What Does Your God Look Like?

One of the perennial dangers of the life of faith is loving the gifts more than the Giver. It is the root of idolatry and broken-down relationships. Genesis tells us that human beings are made in the image of God, but only a short while after creation people began trying to make God in their own image. Here are some popular counterfeit gods…

God, the cosmic vending machine: This god exists to cater to your every whim. Have a need, say a prayer, you will get a “guaranteed answer within 24 hours” (you may have to reply with “amen” or repost on social media to access the guarantee!). Since this is a transaction, not a relationship, all you need to know is your desire and the correct amount to insert and you are happily on your way.

God, the fortune teller: this god specializes in the future and is truly helpful, if you can just decode the messages being sent. Since knowledge is power, knowing your future makes you feel fully in control. Lots of people like this model.

God, the divine therapist: this god is very helpful because you can bring your messed-up life, tell your story and expect that wisdom and healing will flow like a river, without much work on your part. Living in a therapeutic culture, this image of God is always a best seller.

God, the GPS for life: if you like planning and order more than adventure and uncertainty, God as GPS may be exactly what you are looking for in a deity. You say, “Let’s make a deal,” agree to the terms, then you can move confidently through life with no surprises or unwanted circumstances. Deal?!

A pattern can be observed in these images of God – we provide the “problem” and God provides the “solution.” There is so much truth in this pattern of God as helper, healer, provider, teacher, redeemer, and guide, which makes it easy to believe our truncated image of God is, in fact, the fullness of God. We are suffering from a devastating lack of imagination when it comes to our perception of God.   

I recently read these fascinating words from Greg Boyd: “I think our mental picture of God is the most important fact about our life. All other things being equal, the beauty of our life won’t outrun the beauty of our vision of God.”

The move from viewing God as an object to be obtained, manipulated, used, and controlled, to perceiving God as a personal being who seeks a relationship with you is life changing to say the least. In many ways this is the best news possible – God loves you and desires your love in return. But the catch, and there is always a catch in love, is that it must be a relationship and not just a series of transactions. In this relationship I am surely going to lose my “self” – as in my selfishness, my self-control, my self-centeredness. Jesus called it “denying yourself!” Yet as my self dies and is reborn in this relationship of love with God, I find that I do not need a vending machine, a fortune teller, a divine therapist, or a GPS for life because all these needs and many more are already contained in the love of Christ. Here is how Paul describes it: “I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, may have power, with all the saints, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, and to know this love that surpasses knowledge – that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God! (Ephesians 3:17-19) This is good news, but it is also demanding news – because to be loved calls forth a response of love. To be filled with the fullness of God we must first be emptied of everything that is not God. That is painful: because we treasure our idols, because we abhor being empty.  

We are in mystical territory here – trying to know a love that surpasses knowledge – it is time for some experience! If you could use a walking companion as you enter deeper into this journey of faith, I would be delighted to walk with you for a while.