When Franklin Delano Roosevelt was president, he normally attended an Episcopal church on Sixteenth Street, North West, in Washington. Of course, crowds of tourists and others came just to see the man. One Saturday the rector's phone rang and a lady asked, "Do you expect the President to be in church tomorrow?" Promptly and thoughtfully, the rector replied, "This I cannot promise; but I can promise that God will be here, and this should be incentive for quite a large attendance."

The presence of God ought to be enough to bring almost anybody to church! And he is here, you know. Yes, the omnipresent God is everywhere - I know this. But when his people meet in the worship of him, somehow he is uniquely there. Jesus said, "Where two or three are gathered in my name, there am I in the midst of them."

There seems to be a special and singular kind of way in which God is present where his people meet. Or, it may be that when God's people gather it is they who are present in a special and singular kind of way. Or, it may be that both God and his people are. Anyway, when God's people meet in the name of Christ, it is a special and singular kind of meeting between them and him.

And so it is between ourselves and our Lord today.