I was invited to talk today by somebody who wants me to lead her funeral, it will likely happen in the next few months, and apparently I was recommended to her. Blushing aside I accepted this unusual request, made more unusual because she does not believe in God as such...
Although with a little digging I soon discover that I don't believe in the God she doesn't believe in either...
For her the word "God" is confining and smacks of hierarchical religion, so much so, that although she wants John Ch 1 (or part of it read) the naming of God is problematic. We will talk more, before I left however I explained that God is named in several ways in the Bible, and these descriptions are far from confining.
She wants to continue the conversation, and I am pleased that she does, but I am left asking questions... how has naming God become such a negative experience for so many folk who would describe themselves as spiritual?
I know there are many communal and personal stories that tell of a boxed in oppression by the establishment and for that I am profoundly sorry, for we have boxed in God and made him into a super-tyranic despot, a parody of freedom and one who is ultimately stripped of power and made into a scapegoat. A scapegoat upon whom we heap all of our questions and frustrations and hurts...
...Suddenly God begins to sound a lot like Jesus, and people respect Jesus, so how do we begin making connections in a Post Christian Age?
I need to begin thinking outside of the box, to begin to introduce the God of grace and mercy, the God of light and life, for this is the God I have encountered and begun to know, for in the words of Psalm 18:
he caught me—reached all the way
from sky to sea; he pulled me out
Of that ocean of hate, that enemy chaos,
the void in which I was drowning.
They hit me when I was down,
but God stuck by me.
He stood me up on a wide-open field;
I stood there saved—surprised to be loved!
(Psalm 18: 19-20)
I want others to be surprised by the love and grace of God, but for some that will mean introducing them to the God who is beyond the box of their deepest fears and imaginations...
And so I pray, Lord help me to help people to see, even when I see through a glass darkly...
