I want you to invent God.
Seriously.
This blog post is an invitation to you to invent God, and then tell me about this God in the comments below. If you are uncomfortable sharing what you write, feel free to leave an anonymous comment.
This is a practice I have occasionally done in small groups of people, but I am interested in seeing what sorts of response I get from you, my blog readers.
Here are the guidelines I want you to think about and follow as you invent God.
1. Forget Everything you Know about God
In order to invent God, you need to forget everything you have ever learned about God. Forget what the Bible says (or doesn’t say) about God. Forget what you have read in theology books. Forget what you have learned from Bible studies and sermons. If possible, just forget everything you know (or think you know) about God.
2. Look into your heart and imagine the perfect God
If you could invent God to be and do anything you wanted, how would God behave? How would God act? What would be the character and qualities of this God you invent? What would you want this God to do?
Describe this God in the comment section below.
3. WARNING!
There is the one caveat to this exercise I want you to keep in mind….
Remember that the God you invent will be the God of the entire world. So however this God behaves toward you is also the way this God will behave toward others.
This means that if you have this God give you $1 million, God will also give every other person $1 million, which doesn’t put you ahead of anyone else, and essentially makes that money meaningless.
Similarly, if you have this God kill all your enemies, just know that this God will also kill all the enemies of your enemies, which most likely means you yourself will get killed.
So in this exercise, whatever God does for one, God does for all.
Got it? Good.
Sound fun? Of course!
Is this dangerous? You bet!
But has that ever stopped us before? Nope.
So … On your marks … Get set … GO!
What would God be like if you could invent God? Leave your description in the comment section below. I am excited to read what you write.
After you leave your comment, share this post using the social buttons below to invite others to participate.
this god would be endlessly curious, and insatiably experiential … this god would be masculine and feminine, and ginormous and infinitesimal, and truthful and compassionate, expansive and contractive, and both light and dark, and both knowable and yet ineffable, and this god would be All in All, and in us *as* us … pretty much like god is, without all the religious attempts to define and confine who/how god is.
I would like God to speak to us in an audible voice. He would speak to us much like you and I would talk.
I would like for YHWH to speak to us more directly. I do not trust most of the “revelation” in scripture because I believe that most of it has been tainted by passing the message through human beings. For instance, I do not believe that the 613 mitzvot are legitimate commandments from YHWH. I believe that they were a collection of social conventions to keep the Israelite people bound together in common spiritual and social practices, particularly their sexual practices, that would increase their power and numbers relative to the neighboring peoples. Furthermore, many of the teachings of Saul of Tarsus after his conversion seem to contain more of his own opinions than Yehoshua’s teaching; Saul was a misogynist but Our Lord was not. Much evil has been done in the world by people who have treated scripture as being literally true and, particularly in the case of the Old Testament, as a pattern upon which to base behavior. The ancient Hebrews were a wicked people who were constantly killing other people, supposedly upon orders from “The Lord” yet YHWH’s son Yehoshua preached a completely different message that was filled with love for other people and instruction to live peacefully with them. Anyone who tries to follow the teaching of Yehoshua lieterally will see very quickly that the Old Testament practice of condemning to death anyone who doesn’t follow some laws strictly is directly contradictory to Yehoshua’s teaching. The one that troubles me the most is the condemnation of homosexuals because homosexuality is clearly inborn rather than a lifestyle “choice”. Why would The Lord order the execution of people for having a trait that they did not ask to be born with?
Nope
God would be physical. He would be eveything Jesus is but would talk and and be real not just a spirt. I have always felt that the Holy Spirit is a sad substitute for a physical Jesus. He would be as real as my wife. No more faith, no more testing, just be real in every sense a human understands.
He would be very humble and grace-based and let everyone into heaven regardless of anything and he would speak to us AUDIBLY but only the person he was talking to could hear and raising someone from the dead or healing of cancer would work each and every time regardless of faith or whatever.
Deidre, anything other than what you pointed out would be creating God in OUR image.
