How Can We Possibly Comprehend God?

No matter what we say about God, or the attributes we assign to God, we ultimately have no clear idea of God’s essence.

“God is very unique, having no beginning, and having no end. The God of the Bible exists outside of our dimensions of time and space. So, any attempt to find analogies to help you to understand God will be lacking and incomplete. God is an uncreated being, and any attempt for finite people to understand or describe God will end up wanting.

 Let’s say, just for fun, that there are two flat people, Jack and Jill who live in a two-dimensional plane. And let’s say these flat people have a loving creator who is a three-dimensional person that they have named “God.” So, we have a three-dimensional God who is the creator of two flat people who live in a two-dimensional world.

As flat people live out their lives, they would wonder and speculate about their unseen creator. Within their two-dimensional world they could draw flat pictures or make diagrams of their creator, but they would have some serious difficulties trying to understand the nature of God from within their two-dimensional perspective. Sure, they could speculate and make analogies, but it would be very difficult for them to fathom.

Now, how could God be made known to the flat people? God may show up in a dream, or could show God’s self to their world. God could take a three-dimensional finger and place it through the flat world plane. What would the flat people say that their God looks like from within their limited world?

They would say that God looks like a circle. In fact, being a pessimist, you might likely say, “I can understand God as a circle, but I cannot understand or believe that God exists in three dimensions. That makes no sense!”

It is very difficult for two-dimensional beings living on a two dimensional plane to understand a three-dimensional being. Likewise, we humans have the same difficulty. We are finite three-dimensional human creatures trying to explain an uncreated personal God outside our three dimensions.”  Matt Paulson

Maybe a phenomena called near- death experience can provide some clues .

According to people who have had near-death experiences, two common themes in most accounts are LIGHT and LOVE.

What Do We Know About Light?

So…light- beaming, glowing, brilliant, blazing, incandescent, luminous and radiant. Or what the Roman church referred to God as LUX ETERNA- eternal light.

“And so this is what light is: an electric field tied up with a magnetic field, flying through space.

You can think of the two fields as dance partners, wrapped up in an eternal embrace. To keep self-generating, both electric and magnetic components need to stay in step. It takes two to tango.”  Cosmos: The Science of Everything

Quick Physics Lesson-LIGHT

Electric charge and magnetic pole are synonymous. They represent relative directions of imaginary lines of force that indicates direction of respective fields.

Virtually every single process which is keeping you alive can be traced back to an electric field that some component of your body is creating.  These electric fields are caused by charged particles.

Magnetic fields are caused by moving charged particles. Biomagnetism is the phenomenon where magnetic fields are produced by living things, especially by the human body and these magnetic fields are very weak,

“Typically an electric field will cause a magnetic one and vice versa; in fact, that’s how electromagnetic waves propagate.

Not only is it possible that the human body creates EM fields — it is the only way you can possibly exist as a coherent entity!

You are an electric field — a giant electric field which holds your atoms together, and which uses other electric fields to talk to different parts of yourself.”  Jack Fraser

Thought to ponder- If an electric field is tied up with a magnetic field, what might that say about the relationship of a God of light, and human beings possessing both electric and magnetic fields???

ENCOMPASSING LIGHT

Personally, if we take into account near death experiences, I think then we have an idea of at least two of the qualities of God.

Almost all those who have gone through a NDE report seeing light brighter than the sun, and feeling a love that surpasses anything they have ever known.  Most described an unearthly and otherworldly kind of light

(All following personal accounts come from the website- Near Death Experience Research Foundation)– www.NDERF.org

 I remember seeing a blinding bright light but I turned away because I was trying to breathe. Everything was so bright and vivid I remember it even now. Paige

I saw a very bright white light, unlike anything on earth.  Alex

Then, I saw the brightest light.  It is hard to describe because I’ve never seen it here on earth.  The light did not hurt my eyes.  Pamela

The light was extremely bright and white but not hurtful to my eyes and definitely not the sun kind of light where it is or would be warm or scalding in this case.  Arlene
I saw a massive ball of light of indescribable brightness. I knew immediately this was God.  Greg

I was in a tremendously vast, light-flooded space. The space was without limits, like space without space. The light was bright, warm, pleasant, and loving. It didn’t have any source, but was everywhere. When I arrived, I felt loved and endlessly happy. I knew, here is my real home.  Sybille

