What I Mean by "God"

The word “God” that I use in these posts has many meanings. I want to clarify what I mean when I use the word.

 

To me, the word “God” is a symbol, as all words are symbols, that stands for the energy that creates, animates and guides all things; the source in and thru everyone and everything. It’s an energy that human beings have been seeking to understand and use since the beginning of time.

 

Science seeks to explain and use this energy as does religion. But the energy itself remains a mystery. Cutting edge science and spirituality have enabled us to understand some things about it, but not all. It’s encouraging to me that the findings of cutting edge science and spirituality reveal a congruence with many of the insights and core ideas of most of the world’s religions. Physics shows that the ancient idea of one God, one energy, is true. Contemporary spirituality shows that the ancient ideas of, “it is done unto you as you believe” and “seek ye the kingdom of heaven first,” work best.

 

This energy is what I mean by the word “God.” Ubiquitous and invisible in its purest form, it steps down into the particular in our human experience of it. We experience it first in its ubiquitous invisible form, what we label “spiritual”, then as a mental/intellectual experience, then emotionally and finally physically. All four kinds of experience: spiritual, mental, emotional and physical, are manifestations of the one energy, co-exist simultaneously and are the labels we use to describe our experience of It.

 

This is what I mean when I use the word, “God.” I do not mean an old white man with a beard, sitting on a throne in the sky who keeps score, judges, rewards and punishes. I mean a neutral force like gravity or electricity that we can partially understand and work with. When we use electricity correctly, it’s a blessing. When we use it incorrectly, it’s a fearsome horror. It is not the electricity that blesses or destroys, but our use of it. The electricity and gravity, like my understanding of the energy that I call “God,” is neutral.

Spirituality is our basic, fundamental connection with this energy, the thing Itself. Religions are the various brands, the stories we make up to help us understand the thing Itself.