"Why do you believe in God? Lately, in a struggle with some physical issues, I have felt myself less faith full and more fear full. And yet, when I go to the Source in silence, the peace and the faith return and things balance out.
There are so many reasons I believe in God, so many reasons that I find myself immersed in God's great love.
And I know all the reasons why perhaps it isn't rational to believe in God.
There was a minister I knew who had never had a spiritual experience. Her intellect got in the way she told me. She would rationalize away, anything of that sort which might try to peak through to to her.
This morning as I write, there is a snow falling. I've missed morning prayer as I don't have snow tires and the driveway is very steep and slippery. So I am blogging instead. Thinking deep thoughts and asking profound questions :-)
It isn't so much all the extraordinary spiritual experiences that I've had that give me faith. They certainly have helped me in difficult times. But it is the ordinary stuff of life that I find shining with the touch of heaven most days: savoring a bowl of steel cut oats for my breakfast; a little black dog filled with so much enthusiasm she squeals all the way down the street as we go for a walk, making me laugh; a serious conversation with my significant other which turns somehow into absolute hilarity and we laugh until we can hardly catch our breath; the sun, sparkling on the water; Mary Oliver's poetry and John O'Donahue's blessings; the sound of my best friend's voice as she speaks about something that excites her; my own passion about this thing called faith and protecting it from apathy, cruelty and fear.
Just writing about it all fills me with a sense of that "peace which passes understanding!"
Love is at work. God is present in this world...in all the tiny details as well as the grand schemes.
Someone said recently that people these days, since the dawn of enlightenment, don't find belief in a God who is personal, relevant. Well...perhaps not personal in the sense of some old fellow in a white beard handing down edicts from on high, directing traffic. But the inference was that God is not involved in the details of our lives either. And I find that very sad. Madeleine L'Engle used to speak about an infinite God...God who is very much in the large workings of the universe, and God who is involved in the tiny infinite details as well. I believe that. And when I choose to believe in God's goodness, it shows up everywhere I turn. That's the choice you know. If we choose not to believe, God respects that, stepping back and we create all kinds of things from that kind of choice. Mostly chaos! But when we choose to believe in God's goodness, we begin to find it and see it in every leaf, in our breathing, in our steady or not so steady heartbeat and in the miracle of waking to life each morning!
Hoping your day is full of goodness and faith.
(The photos today are by yours truly. Ordinary moments full of heaven!)
Someone made a commented that I thought I pressed "Publish" for, but it disappeared completely. My apologies. One part of the comment said that when people step back from God they are looking at a well ordered universe, not creating chaos. That can be true of course. However, my qualifier is that what I meant to say, is when one does not believe in God as good, chaos erupts. I held such a belief for a time. And atheism has it's points. I've known some wonderfully ethical and moral folks who don't believe in God, and with whom I have had deep friendships. And there is nothing chaotic about their lives. But when one believes God to be neutral...that might be another story. Anyway. Sorry I didn't get to post your comment as it was whoever you are.
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