   It was the fullest, most beautiful extended light I have ever seen. Time had stopped. It was simply magnificent and all encompassing. I felt utterly amazed, light, welcome, curious and loved. There was nothing but love and light, and I opened to it, I wanted more.  Siri

I saw an indescribably, powerful light. It was like the brightness of sunlight going through a prism, as if all colors were present but yet all colors are mixed together. It was much more powerful than simply being ‘ brightness.’ I was attracted by this light, yet it is impossible to say if I was going towards it or if it was coming towards me. The closer it came, the more I felt the immense love emanating from it. The love was so indescribable, that I never knew it before and never experienced it again.  Julie

The light was so bright and comforting I wanted to stay forever. The light didn’t hurt my eyes but all you could see was the brightness of the light and you could feel yourself floating or rising in the light. Pamela

Then I saw a white light that was beautiful and intense as it surrounded me. I couldn’t say if this had the shape of a tunnel, but I can say that the light had this absolute sensation of calm and well-being.  Perry

The Light resembled nothing I had ever seen, it was huge.  I would even say infinite. Like a sun above the sea, it gleamed with every color. I could feel its warmth. It seemed to have its own life, its own consciousness, and its own movement, and it seemed to be aware of me and to be communicating with me telepathically. I perceived the Light above the water as being part and parcel of ‘my’ Light (that is to say, myself.)  Anna

I looked up and saw a huge ball of light that cast the purest, warm light all around me and felt God touch my skin. He knew me, he loved me no matter how imperfect my Earthly life had been.  Laurie

…The cloud was increasingly larger and brighter. Its whiteness was impressive and that glow was growing more and more; it approached me until it enveloped me. In the light of the cloud I realized that its color was white, but with a slight golden hue. I felt at that moment peace, joy and absolute tenderness, as if that light burned me and gave me complete serenity. I was subjected to a love without limits comfortable as if on one’s lap. I felt welcomed, loved unconditionally, forgiven for all my mistakes in life.  Ricardo

See video below-

What is Light?-    

 LOVE INDESCRIBABLE–

How could we possibly understand ultimate love?  Sure, we attach all sorts of human characteristics to the word, but somehow none of those words add up to what the NDE folks experienced.

I remember feeling a sense of total love. There was no judgment, only pure love and I felt so good.  Bella

There was the most incredible mixture of peace, joy, love, and acceptance; so strong, I still cry thinking about it. Rhonda

I can’t even describe the overwhelming joy I felt, or the atmosphere of love and acceptance I was surrounded by.  Glenda

I was awash in love.  John

We truly have nothing to fear, we are really loved. There is a power so great, that it can only be called God.  Scott

There was an indescribable, unbelievable love coming from this light. There’s no word for it. Every word is just too inadequate to describe this love and this peace, which fulfilled me and flew through me from this light.  Maria

I felt completely accepted. Totally whole and loved. Loved beyond comprehension. Loved in my entirety. Loved with a Love I have not felt here. Loved with the purest love there can be. I felt I was ‘home’. I felt I knew this place/space/being. It was light.  Rachel

It was a love so great that even if I added the love of my parents, my husband, my son, all the family and that which I felt for them, it could not be compared to this love more than a grain of sand to the desert. I had never felt anything like it…I felt loved in an unexplainable way.  Graca

I went from being in my body to being in a place of absolute Love. I can only describe it like being in a swimming pool, but even my body was filled with this Loving. I was one with it, but also apart from it. I was still me, but I was far more than me. I was one with everything: it was ALL good. I was enfolded in this Loving, and was part of it, too. There was not one single part of me, or part of anything else, that was not love. Individuals did not exist in the same way as we do here. I was still me, but I was also part of The Loving.     Joan

I was suddenly in front of a great Light. It had to have been God! It was so powerful that no words can describe it. The closest I can come is to say it was like being suddenly placed a few feet from the Sun; but instead of feeling heat, you feel Love, infinite Love. The Love emanated out in all directions in slow, gentle rays of light. Never can I forget it. Thirty years later, it’s still what I mostly think about.  Tom

