My wonderful landlady Dragita gave me a book for Christmas 2010. It was a miniture edition of Rick Warren’s “The Purpose-Driven Life”. I didn’t read it right away, figuring it was the usual fundamentalist Christian bullshit.
I don’t remember when I actually first read through it. The book has 40 ‘chapters’, 40 being a significant number in the bible. The idea is to read 1 chapter a day and reflect on the lesson, kind of like the daily bible reading we did when I was a JW.
I have reread The Purpose-Driven Life 3 or 4 times since Dragita first gave it to me. Today I am reading Day 10. The lesson is about surrendering to God. And, the notion is that when we surrender to God we MOST become US. That is, surrender is not about becoming some sort of robot but about being “all we can be”.
And, I began to think about the notion of surrendering to some greater purpose. A number of religions talk about surrender: I think it is part and parcel of the essence of Bhuddism. I know it IS an aspect of Christianity: the Desiderata says of God, “however you conceive him to be”. And, the Serenity Prayer teaches us to let go of the things we can’t change. Finally, a keystone of the 12-step program of AA is the notion of surrender to “your Higher Power”.
I just reread Deepak Chopra’s “God” for the third or fourth time. It contains the stories of 10 Spiritual Seekers. People like Job, the Apostle Paul, Rumi, and Julian of Norwich. Their seeking, in different ways, leads to the final chapter of the book where Deepak uses the 10 examples to examine the nature of God. He suggests that like the cells are part of the body WE are part of God. When I was a JW I was taught that God was “in heaven”. I thought of him – and he was a HE – as a wee bit schizophrenic or at least he had a mood disorder; for he was either VERY ANGRY or he was LOVING.
I mean the Old Testament God is one pissed off dude. Then between the first and second acts he transforms into the Loving Father who sacrifices his Son to save Mankind. REALLY, said in a snarky voice.
ANYWAY! (As Ellen says). I digress. My journey over these 29 years since I left the smothering womb of the JW religion has been the realization that God is
NOT seperate from me but is part of me and I am part of him/her and hers/his Universe. That notion is particularly freeing for me.
For you see, I AM NOT A SINNER because to be a sinner is to be apart from God. I am a part of the Universe, so I CAN NOT be apart from God. Ergo I can not be a sinner. Of course, this notion plays havoc with the teachings of most, if not all, Christian churches.
What if I am not a Sinner but just a Human Being trying to find his way in the world by listening for the voice of the God in me: gently giving Guidance.
