All these posts on “Trading Your God In for a New One” have been heading to this conclusion: there is a better Christian way to imagine God in the Quantum Era.
Our scriptures, our saints, and especially our contemplatives all place connectedness at the center of our Story; connectedness to God, connectedness to one another. We’ve heard as much from Jesus, Paul, and Julian of Norwich. The new universe emerging before us allows us we take them seriously…
Perhaps to imagine reality like this…
Imagine God, not “out there,” but “in here.” Imagine God, not separate from me, but inextricably connected with me.
Imagine that our saints were on to something real; something more than poetic. Paul spoke of the Spirit of God indwelling us. Maybe he was right. Jesus spoke of our oneness with God. Maybe he was right. Genesis speaks of us being made in God’s very image. Maybe that’s right. Paul says we’re all members one of another. Maybe he was right.
In future posts, we’ll work with this idea a bit. We’ll imagine some of the practical implications of a “oneness” version of Christianity instead of a “twoness” one.
But for now, imagine how our Story changes if our most fundamental nature is one with God. The spiritual journey no longer makes sense as a quest outside of ourselves. It becomes instead, a quest inward. Our focus becomes to quiet the noise of our minds and hearts, and listen for the Inner Voice; the Indwelling Spirit of God. We stop scurrying around outside of ourselves, seeking our God “out there somewhere;” perhaps in heaven, perhaps at the conference, perhaps in the church building.
Imagine how the idea of our unbreakable connection to the Divine changes how we tell the Story of sin and salvation. Yes, sin separates from Divine purpose. However, it can never undo the fundamental nature of reality; connectedness.
Imagine how this changes how we think about prayer. It no longer makes sense to send words out there to that faraway place where God lives. How can that be, if we’re inextricably connected to the Divine?
As I said a few posts ago, once the hippy-granola idea of “oneness with God” stops being so strange, it changes everything. And we’re at a moment in our Church’s history, when we could really afford for everything to change.
It is time for us to trade our God in for a new one.
Just discovered your blog via Mike Morrell and I love this series! You have written about a different way to view all of Reality as Divine in simple yet profound terms that are very enjoyable to me. Thank you very much for your gift. I look forward with excitement to exploring more of your writings. Namaste!
welcome, mae.
i look forward as well.
d.
I agree with Mae. I really liked these posts. I’m not sure I understand why you say it’s hard to intuit though. Isn’t that the only way to really get it? Maybe I need a definition check.
We are all connected. On the one hand, that doesn’t sound quite right. But on the other hand, it feels right. You can feel connected, you just can’t see the connection. You know? You can feel grounded in something big, but if you look around sometimes it doesn’t seem so.
Anyway, I like what you say. I hope you talk more about prayer. I’ve been reading some stuff that I can’t seem to wrap my head around. But it suggests that prayer is a little bit like this connectedness thing. It’s almost like you can’t not pray. Crazy.
yep. when we talk about prayer, it will be more about the connectedness than about twisting the divine being’s arm.
d.