A Year With God…. Interrupted

This project is on hold with no current time frame for restarting. Thanks for your interest. Read more...

OF SUBMARINES AND GOD

    All though I am not sure if this is still the case, in times past, especially in times of war, one of the ways a submarine crew would try to avoid detection would be to run silent. All or most power would be shut down so there would be no noise from the engines. Even the men where to maintain silence as much as possible. Any noise or sound from the sub could be picked up by sonar and give away the fact that they where there and perhaps even their exact location to enemy warships above. The lives of the men on board and the success of their mission depended on their presence not being detected.

    The fact of the matter is that even though the presence of the submarine was not detected, it was there and it was actively on a mission. While running silent, neither friend nor foe would detect the presence.

    In my experience of God, he often seems to be running silent. Sometimes…… OK, more often than I care to admit, I take this silence to mean he is not there or does not care. Sometimes God’s silence is deafening.

    God may be running silent but that does not mean he is not there. You are not the enemy but his silence may be critical to the mission he is performing in your life or mine. The question then becomes not “is God there?” but rather, “what is God up to?” We have a very limited view of what God may be doing in the world around us and in our own lives, but that does not mean he is not there or does not care about us.

Have you experienced times like this, when God’s silence seemed deafening because you were trying so hard to hear his voice or sense his presence? What helped you get through these times? Do you have any Bible verses you turn to that let you know that God is there even when it seems like he isn’t?


Read more...

THE NEW A YEAR WITH GOD WEBSITE

Today I finally finished the main page of the web site that accompanies this blog. In fact I’ve been so busy working on the web site that I have had to consciously force myself to think about God instead of whatever I was working on. Sometimes it’s just not easy to stop and just be.

Not that long ago my wife and I took a weekend trip up to Camden ME. Before dawn one morning while she was still sleeping, I slipped out and headed down to take some photos of the waterfront at sunrise. Soon I was totally focused on the task at hand as I quickly moved from one spot to another taking photo after photo. Once the sun was up I put my camera away and started heading back to our lodging. That’s when it occurred to me that I had been so focused on taking photographs that I hadn't really stepped back to take the morning in. Instead of hustling back to our room, I found a bench along the waterfront right next to a small waterfall and sat down. Thinking about God and about life for a few minutes, I let the peacefulness of the morning overtake me. When my mind slowed down, a single thought was left. Just being is enough.

So often we are so busy doing things and rushing from one thing or place to another that we miss the experience of just being in the here and now. Sometimes, when it comes to experiencing life and experiencing God, just being is enough.

Please go check out the web site and tell me what you think.
Read more...

THE PROBLEM OF SUBJECTIVE EXPERIENCE

When we speak of how we experience God, we immediately run into two problems. First, how do we know that whatever it is we are experiencing is actually of God or from God? Secondly, how do we test the validity of the experiences others say are of God or from God?

There was a time when truth was truth and there were absolutes. In Post Modern America truth has become relative and many now believe that what is true for you may not be true for another or for them. This is especially true (in the absolute sense) as it relates to spiritual experiences and insights. How we think we experience God is highly personal to each of us and we have a vested interest in the validity of our experiences. As human beings it is our nature to defend our beliefs when the validity of them is questioned. In defending our beliefs, specifically in this case as we speak of how we experience God, the more ingrained our beliefs become and the more vested we become in them, even if they are wrong.



When we have or think they have experiences such as the type we are talking about, we look for validation. Each thing we find that seems to validate our experience further shores up our belief that the experience was genuine. One of the ways we do this is to turn to our scriptures or other writings in search of this validation. Let’s take two cases of Bible Believing Christians who turn to the Bible for validation of their experience.

In the first case, let’s take the example of a Christian woman who was in a very trying situation and found herself very anxious. She claimed that she experienced God in the midst of this situation and felt a sense of peace and release from the anxiety that was almost paralyzing her. This is a very subjective experience. When this was pointed out to her, she turned to the Bible for validation of her experience. She found that the Bible clearly teaches that she can lay all her burdens on the Lord because he cares for her. That she should not be anxious about anything but in everything give thanks to the Lord. She found that the person who waits on the Lord will be lifted up. She remembers that she did pray and lay her burdens on the Lord and she did thank him for his help and that she was lifted up because her trust in the Lord caused the very tangible pangs of anxiety to be reduced. She believed she got through it all because God lifted her up. When her experience was questioned she was able look to the Bible for validation and found it there.

In the second case we have a Christian man who spends a great deal of time reading and studying the Bible, praying, and being involved with and encouraging other Christians. His family is solidly devoted to Christ. He often talks about God saying things to him in the course of his day. He will often say things like “God said to me “. God spoke to him addressing him by his first name and then God told him His thoughts on the matter or what action he should take. Let me point out that this was not a loud clear outward voice but rather somewhat of an internal nudging. He never to the best of my knowledge actually heard a voice, but he felt so close to God and knew the Bible so well that in these situations it was a still small inner voice he seemed to hear. He always verified what he thought God was telling him with scripture. He truly believed God was guiding his life.

