Learning how to float.

Maiken at A CASE of ME got me thinking. Are you afraid to question God? Jesus didn’t seem to have a problem with it (My God, my God why have you forsaken me?) perhaps we shouldn’t either. Doubt is how we come to believe; look at Thomas, he had to touch the wounds in order to believe. God doesn't distance God-self in our questions and doubts, God moves even closer to us.

Has your faith or your understanding of God chaged over the years? Some will never challenge their beliefs or allow their beliefs to be questioned and only look to support their long held beliefs. My experience has been that God entered into my questions more fully when I allowed myself to ask the questions. It is the absence of questions that is dangerous and scary. Questions do not necessarily mean that one doubts (although it can), it means I want to know God more intimately. At the same time, doubt isn’t always a negative, it may mean that one is undecided about a certain belief or understanding. I don’t doubt that God exists, but I am often undecided about what I believe about God. For example, suffering is a bummer and I often am left with living in the question more than the answer. Sure I look to scripture, tradition, and experience but I cannot rely solely on a particular theologian’s understanding of scripture.

Are you seeking a new understanding to your faith? I have to seek an understanding to my faith—this is the work of theology according to Anselm, that is, faith seeking understanding. I think my faith should force me to think, force me to question, and force me to wonder. It is when I come to a place where no longer question my faith that I cease to encounter the mystery and wonder of God and to grow as a human being. I’ve met people who think they possess all the answers about God, yet their desire for answers often seems more about control than living in the freedom and love of God.

I have fallen more deeply in love with God as I have discovered that the less I can prove about God the more that I can actually know God. There is a huge difference from knowing about someone and actually knowing someone.

For so long I feared doubt and uncertainty, not so much about God, but what some claimed God to be. The Mystery was luring me, but I was fearful of the Mystery. What does one do when one enters the question and lets go of the demand for an answer? Hopefully we move beyond certain beliefs, for our beliefs are not God, they are beliefs about God. God IS. "Tell them I AM sent you". I believe in God. I trust God. I give my heart to God. I just sometimes question my beliefs about God and sometimes I question God, but I am learning not to fear the question and to allow myself to enter the mystery.

For me, surrendering to the mystery of God is like getting out a boat that held my understanding of God, removing my life-preserver and entering into the warm water which IS God. It is like learning how to float. The boat allowed me to navigate the water, control the journey, and gave me a sense of security. When I entered the water I relinquished control and I risked being drowned in the Mystery. I learned to stop fearfully and frantically flapping my arms and swimming back toward the boat to prevent myself from drowning. I learned to relax and calm-down and just float in the Sea of the Mystery where the Water holds me and bathes me.

I used the think the boat was God, but it the boat only brought me near the Water. The boat only supported me and brought me near the Other until I was ready to float on my own.

Now I just attempt to practice floating and allow God to hold me.