had a religious background. He had knowledge. He had discipline. He had morality. He had the kind of life that could make someone say, “I have done enough. I have earned my place.” But Paul says all of it is loss compared to knowing Christ.

He is not saying those things did not matter at all. He is saying they could not carry the weight of his soul. They could not save him. They could not make him right with God. They could not give him a righteousness he could stand on when everything else began to shake. Christ is of surpassing worth. Christ is better.

Then Paul says in verse 9 that he wants to be found in Him. Not found in his own righteousness. Not found in his own ability. Not found in his own record. Not found in how well he has done. Found in Christ.

That matters when you pray. When you come before God, you do not come hoping you have had a good enough week for Him

to hear you. You do not come hoping your words sound right enough. You do not come bringing your spiritual résumé and saying, “Lord, look what I have done.” You come through Christ. You are found in Christ. The righteousness you need is not something you build for yourself; it is something Christ gives when you trust Him.

Then Paul says in verse 10, PHILIPPIAN S 3:1 0 “I want to know Christ.”

There it is again. I want to know Him. Not only know facts about Him. Not only know what He can do for me when I need help. I want to know Christ. I want to know the power of His resurrection. I want to know Him when life is good, and I want to know Him when life hurts. I want to know Him in suffering. I want to know Him in uncertainty. I want to know Him.

Then Paul says in verse 12, PHILIPPIAN S 3:1 2 “I press on to take hold of that for which Christ Jesus took hold of me.”

That is where the whole thing started opening up for me. Paul is seeking Christ. Paul is pressing on. Paul is not sitting still. But

he is not chasing Christ in order to make Christ love him. He is pursuing Christ because Christ has already taken hold of him.

Christ came after Paul. Christ saved Paul. Christ made Paul His own.

Paul is not trying to make God come near. Christ has taken hold of him.

Paul is not trying to earn the love of God. Christ has taken hold of him.

Paul is not trying to work his way into the presence of God. Christ has taken hold of him.

And then Paul comes into chapter 4.

PHILIPPIAN S 4:1 , 4 – 5 “Therefore, my brothers and sisters, you whom I love and long for, stand firm in the Lord.” Rejoice in the Lord. Let your gentleness be evident to all. The Lord is near.

That is what comes before, “Do not be anxious.”

Paul is not giving an anxious person a command detached from the gospel. He is not saying, “Stop worrying.” He is reminding them of the Christ they know, the Christ in whom they are found, the Christ who has taken hold of them, the Christ in whom they are called to stand firm.

Then he says, “The Lord is near.”

I had been trying to lay anxiety down almost as though I was alone, trying to get rid of something inside of me. But Paul is showing us that before we ever form a prayer, before we know what words to use, before we can make sense of what hurts, we are already before God.

The Lord is near.

My pain is real, but it is not the only thing that is real. My anxiety is real, but it is not the only thing that is true in that moment. My questions may be real. My fear may be real. I may not know what comes next. But the Lord is near. Christ has taken hold of me. I am found in Him.

And that changes how we lay anxiety down. It does not mean that pain suddenly stops being painful. It does not mean that we learn a formula and everything becomes easy. It means I am no longer trying to empty my heart into a vacuum. I remember Jesus. I remember who He is. I remember what He has done. I remember that He has taken hold of me. And I bring what is real in me before the God who is already near.

There is a reason that can be hard for us. Go all the way back to Genesis 3. Adam and Eve are in a garden God has given them. They have life. They have abundance. They have one another. They have the presence of God. And then the serpent begins with a question: “Did God really say?” The serpent does not

begin by attacking the fruit. He attacks the character of God. He makes Eve wonder whether God is good, whether God is holding out on them, whether God can be trusted.

That is still the lie underneath so much of our fear and sin. God is not good. God is holding something back. I have to take control. I have to make my own way.

Adam and Eve take the fruit, and the first thing they do is try to cover themselves. They sew fig leaves together. Then they hear the Lord God coming in the garden, and they hide.

God is near, but they hide.

That is what sin does. It does not mean God has become absent. It means His presence now feels dangerous to us because shame has entered the room. We are afraid of being seen. We want to cover ourselves. We give God safe words, religious words, words that sound fine, but we keep the deepest part of us hidden.

But God comes looking for Adam. “Where are you?” He knows where Adam is. He is drawing Adam out. He is calling him to stop hiding and tell the truth.

That is the story of the Bible. God coming after hiding people.

Jesus did not come to teach us how to make better fig leaves. He came to deal with sin and shame. Adam took what the Father had forbidden. Jesus went into another garden and

prayed, “Not My will, but Yours be done.” Adam hid from God. Jesus stepped forward to meet those who came to arrest Him. At the cross, Jesus bore our sin and shame. Scripture says that Christ suffered once for sins, the righteous for the unrighteous, that He might bring us to God.

That is why “The Lord is near” is good news. Because of Christ, the nearness of God is not a reason to hide. It is an invitation to come.

Then think about Moses. Moses is tending sheep in Exodus 3. He is not in a sanctuary. He is not in front of people. He is in the wilderness, doing ordinary work on an ordinary day. Then he sees a bush burning, but it is not consumed. God calls his name. God tells him to take off his sandals, because the ground where he is standing is holy.

Why was the ground holy? Not because there was something special about the dirt. Not because Moses had found a more spiritual place. The ground was holy because God was there.

Then God tells Moses, “I have seen the suffering of My people. I have heard their cry. I know their pain. I have come down to rescue them.” That is the God who is near. He sees. He hears. He cares. He comes down.

And then God calls Moses into it. Moses had been tending sheep. God calls him to lead people. The shepherd of sheep is

going to become a shepherd for a people who need to be delivered.

