Sep 14, 2016

 

Five Fallacies About God (5)

2. God can fail to get what God needs (2)

So much of our religion centers on how we are not worthy to receive the love of God. True, we say it is by grace alone that we are ’saved’, but even that implies that we are not worthy (whatever that means) to receive the love of God. Somehow, the power and beauty implied in Genesis 1, that we are created in the very image of God, still is not ‘worthy’ of the love of God. Our religions remind us that we are soiled beyond measure, worthy only of eternal damnation and punishment – unless we somehow come with our hat in our hands, so to speak, abasing ourselves before this almighty power, begging forgiveness for a list of ‘sins’ that we commit, no matter what, and somehow get the attention of this power to deign to look at us.

 

This God who fails to receive what It needs is still upset, and always frowning at the universe, apparently unhappy on not being able to achieve or obtain whatever this God is lacking. This strange ‘God’, one that can fail to get whatever It needs to be happy, is indeed a fearsome creature, One that we would be wise to be able to hide away from, but One that we need to appease if we are to find joy after this life. I find it difficult to imagine this sort of god when I look at the incredible beauty that seems to surround us, both outside in our lovely universe and inside at the potential for joy and happiness that resides within each of us.

 

Part of our problem is that we have been told about this God that is missing something so often in our lives that we find it buried in our innermost understanding of the word ‘God’. This Being not only created us for damnation from the very start, but continues to hold us at bay, since It must be angry that humanity has failed to render ‘God’ it’s due for 70,000 years. Not only have we failed to accomplish this in the past, but we continue to fail to give God whatever is due. This understanding of the fearsome God underlies the basic structure of what we call God in the mind of humanity. No matter what we tell ourselves we think about God, our innermost understanding of “God” is of this fearsome old man with a long white beard, frowning down on the blue planet where we find ourselves at this time, apparently grumbling to himself about the mistake he had made creating us. (Yes, I am using the male image of God here, for that ability to strike fear into humanity seems to have arisen with the male approach to this God some 5000 years ago.) Nowhere to be found is that gentle Being of Genesis 1, who claimed “Let Us make humanity in our image and likeness. So God created humanity in their image and likeness, male and female God created them. And God saw that it was good.” (Genesis 1:26). No indeed, instead deep in our subconscious is that image of that fierce old man, still inducing terrifying images in our minds.

 

Indeed, the God of our subconscious is that fierce old man shaking the two tablets with the ten commandments imbedded in them, saying “Obey them or else be prepared to burn for eternity.”

 

And of course, humanity generally ignores them unless we want to rattle them at someone else in a parody of that old man we have deep in our minds.

 

We forget Psalm 100:

Shout for joy to the Lord, all the earth.

Worship the Lord with gladness,

Come before God with joyful songs.

                         Psalm 100: 1-2 (NIV)

 

Meditation

 

God, how I put myself forth in gratitude for the beauty You give humanity in Your world you have blessed and given to us for our playground. I am truly grateful for this beauty that surrounds us in nature and in reality of this incarnation. I am reminded every day, indeed many times a day, that peace and joy are ours for the taking, always plentiful and in every corner we look. I understand that this image we have made of Your Being is but a caricature of the truth of Your Being, and have spent all of my adult life working to see the perfection of Your Creation that fills everything. There is nothing but perfection, for all is a form of You that is the All in All, the Perfection of eternity. I ask but that You continue to open my eyes and my innermost soul to the glory of Your Being in everything I look at or sense in the limited abilities of this incarnation.

 

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These five themes are taken from Conversation with God series of books, but the process discussed is a compilation of many sources and my processing of those sources.