“Coram Deo”
1 Chron. 16:11 Seek the Lord and his strength, seek his face continually.
Introduction: First some context from Barnes Notes. He says: The Psalm here put before us by the Chronicler, as sung liturgically by Asaph and his brethren on the day of the Ark's entrance into Jerusalem, accords closely with the passages in the present Book of Psalms noted in the marg reff.
This Psalm is apparently, a thanksgiving service composed for the occasion out of Psalms previously existing.
I. Live in His Presence - living in the presence of
I remember Mama standing in front of me, her hands poised on her hips, her eyes glaring with hot coals of fire and saying in stentorian tones, “Just what is the big idea, young man?”
Instinctively I knew my mother was not asking me an abstract question about theory. Her question was not a question at all—it was a thinly veiled accusation. Her words were easily translated to mean, “Why are you doing what you are doing?” She was challenging me to justify my behavior with a valid idea. I had none.
Recently a friend asked me in all earnestness the same question. He asked, “What’s the big idea of the Christian life?” He was interested in the overarching, ultimate goal of the Christian life.
To answer his question, I fell back on the theologian’s prerogative and gave him a Latin term. I said, “The big idea of the Christian life is coram Deo. Coram Deo captures the essence of the Christian life.”
This phrase literally refers to something that takes place in the presence of, or before the face of, God. To live coram Deo is to live one’s entire life in the presence of God, under the authority of God, to the glory of God.
a. The Sovereign’s attribute
To live in the presence of God is to understand that whatever we are doing and wherever we are doing it, we are acting under the gaze of God. God is omnipresent. There is no place so remote that we can escape His penetrating gaze.
b. The Holy Spirit’s abode
The indwelling of the Holy Spirit is the action by which God takes up permanent residence in the body of a believer in Jesus Christ. In the Old Testament, the Spirit would come and go from the saints, empowering them for service but not necessarily remaining with them (see Judges 15:14; 1 Chronicles 12:18; Psalm 51:11; Ezekiel 11:5). Jesus revealed to His disciples the new role the Spirit of Truth would play in their lives: “He lives with you and will be in you” (John 14:17). The apostle Paul wrote, “Do you not know that your bodies are temples of the Holy Spirit, who is in you, whom you have received from God? You are not your own; you were bought at a price. Therefore honor God with your bodies” (1 Corinthians 6:19–20).
These verses are telling us that the believer in Jesus Christ has the third Person of the Trinity, the Holy Spirit, living in him. When an individual accepts Christ as personal Savior, the Holy Spirit gives the believer the life of God, eternal life, which is really His very nature (Titus 3:5; 2 Peter 1:4), and the Holy Spirit comes to live within him spiritually. The fact that the believer’s body is likened to a temple where the Holy Spirit lives helps us understand what the indwelling of the Holy Spirit is all about. The word temple is used to describe the Holy of Holies, the inner sanctum in the Old Testament tabernacle structure. There, God’s presence would appear in a cloud and meet the high priest, who came once a year into the Holy of Holies. On the Day of Atonement, the high priest brought the blood of a slain animal and sprinkled it on the mercy seat of the Ark of the Covenant. On this special day, God granted forgiveness to the priest and His people.
c. The Savior’s assurance
Hebrews 13:5 Let your conversation be without covetousness; and be content with such things as ye have: for he hath said, I will never leave thee, nor forsake thee.
ILL. On the first anniversary of 9/11, TIME magazine had a article about 31-year old Genelle Guzman. She was the last person caught in the debris of the Twin Towers to be found alive.
After the planes hit, Genelle was descending a staircase from the 64th floor of the North Tower when it all came crashing down around her. Her right leg was pinned under heavy concrete. Her head was caught between stacks of wreckage. But there was an air-pocket around her, & for 27 hours she lay there, trapped & seriously injured.
Genelle had recently started attending church, & had been wanting to get her life turned around. So while she was stuck in the rubble, she started to pray. She would pray for awhile, & then lose consciousness. Over & over again she would wake up & start praying, then trail off, & then wake up & pray some more.
Shortly after noon on Sept. 12th, she heard voices. So she screamed as loud as she could, “I’m here! Hey, I’m right here!” A rescue worker responded, "Where are you? Do you see our lights?" She didn’t.
So with her free arm she took a piece of concrete & banged it against the broken stairway. The searchers followed the noise to a cracked & broken wall, & began to shine their lights through it.
It was at this point that Genelle wedged her hand through one of the cracks & someone grabbed it. She heard a voice say, "Genelle, I’ve got you. You're going to be all right. My name is Paul. I won't let go of your hand until they get you out."
Genelle responded, "'Oh, thank God! Finally, someone has found me. Thank you God!' I tried to see who it was but my eyes were so encrusted that I couldn't make out a face, though I could feel his hand holding mine."
"As soon as he grabbed my hand, I felt complete calmness throughout my body. Paul kept telling me I would be all right, & I believed him. I kept his name in my head because I wanted to meet him when I got out of there, to thank him."