Moses does not leave that bush saying, “That was a nice moment.” He does not go back to tending sheep as though nothing happened. He surrenders his life to the God who met him.

And Moses is not suddenly confident. He asks, “Who am I?” He gives God reasons why he cannot do what God is asking. But God does not answer Moses by telling him how impressive Moses is. God says, “I will be with you.”

Moses asks, “Who am I?” God says, “I will be with you.”

That becomes the answer for us too. The question is not, “Am I enough?” The question is, “Is He with me?” And when God is with us, He does not merely comfort us for a moment. He calls us. He redirects us. He teaches us to depend upon Him.

And later, in Exodus 33, after Moses had seen the sea open and water come from a rock and God rescue His people, he said something I still think about. “If Your presence does not go with us, do not send us up from here.” Moses had learned that the greatest gift was not safety, or bread, or even the promised land. The greatest gift was God Himself.

And I think that is where prayer changes. It is not only, “Lord, give me what I need.” It becomes, “Lord, I need You. I cannot

move one step without You.”

Through Christ, we have been given something Moses could only look toward. Moses met God at a bush. Israel would meet God in a tabernacle. Then there was a temple. But Jesus came. And Jesus says in John 14 that the Spirit will be with His people and in them. He says that the Father and the Son will come and make their home with the one who loves Him.

Make their home.

The Holy Spirit is not merely a feeling that comes and goes. He comforts us. He convicts us. He breaks our heart. He strengthens us. But the Holy Spirit is not an emotion we chase in a service. The Spirit of Christ dwells in His people.

Paul says the church is God’s temple and God’s Spirit dwells in them. He says we are being built together into a dwelling place for God by the Spirit. We are not holy because we are impressive. We are not holy because we had an emotional moment. Through Christ, God makes His home in His people.

The ground was holy because God was there. Our lives are meant to be set apart because the Spirit of God is in us. We do not leave the presence of God behind when we walk out of a worship gathering. We do not leave Him at the altar. We do not leave Him in one moment from years ago. Through Christ, His Spirit goes with us.

And that means we are not seeking a feeling this morning. We are seeking Christ. Paul said, “I want to know Christ.” That is the heart of this. We bring Him our needs, yes. We ask Him to help marriages, children, sickness, grief, fear, and decisions. But underneath every request is a deeper prayer: “Jesus, I want to know You. I want to trust You. I want to be changed by You.”

There will be times when you do not know what to pray. Romans 8 says the Spirit helps us in our weakness, because we do not always know what we ought to pray for. That is not failure. That is not God looking down at weak people with frustration. The Spirit helps weak people.

There are moments when you do not have a three-point prayer. You do not know whether to ask for healing or endurance, an open door or a closed door, a change in circumstances or strength to keep walking. Sometimes all you have is a groan, or the simple words, “Father, I do not know.”

And even there, the Spirit helps. The Father knows. Christ has taken hold of you.

So when we pray, we do not have to know every answer. We can come honestly and say, “Father, I do not know what to do, but let Christ be seen in me. Let Christ be magnified in this. Help me trust You with what I cannot carry.”

That brings us back to Philippians 4.

PHILIPPIAN S 4:6 “In every situation, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God.”

In every situation. Not only when you feel spiritual. Not only when you have the words. Not only when you know what comes next. In every situation.

Bring Him the fear. Bring Him the grief. Bring Him the marriage. Bring Him the child. Bring Him the sickness. Bring Him the thing that keeps you awake. Bring Him the thing you have carried too long. Bring Him the part of your heart that you have been hiding.

Prayer is not a transaction. We are not trying to make God care. We are coming before the Father who already does.

And Paul says to bring those requests with thanksgiving. Thanksgiving does not mean nothing hurts. Thanksgiving remembers. It remembers who Christ is. It remembers that He has been faithful. It remembers that, even when we do not understand, the Lord is near.

Then Paul says that the peace of God will guard our hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. He does not promise that every circumstance immediately changes. Paul is writing from prison.

But he knows Christ. He is found in Christ. Christ has taken hold of him. The Lord is near.

That is peace. Not the absence of every trouble, but the presence of God in the middle of it.

So I do not want us to leave this morning merely talking about prayer. Paul says, “Present your requests to God,” and we are going to do that together.

I know where we are. We are in a cafeteria. There are tables, chairs, carts, children’s spaces, setup, teardown, all of it. This is an ordinary room. But Moses was in an ordinary place too when God met him.

We do not make this room holy because we came forward. We do not make the front of this room more sacred than your chair. But Christ is present among His people, and we are His body. So we can bring our requests together. We can seek Him together. We can pray together.

Maybe you need to bring something you have been carrying alone. Maybe you are afraid. Maybe you are tired. Maybe there is grief. Maybe there is sin you have been trying to cover. Maybe you do not even know what to ask for. You do not have to come with perfect words. You do not have to prove anything to anyone.

Come because Christ has made a way.

Come because the Lord is near.

Come because the Spirit helps us in our weakness.

Come because Paul, after all he had seen and done, still said, “I want to know Christ.”

You can come to the front. You can kneel where you are. You can find somebody and say, “Will you pray with me?” But let us not walk away from this ordinary room unchanged. Let us seek Christ together. Let us present our requests together. Let us come before the God who sees, hears, cares, and comes down.

Father, we come to You together. We bring You our fear, our hurt, our grief, our questions, our marriages, our children, our sickness, our need, and the things we do not know how to say. We do not come because we have earned our way into Your presence. We come because Christ has brought us to You. Teach us how to pray. Teach us to seek You, not only what You can do for us. Open the eyes of our hearts to see Christ. Make us people who know You, trust You, and live like Your Spirit dwells within us. And do not let us walk away unchanged. In Jesus’ name. Amen.

Deo Volente.