Sign outside a nearby church: “God is with you always.”

Knowing in our hearts that God is always there is comforting, I suppose. But I think it’s worth asking another question: Are you with God always—or even sometimes?

Because God being with us isn’t enough. That’s not a relationship. It’s a presence, perhaps even a reassuring one, but it won’t transform our lives as we wend our way through the world.

We humans are fickle creatures. We decide one thing and then behave as though we believe another. And then, without much notice, we change our minds again.

Even if we believe in God, and we believe that God is “there,” we may not know where there is—or how to reach God.

Why? Because we’re looking in the wrong place.

We find God by looking within: inside ourselves and inside the people around us. All of them.

We find God by doing God-like things. By becoming what we imagine God to be—caring, kind, generous, compassionate, loving. All of that and more. That’s how we find God.

I recently read a remarkable story about an American pilot whose plane was shot down during the Vietnam War. He parachuted safely to the ground and spent six years imprisoned in the so-called Hanoi Hilton, a horrific prison camp. His cell measured just eight by eight feet. There were no windows. Summer temperatures exceeded 120 degrees. He endured torture and long periods of isolation.

Years after returning home, he was eating in a restaurant when another patron approached him and greeted him happily.

“How do you know who I am?” Capt. Charlie Plumb asked.

“I packed your parachute,” the man replied. “I guess it worked.”

That’s God. Another human being who took his work seriously, knowing that someone’s life depended on it.

The article concluded: “Charlie Plumb flew 74 missions and thought he understood what it meant to survive. It took one stranger in a restaurant and four words to show him the truth: Survival is a team effort. You just don’t always get to meet the team.”

Charlie Plumb is now 84 years old, and he still travels the country asking audiences one simple question: “Who’s packing your parachute?”

Life—both our physical survival and our spiritual well-being—is a team effort. You, me, God, and the countless people behind the scenes who inspect the brakes on our cars, repair potholes, care for the sick, teach our children, and quietly make everyday life possible.

God is present wherever human beings choose compassion over indifference, responsibility over carelessness, love over selfishness.

We don’t need to wonder about God, and if God’s going to finally roll up their sleeves and get to work fixing the world. That was never God’s job alone. It’s ours too.

The question isn’t whether God is with us. The question is whether we are with God.