He’s pretty much everything I would want if I were to invent a deity, he’s very strategic, too. I just WISH for the audible/clearer voice and that healing would work first time 100% of the time.
REALLY I don’t mean to sound so negetive on all your blog posts, Jeremy, but someone has got to love you with the James 5:19 prescription.
Tell me of what possible value this line of thinking can have in the life of a disciple of Christ? Even Jesus posture before Yahweh was, “Not my will, but Thine be done.” and “I only do that which I see the Father doing.” How could it be healthy for us, who are far more fallen than Christ, to dare impose our personal agendas upon the Great I AM THAT I AM? …especially when He has made His Character and will known to us so clearly through His Creation, His Son, and His apostles. And yes, we are given His Spirit, to dwell in us as well, but not as a conflicting testimony to againts the other unambiguous testaments. But as a constant reminder of what the objective testaments say.
God playing may be fun for a season, but its end is always destruction! God is looking for people who want to be conformed into His image, to share His life with. He is never impressed with those who pretend to cary forth His will, but who are really far from who He really is! And right now, my brother, you are way off track!
Aaww! You took all the fun out of this. Spoil sport!
I think this is a very valuable and interesting question. The answers are fascinating too. Notice how many want to hear God’s voice, want more direction, more surety. The question I often ask myself is how do I need to change in order to be fully content with God as I understand Him. If I wanted more surety, I would realize that my faith is not so strong, if I wanted more direction I might realize that my sense of mission or values could develop more. In other words, what does my desire about what God ought to be like imply about my need for spiritual growth. If I was completely happy with God as I understand Him, wow, I’m totally in harmony with God: job done, lights out, I’m ready for heaven, thanks very much. I want God to be something God isn’t, and that means I need to look at myself and ask why.
In my case it’s not faith where I feel a need, nor surety, but peacefulness, patience, forgiveness, compassion. My “god” desire, reflects my own violence, anger, revenge fantasies, the pain within me that hasn’t healed. My “god” would be a tyrant, just like the one so many people believe in, the one I’m so grateful God isn’t.
I also think there is great value in this exercise, but especially for atheists. I think it would be quite fun to have them invent God with these same guidelines.
I’m not sure if I have ever read a statement more judgmental and antithetical to biblical teaching than Ben Cooper’s post. This is an exercise we often use in addiction counseling to help addicts see that the “god” they were taught about as a kid was not the true God. We have them “invent God” and they invariably pick the same things: forgiving, loving, just but merciful, etc. We then open our bible and show them the verses that says God are all these things. Too many Christians are teaching a false God who is mostly judgmental and harsh and unforgiving. I wonder if that might be your God Ben. If so I believe you are serving a manmade idol. This exercise helps those who have been abused by believers to find the true God who loves them and wishes for them to be his child.
First, I would want God to meet the three criteria the monotheistic religions usually ascribe to him: omniscient, omnipresent, and omnipotent. However, I understand these terms a little differently than they are commonly understood. Omniscience doesn’t mean that God knows everything there is to know; it means that he knows everything he chooses to know. Omnipresence doesn’t mean God is everywhere; it means he is wherever he chooses to be. Omnipotent doesn’t mean God can do anything; it means he does whatever he chooses to do. The element of choice is important in my mind because God is not a philosophical concept; he is a personal being, a free actor. My God knows whatever he chooses to know, is wherever he chooses to be, and does whatever he chooses to do. Anything more than this, and we lose the person; anything less, and we end up with a highly advanced alien.
Second, I would want God to be the creator of everything and to have a personal interest in us human beings. Whether he is uniquely interested in us — as opposed to, say, the two-headed, six legged intelligent creatures who live on Epsilon Eridani B — does not strike me as an important question. That he has a personal interest in me is important.
Third, I would want God to be just. I want to know that he cares about right and wrong, and acts to right the wrongs.
Fourth, I would want God to be compassionate. I want to know that he laughs with me when I laugh and cries with me when I cry.
Fifth, I would want God to take delight in my creativity. I want to know that he wants me to become a co-creator with him.
