A new day dawns for you…

It’s holiday time again and I’m thinking about the best holiday I ever had. The sun was slipping low in the sky, casting shadows long and golden across the desert plains of Dahab, Egypt.. There’s something about that light—how it turns everything it touches into gold. The rocks, the sand, even the silence. It’s a light that speaks. Not loudly, but with a whisper that says, the old day is ending… and a new one is about to begin.

Kerry and I were out there in the Sinai, walking with a Bedouin whose name now escapes me, though his friendship hasn’t. We had ridden camels earlier—those elegant, plodding creatures that move almost silently, now chewing at dry green stubble. They’d taken us out to his place. Not a house, not really a tent either. Just something ancient and rooted, stitched together with generations of hospitality, and lots of date trees

We sat cross-legged on the ground, no knives or forks, only hands and flatbread. Always the right hand, of course. The food was simple, delicious, generous, Egyptian, and served with a generosity that shames the Western notion of wealth. In that moment, nothing else was needed. No phones. No plans. No clocks. Just the company of a man who knew the land, and the value of shared silence. When it was time to go, it was time to go, not until.

After eating, he invited us to walk back through the desert, to where a vehicle would take us on toward home. We asked how far. “Not far,” he smiled.

So we walked. And walked.

And walked.

The sun began to fall lower. The camels faded far behind us. The pebbles crunched beneath our sandals and flip-flops. We watched for snakes and creatures. We talked with our Muslim friend openly of God. Of life. Mindful of how rare these moments are, enjoying the moment. The light turned a deeper gold, almost like the land itself was holding its breath. An hour passed. Still walking. For us, the journey was becoming an inconvenience. For him, it was fellowship. Time. Presence. A gift.

He invited us to cancel our flights home and stay for his family’s wedding. Just like that. No coercion. Just the offer. Friendship, you see, still matters in that world.

I think about that holiday often. How we move on so quickly—always needing to be somewhere, always pressing toward the next deadline, the next obligation. But Jesus never rushed. Never treated people like interruptions. When they brought everyone to Him—all who were sick, hurting, lost—He healed them all. Every last one. No triage, no prioritising. Just healing, poured out like the sun spilling across a desert sky (Matthew 8:16, ESV). Noone who came to Him was ever… an inconvenience.

And yet, He also withdrew. Often. Into the quiet. Into solitude. Not because He lacked power, but because He treasured intimacy with the Father. We need that too. Not just the noise of ministry or the demands of the day, but moments of shared bread, holy stillness, and the kind of conversations that happen when you walk for miles in the desert and realise the world isn’t ending—it’s just beginning again.

The sun sets. It always has. It always will. But each sunset whispers a promise: that a new day is on its way. And the gospel—that unshakable truth that Christ came, bled, died, and rose again—isn’t just the story of yesterday’s sunset. It’s the herald of dawn. A new day for every heart. A new light for every soul still stumbling through the desert.

So yes, the old day is finishing. Let it go. We’ve sat on the rocks and boulders at the foot of the Sinai mountain in the scorching heat, drinking cans of cola… and as the sun goes down the scenary changes. Life looks different as the shadows lengthen, but don’t miss the call of the new as it emerges. Walk slowly. Eat with your hands. Talk of God as the light turns golden. These are the treasures. These are the gold of Dahab.

And Jesus—He waits for us there. Not just at the end of the road, but in the walking. In the bread. In the silence.

Let the day begin.

It’s a new day for you …

Omnipresence means anything is possible. Anywhere.

As a young Christian, as soon as I got my head around the ‘omnis’ of God, I mused on them often, even getting excited to discover that not only was God omniscient, omnipresent and omnipotent with all that means, He is also immutable; unchanging.

It’s a shame there isn’t an ‘omni’ that would go with that — perhaps ‘Omni-IS’ following God’s self-disclosure of His eternal “I am-ness!” More recently, I have considered the text where Jesus encourages the disciples concerning prayer, that they should go to their closet and pray, and the Father, who sees in secret, would reward them. It got me thinking…

The omnipresence of God is a truth we nod at but often fail to live by. Think about it; scripture is clear, “Where shall I go from your Spirit? Or where shall I flee from your presence?” (Psalm 139:7). There is no dark room, no distant corner, no silent hour where God is not. He is not limited by the expanding edges of space, time or circumstance. He is always near. Always ‘there’.

In a world obsessed with spectacle, engagement, experience, many have come to believe we need something extra to feel God’s presence — the right music, the right lighting, the right crowd, even the right speaker. It’s difficult for us today to fully appreciate it, but God is as present in a bare room with a single chair and no windows as He is in the largest auditorium pulsing with sound.

It appears at times that we’ve bought into the lie that ‘atmosphere’ somehow summons God, as if it is what is needed, but the Lord who fills heaven and earth (Jeremiah 23:24) does not wait for smoke machines or ambient sound or Phil Collins’ drum beat to work wonders.

Elijah learned this on Mount Horeb when God was not in the wind, nor the earthquake, nor the fire, but in the still small voice (1 Kings 19).

Perhaps we can allow this to reset and reshape how we gather, especially in small settings like home groups or around dining tables sharing food with each other. When just a few meet together in His name, Jesus promises, “There am I among them” (Matthew 18:20). That living room, that kitchen table, that quiet corner becomes like ‘holy ground’, a place where God speaks, heals or restores, not because we’ve engineered the mood, but because God is present. Always present. He’s even there where we are not — right now!

I encourage you – more prophetic words and encouragements have taken place over my dining table at home than I probably can count. It’s a place of engagement with friends, and God is there – not as a spectator.

Anywhere God expresses His omnipresence — which is everywhere — we can expect miracles. In your office, on the bus, in the washroom. Isn’t that what Jesus was like? On the water, by the water, next to hungry people in the fields, in houses, next to people up trees or sat under them — or even when someone has lost an ear? He was there. Present. Intervening. Healing and ‘miracling’.

Healing, prophecy, conviction, joy in the Spirit — these are not reserved for annual big conference platforms or even Sunday mornings. They flourish where hearts humble themselves before God, where people trust Him and give Him room to work.

Whether alone in your room, by yourself, you are just as seen, just as known. Just as welcome. The omnipresent God is not a far distant observer but a close-up, near and intimate Lord. He calls you to live in the quiet with Him just as faithfully as in the crowd. Obedience, faith, humility and trust — these are the marks of a life shaped by His presence.

Perhaps this is where we need a mental resetting. We must renew our understanding of who God is — not a God we summon or invite, but a God who is already here, active, on the move. Not a God who ‘needs’ or requires performance, but a God who asks, and looks for faith.

When it comes to the Cross, He did not wait for us to build a stage. He came to us. He took on flesh. He entered our ordinary, very ordinary, broken world to redeem it. It was an overwhelming invasion of grace, mercy, forgiveness and favour addressing and rescuing us from our onion-skin like layers of layers of brokenness upon brokenness.

So whether you are gathered with thousands or sitting alone in the quiet with God you can expect Him to move, to speak, to heal, to forgive, to renew — not because you have set the atmosphere right, but because He is faithful. He is there; in His omnipresence.