God In Our Midst
The overarching story of the Bible is the story of people making their way into God’s Kingdom – and becoming His People along the way.
The Bible was written in the Ancient Near East. It was written for people who communicate in the way those cultures did. And the way those cultures communicated was by storytelling.
Through stories the listener was expected to find themselves in one of the characters, vicariously live through that character, and learn from that character’s victories and mistakes.
It is in that spirit the Old Testament stories were recorded.
One device used by story-tellers was ‘repetition’. The listener's ears were supposed to perk up any time they heard a repeated line or idea. Repetition signified something critical to the story.
For instance, when the Israelite tribes were making their way to the promised land, God says to them time and again: “I will dwell in your midst. I will be your God. And you will be my people.”
These lines are repeated so often we can hardly mistake it for a main theme of their journey.
Here it is in one of its iterations:
[God says] I will turn to you, make you fruitful and multiply you, and confirm My covenant with you. […] I will place My residence among you, and I will not reject you. I will walk among you and be your God, and you will be My people.
– Leviticus 26:9,11&12
There it was: “I will walk among you and be your God, and you will be My people.”
Taking all these iterations together, we notice this: God "being in their midst" or "walking among them" is intimately related to becoming His People.
We modern Christian parents are meant to find ourselves in these stories.
Right along with Israel’s tribes we find ourselves in the middle of our journey – leading our families deeper into His Kingdom: the promised land.
If we are serious about leading our families out of a wilderness and becoming His People, we need to regularly invite God in to our midst and let Him walk with us – in our homes, with our children – in whatever ways we know how.