Sixth, I would want God to be engaged in my life. I want to know that God is with me as I make my way through life.
I like this!
A God who allows me to see through His eyes, I would know what he knows (trusting Him not scare me into the next century), who would speak to me as my best friend as we journey together daily. The gifts He provides to me would be there daily to do the things He wants me to do. The words I speak would come from Him (no foot in mouth issues anymore) and I would have His grace and Patience as I journey through life. I would deeply know the wonder of His creation and know just how much He loves me and everyone else.
As you said, not the God I believe in but the God I would invent.
My god wouldn’t allow children and animals to suffer. They would simply die instantly if a healing was not in his plan. If a healing was part of the plan, then they would remain unconscious until someone asked or acknowledged a need from him. My god would answer every prayer right away with a yes, no, or wait, rather than keeping everyone guessing. My god would make himself known for who he really was from time to time in order to dispel false images perpetrated by the imaginations of men. My god would allow those who would be interested in such things, to travel to different galaxies, dimensions, and meet other being’s of his creation. My omnipresent god would be physically available to touch, hug, converse with, and to receive council from. The Why Guy
Amen to this.
How does something silly become an “Amen”, but I thank you for commenting. Maybe some of my sillyness touched something in your heart. Your “Amen” touched mine.
I am not able to create God. Let me be God as what I want is actually me. What this God is will be is what I want it to be. Then It no longer be God since whatever It is, is under my power.
God is great and everything about Him is great.
People have been worshipping and obeying the god they’ve created for centuries and that’s resulted in the deaths of millions of those who had a different perspective of who god is. I think it would’ve been ‘safer’ to ask us to describe God, pretending we’ve never heard the gospel, went to church, or grew up in a family/country that had no religious views.
If that were the assignment I’d be in awe and reverence of the One who created such a wondrous universe and world. But I’d be confused as to why such a mighty being would allow evil, poverty, disease, and suffering. I would want a God that eradicated all these ills, who intervened in the affairs of nations and individuals, who ensured the well-being of all His creation.
I would want a God who not only knew everything about me but would help me through the difficult times. I would want Him to be a faithful friend who loved me unconditionally. In turn, I could not help but love Him back.
Orlando,
I believe God often permits what He can prevent.
Wow! What a topic! You do come up with amazing challenges.
I don’t know that I can totally shut out preconceptions, but I’ll try.
God would have to be bigger than the universe, however extensive that is. So we better make him infinite in scope and power, though that is quite impossible to imagine. So that would make Him pretty much unlimited since He is creator of all. And then He has to at least be benevolent and without evil since a bad god is really not a good idea at all. Of course, I would like Him to have created me and everything else out of this wonderful benevolence. Should we call that benevolence “love”? Perhaps. As creator too His scope for creation is unlimited and totally without boundaries – so wildly imaginative and creative beyond our comprehension. I run out of superlatives – He would be bigger, better, greater, wilder, more beautiful and wonderful than I could possibly imagine in my limited human mind.
I’m finding as I think about this, and run out of superlatives, how I limit Him in my daily experience, because really this wonderful god that I imagine is less than the wonderful god that He really is. So this exercise is really helping me to expand my faith and trust in Him.
Thanks for doing this.
I would love to do this, but it is not possible to erase everything I have ever read or thought about God. So the most important thing I would love of a self invented god, or of the one and only real God, is to sit with me as a person I can see and have a talk for hours maybe. Ask him everything I want to know about him and the things he does and has done and what love really is, not our small concept of it, but how he meant it to be. And I would want to know what holy spirit is and does.
One thing Jeremy is that in doing this you learn a lot about the peeps reading your blog. What they are insecure about and secure.
He was definitely true and if everyone in the world followed him, there would be no suffering. There is no doubt that he is real and this is objectively true. He’s as provable as the Earth’s roundness. But he would also give us free will. He wants us to love him genuinely, not for entrance into paradise or for special favors.
