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[P1] Reflections on "Reaching for the Invisible God"
11 years ago
Reflection on Part One of Philip Yancey's "Reaching for the Invisible God"
Letter superscripts: Notes
Numerical superscripts: Sources
This book, as I quickly learned, is going to be a read that will take time. Not because it is dense, overtly or aggressively philosophical, but because it requires reflection. Already, I've read a certain distance into the book and have feeling myself looking into my past and thinking hard about how I got through my struggles. Was I really in contact with God? Was I doing what I fear the most, and just imagining a God? What did the situations I'm in say about the God I claim to know?
This internal struggle, at least for the last few years, I've seen rarely in others. If I didn't know any better, I'd say people didn't really care. I'd say many people ask the question "How do I have a relationship with God?" but only a few around me ever actually seek out the answer to the question [A]. I had a conversation with my mother once, about our doubts on how to have a relationship with this celestial actuator. At the time, I could barely relate to God as being more than a mystical force who I'm told to love, but had no real love for. He had my obedience, but it was a fight to get it.
When that question was asked, I felt like I had been t-boned in a car accident. I felt the same shock I felt when I was actually in the car accident years ago. I was in mental shock- I didn't know what to do or what to feel. So I did the only thing I could do: I related. And it was easy to relate, because I was in the exact same situation, wondering the same question.
At the time, I knew a lot of random theological and philosophical tidbits. Just like I was then, I still have little actual knowledge of the way around the Bible. I know a few facts that are helpful with determining the scale and scope of some passages. I have a bilinear Bible and Strong's Dictionaries. I also had full knowledge that I knew very little, next-to-nothing in fact, about how to have a relationship with a God. Yancey nailed it on the head when he referred to John Polkinghorne:
The physicist John Polkinghorne, who resigned his post at Cambridge to seek ordination as an Anglican priest, points out a major difference between knowing science and knowing theology. Science progressively accumulates: first Ptolemy, then Galileo, Copernicus, Newton, and Einstein. Each of these scientists built on the foundation of those who preceded him, so that an ordinary scientist today has a more accurate conception of physical world than was ever possible for Sit Isaac Newton. Knowledge of God proceeds in an entirely different manner. Every counter is unique and individual, just like any meeting between two persons, so that a fifth-century mystic or an illiterate immigrant may have a deeper knowledge of God than a twentieth-century theologian. [1]
Right now, I see God as more of a figure who I love dearly, with actual affection and devotion. I'm afraid of hurting Him just as I'm afraid of hurting the ones I love. I don't obey God out of fear anymore, but out of trust (faith) and love. I know that He's there for me and helpful, but the same question remains: "If someone were to ask me how I know God, how do I tell them?" How can I even communicate something that seems so personal I can't even describe it with normal words?
I think I know God, sometimes. How many times have I "heard" God's voice but instead of actually hearing Him, I hear myself or a lie? I've become so jaded by people telling me "God wants/is-telling me to do this" and then they pursue it, though in my right mind, I would never ever do the same. I don't feel a call to a specific job, or to a specific task. Everything I do I've derived from seeking to serve God, not from listening to voices in my head or urges of my body. Every time I feel that I'm in contact with God, I have my doubts that say I'm not speaking to, or hearing from, Him. It plagues me, sometimes for hours at a time, until I force myself to move on to something else so the questioning doesn't become dangerous. I take these questions and I hang onto them. Instead of seeking the answers, I look around for where to begin and get frustrated at the maze I appear to be standing in. Which path do I take, and when I hit a dead end, how can I even be sure I'm getting back to my original position so I can go back to my original options? Is God the one trying to teach me something? Is He letting me go so that I can find Him on my own?
Sometimes I wonder if this means I've covered my ears with wax so I don't hear the Sirens' call, and I don't hear Him either like a form of collateral. Am I distant from God because I'm afraid of Him, afraid of myself, or because I'm not listening.
I've heard often that God doesn't give us a struggle or a temptation that we can't overcome. Right now, the biggest struggle is knowing Him. I'd be willing to give my all, and I feel that I already have by seeking out the Christian life, for Him. It's not the promise of an afterlife that I'm seeking: I want to know my Creator. It's a bond that's deeper than consanguinity, yet I feel that there's sometimes nothing between Him and I.
