God's Country

Yesterday, in the course of speculating about whether or not God cares if we live or die, I assumed without deciding that heaven was a place where you got to talk to God. The truth is, I don't think the afterlife is probably like that at all.

In fact, a lot of the things I assumed were things that probably are not true. God probably doesn't care if we live or die because God probably doesn't "care" in the way we understand emotions. It's so hard to comprehend, but the truth is, probably, that God is nothing like us.

Now, I assume that God exists because the universe must have come from somewhere, but after that I assume nothing...God could be anything, as far as I'm concerned. I know that I feel the presence of God sometimes, but feeling the presence of something and knowing what that thing is are two very different things.

We speak as if God is like us because we have no other frame of reference. I guess the Bible also says that God created us in "His Own Image," but even if we look like God, we're not like God, because God created everything and we can't do that. And I've got to say, if I were all-powerful, I wouldn't want myself to look like us. At least, not all the time.

So what is God? To me it seems that God is probably incomprehensible, unimaginable, and unthinkable. God might look like us on the outside, but does "His Own Image" also mean that we think and feel in a way that is like the way God "thinks" or "feels"? I mean, imagine the mind of something that could create an entire world out of nothing, and watch that world grow and change for millennia without getting impatient, because time means nothing if you don't die. Such an entity would have to be pretty different from us. So many human frames of reference are dependent on our conception of our own short lives. God's conception of things has got to be different.

So, when it comes to heaven...well, if going to heaven means going to live with God, it probably doesn't involve "talking" and "feeling" and other human things. I suppose God could make heaven a lot like Earth for our comfort, but that seems boring...wouldn't it make more sense if, when you got to heaven, you got to see things God's way? "Back when you were mortal, you experienced existence in one way...but now, check this out!"

Of course, the fact that something, which we will call God, must have created the universe does not, in itself, imply heaven. When we die, it could just be that the lights go out, and that's the end for us. Scary, but true.

However, if there is a heaven, what would you actually do there? The movies show the dead in heaven mostly still concerned with the living, but it seems unlikely that you'd want to spend all your time watching your living loved ones go about their days. Hopefully, heaven is not a place where nothing happens. Hopefully, when you get there, you find answers. There is so little we understand about ourselves and the universe we live in, it's comforting to think that, when you get to heaven, God puts His hands over your eyes, walks you into a room, takes His hands off, and you stand there, blinking, and then you say, "Ah. I get it."

People say that the will of God is not for mortal minds to know; some people take that to mean that you shouldn't even try, because it's wrong to try to understand God. But I think it just means that we're not capable of knowing it, not that we shouldn't think about it. At least, I hope so, because I can't help thinking about it. So, if it's bad to do that, I'm in trouble.

Next time: Hell.