But I have a dilemma:
A lot of people still choose to deny this proven and morally perfect God. And because they aren’t filled with him, they sin. What’s stopping them considering they don’t have to worry about punishment? Regardless of sin, they remain in paradise forever. As long as these people are around, suffering will be rampant.
Should God let them be? If He let them be, this would keep suffering in the world and then we could accuse God of not acting. We already blame the Abrahamic God for not stopping the evil in the world.
Now, should the God destroy the people who cause this suffering so that the world can be brought to perfect peace? It sounds good. But if YHWH is real, isn’t that what He already did when he judged the Canaanites and Israel? Yet we call him unrighteous for that, so we have already rejected this solution.
Or should God find a new way? Should he give us a period of time where we have the freedom to change? Then, after the period is over, he only raises up the ones who freely chose to follow him by *acting* according to him in different situations. They would be the ones who passed the tests. But then that leaves you with this problem: If God was clearly proven to the world, then many people would follow him just for the blessings and entrance into paradise. And then when they were all raised and the ultimatum was taken away, they would start causing suffering all over again. Plus, if God decided to threaten them at every moment, would the love of his children be genuine?
Maybe God could fully prove himself to the entire world, but not tell them about punishment or reward. That seems like it would work, because the people would only follow him for the righteousness of it. But would we then accuse God of not warning us?
Perhaps God could only choose those who genuinely followed God and would not return to sin, even when they were raised up and then guaranteed to not be at risk of punishment. But how do we know who is who? Perhaps he could design a test. In the test, God could be found, but you had to search for him. Therefore, those who did not care to do what is right and fully seek God to see if he was real, but only cared for the bliss of heaven, would seek the pleasures of the world and not give God a full chance by putting their full heart into seeking him. They might be curious for about whether these blessings were real, but they wouldn’t through everything to this being’s feet because they would immediately lose the pleasures of the world. For them it would be like thinking “Why throw away all my entertainment in exchange for a lottery ticket?” They would not find God and thus would not follow him. They are then taken out of the picture and would not be raised up to return to sin. But those who were not concerned with bliss, but with God, would seek him genuinely (not being stopped by the suffering and material losses) and find him if they did so with all their hearts. This would also mean that people would all hear about the consequences for sin even though it was not fully proven. They would have the opportunity to know the consequences, but they could choose not to believe them.
But what if someone stumbled on God but then changed and only cared for the benefits? If they stumbled on him and had total proof of him, they might change and begin only following him to get into Heaven. So to prevent that, there must be some sort of constant seeking required, like Faith. Therefore, if they changed, they would fall away. This would mean that you had to be genuinely in it to follow God, but then you also had to actually act how following him requires.
But then what about those who legitimately seek God in our world, but never find him? That seems incredibly unfair. Perhaps God could prove himself to the world. And then once all the people who followed him were raised up, he would kill anyone who returned to causing suffering. But isn’t that what happened with Canaan and Israel already? They clearly saw God, but they still sinned. And we call God vile for killing them.
But maybe God could simply judge our hearts and not our deeds. That would fix this whole dilemma. But how does judging a heart work? Wouldn’t he need to place us in a simulation to test how we would respond to various situations? But isn’t that what we are already in!
Maybe he could just create a world without sin. But that would take away freedom. Wouldn’t it?
Here is what I don’t want:
–A god who throws people in hell and has them burn for trillions of years on end.
–A hard to understand 3 in 1 god that no one can explain and I cant sit and talk to one day face to face.
Jesus says that sinners will be destroyed, not tortured. He speaks of life versus death, not life in a bad place versus life in a good place. When talking about the word “hell,” we must scrap all our modern conceptions of the place and listen to what the Bible actually says.
>28 Do not be afraid of those who kill the body but cannot **kill** the soul; but rather be afraid of Him who can **destroy** both soul and body in hell. (Mathew 10:28)
>”Then they will go away to eternal punishment, but the righteous to eternal **life**.” (Mathew 25:26)
>For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not **perish** but have eternal **life**. (John 3:16)
**Let’s look at some verses that seem to suggest a Hell**
**Jesus does speak about destruction in an “eternal fire”. So doesn’t that mean the fire will never go out?**
According to Jude, no. In Jude, Sodom and Gomorrah are referred to as having been burned by “unquenchable fire.”
