Joy V
A New View of God
Owen K Waters
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When I was a child in Sunday School classes, I was taught to view God as someone very personal. We were given an image of a human-like God who personally watched over each and every one of us. That was long before the Hubble Space Telescope started to show us how incredibly huge the universe is. In the decades since, our appreciation of the size of the universe has increased enormously. Likewise, our view of the size of God has increased enormously.
Today, we realize that God, as an omnipresent being, must be at least the size of the entire universe. By current estimates, the universe contains over a hundred billion galaxies, each one containing an estimated two hundred billion suns. That means that there are countless trillions of planets, each one filled with the all-pervasive presence of that which created them. This brings us to today’s prevalent spiritual dilemma.
With God’s presence being so far-reaching, how can there be any semblance of the personal attention that we were taught to expect from a father-like God image? Today, you are left wondering whether God is, (a) personal, or (b) so large in scale as to be infinitely impersonal. Surely, one idea would exclude the other.
Or would it? A paradox is something that contains opposite statements and yet both are true. The secret to solving paradoxes is to start using the word ‘and’ instead of ‘or.’ The question is not whether God is infinitely large or personal. The question becomes, how can God be infinite in size and personal as well?
The answer lies within the Paradox of Infinite Being. The term Infinite Being is used here as the ultimate concept of God. The word Infinite, as in omnipresent. The word Being, as in omniscient awareness. Infinite Being is the perfect, unchanging consciousness behind all of Creation.
Because Infinite Being is consciousness, and nothing but consciousness, it is appropriate to note here that nothing in Creation is anything but consciousness in one form or another. Energy is simply a compressed form of consciousness set into motion. Matter is energy. Therefore matter is a form of consciousness. It can’t be any other way, because consciousness is the only tool with which Infinite Being has to work. We are a dream within the mind of the Creator. The universe was created within the consciousness of Infinite Being.
I remember being told in a science class at school that space must be infinite in size because there couldn’t be anything beyond the end of space; therefore, it had to go on forever. It didn’t sound right at the time, and now I know why. Space is actually finite, because it was created within Infinite Being. The created must be less than its creator, therefore space must be less than infinite. Beyond the envelope of space lies that which created it.
In order to create the universe, Infinite Being divided the ‘waters’ – its consciousness – into two aspects: Creator and Preserver. In the West, we are used to thinking of the Creator as God the Father, while the Preserver aspect is called the Holy Spirit. In the East, the names are different but the principles are exactly the same. For example, the Hindu name for the Creator aspect is Brahma, while Vishnu represents the aspect that preserves and sustains the universe. Stories of Creation from all over the world share the common thread of two complementary aspects coming together to bring light into existence.
The two aspects of Creator and Preserver were set into complementary motion in order to manifest the universe. Through the interaction of these two aspects of original consciousness, the universe was formed and, along with it, the capability for Infinite Being to view itself from an infinite number of viewpoints.
The human race today represents approximately seven billion different viewpoints of the one Source. According to the rules of the human adventure, we were born with spiritual amnesia. We have forgotten our inner connection. The challenge of the game is to discover and consciously reconnect with that to which, in reality, we are and always were connected. Self-awareness and free will are included in the rules of the game. The illusion of separateness from each other is created by an intense focus upon life in an outer, physical world, as viewed by the five senses. People are free to choose to interact with other people in the ways that they see best.
People can even choose to believe that they are separate from that ultimate Source to which they are connected. Atheism, therefore, is not a lack of belief. It’s a belief in something that isn’t so. If you have an inbuilt connection to God, yet believe that you don’t, you are expressing a belief, not a lack of one.
Mystics talk of experiencing a sense of oneness with the infinite while in deep meditation. Those who can go still deeper into the realms of consciousness report that there is more to it than just a feeling of oneness. Deep within, you aren’t so much an individual who is as one with Infinite Being. You are Infinite Being!
You are Infinite Being, observing itself through the one viewpoint that is you. You aren’t a part of Infinite Being. You are Infinite Being, acting from one specific point of view. Likewise, every sentient being is also Infinite Being, looking at itself from their own unique points of view.
The solution to the Paradox of Infinite Being is that, while we are a part of an immense universe of almost unlimited proportions, we are also Infinite Being itself. As you experience life through your eyes and ears and senses, you are Infinite Being, acting through yet another viewpoint of the infinite variety of life. Every fiber of your body is Infinite Being, every dream that you manifest is Infinite Being in action, every tear of joy that you shed in the finer experiences of life is a tear shed by Infinite Being in its form as you.
You can be closer to God than ever before when you realize that every part of your body, mind and spirit is God. Even in this strange world where we appear to be separate from everyone else, the conscious awareness of the presence of God is a mere thought away.