Omnipresence & Omnigoodness

Is God limited in any way? Do we limit Him in our own experience, by our own beliefs..? Do we give lip-service to God being unlimited, and yet believe that there are places God cannot fill or inhabit ... or even come near?

Do we believe, for having been taught, that our actions, our sins, keep us from God? Do we believe that we have to *do* something to bring God's Presence near?

According to the psalmist, there is no where in which God is not. He is in the highest heights, and the deepest depths ... even in Sheol, the place of the dead. According to scripture, when Adam and Eve "fell", God was there, even came looking for them, spoke to them, and cared for them with His provision. When Jesus was "filled with our sin" God was IN Christ, reconciling the world to Himself.

Have we been taught a thought-of-man, which is not true of God?

God is Spirit, and Spirit cannot be contained ... God created all, and fills all ... He is the very Source of life of all that is ... He is the very sustainer of all that He has caused to be. Nothing is exempt from that. Nothing.

God's Presence is everywhere .. He is Omnipresent. We can grasp this in the demonstration of air ... we cannot see air, nor hold it, and yet we can feel the effects of it -- it is everywhere. It sustains us, giving us life.

Human religious tradition tells us that there is a place where God is not: hell. Put aside for a moment the fact that "hell" is not in the original text ... that "hell" is an old English verb badly used as a translation of 3 different Greek nouns (Gehenna, Tartarus, Hades [which is Sheol in Hebrew]). Put aside the reality that Jesus only spoke of Gehenna (the literal garbage dump south of Jerusalem). Scripture tells us that "even if I make my bed in hell [Sheol], You are there."

What if hell is the belief, the concept, the mindset, that we are separated from God, and are not able to receive the mercy of God in our situation? What if hell is the despairing thought that God has given up on us, and that we must give up on God? What if it is the fear that God has abandoned us?

Fear can cause us to see things that are not. To see shadows in the closet as monsters ... to see intruders where there are cats on the front porch... to see cancers in the shadows of a sonogram.

But if we heard the Voice of Truth, Who shines Light into the dark recesses of our thinking, what would we hear?

"I Am with you, I will never leave you nor forsake you, nothing can separate you from My love, not anything created, including yourself and your errant thinking ... I Am everywhere, filling all things, filling you, which you would know if you had eyes to see ... I Am the Way, the Truth and the Life, I Am the Light of the world, and so are you, I Am surrounding you, I Am *for* you, not against you, I Am leading you, I Am drawing you to Myself, I Am leading you into all truth, I Am renewing your mind, I AM transforming you from the inside-out, I Am with you always, and in ALL-ways."

God's goodness, His very essence, surrounds us unceasingly ... we either are aware of it, or unaware of it. Our awareness doesn't change reality, but it sure affects our experience!

What if we could remember this, whenever we find ourselves in situations that seem to be negative or threatening? What if we could remain calm and confident, knowing that God is Present and accessible? What if we knew that God is working ALL things (even those we deem, in our ignorance, to be "bad") for our good? What if we could remain quiet, listening, waiting for the goodness to manifest? What if we knew that goodness, order and peace will always prevail? What if we knew this to be true, EVEN if we deem ourselves to be responsible for the negative situation in the first place?

How would such an understanding affect our lives? Our relationships? Our experiences? Our world?

Shalom, Dena