"I could hear men moving steel & concrete above me, trying to get to me. Finally, two men took hold of my shoulders & Paul let go of my hand." And Genelle Guzman, the last person rescued alive, cried out, "Oh God, thank you!”
On Nov. 7, after spending weeks in the hospital, undergoing 4 surgeries & hours of physical therapy, she kept two promises she had made while trapped under the rubble. She & Roger were married, & that evening she was baptized into Jesus Christ.
Genelle recalls, "After I got out of the hospital, a reporter interviewed me along with some of the men who rescued me. When I asked them about Paul, who held my hand & calmed me when I thought I couldn't go on, they were puzzled.
They told me, "There was no one named Paul on our team." But I insisted, "Someone was holding my hand for at least 20 minutes when you were digging me out. He told me his name was Paul. I kept reminding myself of his name because I wanted to thank him."
With a puzzled expression on his face, the leader of the rescue team said, "I'm sorry, but there was nobody holding your hand when we were removing the rubble." (TIME Magazine, 9/11/02, p. 38) ("Breakthrough Prayer" by Jim Cymbala, Zondervan, p 74)
II. Live in His Prerogative - under the authority of
To be aware of the presence of God is also to be acutely aware of His sovereignty. The uniform experience of the saints is to recognize that if God is God, then He is indeed sovereign. When Saul was confronted by the glory of the risen Christ on the road to Damascus, his immediate question was, “Who is it, Lord?” He wasn’t sure who was speaking to him, but he knew that whomever it was, was certainly sovereign over him.
Living under divine sovereignty involves more than a reluctant submission to sheer sovereignty that is motivated out of a fear of punishment. It involves recognizing that there is no higher goal than offering honor to God. Our lives are to be living sacrifices, oblations offered in a spirit of adoration and gratitude.
Romans 12:1 I beseech you therefore brethren, by the mercies of God, that ye present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service.
A fragmented life is a life of disintegration. It is marked by inconsistency, disharmony, confusion, conflict, contradiction, and chaos.
The Christian who compartmentalizes his or her life into two sections of the religious and the nonreligious has failed to grasp the big idea. The big idea is that all of life is religious or none of life is religious. To divide life between the religious and the nonreligious is itself a sacrilege.
This means that if a person fulfills his or her vocation as a steelmaker, attorney, or homemaker coram Deo, then that person is acting every bit as religiously as a soul-winning evangelist who fulfills his vocation. It means that David was as religious when he obeyed God’s call to be a shepherd as he was when he was anointed with the special grace of kingship. It means that Jesus was every bit as religious when He worked in His father’s carpenter shop as He was in the Garden of Gethsemane.
Coram Deo is where men and women live their lives in a pattern of consistency. It is a pattern that functions the same basic way in church and out of church. It is a life that is open before God. It is a life in which all that is done is done as to the Lord. It is a life lived by principle, not expediency; by humility before God, not defiance. It is a life lived under the tutelage of conscience that is held captive by the Word of God.
Coram Deo . . . before the face of God. That’s the big idea. Next to this idea our other goals and ambitions become mere trifles.
Editor’s Note: This article was originally published in In the Presence of God: Devotional Readings on the Attributes of God (Nashville: Thomas Nelson, 2003). www.ligonier.org
III. Live to the Praise of His glory - and to the honor and glory of God.
Eph 1:6-10 To the praise of the glory of his grace, wherein he hath made us accepted in the beloved.
7 In whom we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins, according to the riches of his grace;
8 Wherein he hath abounded toward us in all wisdom and prudence;
9 Having made known unto us the mystery of his will, according to his good pleasure which he hath purposed in himself:
10 That in the dispensation of the fulness of times he might gather together in one all things in Christ, both which are in heaven, and which are on earth; even in him:
Psalms 62:2 Sing forth the honour of his name: make his praise glorious.
Did you know? Johan Sebastian Bach lost his little daughter and then three sons and then his wife. Then he remarried and then he and his second wife, Anna-Magdalena, lost four more daughters and three sons. Eleven beloved children...
Many researchers have wondered: how Bach managed to handle these losses? How did he not stop breathing, how did his heart not stop? And most importantly, how could he continue to write music? Kantati, cello suites, messes, concerts... The most beautiful music the world has heard. Do you know how he did it?
At the end of the his music, he always wrote "Soli Deo gloria" (Glory to God alone) and in the beginning, "Lord help.” Therefore, you can pray during Bach's music because the music itself is prayer. You could, then, consider Bach's music a conversation between man and God. How to you deal with pain? Worship is the best solace.
And so we turn to Gloria. The Latin for “glory”. When I think of your name, Gloria, I think of that story about the small girl who said that she just absolutely loved the music at Christmas time. Why was that? Because, she said, the church choir sings my name over and over again! “Gloria, gloria, gloria.”
Conclusion: Each of us who claim the name of Christ must ask ourselves this one central question. Am I living Coram Deo living my entire life in the presence of God, under the authority of God, to the glory of God. Am I the same on Monday as I am on Sunday. Am I consistently pursuing the presence of God. If the answer is no, then there is a remedy. Repent and commit yourself to the Coram Deo.