I was instantly in this place of golden light and pure love. I was standing in this area of light without boundaries. The love was incredible! I saw a group of people made of light. I wondered who they were. As soon as I thought that, they instantly came to me. There were about a dozen people and two of them came closer to me. One of person was a beautiful woman with auburn hair. She was dressed in a white robe and radiated light from her being. She was powerful, in-charge but full of love. The love surrounded us and it was in us. We were all connected in the love light.  Timothy

There is more to Heaven than what we can see with our eyes. Below the surface visuals was a well of feeling fueled by love, peace, and an abiding Presence that I will call Spirit or God. Through the landscape around me I sensed a profound feeling of peace, “Brightness,” goodness, and love. The Beauty I felt really does deserve a capital “B” It wasn’t just pleasing to the eye, there was something deeper to it, more harmonious, more blessed, more powerful. Everything felt tied together by love and peace, and the beauty of the scenes around me were the product of this unconditional love.

While the beauty of Heaven took my breath away, the sense of love completely ensnared me and made me want to stay there forever. I felt a deep sense of that love flowing through all things around me: the air, the ground below my feet, the trees, the clouds, and me. I felt the love flowing around me, flowing through me, and eventually capturing me by the heart.

I felt supported by a loving Presence so powerful, yet so gentle, that I cried again. I had never experienced such unconditional love and acceptance in all of my years on the planet. It felt as though this place were built from love and peace on a very grand, cosmic scale. What I realized was that love formed the structure or underpinnings of Heaven. Each soul might see the ‘landscape’ differently, but all sensed and ‘saw’ the love that formed the basis for everything in the same way. Nancy

I felt the unspeakable, all encompassing, unconditional Love of God for me. It felt really ‘personal’ and he most amazing part was a pure feeling of the most intense love I can barely describe. It was just wave after wave of pure love. It was within me, it was around me, it was EVERYTHING. It felt like heartbeats of love, one wave of love after another. Yet there was love in the interim as well, and then the wave would come with even more and more. It was endless, eternal and complete. I had no fear whatsoever. I had no feeling other than LOVE. I had no thought other than reaching the LIGHT. I felt pure happiness and joy. It was the most beautiful feeling that words could never even come close to describing. Nichole

The light looked as usual, but this time it was alive. This light was a living entity and had a vibration, or flicker. I could feel its waves and its soul. I felt like something inside me was trying to connect with this light. I don’t know what it was—something in the center of my body. Then, without any reason, suddenly an overwhelming love encompassed me. I could feel its warmth. I learned a remarkable thing about this love. A knowing came to me that it had no reason for loving me—and yet it did!  Sanaz

This love, because of its unconditional character, is almost incomprehensible. To the point where I thought: ‘All this Love for me? Who am I? I am just a boy who grew up in a middle-lower class family, in a regular neighborhood, went to a regular school. I have no accomplishments. I’ve never done anything remarkably special. I’m just a regular guy, a normal human. What have I done to deserve this? Is ALL this LOVE really for me?’ The moment I finished that thought, I was instantly ‘swallowed up’ by this amazing Love. ‘I’ was completely GONE! There was nothing but Love. No me, no God: just eternal, incomprehensible, indescribable, total, complete, absolute LOVE.  Carlos

See interesting video below… 

Human Heart Affects The Earth’s Electromagnetic Field  

Light and love- are these clues pointing toward God?

CALL TO ACTION

For many, getting away from the old Father Time image of God is difficult.  Picturing God as an aged male is so widespread, and religious institutions haven’t been very helpful in encouraging folk to think beyond that image with which many of us grew up.  It’s no wonder today’s science and internet cognizant people have so much trouble believing in a white, bearded male sitting on a throne in the sky.  And so, God ends up being dismissed as an unnecessary myth, without any attempt to work out for oneself an understanding of God as something far beyond human knowing.

Try stepping far outside your comfort zone and see where your mind, questions and thoughts take you.  Double dare!

No Explanation-

Of course, there are controversial opinions about what comprises or causes a NDA, and if it’s a real occurrence or just some chemical reaction of the dying body.  But if you believe it’s all hocus, view the following video, affirmed by medical professionals. 

To Heaven and Back

If the subject of NDEs interests you, there is a multitude of information on line and many youtube videos as well.