" So God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them. And God blessed them, and God said unto them, Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth, and subdue it . . ."
I have been a christian my whole life and I still am but that does not mean that I believe that God is a Christian. I am a christian because I was raised with that historical view of the world. I was born in a Catholic country (Brazil), I had my experiences with the supernatural love of God under the christian perspective, in a protestant country (USA) and I love all of that. But latelly I came to realise that my experience is only mine, I can't agree with my brother that was raised with me in the same house in our image of God, how can I even start to compare my image of God with someone that was born in India, or in Africa, or in China.
I believe that God is Love and Love is God, there is nothing that can describe God rather than Love and there is nothing that can describe Love rather than God. So if you want to know where God is look for Love and if you want to know where God is not find a place where there is no Love. And as far as I can grasp the definition of Love is the oposite of selfishness. When you act against your own natural will of protecting yourself and put someone else in front of your own desire, fear, need, etc. . . than you are acting in Love. So in the end, every religion and life filosophy either talks about denying ownself and desires or serving others. Even though I think that only denying yourself without a purpose does not acomplish too much, in the end the definition stands. This is in the Bible, the Torah, the Koran and I believe (even thought I can't say because I don't know) that this notion is in every holy book of every culture. For me this is what unites creation.
Every person is capable of loving someone else. Forget about romance, I'm talking about real love for others. Love that is willing starve in order to feed others (like Ghandi), love that is willing to "waste" your whole life just to take care of poor and dying people (like Madre Theresa), love that is willing to loose a furtune just to teach people the ways of the Lord (Like St Francis). If anyone in this earth is capable of a little piace of that unselfish service to someone else this person has found God and is part of God's family and will be fruitifull perfectly express God's grace and love in this creation.
If Love is what unites every religion and every experience with the supernatural, to lack this understanding is what creates the separation. All of the religions in the world are right in the sense that their experience is real, but they are wrong to think that their experience is the only real one. God's work includes every place on earth and every culture, every simbolism and every translation that somebody's mind can make when they experience His Love.
Finally in the last years of my life, surelly the most troubled years of my life, I found out that there is no Love for God if not through loving and serving others. Beeing in a place where you have no way out but wait untill the pain goes away makes us closer to the pain of others and makes us see that we are all the same and part of the same body. So you may run to the end of the highway trying to find God in your prayers and in your spiritual exercises, or in the way you leave your life or in what you eat or drink or the way you dress or worship.
As far as I understood (untill this day, this statement may change tomorow ! !) you will only find God and express His love when you learn how to love the person that is next to, especially the different one that does not agree with you, and from those relationships you can have sons and daughers your faith, your love, your work, your compassion, your mistakes, fruits of who you are. That is how God fills the earth with his Glory, by you and I receiving his Love and spreading it as fruits of our relationships with others. So, don't be part of the "eat from this fruit" story that lead our world to where we are, but remember that YOU are the fruit and have all the means to be fruitfull. Be a giver instead of a taker so that you can multiply and fill the earth.
Jesus said: This is how my Father shows who he is—when you produce grapes, when you mature as my disciples. (John 15:8)
God Bless you,
Alex
