Where Is God...really

[JosephM]

Great post Bill,

 

So much of it rings true. So good to hear from you...

 

Love in Christ,

Joseph

[soma]

Bill, Thank you. Your post was very clear and right on the point.

[Javelin]

My first thought, after reading Bill’s post, was wow! My second thought was amen. I try to read a few post each day. I’ve found so many of the thoughts being posted here to be incredibly insightful, uplifting, and inspirational.

 

My understanding of God has come through the lens of Christian fundamentalism, but I don’t think that I was ever truly comfortable with that teaching. It was so depressing because no human being could ever live up to the standards fundamentalist believed God requires. The teaching was also replete with contradictions and inconsistency.

 

I’ve known for a long time that my studies and research lead me to understand scripture in a very different light than my fundamentalist friends. I’ve just recently acknowledged, to myself, my wife, and a few close friends, that I’m a Christian liberal and have probably been for several years. My fundamentalist friends believe I’ve lost it. They think I’ve studied myself into agnosticism.

 

Whatever I am theologically, my thinking and mindset clearly aligns with the thinking and viewpoints that I routinely find on this site. It’s refreshing to find like minded believers. Continually being the odd man out has a tendency to become tiresome and stressful.

[soma]

I’ve known for a long time that my studies and research lead me to understand scripture in a very different light than my fundamentalist friends. I’ve just recently acknowledged, to myself, my wife, and a few close friends, that I’m a Christian liberal and have probably been for several years. My fundamentalist friends believe I’ve lost it. They think I’ve studied myself into agnosticism.

 

Javelin you are a good role model. You have shown us that the key to change is to let go. Thanks.

Emerson said, “For everything you have missed, you have gained something else, and for everything you gain, you lose something else.”

[Guest billmc]

It was so depressing because no human being could ever live up to the standards fundamentalist believed God requires. The teaching was also replete with contradictions and inconsistency.

 

I feel much the same, Javelin. You're not alone, not by far. Even the fundamentalist mantra that all one has to do is to "believe in Jesus" opens up the Pandora's box of what it means to believe in Jesus. Does it simply mean believing in Jesus' death, burial, and resurrection? Does it mean believing in the gospels as historical truth? Does it mean following Jesus' teachings to the letter of the law? Does it simply mean loving God and neighbor and shelving everything else Jesus taught? Questions like these drove me nuts.

 

I’ve just recently acknowledged, to myself, my wife, and a few close friends, that I’m a Christian liberal and have probably been for several years. My fundamentalist friends believe I’ve lost it. They think I’ve studied myself into agnosticism.

 

I "came out" to my wife about 2 years ago. She was very understanding and has given me the freedom to not go along with the "second-hand God" that much of Christianity holds to. But I also know that I am on a number of prayer lists at her Southern Baptist church.

 

What Soma said about hanging on and letting go certainly rings true to me. I sometimes feel like a trapeze artist swinging from trapeze to trapeze. And I'm not exactly sure where the other trapezes will take me. But I have just enough faith to believe that it is further into God.

 

Thanks for sharing part of your journey with us. I look forward to hearing more from you and getting to know you better.

[AllInTheNameOfProgress]

"So, to me, being spiritual does not mean going to church, praying three times a day, studying my Bible every day, or doing all the things that Christians do to practice their religion. To me, being spiritual means being aware of my connectedness to everyone and everything around me. It means being aware of God in my own heart to where I can reach out to the God I see in others. This is a quite different paradigm from the way that Christians think they own or posess God so that they can take him to others. For me, being spiritual means that I learn to love others to where I put them first. That is the kind of God I see in Jesus. That is the kind of God I can believe in, even in my own life. "

 

Bill,

My journey includes church for a few reasons. One is that I can make a bigger impact on the world if I'm not trying to do it alone. So, when I organize volunteers to help the disadvantaged school across town, they get more help than I could provide by myself. My church latches on to my passion.

 

Sometimes church calls me to be more than I am, by asking me to help others with their "missions" or by calling me to new ways of thinking. This tcpc group provides another means of challenging my thinking, but it is also good to be able to talk to others face to face or give them a hug when they need it.

 

Some of the church rituals (not all - mainly the music) fill me with a heightened sense of God's presense, hope during troubled times. Church counteracts some of the negativity and fear-building I feel from the media, knowing there really are a number of us trying to love others to where we put them first. It brings that sense of connectedness you mention.

 

I agree wholeheartedly with your conclusion about what it means to be spiritual!! I also don't think any of the things I have written above have to happen in a formal church building. In fact, I think there may be advantages to doing these activities outside of church, so people aren't reminded of negative experiences they have had there. I don't care if it's "Organized Religion," but let's love the world together, rather than individually.

[Guest billmc]

My journey includes church for a few reasons. One is that I can make a bigger impact on the world if I'm not trying to do it alone. So, when I organize volunteers to help the disadvantaged school across town, they get more help than I could provide by myself. My church latches on to my passion. Sometimes church calls me to be more than I am, by asking me to help others with their "missions" or by calling me to new ways of thinking. This tcpc group provides another means of challenging my thinking, but it is also good to be able to talk to others face to face or give them a hug when they need it. Some of the church rituals (not all - mainly the music) fill me with a heightened sense of God's presense, hope during troubled times. Church counteracts some of the negativity and fear-building I feel from the media, knowing there really are a number of us trying to love others to where we put them first. It brings that sense of connectedness you mention.

 

Good input. I'd definately agree that God can be experienced in church meetings or missions. Of course, churches, like people, all have different personalities, so what works for one person may or may not work for another. My post was not advocating a mass exodus from churches, I was just saying that many (most?) churches seem to think that if God is to be experienced, that he is primarily experienced within those walls. That is why churches refer to themselves as "the house of God." I see a radical shift in the NT that says that God's dwelling place is primarily seen in people. Of course, this doesn't negate God's presence in nature or morality. IMO, God's spirit (or connectedness) can't be confined to a particular place, people, or time.

 

I agree wholeheartedly with your conclusion about what it means to be spiritual!! I also don't think any of the things I have written above have to happen in a formal church building. In fact, I think there may be advantages to doing these activities outside of church, so people aren't reminded of negative experiences they have had there. I don't care if it's "Organized Religion," but let's love the world together, rather than individually.

 

...and a hearty AMEN to that!

[AllInTheNameOfProgress]

"I was just saying that many (most?) churches seem to think that if God is to be experienced, that he is primarily experienced within those walls. That is why churches refer to themselves as "the house of God." I see a radical shift in the NT that says that God's dwelling place is primarily seen in people. Of course, this doesn't negate God's presence in nature or morality. IMO, God's spirit (or connectedness) can't be confined to a particular place, people, or time"

 

I love this, Bill! I may use it in my discussions with people at my church about moving beyond our building.

[Shekinah]

It's the Zen in me speaking, but this has to do with western man's wishing for a higher plane of existence that is free from this existence right here. And the duality between spiritual and material. Out of curiosity I studied the chakra system somewhat. There's an emphasis that the heart is where the energies balance. The higher emotional center is the heart, and is the connection to the relation to God. Hence the Catholic Jesus with burning heart pointing up to heaven.