Issue 37 Encountering JesusBlog | The God who comes down
The God who comes down
Author: Andy PeckPost Date: 26.12.23
‘O, that you would rend the heavens and come down!’ (Isaiah 64:1) So prays the prophet Isaiah, in the context of a scattered exilic people. The people of God had been sent into exile because of their sin, and the prophet is lamenting over the ruins (64:10-11), praying for God to forgive and restore them (64:6-9, 12).
Act One: God’s intervention
The metaphor of God ‘coming down’ is quite common in the Old Testament. Sometimes God comes down to inspect, as it were, the doings of people. So, in Genesis 11:5 for example, God comes down to see what is going on at the tower of Babel. (We should note the irony that though people are building upwards, trying to reach the heavens, they clearly haven’t been very successful since God needs to come down to see what’s going on!) That inspection sometimes resulted in quite drastic consequences – see Genesis 18:20-21 and 19:24-25.
Perhaps the most significant ‘coming down’ of God, however, is at Sinai. Having led his people out of Egypt, God brings them across the desert to the mountain, where he will make covenant with them. At the start of this meeting, he ‘comes down’ onto the mountain (Exodus 19:18); a coming which is accompanied by fire, smoke, and the quaking of both the mountain and the people (19:16-19, see also 20:18).
