God Within You

There is a charming story told about a little girl who was visiting her grandparents on their farm. She was having the most intriguing time going from chickens to cows to pigs. She studied her grandfather while he milked the cows. Her microscopic eyes were fastened on her grandmother while she baked pies that “smelled like heaven” as her grandmother would say with such a beautiful smile. She loved visiting her grandparents. It was such a thrilling adventure.

One day she walked with her grandfather down to the well. As he about to lower the bucket, she asked, exploding the soft, calm summer day with a theological bomb, as children so often can, “Grandpa, where does God live?”

Her grandfather paused and thought for a while. Then he picked his little granddaughter up with arms as sturdy as the branches of an old oak tree. He held her over the well and asked, “What do you see down there?”

“I see me!” she squealed with the trumpeting excitement of discovery.

“Well, Honey,” her grandfather whispered, “that’s where God lives.”

One of the best kept secrets in Christianity is this: God, the infinite, all-powerful, eternal Trinity, Father, Son and Spirit, dwells within each one of you and is closer to you than you are to yourself.

This is the mystery of the Divine Indwelling.

Jesus proclaimed in words as clear as the water of Jacob’s well, “I have come that they may have life and have life to the fullest.” And where God’s life is, there is God.

This is one of the most ancient doctrines of our faith. A belief, I’m afraid, that for the most part is lost in the dusty annals of history. It is a faith-conviction which, if lived, could make all the difference in your life in a way as vivid as the Transfiguration, as subtle as water changed into wine, as dramatic as a prostitute repenting her way into sanctity.

Do you have trouble praying? Do you get easily disconcerted? Aggravated? Depressed? Stressed? Anxious?

Is the supersonic speed of today’s living and working, the technological wizardry, the twisting and torturous demands on you, the overall messiness of life making you feel like your path through life is filled with blistering hot coals that keep you running, jumping and suffering?

Do you feel like you’re being forced to be an instrument of industry and Big Business? And your stress is only intensified by your seeking release in the hectic pace of compulsive religion?

Do you have low self-esteem? Lack a sense of self-worth and self-acceptance? Do you feel socially inadequate? Are you easily intimidated? Are you displeased with who you are? Do you consistently indulge in fantasies that create a different you?

Are you having problems loving and being loved? Do you feel disillusioned in your marriage? Lonely in your single life? Are you bored with the routine of your daily living and relating? Are you too cautious and wary about making new friends? Do you feel you are the victim of your current friends’ manipulations? Are you concerned that you are going through life drawing on your repertoire of counterfeit emotions?

I’m not going to pretend that I can supply you with satisfactory answers to all or even one of these problems. I will not be giving you a box of religious vitamins nor will I be advocating some kind of utopian romanticism. But what I intend to do is to indicate to you that your unpacked consciousness of the mystery of the Divine Indwelling will help you.

I am convinced that people are tired of speculating on a kind of religious Wall Street as far as increasing their spiritual wealth is concerned. They are fed up with sugary platitudes. Sincerely religious people are craving the raw spiritual challenges that will stretch their abilities and talents far beyond what they thought they were capable of.