Experimenting - #19 – Test Tube #2 – Entry #1

          I ended the previous entry on this topic <*here*> by saying that I think God does want to communicate with us, but He won’t be rude.  He’s not going to yell.  This goes back to the “if God is there, all he has to do is make himself obvious” discussion <*here*>.  Why doesn’t God yell?  It seems like it would be so easy if He did!

          Well, why do we yell?  We yell because we want to make sure the other person listens.  We use it for emphasis.  THIS IS A REALLY IMPORTANT POINT.  Well, really, I just used that last phrase as an example.  For those of us who grew up with the concept that capital letters indicate yelling, just seeing something written in all caps raises our blood pressure a point or two.  Yelling is often associated with anger.  Or it is associated with the feeling that you are being ignored.  We can be in a crowded place – a noisy restaurant for example – where the din is deafening, but it one person starts yelling at another person, our attention will immediately be drawn to that person.  If there is a lot of yelling, that’s usually not a good sign.  If God yelled, we’d listen!

          But, sometimes I intentionally don’t yell when I am trying to make a point.  That happens when I have the upper hand.  I don’t yell because in my mind I say something like: “well, if you don’t want to hear what I have to say, that’s your problem.”  This type of thinking, by the way, is why I’m not a great educator or parent!  Anyway, sometimes I just think of yelling as being “beneath me.”  Why should I have to yell?  You’re the one who needs to know what I already know.  That’s my pigheaded pride speaking.  I don’t think God necessarily would see it exactly the same way, but I can definitely see that yelling is beneath Him.  If there really is a God, he surely doesn’t need us; but we surely need him.  So why should he stoop to our level to yell when we are the ones who need to stop talking and listen?

          There’s another thing though.  Have you ever tried to catch a wild animal and turn it into a pet?  Growing up I always imagined I could catch a bird or a squirrel and turn it into a pet that would hang around with me.  I had a few occasions where I saw a bird that was injured and so I would try to come up to it and pick it up.  When you approach a bird like that, you don’t come up running and yelling.  You have no chance if you do that.  You approach the bird slowly and speak in low tones. You can’t make a wild animal a pet by scare tactics.  People good at this sort of thing are called “whisperers” for a reason.  Yelling is out of the question.  I think God is in a similar situation - at least the God described by Christians (the “such a” God)…He apparently wants some kind of relationship with human beings that isn’t established through intimidation.  So yes, God could yell and make you cower, but what’s the point of that?

          As a skeptic I could say sarcastically “well – isn’t that highly convenient?  You come up with a God who has reasons not to be obvious.  Isn’t the more obvious explanation to the lack of evidence for God that there simply is no God?”  This bothers me because it’s a good point.  It certainly would make everything a lot easier if we were searching for an “obvious God” rather than a “subtle God.”  We can easily rule out an obvious God – at least an obvious God who yells!  But, the point is, if we are serious about searching, we have to give the subtle God a chance.  Opening Test Tube #2 is about giving the subtle God that chance – that chance to whisper.

          Test Tube #2 is communication with God.  Most religions would call it “prayer” and I’ll use that term here, but prayer usually has a lot of elements and broad meanings to it.  What I am talking about here when I say “prayer” has three important elements:  1) go to a quiet place, 2) talk to God, and 3) listen to God.

          Actually, I would recommend Test Tube #2 to anyone, regardless of whether they believe in a god or not, regardless of whether they are seeking, and regardless of whether there actually is a god or not.  True, you could find yourself talking to a wall (if “talking to God” is the same as “talking to nothing”), but the very act of going to a quiet place for a few minutes is, in my opinion, extremely valuable for human beings.  It sounds so simple, but in practice, if you live where most people live (in or near cities) and have a life that most people have (hectic), it’s not so easy!  Let’s think about this very simple act of “going to a quiet place.”

          First of all, a quiet place is both physical and mental.  In my experience, you need both to coincide.  I’m not talking about a metaphysical experience here.  I’m just being very practical and concrete.  A quiet place is one that is free of distractions and, as much as possible, free of potential distractions.  It’s also a place where you can be totally comfortable.  I am not comfortable talking to God in the presence of others.  I am not comfortable talking to God in a situation where any human being could hear me or even see me.  I need a place that is hidden.  Safe in every way.  Places I have found in the past include a locked room or a tucked away room (basements are good for that), a walk in the woods, or, at one apartment I lived in, I found a place tucked away behind the furnace.  More recently, I find the best thing in the world is a solo cross-country drive.  But in a busy city with a busy life, I have to say that physically finding a quiet spot is just not easy.  There can be noise, of course, in a quiet spot – it just can’t be distracting.

          The mental part is even harder.  It takes a while to stop thinking about all the things you have to do.  Frequently I make sure I have some way of taking notes, so that when various issues come to mind, I can write them down.  I can’t tell you how many times I’ve tried to start praying and suddenly I remember a dozen tasks that I haven’t thought of in weeks.  Why does that happen?  Well, it’s because we never stop to be quiet for any reason, not just for prayer.  This is why I recommend a “quieting down time” for everyone.  But there’s a deeper purpose that I’m proposing here.

          The second element of prayer is to “talk to God.”  All I’m suggesting here is to talk to God in plain language and say what you think.  It could be:  “Well, here I am.  I don’t think you’re there, God, and I think this whole thing is stupid, but, well, let’s hear it.”  That would be a really good start, in my opinion.  You can say more, of course, but only if you want.  Tell Him what He needs to do to get you to believe.  If you are facing something difficult, ask Him to help you through it.  There’s nothing magical here – either God is there and has the ability to hear you, or He’s not there or is deaf.  You can talk out loud or just think these things silently.  There is no deep meditation needed.  It is simple.

          The third element of prayer is listening, and we will deal with that next time.  You could actually skip the talking and go straight to listening, but I find it is helpful if I express my own thoughts.  It’s helpful to me, anyway. 

          How much should you “pray” in this manner?  Well, at least once.  But if you want a serious attempt at this, I would make the same suggestion I made with respect to reading the Bible.  A serious attempt, to me, would be praying daily for three months.  That is actually very hard to do and I have no real basis for picking that period.  And it’s not like if you miss a day you have to “start over”.  This isn’t about gaining some kind of points with God – it’s just about making a serious attempt that I think most of us would agree is really a serious attempt.  If you’re trying to lose weight or stop smoking or change any other habit, you’ve got to go more than a few days for sure.  One month is good, but seems barely there.  A quarter of a year – a season – seems like a really good goal.  Try it.