I Can See God

When I was a child, my mother would drag my 5 siblings and I to church. Always Christian, usually Pentecostal, never without a fight.

I recall sitting in Sunday school thinking that this woman who was singing songs to me about bubbles in her soul and telling me that some guy who built a boat was able to get 2 of every animal in the world on it was absolutely nuts. I wasn't buying it, and I wondered how she could - and spent a lot of time trying to figure out if she really did. However, it was better than sitting out with the adults for the adult sermon. When they began speaking in tongues it gave me the heebie-jeebies.

Kinda like this -

HEEEEEBIE-JEEEEEBIES!

So when I outgrew Sunday school I volunteered to do infant care.

A pretty rough childhood, followed by a rocky set of teenage years, (and really, early adulthood was no picnic either) left me looking for that question of "Why? Why are we here? There has to be some sense to it, right?"

I went day by day looking for answers to those questions that no one knows. Studying every religion I could get my eyes and ears on, and finding pieces of truth - MY truth - scattered in between, but never on a whole. Every religion has it;s own set rules - it's own dogma. I kept looking for my label. Never able to embrace atheism, unable to call myself agnostic, although I didn't have religion of my own.

The last wish of my former husbands dying grandmother was that my marriage embrace the Christian faith. Now that's a whole lot of guilt to lay on a person. It was considered, but decided that I could never be forced to believe in something. It doesn't work that way. I don't work that way. I don't understand how anyone can think others could be coerced or forced into a religion. Long gone are the days of "believe or else".

I think that was the turning point for me; when I stopped asking everyone else the questions and began asking them to myself. What matters to me? Why do I want to be here? What is my purpose? Who am I?

I think when you go through dark times for so long, it makes that light so much brighter when it's finally there. I had to make a choice:

Live or Don't.

So I lived. I stopped trying to force life to happen and I just let it happen.

What does that have to do with God? Everything.

LIVE!

Love yourself enough to let the stress of life go once in a while. Love others enough to let them be who they are! We don't have to have all the answers. We can drive ourselves crazy with who, what, when, where, why, how - and in the end, it doesn't matter one bit unless you experience life for yourself. If you can let go of your worries just long enough to look outside yourself, the view is magnificent.

Serving others.
Breathing in fresh air.
The smell of a newborn baby.
The laugh of a child.
Whatever makes you smile.

In the end I realized: I don't need a label. I've had faith my entire life.

How can I see God in all of this?

How can you not?