One time a situation arose and he prayed about it a lot and searched the Bible for God’s direction. He proceeded the way he was sure that God wanted him to go. When the bottom fell out of that situation he was somewhat devastated because he was so sure God was leading him. He did everything the “right way” and trusted that he was experiencing the leadership of God in this situation. The Bible seemed to validate what he was experiencing. Fortunately for him, his faith was strong enough to help him overcome the devastation of a misdiagnosed experience of God.

In my life I have had times when I thought I was experiencing God and may have been. I have also had times when I was sure I was following God’s leading, only to find myself traveling on the wrong road. I’ll share some of these as we go but for now, how about you? What kinds of experiences have you had that you were able to back up with the Bible or any other sacred book or writings? Which experiences that you thought were from God turned out not to be? How did this affect you?

Read more...

THE "A YEAR WITH GOD PROJECT"

Originally I called this The “A Year with God” Project. The purpose of this project was to gather and learn as much as I could about how we actually experience God and how this affects our every day lives, then write about it. In essence, it is a writing project about something in which I have a profound interest. It was not my original intent to write regular blog entries to engage people on line so much as it was to meet with people in person or through email and discuss how we experience God.

This project is not just about gathering stories to tell. It’s about sharing the experiences of God that are at the very heart of our lives, with each other. Even if a single word of what I write never finds its way into a printed publication, this project can still be a success. The success will lie in our shared experience of seeking deeper, richer, more profound awareness of God.


OPEN WINDOWS, OPEN DOORS, AND AN OPEN MIND

Although I have high hopes, I also have many, many unanswered and perhaps unanswerable questions about God. Much of the time God seems so distant to me that I wonder if he exists at all. I’ve gone from being a born again fundamentalist Christian to an agnostic on the verge of atheism, and back again. Over the years I have read the Bible many times and studied it deeply. There have been times when I have been strongly drawn into philosophy and sought my answers about God there in the writings of the great minds of history. The Tao Te Ching is a favorite book of mine and I love the Taoist concepts within it, but I know it stands in stark contrast and contradiction to what the Bible teaches on some issues. There are many concepts of Buddhism, especially Zen Buddhism, which I find rich and meaningful. There are also many, philosophies, religions, and concepts about God that I outright reject. This is where the “open mind” part comes in.

Just how open a mind can we have and should we have when it comes to what constitutes an experience of God? As I write this I am deliberating whether or not to have a completely open mind to all ideas and concepts concerning the issue at hand, or whether I should put limitations on this. Do I stay within the confines of traditional Christianity, and if so, how much further should I narrow it down? A Protestant evangelical will probably be at odds with a Catholic in some areas. Those that believe that the Bible is the inerrant Word of God may be at odds with any who say they experience God in ways other than those which agree with their interpretation of scripture. Should we expand into other faiths and philosophies of God and include the experiences of their adherents, even if they are starkly at odds with one another? These are things I am considering. Any thoughts?
Read more...

OF HURRICANES & GOD

(AFP/NOAA/File)
Here comes Hurricane Ike! Last night the remnants of Hannah came through our area. As I was laying there on my relatively comfortable bed listening to the storm outside, I found myself thanking God for our home and the shelter it provides. I also found myself praying for those whose lives had been altered for the worse just because they where in this storm’s path of destruction. This left me feeling very uneasy. Somewhere while I was praying, there were real people that just lost a loved one. People were hurt, some seriously. People were cold, shivering, wet, and without dry clothing or shelter. Homes that provided shelter and safety were damaged or gone in but a moment of time. All I could do in that moment was pray, and I didn’t even know exactly how to pray. God of course, could have prevented the storm but he allows and perhaps in some cases directs such things to happen in this world. How then do I pray “according to his will”, concerning the suffering and damage that has been unleashed?

In my experience of God, I often struggle with the many things I don’t understand about just how this world works, including but in no way limited to the issue of natural disasters. One of the ways I experience God is through struggle and that is a theme that I will visit often here in this blog. What I do know is that I can pray and that God can and will help people in and through their time of need if they trust him to. I also know that there are people somewhere in the middle of all this who are, even as I write this, trusting God to help them and even experiencing him in ways they may have never experienced him before. They also need and want people like you and me, who aren’t there to lend a physical hand, to pray for them and provide for them in whatever way we think we can.

How do you experience God in times like these? What are your thoughts on dealing with issues like this? Please add your comments.
Read more...

WORSHIP - WHAT IS IT?

A big part of experiencing God is tied up in worship. Most of us that have faith in God probably attend or at least have attended church worship services. In fact many call their church buildings places of worship. For many, music of one form or another is the main thing associated with worship and that part of the service is often considered the worship time. Most Christians would say that we worship God, but what do we really think worship is? I personally think that everything we do in such a service, whether it is in a church building, home, outdoors, or anywhere else, should be considered worship. We worship when we pray, when we fellowship with other Christians, when we give our offering, read the Bible, and even while we listen to the sermon. We’ll look at this topic again tomorrow and probably come back to it often over the coming months.

What are your thoughts on worship? How do you worship when you are alone? Does your worship of God affect your daily life? How so? Please click on the COMMENTS link below to answer any of these questions or just say what you think. Read more...