God’s
Love
“Listen,
God loves everything you do, and a mess of stuff you don’t.”
Alice
Walker
I’m
always amused and slightly annoyed when someone tries to tell me what God wants
for my life, or what God says about this or that. I’m particularly annoyed when
I assume that I know what God thinks, too. We all interpret God’s wants and
wishes according to our own. It’s hard not to, because our own is all we know.
Who even knows what God is, if God is anything namable, or knowable? All I know
is this: That which we call “God” is a great mystery.
One
thing I do know is that we humans are not God. To the person, regardless of which
culture we spring from, we have our prejudices and our judgements. We measure
one another by our own yardstick. We idolize those who please us, agree with
us, and think as we do. We demonize those who don’t. We have evolved enough to understand
that we need others to survive, but not to the point that we won’t kill those
who oppose us. We know how to be civil and respectful, and we choose to be
otherwise with certain people.
We are
also creative, and gracious, and generous, and kind, at least to those who please
us. We choose who we bless and who we withhold blessing from. We are loving,
nurturing parents, who also have the capacity to treat our offspring like
puppets. Human beings are a different sort of great mystery--a passel of
contradictory traits, alongside complimentary behaviors. We have a long way to go
before we are “godlike,” and we drag a long tail of genius and barbarism behind
us. Who knows where we’re headed?
I
believe the ancient Hindu cultures were wiser than we are today. Their greeting,
“Namaste” translates to “hello,” but also, “I greet the light in you.” Or “I
greet the divine in you.” This is the place we can touch the face of that which
we call “God.” The divine in each other, and in our beautiful world.
In
the Spirit,
Jane
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