My Evolution (Part 4)
Welcome, and thanks for taking the time to stop in.
This week, my post will probably be weird and offensive to some. We may not agree, but hear me out, and feel free to pity me in my misguided theology.
This step in my evolution can be at least partly credited to learning about Hinduism and the old quote 'There are only two ways to live your life. One is as though nothing is a miracle. The other is as though everything is a miracle' (often attributed to Einstein). While I haven't become a Hindu, chewing on their worldview has inspired me to see the world in a new light. Hinduism teaches that God and nature are one and the same. I've read that in India, people don't keep up yards and such because 'God does not require routine maintenance' (Working Across Cultures, by John Hooker). Don't worry, I will continue to do what's needed to placate my HOA, lol, and I'm not a pantheist. But the concept got me thinking about how God and the physical realm interact, how everything is a miracle or nothing is, and ideas started to mix around. They have, at least for now, come to a rest looking something like this:
Science tells us that the world continues to expand, right? It started somewhere and it's still growing. I don't have references for you, but you can Google it. Now, in the Bible, right there at the beginning, you can read 'In the beginning God created…', but a better translation would be 'When God began to create…' or 'When God began creating…'. You can Google that, too. The point is that, childhood songs aside, even a Christian doesn't need to believe that God created and then severed his nature from the physical world, with only the occasional miracle to show he's still hanging around in some distant heaven. If God created everything, if he's still creating everything, he's still deeply involved. He may not be the world, but it continues as a result of his influence and power. It is inextricably linked to him. He's not afraid of growth and change, and we shouldn't be either. If he didn't create the world, well, the universe is still expanding and evolving, and so should we.
So, how does this change of viewpoint constitute a post in My Evolution? It sounds pretty abstract, doesn't it? But it has changed the way I live in a couple of ways, and here's how. First, because I believe everything around and in me is a miracle, choices that I might have considered secular now have spiritual meaning for me. Because if God made nature, is still working in nature, then nature isn't merely secular. Everything has a spiritual aspect. The way I eat affects me spiritually as well as physically. The way I treat people isn't only social, it's spiritual. The way I consume and throw away isn't merely practical, it's spiritual. I'm not going to become a zero-waste, hermit fruitarian anytime soon, but the way I think about routine actions has changed, and therefore so have my routine actions. I have developed a new respect. I've no doubt that I will continue to explore these ideas and change the way I live accordingly, because the second part of this stage is the conviction that believers in God should be the first to embrace change and adaptation. God created the world with the ability to adapt (is actively helping it along, I suspect), and humans aren't an exception.
That was strangely exhausting and difficult to write. I think I'm ready to go back to less complicated, more lighthearted posts, but I still have at least one more troubling revelation to present. Next time, I'll write about a lesson I learned from a young man with Tourette Syndrome.
Growth to you all,
R.A.
This week, my post will probably be weird and offensive to some. We may not agree, but hear me out, and feel free to pity me in my misguided theology.
This step in my evolution can be at least partly credited to learning about Hinduism and the old quote 'There are only two ways to live your life. One is as though nothing is a miracle. The other is as though everything is a miracle' (often attributed to Einstein). While I haven't become a Hindu, chewing on their worldview has inspired me to see the world in a new light. Hinduism teaches that God and nature are one and the same. I've read that in India, people don't keep up yards and such because 'God does not require routine maintenance' (Working Across Cultures, by John Hooker). Don't worry, I will continue to do what's needed to placate my HOA, lol, and I'm not a pantheist. But the concept got me thinking about how God and the physical realm interact, how everything is a miracle or nothing is, and ideas started to mix around. They have, at least for now, come to a rest looking something like this:
Science tells us that the world continues to expand, right? It started somewhere and it's still growing. I don't have references for you, but you can Google it. Now, in the Bible, right there at the beginning, you can read 'In the beginning God created…', but a better translation would be 'When God began to create…' or 'When God began creating…'. You can Google that, too. The point is that, childhood songs aside, even a Christian doesn't need to believe that God created and then severed his nature from the physical world, with only the occasional miracle to show he's still hanging around in some distant heaven. If God created everything, if he's still creating everything, he's still deeply involved. He may not be the world, but it continues as a result of his influence and power. It is inextricably linked to him. He's not afraid of growth and change, and we shouldn't be either. If he didn't create the world, well, the universe is still expanding and evolving, and so should we.
So, how does this change of viewpoint constitute a post in My Evolution? It sounds pretty abstract, doesn't it? But it has changed the way I live in a couple of ways, and here's how. First, because I believe everything around and in me is a miracle, choices that I might have considered secular now have spiritual meaning for me. Because if God made nature, is still working in nature, then nature isn't merely secular. Everything has a spiritual aspect. The way I eat affects me spiritually as well as physically. The way I treat people isn't only social, it's spiritual. The way I consume and throw away isn't merely practical, it's spiritual. I'm not going to become a zero-waste, hermit fruitarian anytime soon, but the way I think about routine actions has changed, and therefore so have my routine actions. I have developed a new respect. I've no doubt that I will continue to explore these ideas and change the way I live accordingly, because the second part of this stage is the conviction that believers in God should be the first to embrace change and adaptation. God created the world with the ability to adapt (is actively helping it along, I suspect), and humans aren't an exception.
That was strangely exhausting and difficult to write. I think I'm ready to go back to less complicated, more lighthearted posts, but I still have at least one more troubling revelation to present. Next time, I'll write about a lesson I learned from a young man with Tourette Syndrome.
Growth to you all,
R.A.
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