>In a similar way, Sodom and Gomorrah and the surrounding towns gave themselves up to sexual immorality and perversion. They serve as an example of those who suffer the punishment of eternal fire. (Jude 1:7)
But they obviously still aren’t burning. Here is an illustration
>If you light a match and let it burn to ashes, the match cannot be reconstituted into a match, it has been eternally burned and destroyed. The match burned until there was nothing left to burn, then the fire went out.
Some verses speak of “everlasting death.” This is death that is never undone. The saved will die for a time, but it is not everlasting. They are resurrected to eternal life. The sinners will die once and for all. It has been argued by some that the sinners actually don’t *literally* die. Instead, they “spiritually die.” They actually remain alive and are tortured for all eternity. But this is a stretch. Another theological issue with a Hell of life and torture is that sin would never be destroyed. It would remain forever.
Jesus speaks of “Hell,” but “Hell” simply didn’t have the meaning that we’ve added to it today. “Hell” is translated from the Greek word Gahenna which means the Valley of Hinnom. This valley in Israel was a place where people burned their children to death as sacrifices to the gods. It was considered so detestable by Israelites that they burned their trash and buried their criminals there (http://www.theopedia.com/gehenna).
One verse that people interpret as referring to an eternal life of torture is Mark 9:48:
>”to be cast to the gehenna of the fire — where their worm is not dying, and the fire is not being quenched;” (Mark 9:48 according to the YLT)
Hell supporters interpret this as meaning that the person’s soul is the worm and it’s burning in an unquenchable fire.
But it can also be understood as meaning that those who are thrown into “hell” will be consumed by worms and fire until their is nothing left. The worms and the fire do not stop consuming.
Here is how the NIV translates it:
>”be thrown into hell, where ‘the worms that eat them do not die, and the fire is not quenched.'”
(Mark 9:48 according to the NIV.)
But how do we know that this is the right interpretation of Mark 9:48? First of all, Hell being a place of eternal *torture* is clearly refuted by a wealth of other verses. But the smoking gun is from Isaiah. Here, Jesus is quoting from Isaiah where it says,
>”And they will go out and look on the **dead bodies** of those who rebelled against me; the worms that eat them will not die, the fire that burns them will not be quenched, and they will be loathsome to all mankind.” (Isaiah 66:24)
It says that their *dead bodies* are eaten by worms and that they burn! Not that the sinners’ souls were like worms and that they were tortured for all eternity.
Yes,that all makes sense but what about Luke 16:19-31 – The rich man in hell.
Perhaps it’s a contradiction. But I think it’s important to realize that it’s a parable. Would there really be a physical chasm between Heaven and Hell? Why would a tiny bit of water help someone if they’re burning to death for eternity? There are other holes in the view of Hades in this passage. Do a Google search if you’re looking for more.
I found this very helpful.
http://www.revisedenglishversion.com/Appendix/5/Annihilation-in-the-Lake-of-Fire
My imaginations could not let me think past few things I read and know about God but in an attempt to invent God I would rather put the play this way; putting a light bulb on a center of table with little particles of crystals scatter all around the light bulb that the light shine so bright it reflects the crystals scattered on the table. Imagine what happen to the crystals and whatever color the bulb changes it would be what those crystals would look like. God will be without a name but rather a reflection of what we see, every situation will describe what God is capable of. When we see the sun we will say today he appear as a sun to the moon the same thing to stars, to the rain, the sky, water and everything that our natural eye could see. Familiarity will then become the problem and also new discovery will also become the area of concern. But the best way that I can possibly invent God is by the illustration of light bulb and the crystals reflections thank you.
makes a lot of sense.
Your wish can be granted.
