23 “Am I Elohei Mikarov” saith Hashem.
    “and not Elohei merachok?”

24 Can anyone hide from me in a secret place?
    Am I not everywhere in all the heavens and earth?”
    says the Lord.

Jeremiah 23:23 (OJB) and 23:24 (NLT)

Elohei Mikarov: God Who is Near Elohei Merachok: God Who is Far Off

We have a word for this truth about God: “omnipresent,” we call Him, at once both near and far away. Elohei Mikarov and Elohei Merachok, He calls Him; His presence is so important, it is His name.

This idea was revolutionary in the age He first spoke it; the gods of other nations were territorial and only had power in their own domain, which often, funny enough, took the shape of the borders of the nations that served them. It was as if the only power they had was the power…people…gave them. Like children pretending a doll is a real baby, making crying sounds for it and holding plastic food up to plastic mouths, they paraded their puppet gods up and down their own land, but they could not make them actually come to life.

Sometimes God’s people would get confused and think they could put their God on strings, too, and pretend He would do whatever they wanted Him to do. In Jeremiah 23, He is furious. He is furious because would-be “prophets” have been claiming their own words were His, their own ideas His, their own dreams His. They stole His authority to lend power to their own thoughts, and He, the Living God, says to them, “You know I see you, right?”

We would all be wise to remember Elohei Mikarov is Elohei Merachok, and Elohei Merachok is Elohei Mikarov. This God of ours has no strings to hold Him down. We do not control Him with our prayers, our thoughts are not His thoughts, and He speaks for Himself.

Our God is not a doll. He is Elohei Mikarov. He is Elohei Merachok. He is God, near and far.