The Big Guy Upstairs

I've been reading Marcus Borg's book "The God We Never Knew," and it's got me thinking. When you were little, how did you imagine God? For Borg, his "picture" of God was based on the Lutheran pastor of his childhood--an old man in the sky. As he grew up, Borg found this way of thinking about God as harder and harder to stomach. For one thing, if God's "up there" somewhere, how far away is God if the universe is practically infinite? And if God is that far away, how much does it really matter that God exists at all?

I think it's easy for kids to take things literally, but when you grow up, how you think about things changes. This isn't just for spirituality, but I think a lot of people hold onto religious pictures and ideas from childhood, when an adult faith looks a lot different. Kids and adults understand things differently.

So, what if we think about God a different way--as existing here and now, but in a spiritual dimension? Greater than the universe, but also present everywhere in it. Not as some man with a white beard, but as a force, or a presence or a Spirit. What if God is like The Force (except for the whole--relying on bacteria and being manipulate-able by Jedis--thing)?

Some food for thought.