Exploring The Depths of God

Exploring the Depths of God

Americans overwhelmingly believe in God. However, it is not clear that we overwhelmingly think about that belief – what it means, whether it is credible and its consequences for everyday life. For Christians, however, an unreflective faith is not possible if we take seriously the injunction to love God with the mind as well as the heart and soul. A faith immune to open and self-critical reflection is not a Christian faith, nor is it an authentic standpoint for any Christian who acknowledges the biblical insistence that we should “be prepared to give a reason for the faith” that guides our lives.

The ASLC Adult Discussion Group is examining the question “What does a Christian Believe?” Many of us have held our individual beliefs for so long that we no longer appreciate Why we hold these beliefs. The following statements present some unorthodox beliefs that may challenge us out of our complacency. They are stated as though they are dogma – an established belief or doctrine thought to be authoritative, and not to be disputed, doubted or diverged from – but they are not. Consider them instead to be theses for us to debate and discuss next Sunday, February 1. You are invited to participate in these discussions.

Many Christians view God as the all-powerful ruler of the universe whose will controls the direction of human life, the development of history, and the destiny of the entire creation. God is the cosmic monarch. Whatever happens, good or evil, is caused or permitted by this God in “his” infinite wisdom.

There may be temporary comfort in believing that everything is determined, or at least permitted by God, but there is also puzzlement and moral distress. One puzzle is why, if all that happens is in accord with the will of God, we should try as diligently as we do to make things better. Why seek to improve upon the course of events that accord with the will of God? Or, if God has ordained that we should seek improvementson the things that “he” has caused or permitted, why did God cause or permit them in the first place?

This puzzle leads to great personal anguish when it is coupled with the belief that this all-powerful monarch is good and loving. Why, indeed, would a loving God bring about, or even allow, the wasteful destruction that besets nature, history, and every human life? Surely an omnipotent God could, and, if loving, would, end, or at least diminish, the wanton brutality all around us.

The development of belief in a monarchial God emerged in the ancient world when powerful rulers arose to impose order and prtoect their subjects. These developments were deemed to be good. Since it soon became apparent that no human ruler is absolutely good, the equation of absolute good and absolute power was made to a divine ruler – God.

Many Christians have wrestled in the depths of their souls with the question that arises from this view of God: “Why, if God is all-powerful and good, is there so much utterly pointless evil in the world?”

There is another understanding of God – the view that God is incarnate – that God has descended into human form on earth. This view can not be proven; it can only be tested against everyday realities for its adequacy as a guide to living in the world.

The fulcrum of this faith is belief in a God who is fully in and with the world. The world is God’s place, its processes are the means through which God works, its desiny and that of the divine are intertwined. There is no one way to think about the incarnate God. However, if you begin with the conviction that love is the fundamental character of God, then everything else that is said must be compatible with saying that God is love. God is intimately connected to the world, caring for it, and committed to its good. God makes a real difference in the world, and the world makes a real difference in God. The key element of love to be considered is the vulnerability that it entails. God is vulnerable; the life of God is a dynamic process that is affected by the world. The joys in our personal lives are joys to God, and God suffers in our suffering as well.

The vulnerability of a loving God leads us away rapidly from the concept of a cosmic monarch. A God who is open to the world can not do everything that God might wish to do, and to know everything that God might wish to know. The process of the world in which God is incarnate are characterized by an element of contingency or chance. Further, it is a world in which humans are in some measure free agents who make choices. The autonomy of human beings is not and can not be abrogated by God. Instead of absolute power, God interacts with the world through the persuasive influence of love. This means that, at any given point in time, the future is to some degree open, unclear, undecided, indeterminate.

Christian faith is experiential, as well as conceptual. God impacts Christians’ lives as a divine guide. The call to repent and move away from self-centerdness and towards justice is an experience of God. God is also experienced as a presence, an immediacy that is intrinsically valuable, valuable simply for its being-with-us. A gripping experince of nature is an experience of the God incarnate in nature. An experience of communin with other individual is an experience of the God incarnate in human relationships. God is experienced as a mystery – there is an inexplicable power that affects us in the forms of healing.

Our concept of God is always an interpretation, never a straightforward description of what is there for all to see. The “absolutizing”of religious belief is a sign of fear, a desperate attempt to hide the fact that our fundamental orientations toward life are always interpretative adventures, always a risk.
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Those who know me, know that I am not this eloquent. The above borrows very heavily from Chapter 4 of “What Does A Progressive Christian Believe?” by Delwin Brown.