Relating to God

Last evening a group of my spiritual soul sisters and I got together for dinner, a concert, and a pajama party. What a delight--but at 60, my body doesn't quite last as long as it used to. By the time the question of the evening was posed, "So, how are you relating to God today?", it was 5 glasses of wine, and far too many hours too late for me to respond.

But on the solitary drive home this morning, I had time to ponder my relationship to God. How am I relating to God today? Much the same as I have been over the last 10-12 years. My perception of God has changed, but God has not changed. I think that's finally sunk deep into my soul.

I lost God about 6 years ago, and I panicked. But over the last year or so, I've found my way back home. The God I know today is the same God I've always known. The only thing that's really changed is my "picture", the way I see God. God is no longer a "being" as I am a being; instead, God is Being, the Ground of all being, the Source of all being. God does not give life; God is Life.

And I still relate as I've done in the past, by staying awake, by paying attention, by taking note, by listening closely. I haven't prayed much with words for many years, but I do practice stillness. When I sit quietly in centering prayer or meditation, all my parts come together, and I can hear--softly in the temple of my soul, the voice of God. When synchronistic acts line up and the eyes of my understanding gets it, God shouts, and I hear. My worship method has changed from singing songs, to simply noticing how my heart lifts, like a large flock of birds lifting simultaneously from the pasture and soaring in beautiful pattern through the bright blue sky. My heart soars with them, in unison, as God and I delight together in the beauty of Creation.

Is God energy? Yes, no, maybe--God is infinite. No one word can define. Is God me? Is God you? Yes, no, maybe--God might be me, God might be you, but God definitely is more. God exists without me, but I don't exist without God. One thing I know--God isn't "he", nor "she"--dispite our distaste of the thought, I rather believe God to be "IT", in me, outside of me, around me, through me, part of me, and apart from me. To know God is to know my true Self. To know my true Self is to know God.

Should I worship this "Energy"--how can I not? Worship is a response of the heart to something more--I don't plan it, nor do I "do" it, but instead, it does me. I was created to worship--remember those vast flocks of birds lifting up into the sky and flying in pattern? How can I keep my heart from following?

To me, worship isn't a song of notes and words, but a gesture of recognition that Something More has caught my heart and given me wings.

I am more sure today than ever before that God is. We are in partnership, God and I. I was born to "see" God, to "know" God, to worship God. And I was born, like those birds, to fly. Even though gravity pulls my earth suit downward, my spirit flies because God is, and we relate.