Where is God – Part I

I don’t honestly believe that I ever really lost him. Rather, I feel that as I have grown older my needs have changed. One of those changes is the need to better understand who God is and how he really works in my life. To take it a step further: the need to understand the truth about God, who he is and how best to connect with him. To understand his truth, Gods truth, not that of some organization that wants me to follow their version of His truth.

Don’t get me wrong: I am a church going person who believes in the community and faith building premise of an organized religious experience. I believe that being a part of a church based organization can be a fundamental and important part of any faith building quest. However, I am also growing into a belief that ultimately, finding and experiencing true spiritual enlightenment cannot be found through someone else but must be experienced firsthand, for oneself.

This does not mean that this truth cannot be found through the teachings and preaching’s of a churches clergy and other religious leadership and doctrine. On the contrary, if the average human were to live their life without any exposure to church, and through this to God, they might just live their whole lives without ever knowing about a God at all.

So… church is important.

To me, at this stage in my life (that stage being that I am a bit older) the challenge comes in the form of trying to make sure that the truth disseminated to me is really His truth (God’s) rather than some organization’s interpretation of the truth. Accepting someone’s interpretation as right purely because they say so brings with it a great possibility that you would be accepting something that is completely wrong.

Most people at this point would answer with the “Faith” response; stating that one must have faith, backed by that inner fire. One must rely on that strong inner feeling that he / she are indeed on the right path that can lead to the one and only God.

I believe this as well. I have felt this on more than one occasion in my life; a feeling that without a doubt, this is the right path, that the spirit is not only near, but within and strong.

Now at this point the reader might be thinking: “Here is a man who has lost his faith”.

On the contrary: I have lots of faith. I have faith that there is a God. I also believe that he has a Son; a child born of the Virgin Mary who lived and walked amongst us and died for our sins. Even writing this paragraph I can feel that same inner feeling that tells me that I know this is true. It is that same feeling that reinforces the truth of the fact that God’s son died for our sins and then raised again thereby cheating death, proving that the resurrection and unification of the body and the soul is real, that God’s promises are true.

It’s not faith that I am lacking; it’s more of a sense of direction that I am looking for. I seek A better and truer understanding of what is the right path. I want to know where the truth about God exists most in this world, even if that truth eventually leads back to within me –within the heart of someone who believes.

I’m not “Over the hill”, whatever that means, but I am getting older, and as an older person, I long to make sure that the path I am walking is really leading in the right direction. I want to know before I get to those pearly gates only then to find out that I was way off base entirely.

And so I pen this series; and I begin without a clear knowledge of where it will lead me or what I will learn. I seek the peace of knowing that I really do understand the truth; that what I have found is good, and right –His Right- and that it’s alright if people don’t understand or agree. And if that truth takes me back to the church I have been going to, or to a grove of trees in a quiet glen or back to that wee small voice in the depths of my own heart, or, all three –then that is where I will go.And as I search and learn, I will report my findings back here.

Follow if you will; in fact I welcome it. But if you do decide to read on as I travel on, know that I am probably writing more for myself than for your entertainment or enlightenment.  This will be more of a way of recording my findings or as a sounding board for all the different things I discovery. Basically, in this case, I am writing for me and you are just along for the ride.

Finally, as I go along, I welcome your comments. Who knows; maybe your comments will be that one thing that helps me find the way.