Your God Is Dead...

I found this scrawled on a T-shirt in Beth's room the other day.  Things have not really improved much...and on this particular day, they were perhaps at a very low point.  At first, it hurt my feelings..sort of like another one of her "screw you's"  (screw you's that are communicated silently, via a look and pursed lips...sometimes articulated) At the time, I didn't say anything to her about the shirt.  For one thing she is mad because I told her that she is going to go to church and youth group.  It is her silent protest.

This is a first. I've never forced any of the kids to go to church.  Matthew hasn't been to church (other than the Christmas Eve services) for about 6 years.  Beth was involved in the youth group last year, briefly...and then she pretty much said "screw you" to them too.  I think if you force kids, they grow up bitter...with a major chip on their shoulder and seeking God is the last thing on their minds.  So it is not so much because I think she will find God by going to church...it is just that I want to find some kind of wholesome activity for her to get involved in.  We live in a small town...there are not a lot of activities for teens.  Hanging out is the major pass time...and oftentimes, hanging out involves drugs and alcohol.  It is her preferred lifestyle. She's has made it clear that once she turns 18 it is the lifestyle she is going to pursue.  But I digress...

So at first it hurt my feelings...but then I got to thinking...

The God she is referring to, in the scrawled graffiti like message on the T-shirt, is indeed dead.  More accurately ...he never lived.  The God of mainstream Christianity does not exist.  Many things the United Methodist Church teaches, I have issues with.  The youth leaders, as wonderful and loving as they are, teach a view of God that I think is skewed.  (Love...not correct doctrine, is the benchmark of a Christian and they show the kids their love in large and small ways)

The girls and I drove up to the mall today and on the way there the T-shirt came up.

"Mom, Beth is going to wear her God is dead T-shirt to church on Sunday."

I told them some of the things I have been thinking about...how the God many of us worship is very far from who he really is.  Emily pointed out the differences between churches and the differences between their "Gods." She mentioned Catholics as an example...with their worship of saints and their view of the Pope as akin to Jesus.  Keith and I have talked about the cliché that oftentimes pops out of the mouths of Christians when they are confronted with something attributed to God that they consider totally out of character.

"That's not the God I worship"

I pointed out to Em that there is a God and there is a definite unchangeable truth about Him...even though we may not know it.  It is just that we humans do not always see or accept that truth.  Sometimes we won't see it.  Sometimes we can't see it.  Sometimes, the "my thoughts are not your thoughts nor are my ways your ways" thing comes into play. 

But there is one absolute truth about God...even if our minds cannot comprehend it.  There is one most high God and he never changes.  Scripture describes him AS love.  Not that he possesses love....or that he embodies love...or that he dispenses love.  He IS love.  It is his essential character.  Who he is...not what he does.  (I will be the first to admit that some of his acts do not really look like love)

And the God who sends non-believers to hell, or who sanctions jihad, or who is exclusive instead of inclusive, who will rapture his elect, who hates homosexuals etc. etc is indeed dead.  He never lived.  He is a figment of churchianity's imagination.  He is scripture misread and misunderstood.  Sometimes he is the embodiment of hate.  Sometimes he is the embodiment of fear.  Sometimes he is the embodiment of prejudice.  Many time he is the polar opposite of love. 

I know my view is skewed too...that I don't have all the answers.  My vision is not unobstructed and my beliefs are tainted by my humanity, my carnality, my egoic nature.  But I will continue to seek him. Who he really is.  Like Moses, my plea is, show me your Glory.