(Rereading that now, it really sounds like I need relationship counseling. And I do, of a sort, just not your everyday relationship.)
My quest, as it has been for about four years now, is to seek out God's signature. The whole universe is His Creation, so certainly it's indicative of who He is? I'm a computer scientist, so with a little bit of time, I could recreate objects in code and give them attributes. I'm also a fiction writer and a musician/composer. I found that creating things, telling stories, and writing melodies, gives me peace and comfort, and I feel for the characters. I wonder if God felt the same when he wrote our stories and watches us.
But I'm told He's the Author and my father. If he's my Father, why does some of His affection seem mechanical, or so fluid it seems to flood me with sensation and awe? I don't imagine for one instance His affection is ever lukewarm. We know what He thinks of that. But is He always warm? Our cup overfloweth, or so I've heard. But what about the times when it feels like the cup is empty, or we don't even have a cup?
When I lay my head down on my pillow my mind races off to logical extremes and I'm stuck laying there for hours, looking at myself, looking at God, and wondering if I'm just missing the point. I've been seeking more than I ever have before in my life. This book coming into my hands might just be the best thing to help me since I started reading C.S. Lewis.
Notes:
A – Reading the ear the book originally came out, 2000, was a bit of a comfort. I felt like this book was new, and that only in this society where technology connects us in ways previously unimaginable, that people were disconnected from God. Sometimes it feels like I'm the only person looking. Sometimes other people seem extremely indifferent to what I realize is the most important question.
There is little to no dialog. I'm tired of going to churches where the congregation sings of knowing God and His love and does not display it. Or where the congregation is so large, having questions means they never get answered because the church is too big to make time for the individual. I feel that many churches miss the mark, on that. That's why I have a small circle of friends and a small attendance to those I speak about. I want a personal connection with the people I know so I can witness God changing their lives, not so I can pretend that I'm doing the right thing and justify my carelessness with thoughts of my own righteousness. I'm a human being just like everyone else. They deserve my time and attention, and for this matter, I can't knowingly push them away.
Source:
1 - Yancey, P. (2000). Part One - Thirst: Our Longing For God. In Reaching for the Invisible God (p. 27). Grand Rapids, Michigan: ZondervanPublishingHouse.
Letter superscripts: Notes
Numerical superscripts: Sources
This book, as I quickly learned, is going to be a read that will take time. Not because it is dense, overtly or aggressively philosophical, but because it requires reflection. Already, I've read a certain distance into the book and have feeling myself looking into my past and thinking hard about how I got through my struggles. Was I really in contact with God? Was I doing what I fear the most, and just imagining a God? What did the situations I'm in say about the God I claim to know?
This internal struggle, at least for the last few years, I've seen rarely in others. If I didn't know any better, I'd say people didn't really care. I'd say many people ask the question "How do I have a relationship with God?" but only a few around me ever actually seek out the answer to the question [A]. I had a conversation with my mother once, about our doubts on how to have a relationship with this celestial actuator. At the time, I could barely relate to God as being more than a mystical force who I'm told to love, but had no real love for. He had my obedience, but it was a fight to get it.
When that question was asked, I felt like I had been t-boned in a car accident. I felt the same shock I felt when I was actually in the car accident years ago. I was in mental shock- I didn't know what to do or what to feel. So I did the only thing I could do: I related. And it was easy to relate, because I was in the exact same situation, wondering the same question.
At the time, I knew a lot of random theological and philosophical tidbits. Just like I was then, I still have little actual knowledge of the way around the Bible. I know a few facts that are helpful with determining the scale and scope of some passages. I have a bilinear Bible and Strong's Dictionaries. I also had full knowledge that I knew very little, next-to-nothing in fact, about how to have a relationship with a God. Yancey nailed it on the head when he referred to John Polkinghorne:
The physicist John Polkinghorne, who resigned his post at Cambridge to seek ordination as an Anglican priest, points out a major difference between knowing science and knowing theology. Science progressively accumulates: first Ptolemy, then Galileo, Copernicus, Newton, and Einstein. Each of these scientists built on the foundation of those who preceded him, so that an ordinary scientist today has a more accurate conception of physical world than was ever possible for Sit Isaac Newton. Knowledge of God proceeds in an entirely different manner. Every counter is unique and individual, just like any meeting between two persons, so that a fifth-century mystic or an illiterate immigrant may have a deeper knowledge of God than a twentieth-century theologian. [1]
Right now, I see God as more of a figure who I love dearly, with actual affection and devotion. I'm afraid of hurting Him just as I'm afraid of hurting the ones I love. I don't obey God out of fear anymore, but out of trust (faith) and love. I know that He's there for me and helpful, but the same question remains: "If someone were to ask me how I know God, how do I tell them?" How can I even communicate something that seems so personal I can't even describe it with normal words?
