We have all kinds of odd ideas about this thing we call God. We imagine some anthropomorphic being, like either some chairman of the board, in a three-piece business suit, or the bearded old man, white-haired, in a snow white robe, or even a muscular figure in a roman toga, like some Arnold Schwarzenegger with super powers. People form all kinds of mental images of what God is.
Agnostics and atheists even react to these imaginary figures and these stunted, limited ideas of Deity underlie their positions of doubt or denial. For this reason, I like to say, "The God you don't believe in doesn't exist!"
Why must we superimpose our own limitations of imagination upon the intelligence that formed the universe, and which continues to evolve it to this very day?
The principles of metaphysics (literally, beyond physics) describe the relation between Mind and matter. Creation is something that is an action of Mind - an action which creates a mental template, a mental equivalent, that has the FORM of the thing which will finally emerge as the physical result. This process of emergence results when the universal substance, which we might now call zero-point energy in the world of quantum mechanics, collapses into the form that has been created in mind.
The process that we call creation is the use of Mind to choose from among an infinite set of possibilities, reducing it to the most probable, and finally the actual experience of life. We can each exercise this process, but in doing so, we are using a mental principle that is beyond us, and a Power and Intelligence that, in forming our universe, has Its origins before and beyond it.
Creation is the action of mind; and that which we define as Creator is pure Mind in action. The principle of creation, together with the invisible energy upon which It acts, together is what we think of as God, although the term seems outdated and weak to describe what we are talking about.
This is one thing that Islam goes about in the right way. It forbids the use of images to represent God, and this has the benefit of forcing people to avoid forming limited and limiting concepts. Instead we use the wounded man on the cross, a suffering God, not the very force of creation itself.
Ernest S. Holmes used another technique by referring to God as "The Thing Itself", and then going on to use a different term or descriptor on almost every other page of his famous text, "The Science of Mind". While this confuses many first-time readers, it does have the effect of making it difficult to form limited and rigid concepts about something that is infinitely vast and ineffable.
Other teachers have told us that our concept of God will limit the scope and power of our religious experience and the richness of our life. To expand either or both, we must form an expanded view of what God is, or as Rev. Helen Street used to say "Get a bigger God."
We can only experience as much as we can imagine, because the Principle of Creation is responsive to our thought. As we reach out in thought, It responds in kind. The more power we can imagine, and the closer we can personally feel to It, the more power is available.
Isn't it time to get yourself a bigger God?
Saturday, September 6, 2008
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