One God

The question of one God....

I think the question of one God vs multiple Gods sometimes becomes an unhelpful semantic barrier.

I do believe in one God. I know some people believe there are multiple Gods. Those people might not be satisfied by the perspective I'm about to give. In fact, I'm a bit concerned that it may not be respectful of me. I'd like the opportunity to discuss the issue with people who believe in multiple Gods. I'd like the opportunity to learn from them. But to the best of my knowledge, I don't know anyone with that belief.

In my perspective, belief in one God does not preclude recognition of what may be understood by others as multiple Gods, or even competing Gods. God is big enough that we use multiple metaphors for God. In my thinking, multiple Gods (past or present) may be considered a partial representation of God. Each of them are, if you will, one of many relevant metaphors for God. Metaphors (whether used for one God, multiple Gods, or anything else) in some way represent the thing for which they are being used as a metaphor, but can not completely represent or contain it, nor can they represent it with completeness or full accuracy.

In some ways those of us steeped in monotheism might benefit from thinking in terms of multiple Gods, or at least by taking diverse metaphors for God more seriously.

Too often I think we have an image of God that is neatly packaged, defined and contained. We miss too much of God that way. We tame God too much that way. We try to keep God fitting into our theology, our religion, our society, our comfort zones. But of course God isn't so easily limited. It's our theology and ourselves that we're limiting. We're keeping parts of God at a distance when we could be drawing near. Sometimes those are the parts of God we or others may need to keep our spiritual lives engaged and growing.

Night Owl

I've long had a bit of a night owl tendency, and an appreciation of the benefits of being awake in the wee hours.

Since I spent a year & 9 months awhile ago working an overnight shift, and being influenced now by factors of relevance I will not enumerate, my schedule has not been the same.

You may notice that I'm posting at 4 something am.

While I could debate the pro's and con's of purposely altering the rhythm of my life to keep earlier hours...Ill refrain from boring you (and myself) by writing out that debate.

I do want to say: one advantage of the approach of winter is that I can be awake at such hours with decreased concern that the morning birds have begun to sing and the sky has begun to show signs of light.