I forgot to list a book in my last post. While at General Assembly, I picked up a devotional by Stephen Smallman called Forty Days on the Mountain. I rarely encounter a daily devotion type book that I like, but this book intrigued me. I like Stephen Smallman. His book on conversion was very insightful.

The devotion for today was # twelve, The Tent of Meeting. In this lesson Smallman describes Moses’ pattern of setting up the tent of meeting outside the camp and going there to meet the Lord. Smallman derives a couple of thoughts from this passage (Exodus 33:7-11), but the one that gave me pause was the thought of having a place to meet God.

My devotional life is a meeting in motion. I’ve always rebelled against the “if you love God you will have a quiet time between 5:00 and 5:30 a.m.” mentality, yet what I find is that my efforts to meet God are often full of interruptions, distractions and just plain laziness. I’m often too busy to meet God. I carve out some time sometimes.

We long for His presence in our lives. As good existentialist, we want a greater, more real experience of God. While we know that reality isn’t dictated by experience, we want to know Him more. Moses gives us good advice. Seek to carve out a place, a quite corner, a certain room, a chair, a tent in the back yard (in worked for Moses). Find a place where your thoughts can soak in God. As we endeavor to do this, Smallman gives us encouragement through the words of Henri Nouwen

The remarkable thing, however, is that sitting in the presence of God for one hour each morning—day after day, week after week, month after month—in total confusion and with myriad distractions radically changes my life. God, who loves me so much that he sent his only Son not to condemn me but to save me, does not leave me waiting in the dark too long. I might think that each hour is useless, but after thirty or sixty or ninety such useless hours, I gradually realize that I was not as alone as I thought; a very small gentle voice has been speaking to me far beyond my noisy place. So: Be confident and trust in the Lord”


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