HeSheIt would any and everything instantly that I wanted once I say the magic phrase “Abracadabra”… It would all be reversed or radically adjusted on the fly…moment by moment according to my moody whims in order to keep me as satisfied and happy as I knew how to be…constantly… Or, just bypass the middle man, and I…or, the ideal, best possible Me, would be God… Oddly, that is also th very last thing I’d make of Him as well… Were I God, my first act would be to find another more worthy and better at it than I can even imagine ever being… A god, maybe. Just not GOD.
Jeremy Meyers’ challenge to “Invent God” elicited some interesting responses, ranging from “I want God to be like … (fill in the blank)” to “This is a silly exercise.” Many of the responses pointed toward the the several unanswerable questions about God and why he does things the way he does; questions that trouble us whenever we think about them.
• Why does God hide behind a veil of silence instead of talking to me in plain English (or whatever my native language is) like other people do?
• Why does God require me to obey his will, and then make it so damned hard to figure out what his will is?
• Why does God tell the Israelites to commit genocide?
• What kind of God has his own private torture chamber where he can roast unbelievers for all eternity?
• If God is both good and all-powerful, why does he allow so much pain and suffering to go on in the world?
• Will my cat go to heaven? (Okay … I made that one up)
• Add your own favorite conundrum here …
These are the kinds of questions that make us wonder if all this God stuff is really true. It is no surprise that our re-invention of God tends toward imagining a God who doesn’t leave us in the dark about these things; in other words, a God without mystery.
I find myself sympathetic. I, too, wish God would just show up and talk to me, instead of hiding behind a veil of unknowing. I, too, wish God’s perfect will for my life was writ large on my bedroom wall fresh every morning, preferably in big block letters so I can’t possibly miss it. I, too, wish God would explain himself with respect to the genocide he ordered. I, too, wish God would shut down Hell. I, too, wish God would make all the pain and suffering go away.
But I did not include any of these things in my contribution to this exercise of inventing God. Instead, I focused on the attributes I hope are true of God. I hope he knows me and understands my hopes and dreams. I hope he is with me no matter where I go. I hope he has the power to make right all the wrongs. I hope he created the whole universe, and that he wants me to be creative too, and takes delight in my little attempts at creating things. I hope he is a just and fair God. I hope he is a compassionate God, one who laughs with me when I laugh, and cries with me when I cry. These are the things that I hope are true about God. The rest I am willing to leave to him.
I don’t know why God has set things up the way he has, or why he does things the way he does. As much as I would like to understand, I am willing to believe that God knows what he is doing; that he is competent; that he isn’t a bumbling god who was playing around one day and inadvertently created a totally messed up world that he hasn’t gotten around to cleaning up yet. I am willing to believe that God knows more and better than I do. I think this is called faith.
a god i could never invent or imagine.
I read the following yesterday and it made me think of your assignment: “Often we can be trapped by our own preconceived notions of how God judges, how God reacts, and how God relates to us. Some of these come from the unhealthy ways that other authority figures, like parents or teachers, may have related to us, rather than from the ways that God actually relates to people. We end up withdrawing farther from a God of our own making, rather than drawing closer to the God who made us.”
i have tried to reach you but there has been no responce. Please let me know if you get this email mail i would love to hear from you. If I could create GOD there would be no hell. Otherwise he would be just like he is in the Bible Jim Lavenson
Did you have a question?
A god which would demote itself to mortal form and die, not take sides with good, bad, human or animal. To not be selfish of being all powerful. Just die and let the universe run as it wishes, an autonomous non judging universe. And humans, sort this world ourselves. I guess non suffering is a privilege, the natural world is cruel from our point of view, it’s a suffer, fight, or die world.
Example, if we intervened in stopping lions kill zebra all the time out of our own moral judgement, that lion species would starve, would that be right. Best let it be.
Thank goodness I am not able to do such a thing literally. However I can attempt to emulate him by being Just,Clean, and Compassionate in my thoughts and behaviors. Being truthful and transparent in my actions and deeds.
Not sure what the Heavenly Father’s words would be on such a post as this; However since man is supposed to be the temple of God and God is to be able to dwell within us.
This should be about reinventing ourselves and by reinventing ourselves we should be accountable whether good or bad.