I think I know God, sometimes. How many times have I "heard" God's voice but instead of actually hearing Him, I hear myself or a lie? I've become so jaded by people telling me "God wants/is-telling me to do this" and then they pursue it, though in my right mind, I would never ever do the same. I don't feel a call to a specific job, or to a specific task. Everything I do I've derived from seeking to serve God, not from listening to voices in my head or urges of my body. Every time I feel that I'm in contact with God, I have my doubts that say I'm not speaking to, or hearing from, Him. It plagues me, sometimes for hours at a time, until I force myself to move on to something else so the questioning doesn't become dangerous. I take these questions and I hang onto them. Instead of seeking the answers, I look around for where to begin and get frustrated at the maze I appear to be standing in. Which path do I take, and when I hit a dead end, how can I even be sure I'm getting back to my original position so I can go back to my original options? Is God the one trying to teach me something? Is He letting me go so that I can find Him on my own?
Sometimes I wonder if this means I've covered my ears with wax so I don't hear the Sirens' call, and I don't hear Him either like a form of collateral. Am I distant from God because I'm afraid of Him, afraid of myself, or because I'm not listening.
I've heard often that God doesn't give us a struggle or a temptation that we can't overcome. Right now, the biggest struggle is knowing Him. I'd be willing to give my all, and I feel that I already have by seeking out the Christian life, for Him. It's not the promise of an afterlife that I'm seeking: I want to know my Creator. It's a bond that's deeper than consanguinity, yet I feel that there's sometimes nothing between Him and I.
(Rereading that now, it really sounds like I need relationship counseling. And I do, of a sort, just not your everyday relationship.)
My quest, as it has been for about four years now, is to seek out God's signature. The whole universe is His Creation, so certainly it's indicative of who He is? I'm a computer scientist, so with a little bit of time, I could recreate objects in code and give them attributes. I'm also a fiction writer and a musician/composer. I found that creating things, telling stories, and writing melodies, gives me peace and comfort, and I feel for the characters. I wonder if God felt the same when he wrote our stories and watches us.
But I'm told He's the Author and my father. If he's my Father, why does some of His affection seem mechanical, or so fluid it seems to flood me with sensation and awe? I don't imagine for one instance His affection is ever lukewarm. We know what He thinks of that. But is He always warm? Our cup overfloweth, or so I've heard. But what about the times when it feels like the cup is empty, or we don't even have a cup?
When I lay my head down on my pillow my mind races off to logical extremes and I'm stuck laying there for hours, looking at myself, looking at God, and wondering if I'm just missing the point. I've been seeking more than I ever have before in my life. This book coming into my hands might just be the best thing to help me since I started reading C.S. Lewis.
Notes:
A – Reading the ear the book originally came out, 2000, was a bit of a comfort. I felt like this book was new, and that only in this society where technology connects us in ways previously unimaginable, that people were disconnected from God. Sometimes it feels like I'm the only person looking. Sometimes other people seem extremely indifferent to what I realize is the most important question.
There is little to no dialog. I'm tired of going to churches where the congregation sings of knowing God and His love and does not display it. Or where the congregation is so large, having questions means they never get answered because the church is too big to make time for the individual. I feel that many churches miss the mark, on that. That's why I have a small circle of friends and a small attendance to those I speak about. I want a personal connection with the people I know so I can witness God changing their lives, not so I can pretend that I'm doing the right thing and justify my carelessness with thoughts of my own righteousness. I'm a human being just like everyone else. They deserve my time and attention, and for this matter, I can't knowingly push them away.
Source:
1 - Yancey, P. (2000). Part One - Thirst: Our Longing For God. In Reaching for the Invisible God (p. 27). Grand Rapids, Michigan: ZondervanPublishingHouse.
