YouTube: What if God Was One of Us?
To the Jewish mind of Jesus’ day, claiming oneness with God was a crime punishable by stoning. That the foundation of his message was oneness with God probably contributed to his conviction in the Jewish court.
With her 90s hit song, “One of Us,” Joan Osborne met with similar resistance from mainstream Christian groups. While the song takes a rather anthropomorphic view of God, it has the effect of bringing the abstract notion of God into the human experience. This is what we want to do. Many people picture God as having an existence somewhere in a distant realm. We want to think of God as the creative life force, the vital essence of every living thing. Most importantly, we want to think of God as centered at the core of our being.
If God was one of us, that would again put us in a place of separation. If God becomes a stranger on the bus, and I’m not on that bus, then I’m here and God is not. However, the purpose of engaging in such reflections is not to run aground in problems with literal interpretations. I consider the idea of God being present in my life at this moment, actively involved right on my level. How would I think of my life if this were true?
One near-death experiencer said he met a being of light whose telepathically transmitted voice he instantly recognized as the intuitive voice he’d heard all his life. What if we acknowledged the countless ways through which we are connected to God’s guidance and inspiration? Might we not pay a little closer attention to that stranger on the bus? This thought is a powerful point of contemplation: I am in God, and the full light of God shines through me and through all people and things in my life.
I did not ride with strangers on a bus this week, but I sat with some in a waiting room at the Social Security office. It occurred to me that each one had a unique story to tell, a journey that had brought them to that moment. As I waited for my number to be called, I thought how interesting it would be to have everyone share their story. While I refrained from suggesting this idea to the group, I silently offered each person a blessing, wishing them peace and success in their ongoing journeys. I will never know if this simple prayer had any impact. What I know is that the exercise prompted me to ponder a different question: What if God was all of us?
J Douglas Bottorff 