I grew up in the church. It was a part of life from the very day I was brought home from the hospital. My dad was a Pastor and our home was always filled with the talk of God. God was indicated in all things powerful and beautiful. A snowstorm, a setting sun, crashing waves, all reminders of his glory, his creative genius, and his glory. There was not a day that passed by that my parents did not try to instill in me the truth about God. Still, with all my parents teaching and influence I recall my warped understanding of him when I was a child. I had a caricature of God not a true picture. We have all been to the beach and seen the caricature artist on the boardwalk drawing a picture of someone. Typically they emphasize an already prominent physical characteristic of the person to the laughter of all those around. To me I saw God as good to be sure, but scary nonetheless. I viewed God like Mr. T from the A-team only with less bling (I pity the FOOL). He was a good guy who hated bad guys and was generally angry at everybody all the time. If you were bad he would most likely squash you and at your best he would generally scowl and permit your existence for one more day. I was terrified that at any moment he would crush me, kill me or worse make me a pastor if he found out that I actually hated going to church.
Contrast this with my sister's understanding of God. She viewed God as if he was the dad from Little House on the Prairie only with less hair. He was gentle and passive and would get into a fight only if provoked. It didn't really matter what you did or how bad you are as long as you said your sorry. Then he would cry and say it ok and give some folky life lesson in song or something.
This is how I think most people understand God even as they grow older. Their theology is that he is either he is powerful or meek, vengeful or forgiving. These characteristics can all be true of God, but like a caricature, any characteristic out of proportion distorts the picture until it is almost unrecognizable. Today, as a father I can see misconceptions about God taking root in my own children. It makes me wonder how to best communicate with them the truth about God in a way they can understand. How is this done? How can I prevent false concepts of God that are ever so present even in the people of my church? (Yes, God made me a pastor).
I was reflecting on this the other day as I stumbled through an answer to my sons question about God. I tried so hard to take a difficult concept and whittle it down into bite-sized pieces that I reduced it to something that, upon reflection, had no meaning whatsoever. We try so hard to explain what we understand God to be (often filtered through our own misconception) that we give our children a reductionist theology.
As was done with me I do with them and I try to distill an ocean of truth about God into a sippy-cup for their consumption all the while robbing them of deep water in which to swim. God has revealed himself in depth and nuance in the scriptures. He promises to teach us about himself through them. Yet when it comes to our kids we don't trust God enough to actually do what he promised to do in revealing who he is through his word. We try to dumb it down until the picture our children get is warped without context or perspective.
Come to think of it, this doesn't stop with kids, and if we Pastors aren't careful we can do this to our congregations just as easily. What would happen to our children and our churches if we would actually let the scriptures speak to us the deep things of God? What if we trusted God to communicate to us through the Holy Spirit and reveal who he is? What if the point is to be lost in the depth of truth about God so that we can see how big and weighty, powerful and meek, vengeful and forgiving he really is?
As for me I am thankful that God is bigger than my caricature of him. He gently breaks all of the falsehood through the revelation of himself through his word. Though I can see him clearly and closely it is like a child diving in the ocean of truth. You can see the water, feel the power of the waves, yet you can't grasp it's fullness or pick it up or take it with you. You can't bottle it up and slap label on it "The Ocean", or though it is part of the ocean it is not the fullness.
