Life, the universe, and everything…
Feb 21st, 2008 by spaceagesage
I grew up with the apocalypse on my horizon.
Yes, the whole Book of Revelation in the Bible was to hit before I went to college — all those plagues, the Four Horses of the Apocalypse, the rise of the Beast Power, and the darkening of the sun, moon and stars by a third.
(It kind of put a damper on this classroom question, “What do you want to be when you grow up?”)
So much for predictions about the end of the world. A whole generation of kids in the Worldwide Church of God (a cult religion born of Herbert W. Armstrong) never thought to plan for adulthood. We have been late bloomers ever since.
I have decided to bloom now.
Yeah, I am 48, thank you for asking.
I am still a follower of Christ, but age has made me a bit more sage. I don’t do cults anymore. I don’t look to any one person for answers. I don’t accept that I can call anyone good or bad anymore.
A few profound moments of clarity and understanding started me on this journey toward a genuine relationship with God and people.
One came to me when I realized God did not stop Adam and Eve from making their own decision about the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil. He gave them some stern warnings, and he could have intervened, but he did not.
Why not?
Did he have trouble communicating? Nope.
Did he have difficulties being a motivational leader? Nope.
Did he suck as a parental/authority figure? Nope.
Why would the God of the Universe allow such a cataclysmic decision to happen without intervention –a decision (metaphoric or not) that got us all kicked out of the Garden of Eden and left to wallow through life the hard way?
The God of life, the universe, and everything doesn’t make our decisions for us. We have complete freedom to choose.
~But wait — there’s more!~
I realized then that I don’t have the right to make anyone’s else decisions for them either … well … unless I want to think I am better than God.
- I have no right to take someone else’s inventory (as they say in 12-step programs)
- I have no right to impose my sense of right and wrong on anyone
- I have no right to make someone adhere to even what I think God prefers that they do
- I have no right to use shaming, guilt, verbal manipulation, a position of authority, or Bible thumping to show another person “the errors of their ways.”
As a person who grew up in a control-freak family environment with total emphasis on being perfectionists, this was quite revelatory. It took some time to wrap my head around it — going on about 3 years now.
I can still put my opinion and thoughts a public forum, I can offer advice to those genuinely asking, and I can live a positive example in my life, but you the reader make your own choices and create your own relationship with God, life, the universe, and everything.
The more I move away from neediness to judge others, the more I feel a sense of freedom that is amazingly peaceful. Since I don’t want to covet control over people who I used to think needed an “attitude adjustment,” I am free to let them be responsible for their own lives. We can now be independent or inter-dependent, but no longer co-dependent.
Viva la difference!