One day last year, as I was praying for myself, I had a thought that grabbed my attention. It was something I had heard years earlier from the children in the Sunday School class next to mine. Attendance cards were used at that time, and as the teacher flipped through the cards, she would call each child’s name. The child would answer, “I am in the presence of God,” which brought a whole new, spiritual dimension to the exercise. It was a reminder of where each of us truly resides—in God’s all-encompassing ever-presence.

When the memory of this came back to me many years later, I took a deeper look at its meaning. I reasoned that if God is All and is present everywhere, and I am His constant, exact reflection, then I am not in the presence of anything unlike God—anytime, anywhere—because God is the infinite One, the All, the only.

What a beautiful thing to teach a child, that we can always answer to being in God’s presence, regardless of what knocks at the door of our thought. Whether it is God calling our name, or some phase of mortal mind trying to get our attention, we can answer with assurance, “I am in the presence of God.” 

In the Bible we read, “Behold, I have graven thee upon the palms of my hands” (Isaiah 49:16). We also learn that Jacob saw God “face to face” (Genesis 32:30) in his victorious wrestling match at Peniel and that “the Lord spake unto Moses face to face, as a man speaketh unto his friend” (Exodus 33:11). Could there be a more intimate relationship to God than being engraved on the palms of His hands and having a “face-to-face” presence with Him?

This spiritual reasoning was very helpful to me a few days later. I had a large, heavy pot of flowers I was attempting to empty. The plants had become so root-bound that they were clinging stubbornly to the pot. Having no success in removing the impacted root mass, I had an idea. I had a pointed garden tool I inserted into the drainage hole and pushed on the stone covering the hole from the inside. I thought this would dislodge it. But to my surprise, all my exertion was unnecessary. The root ball yielded suddenly, and the added force caused my index finger to be deeply pierced by a jagged protrusion of pottery.

The injury was very painful, and I wrapped the finger because of the bleeding. Immediately I began to insist, “I am in the presence of God.” The pain stopped quickly in response to this healing thought, but further prayer was needed to stop the bleeding.

We can always answer to being in God’s presence, regardless of what knocks at the door of our thought.

In the textbook of Christian Science, Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures, Mary Baker Eddy writes: “Accidents are unknown to God, or immortal Mind, and we must leave the mortal basis of belief and unite with the one Mind, in order to change the notion of chance to the proper sense of God’s unerring direction and thus bring out harmony. 

“Under divine Providence there can be no accidents, since there is no room for imperfection in perfection” (p. 424). This reassured me that despite appearances to the contrary, I was safely in God’s care.

Paul’s letter to the Romans added depth and “punch” to my prayers about being in God’s presence. Paul writes, “For I am persuaded, that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord” (Romans 8:38, 39).

I was to substitute as Second Reader in my branch church in a few days, but whenever I tried to use my finger, it started bleeding again. I went back to what had unfolded to me about my inseparability from the presence of God. One of the things I needed to refute was the suggestion that I could do something stupid or unthinking. I saw that I am always in the presence of the one all-knowing Mind and therefore governed by the spiritual laws of divine intelligence. I reasoned that as the infinite reflection or expression of God, I am at one with this unerring intelligence.

The next day I could use the finger normally, and the bleeding lessened. Two days later I was able to be at my post as Second Reader and could handle the markers in the Bible without any discomfort. Complete healing was realized within a few days of the incident. There is no scar to serve as a reminder of something that never occurred in the presence of God.

What a wonderful opportunity to put this simple but profound declaration of truth, “I am in the presence of God,” into practice. This foundation stone of spiritual progress, the understanding that we are forever in God’s presence, awaits demonstration in the lives of all seeking to see their “face-to-face” relationship to God.